What is this notion we have of “nature” and what defines it? That is, what makes one place “nature” and another not? Where is the dividing line? Also, why is it that some children seem so drawn to playing out of doors or exploring while others are made uncomfortable by the thought of it? Why is it that some adults find spending time in nature important to their well-being, whatever the activity, kayaking, walking, camping, fishing, birding, or beach-combing while others see the natural world as just plain dirty, uncomfortable, and threatening?

It’s brought to mind the myriad of experiences I’ve had around this topic having lived remotely for twelve years, and having continued to spend a fair amount of time in that island home since moving to Victoria six years ago. I recall one visitor we had at our place in the woods who was unable to stop pacing the floor after hearing wolves, however much we reassured him that they had no interest in us, and however much we reminded him that we were safe inside.  There was the conversation on the cabin deck that I had with a neighbor and her new friend about religion. We were two Christians and an atheist: the one thing we could agree on as we sat under towering Spruce trees was the healing power of nature. There were the people who so hated having to go outside to use an outhouse when put up at our guest cabin that they refused to visit again. There were parents who couldn’t quite see the value in their children running freely; the experience seeming bereft of learning any obvious skill sets all they could muster up as a response was to cringe at how dirty the children got while playing. And every year there were the others that traveled half-way around the globe to breath our forest air, to be enveloped in the quiet, to be beyond the scope of society and the eyes and ears of others, to be able to look deeper, to write, or to meditate.

So, where is nature and why are some people afraid of it while others cherish it? And why should any of that matter?

I keep coming back to something I said in the conversation at the screening that night, nature isn’t out there, it’s right here. But is it? I show my daughter the inside of an acorn that I’ve picked up off the sidewalk on our way to school; I tell her that this is the seed from which mighty oak trees grow. I tell her the story of how south of here there are great forests of them and that indigenous people used them for food for many generations. I explain to her how they were cooked, the process of cooking and cooking again. She nods and puts another in her pocket to play with later. As she runs across the neighbor’s lawns I don’t stop her; no one seems to mind. If I confine her to walking on the sidewalk, her head droops, her shoulders slump. In other seasons she’ll chat at length about the flowers set about the houses and she asks a lot of questions about the changes in the vegetable gardens planted on the verge. She plucks and eats the kale and raspberries from our own small plot, and climbs the two trees we have, a heritage apple and an ornamental we don’t know the name of. At the school playground there is a section left less manicured than the rest where the ground is uneven and there are many rocks to climb and huge trees to play beneath. These experiences add to her understanding of the world and engage her physically. I can see that this contributes to her confidence and well-being, but is this outside-time in an urban environment, however well designed with her in mind, nature?

There is an area of early childhood development that suggests that a child’s environment is the third teacher (the first being parents, the second, caregivers). And it is for this reason that this philosophy (Reggio Emilia) focuses on creating an environment that encourages children’s creativity and curiosity by doing such things as providing space for an (adult) artist to work among the children or arranging creative supplies, and then finished work, in a way that inspires. The philosophy also embraces the notion of a natural playground like the one my daughter plays in. But if environment is the third teacher, what else are our children learning when they play in such settings?

When I’ve traveled I’ve often been shocked by the over running of nature in the places where people live. Even a cobbled street, as lovely as it is, leaves no room for trees and other living things to grow. To be sure this is the point of such roadways. And the walls, that come right up to the street in many areas of the world, serve the same purpose. Any bit of nature left to struggle for life in the pots of inner courtyards and balconies. Besides vegetation, such walls also have the effect of keeping out children, stray animals, and the desperate. As our world seems to teeter on an ecological and financial precipice I wonder how long it might be before we too fall to the building of such architecture, to preserve ourselves (the ones who can afford to build walls), however feebly.

The gardens and trees of our neighborhood sustain us. The cherry trees when they blossom are documented and commented upon at length every year. Locals and visitors alike make a point of saying how much they cherish the neighborhood’s gardens. The green spaces allow us all to experience the changes of the seasons beyond just the weather. The vegetation keeps our air cleaner than it would be without it, so close to the inner city as we are. People here linger on lawns and porches. The birds and squirrels inhabit the trees and run or hop to the ground. This is life, the web we are a part of, however controlled in this element, however shaped by our human hands. And if this is the third teacher, this is what our children learn: nature, however much our friend, is a controlled element, surely not as conquered as the cemented and walled streets of so many other places in the world, where the natural world is but a memory, but controlled nonetheless.

