The forest knows stuff.
JD Vance doesn't know stuff.
“E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G—is connected. The soil needs rain, organic matter, air, worms and life in order to do what it needs to do to give and receive life. Each element is an essential component. Organizing takes humility and selflessness and patience and rhythm while our ultimate goal of liberation will take many expert components. Some of us build and fight for land, healthy bodies, healthy relationships, clean air, water, homes, safety, dignity, and humanizing education. Others of us fight for food and political prisoners and abolition and environmental justice. Our work is intersectional and multifaceted. Nature teaches us that our work has to be nuanced and steadfast. And more than anything, that we need each other—at our highest natural glory—in order to get free.”
- adrienne maree brown
I’ve been listening and re-listening to a beautiful Bioneers podcast episode called Seeing The Forest for the Trees. The episode features two Canadian ecologists, Suzanne Simard and Teresa Ryan, who share their knowledge of and passion for the expansive system of collaboration, mutual aid and connection within the forest and the natural world.
Trees are not in competition with one another. Life and the living world is the most important thing to the trees and so, they work together, communicating with one another through huge webs of funghi woven beneath the Earth.
Teresa Ryan, from Gitlan tribe with the Tsimshian Nation, Ganhada Clan, also tells listeners about the marine-derived nitrogen that is offered to the forest by way of the salmon. These salmon come in from the ocean, and then predators feed on them, and then other little critters feast on the carcass, and then once again, the magical below ground fungal system moves that nitrogen and other nutrients from the salmon through the rest of the forest.
My friend told me about how the Pope recently called out JD Vancypants because he made up some bulldust theory about Christian love. Apparently he said that it’s actually very Christian to love your family and care for the people from the country where you were born over people from the rest of the world, and therefore, it’s totally Christian to kick all the brown people out… or at least imprison them indefinitely. The Pope, however, was all like, ummm no, the bible literally says love your neighbour as you love yourself, ya twat. I’m paraphrasing. But this is some of what he really said:
“Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extend to other persons and groups … The true ordo amoris that must be promoted is that which we discover by meditating constantly on the parable of the “Good Samaritan” (cf. Lk 10:25-37), that is, by meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception.
But worrying about personal, community or national identity, apart from these considerations, easily introduces an ideological criterion that distorts social life and imposes the will of the strongest as the criterion of truth.” - The mother effing POPE
Mic drop, mate. Mic drop.
The forest gets it. The Pope gets it. JD Vance does not at all get it… or maybe he really does and that’s the whole point of his particular brand of douche baggery evil.
Another friend and I were laughing recently about how bananas it is that we’re expected to raise children within the nuclear family structure. But that people also love to tell you, with a sweet smile, that it takes a village. As if that’s a thing that exists within our culture. Cute. When someone tells me this, I always smile back but what I’m really thinking is that I would love to have the phone number for the village, please. When I’m up to my brain cells in poop and I have stain after stain to get out of little tiny clothes and there is dinner to cook and weeds to pull and a 1st birthday party to plan and flowers to plant and a dog to walk and and and and JUST POINT ME IN THE VAGUE DIRECTION OF THE F*CKING VILLAGE ALREADY! Please.
As sociologist, Mihai Stelian Rusu shares, the institution of the nuclear family was constructed as a result of the industrial revolution. With this brand spanking climate catastrophe-y intensification of capitalism, people were forced away from their extended families and kinship (bye bye village) in order to seek employment for apparent individual gain. Capitalism is, therefore, responsible for removing us from networks of support and isolating us within the “so-called” ideal household, which is that of two (opposite sex, duh) parents and their dependents.
In a recent article in Yes! Magazine, Quinton Sankofa writes that we are experiencing a crisis of disconnection. Sankofa shares that the industrial revolution was fueled by the enslavement of African people, the genocide of Indigenous people, and the taking of Indigenous land around the world. It is these horrors that have led to our current ecological crisis and the potential end of humans (no biggie). But it all comes back to disconnection:
One of the most important and enduring teachings from our ancestors is the idea that humans are not separate from nature. We are all connected. What you do to the land, you do to the people, and what you do to the people, you do to the land. This overarching message has been a foundational belief of humanity from our earliest days on the African continent up to the present moment. - Quinton Sankofa
By the way, I’m exaggerating about my own experience and the whole village thing. I just got back from Australia where many many people cooked me meals and cared for me. Now my baby’s Grandma is with us. Her Dad too. And my friends here in Louisville are definite villagers. But still, I’m tired. I’m tired in a way I don’t think the trees with their fungal support networks are. The trees, who talk to one another, support one another, warn each other of threat, who through their interconnected system, help the forest, and kind of everything everywhere, thrive.
So in all of my tiredness, I’m really very inspired by these root systems of support.
I’m inspired by the practice of reconnecting with each other and the Earth in order to save one another and the Earth. I’m inspired by the idea of loving our neighbours. By these networks of interconnected goodness. And it makes me think that maybe it’s there where we hold hands through the hard shit. Help each other re write our resumes. Say we’re sorry. Where we drop meals to front porches. Babysit. Send care packages. Drink tea together. Dance to Billy Ocean. Clean each other’s bathrooms. Protest. Fight for one another. Fight for the Earth.
Just you know, be the village.
Be like the trees.
Connect.
… And finally, just wanna send a special shout out to those salmon.
March life stuff… things I’ve been doing… things I’ve been enjoying…
Listening to ‘GNX’ because it’s a great album but also because my baby loves it. She squeals every time ‘Squabble Up’ comes on.
Making and eating different kinds of nut butter.
Drinking kombucha from wine glasses.
Dancing in the kitchen to ‘This Must Be The Place’.
Hiking.
Eating a bunch of Hu Chocolate- hazelnut butter flavour.
Going to the local hardware store instead of buying on Amazon (note, I’ve still bought some stuff on Amazon but I’m working on it, ok).
Drinking hot cups of tea on cold afternoons.
Celebrating the spring equinox with a felt egg hunt and brunch in the park.
Watching season 2 of Severance and as always, appreciating Tramell Tillman’s turtle neck game plus also that sheepskin coat.
Cooking a roast on a rainy Sunday.
Walks around my neighbourhood.
Catching up on voice messages.
Thank you SO much for being here with me.
I HOPE THAT YOU ARE ABLE TO TAKE CARE OF YOURSELVES
AND YOUR COMMUNITIESLOTS OF LOVE XX
This email was composed where I live, which is the land now known as, Louisville, Kentucky; the unceded land of the ᏣᎳᎫᏪᏘᏱ Tsalaguwetiyi (Cherokee, East) , 𐓏𐒰𐓓𐒰𐓓𐒷 𐒼𐓂𐓊𐒻𐓆𐒻𐒿𐒷 𐓀𐒰^𐓓𐒰^(Osage), Shawandasse Tula (Shawanwaki/Shawnee) people, as well as the people of the Hopewell and Adena Culture. I am originally from, what is now referred to as, Melbourne, Australia. I would, therefore, also like to acknowledge the people of the Kulin Nation, Traditional Custodians of the land on which I grew up. I pay my respects to their Elders past and present.