As soon as Maia told us to begin our visual journal, I leaned back and took a picture of the view looking directly up, leaning back on the big tree of Guilford.
Then, after taking one picture of the group, I tried to distance myself from any form of human and focus on the icy forest around me.
While walking around in the snow and ice, I let my mind calm itself by focusing on my breath. By doing this, I was able to let all my thoughts and feelings of the day slip away. Even the deep, piercing chills I had felt sitting in the snow on my Twister mat just a moment before ceased to be a distraction from what I was about to do. Being in the moment, I began to walk through the forest. Once I had developed a large distance between myself and anyone else, I began to slow down and take in each object around me in its entirety. The first thing I stumbled across was a large tree that had been uprooted from the earth’s floor. I urinated behind it because it provided sufficient shelter and I love peeing in the snow. Because simply being out in the snow had been so painful for me while we were merely sitting down, I began to develop a large appreciation for everything that was still alive amongst the chilling whiteness.
Ivy still occupied the bottom of the forest floor, poking out between small patches of white. A bush with spiky leaves remained intact until I ripped one of its leaves off, thanked the bush for letting me do so, and then took a picture of the leaf against the ice.
I climbed down across a creek and noticed how the ice had frozen everything still, as if time had stopped and everything remained unable to move. The fallen stick that had been pushed back and forth by the currents of the creek now lay motionless, stuck halfway under the chilling ice, just as the random fallen leaves had traveled the current down the stream. Now they were stuck, frozen in time and space. Time has officially stopped.
Upon examination of more fallen trees, strange tones of orange and brown crept up and down the trunks of the dead mass. Fungus truly is one of nature’s miracles, for it can grow, in almost any condition nature presents it.
It was also interesting to notice the very few spots where snow or ice had not crept over. This fungus supporting tree also served as an umbrella for the dead leaves below it.
In the distance, I heard Maia’s calling. Time to get back to the group. I casually start to meander back to the group when I hear another yell “Jason Straus!” Okay, now it’s time to hustle…
.…Back in the circle, we read two poems: “Introduction” and “Getting Ready” by Mary Oliver. Four people each read the poem aloud to the group and I noticed how the meaning changed depending on who read it. The pronunciation of specific words, the rhythm and flow of the way each person read it gave new meaning to the poems. By the last couple of people who read the last poem, the sun had fallen and it had become too hard for me to concentrate on anything that was being said due to the excruciatingly cold atmosphere. Upon our walk back, the sun had almost fallen completely and the ice shined in the streetlights as we walked back to campus, to warmth.
Below are the tracks to a rare breed...Guilford Students!
The lake was completely frozen over as we scurried back to warmer grounds.
I have been required to read Annie Dillard’s chapter “Seeing” in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek 2 times since I have been at Guilford. The first time was in Kaylene Swenson’s English 102 class when I was a first semester freshman. Back then, I embraced the words and thought how beautiful her writing was about the small treasures of nature, but I did not develop an outright appreciation for it until my voyage as a student at Guilford over the past 4 and ½ years. Now that I read it, I understand what she feels when she says “These appearances catch at my throat; they are the free gifts, the bright coppers at the roots of the tree.” (16) With the many distractions of our modern world, the endless electronics, nonsense mainstream media, and non stop paranoia of propaganda, there are too many people that are unable to take a step back from these distractions to appreciate the penny. The Guilford woods have been an integral part in my appreciation for the penny. There is endless pleasure in simply walking around in the woods and recognizing that there are so many living things in it and things happening that we can’t even begin to comprehend through our senses.
During my visual journal and my response to my visual journal through m verbal journal, I embrace Annie Dillard’s writings and have adapted them as a sort of lifestyle. When people ask me my political preference, spiritual preference or religious preference, I simply reply that I am concerned with nature and that is that.
Below is a rendition of a shot of the fungus I took on my walk. After a little photoshop editing...here it is... SOmething that I am going to strive to do is to take parts of my visual journal, manipulate them on photoshop and then put them up on this blog. Please enjoy.
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