And surely, it is from such controlled environments that people emerge who are afraid to leave it, who are afraid to walk where there is no path, who are afraid to go where all you can see at night are the stars and the moon, if you’re lucky, people who are afraid to linger where it is quiet, who are unable to remember our place within the tapestry that is greater than our own making. It is this other nature, the place we haven’t tamed yet, that is the teacher we need our children to be exposed to. The lessons there cannot be replicated in any classroom, however progressive, any playground, however dynamic, or any urban or suburban park, however wild. It is only in an environment that exists beyond our making that we can learn our place. And perhaps, being the ravenous and rapacious species that we are, this is the most important lesson for us to have. This is a difficult thing to teach an adult; children, however, exposed early enough, welcome this truth, and find comfort and strength in it.

“Smoke a doobie?” he asks looking at her sideways, grinning. She is in a stranger’s, 1940′s bungalow. She has come across the water on the ferry from Port McNeil to a village that she thought was Alert Bay but is not, a village that she thought would be her last stop before her final destination of Swanson Island. Her host reaches over to a wooden box on a coffee table where rolling papers and scissors already lay scattered amongst bits of green.

“No,” she responds, her attention moving to the window to see if her friend’s dad, Zach, has arrived at the Co-op across the street yet.

She had waited at the Co-op for over an hour. She refused three offers of rides. Then the Co-op, the only store in town it seemed, closed. When they turned out the lights there, it became dark, darker than she is used to. The snow had not yet stuck to the ground to shed any brightness. The only streetlight was on the ferry dock. It glowed an eerie orange hue. Down the road yellow shone in the hotel windows and from the small houses on the hill. The occasional truck drove by, headlights bouncing up and down on the bumpy tarmac, coming on strong, then leaving, making the dark seem even darker. Finally she had accepted this invitation to wait inside.

“I better not,” she says responding to his offer.

“Usually?” he asks, raising his eyebrows.

She shrugs. “Sometimes. Snow’s really comin’ down now.”

“Maybe you should call and see what’s up,” he says, cutting green with tiny scissors.

“All I have is this radio phone number.”

“Just call the operator. They call it for ya.”

“It’ll cost though,” she says looking at him intently.

“Don’t worry about it.”

After a brief conversation, she hangs up. He snaps his lighter and inhales deeply. Scrawny little guy, she thinks, wishing he would push his hair out of his eyes. He passes her the joint. She pauses, grins wryly and accepts.

“So you got off on the wrong island,” he says, holding in the smoke, and beginning to laugh as he exhales.

“Didn’t you see the sign that said ‘Sointula’?”

“I wasn’t looking for it. I didn’t realize the ferry had more than one stop.”

His cheek dimples. “So now what are ya gonna do?” He looks at her squarely for just a moment. “You’re welcome to stay here if you like.”

“No. Thanks. Zach said to take the next ferry and meet him.”

He checks a clock in the kitchen. “Six twenty. It’ll be here pretty quick then, the last ferry. Lucky. You caught him just in time.” The doobie finished he lights up a cigarette and leans back. “So what have you got under that hat?” he asks.

“A cold head,” she blurts out, laughing, pulling off her cap to briskly rub the soft stubble beneath it, and thinking to herself that perhaps she’d gone too far in paring down her life.

Full disclosure, I have a part-time contract position with Vancouver Island Community Forest Action Network, though I did this post on my own time.

sightseeing at Ali ben Youssef Medersa, Marrakesh

Above him birds sing in the Datura plant that cascades down from an upstairs balcony. The four of us sip sweet green tea with mint, taking in what seems a strange quiet after negotiating the streets outside. “But that didn’t scare you off. You’re still here,” I say. He laughs and nods, and with a hint of resignation, or is it uncertainty, he says, “Yes, I’m still here.” Shades of Heart of Darkness; I look around for heads on sticks.

Our son is seventeen, and our daughter six. Going to Morocco was part of a spring break trip. It was our son’s last year of school, so we were taking the opportunity to travel as a family before he headed off to work and university.

As was arranged online, we were met at the airport by Rachid. In a dilapidated Mercedes, he drove us through wide, sunny, palm tree lined walled avenues and into the Medina. Through the gates, the walls suddenly stepped in closer corralling everyone into winding and twisting narrow streets lined with vendors and small shops.

The police stopped our car. Rachid got out, papers in hand. Looking back over our shoulders we watched the interaction in silence. Cars and beeping motorcycles piled with families stopped and started and sped by. Donkeys plodded along like moving statues among the flow. Pedestrians, many wearing long robes with their heads covered in scarves or the pointed Jellaba hood, lined the roadway on either side. Our driver back in the car, we drove on, all sense of direction now lost to us, to where the car could go no farther. Our packs were then piled into a battered cart and pushed up an even narrower street still filled with pedestrians to a long quiet passageway where few passed us. It wound deep into the three story high buildings, some crumbling, and narrowed even more into a cool dark passageway lined with barely visible arched wooden doors, and there, at the very end, behind an ornately carved and painted door, was our riad.

