life in the woods

Life in the woods is full and rewarding. The smells, the colors, the sounds; all of it makes my heart swell when I think about it. The cracks of squirrels and deer walking through two foot piles of autumn leaves would have sent me into a small state of panic two months ago, being an incredibly nervous person. Now I consider it something strange NOT to hear, as well as the mechanical flutterings of songbirds and flushed grouse and the deep, throaty calls of ravens. The smell is usually a delicious, woodsy scent that is like a mixture of soil, decaying wood, and greens, but lately it has instead smelled like a large variety of farm animals due to lake turnover season. Ah, well. The colors are absolutely magnificent. I was excited for fall up here, and I was not disappointed. The maples, aspens, and birches surrounding our house and the lake all exploded into differing hues of golds, oranges, and the most beautiful red. That red is the most amazing color; only cheesy words like "passionate" and "lovely" do it justice. I have pictures to post next time that will hopefully convey what I'm trying to write about here.

In fact, I have become so habituated to life in the woods that I almost take it for granted now. I am trying so hard not to, though, because I love every little thing about this place. Sometimes it is hard to appreciate the way the lake looks like a Monet painting in the early blue light of the morning, or the rolling fog coating the wetland marshes surrounding the barn, especially when you're sick and coughing, wiping snot from your nose and wishing you had gone to bed an hour earlier the night before. I realize time here may be short, and do not want to waste any second of it lamenting loss of sleep (though regrettably it is an inevitability, considering my sleep requirement). While taking the woods for granted is not something I want to continue, habituation is actually an interesting and desirable setting for me. I realize that I know these woods now. I can pick out landmarks to guide my way much like I do in cities, though woodland landmarks are much more subtle and hard to distinguish. One might be an overturned tree stump with its roots sticking out of the earth while another might be a square rock with 2/3 of its surface area covered in moss (both are real landmarks I use: the first marks where I like to take my classes to build shelters for survivor and the second marks where to go off the path to get to the area where we feed our foxes).

Speaking of moss, I love it. I am madly, deeply in love with moss. The forests that I grew up in while living in Utah were very similar in tree growth to the Audubon Center (though different trees, which I wouldn't have known at the time), but plant life is completely different. The forest floor is covered in different types of plants, sprigs of tall grass that exist in singular clusters, mushrooms, and MOSS. So much moss, the softest and most extravagant kind. I purposely take my shoes off to stand on moss wherever and whenever I can find the time. It makes me so happy to feel the moss on my toes, on my fingers, and if I could I would rub it on my face (well, I can but I haven't). Lichen is also abundant on almost every tree surface, in different textures and colors that I could take photographs of all day long. Mushrooms are another new thing to me, since I'm only used to occasionally finding the one boring grey mushroom that sprouted in a particular damp spot in the backyard. Here there are different variety pushing through the nutrient rich forest soil and fighting it out in the rough and tough wilds of the woods. They're also fun to take pictures of, though most of them are gone now due to our cold spells.

I used to get nervous about driving at night in areas where there seemed to be no civilization around, no lights from nearby houses, towns or cities to seemingly guide the way. I would feel a great sense of relief to see the lights of Salt Lake Valley upon arriving home from a trip where a great expanse of it had been driven on desolate expanses of interstate. However, now it's normal. In fact, I feel the opposite feeling. As soon as we emerge from the lights of the city and can be found driving along our peaceful forest road back to the Audubon Center, I feel calm in my heart. Don't get me wrong, I'm still pretty scared of the dark (I try to walk home with people at night at every opportunity) and my night vision is horrendous, but it's home now and I'm slowly but surely acclimating to it. One of my goals is to hopefully be okay with the dark and the nightly woodland activity by the end of my stay (which I don't want to think about at all right now).

I notice that I've gotten stronger since I got here. The first week we started training, we did a high-ropes course emergency take-down to train staff on what would need to happen. Some of us practiced climbing one of the poles up to the zip platform so that we could learn how to maneuver our way around an awkward portion near the top where the balance beams were nailed in place. The other difficult part of this situation was that we weren't just climbing, but we had to clip in as we climbed in order to remain safe 20 feet off the ground, since there was no belayer (part of the emergency scenario). This was a new challenge for me, both climbing vertically up a pole and then needing to hold my body in different positions in order to clip in and clip out and thus keep me from falling to the ground. I did it once and was exhausted. Last week (about two months after I first arrived here), we did another training that involved learning more about zip-line training, since many of us hadn't done it before. I climbed the pole faster and found it MUCH easier than it had been two months ago. Not only that, but I also did it three more times with no issues whatsoever. I was proud of myself. Hopefully I continue to see changes in my physique, I want to get even stronger and hopefully improve on my rock climbing skills!

I have so many more things I want to say, or at least that I've thought about while walking through my beloved woods, but I can't think of any of them right now and I believe this post is long enough (with no pictures and all text, a rarity!). I need to go to bed now so I can do barn chores in the morning. Nighty night.