We were charmed by the historical home. We loved the painted ceiling and tile work, the private sitting rooms, the rooftop on which to lounge and eat breakfast. However, it did not provide other meals. With kids in tow, the next meal was foremost on our minds. So after our tea, with a map tucked in each of our bags and our daughter’s contact info pouch slung around her neck, we ventured back out into the maze of the medina in quest of food. The most direct route to the main square and restaurants was the route of the locals. Senses peaked, our awareness full of new sights and sounds and everyday dangers we were yet unfamiliar with, motorcycles coming up fast behind us, cobblestones loose in the street, donkey carts to let by, we set out. We ate traditional tajine, a simple stew, in a tourist joint where the price of lunch was comparable to home and headed out to the square, Djemmaa el-Fna.

evening in the square Djemma el-Fna

The sun blazed on the soot covered stones as we wove our way through the crowd. Men with chained skinny monkeys in dusty diapers aggressively demanded we take their picture. Women beckoned us for henna tattoos. Blankets with trinkets, crafts, ostrich eggs, argon oil, and a host of other obscure ingredients sat out in the sun for sale with vendors calling and approaching us to buy. We quickly learned that it was all about the eyes, and to look at things only with a quick sideways glance unless we were really interested in engaging, which, we nearly instantly decided, we were not. Of course, our daughter was unable to do this, and was harangued to buy the wooden snakes that were shoved to her face. I caught the splay of a cobra’s head in one of my furtive glances, something I’d been eager to see, but, in the context of the square, it just looked more sad than mysterious. I was ready to exit.

We’d read that Moroccan families toured Marrakesh in a horse and carriage. So we opted to do the same. A long line of drivers waited on a street that merged into the square. As we neared the line, we were approached by a man who looked more ready to fight us, and had the facial scars to prove it, than offer us a ride, and fight us he did, in a way, as we negotiated a price. He finally stepped away with a look of what seemed an inordinately disturbing level of disdain to let a young, bright faced man take over. He looked me in the eye and tossed us a broad smile. I felt much better about the possibility of piling my family into his carriage and encouraged Peter to hand over our money.

And though I expect that was how it was scripted to go in that interaction, we were to find in the following days that this was the way it was throughout the medina, where many people were very kind, others were decidedly not, and in fact could be downright combative. In one instance, I felt compelled to take on a mother bear role and move between my son and a man with a monkey who demanded my son take a picture of him. When my son had shaken his head in refusal the man had started lunging and swearing at him. Life was tough here, and clearly desperate for some.

camel ride in Essaouira

Lulled to sleep by the motion of the carriage and the heat, my daughter slumped down next to me as we left the square and the medina. For the rest of us, it was a surreal transition from mayhem to opulent order as we were taken away from the busy square to pass the high walls and guarded entry of the King Mohammed VI’s palace, one of a handful he maintains. Despite recent reforms the king remains one of the last remaining monarchs with vast executive powers over the country he rules, including the power to dissolve parliament. He is a man whose wealth has doubled since he came into power in 1999, which also makes him one of the richest monarch’s, and therefore one of the richest people, in the world.

“No pictures,” we were told, as my son raised his camera. And then we were at a roundabout. Water streamed from fountains; lush palm trees and gardens adorned stylish modern buildings all the same red ochre colour as the walls of the kings palace, then an outdoor café, a flash of opulence from the first world. One glance and I decided it was beyond even our middle-class Canadian budget. A European looking woman emerged from inside to sit on the patio with her daughter. Their experience of traveling with a child in Morocco was likely decidedly different than ours.

But this would change. Our next destination was the historical coastal town of Essaouira. We rode the bus through an arid landscape, dotted with small strips of all but crumbling villages, from which people eked out a most basic existence tending argon trees and raising goats. Roughly dressed pushers of the same battered carts that had carried our bags in the medina pressed us to hire them upon our arrival. Knowing we were only around the corner from our hotel, we complied. As we trudged up the dusty and broken, trash strewn street to the stairs of our hotel the rotund concierge smirked before composing himself and directing two bell hops to unload our bags. I smiled too. Surely not too many guests arrived to this hotel in such a manner, it was Le Medina, the best hotel in town, and I had booked us in at a fraction of the full rate. We were greeted with cool cloths and served the traditional tea, complete with the high lift of the tea pot, while we filled out our paperwork and caught glimpses of the pristine pool through the billowing curtains of the courtyard doors.

woman extracting argon oil

We spent our days in Essaouira swimming in the pool, wandering the ramparts, checking out the port busy with fishing boats, walking along the sea wall, and, for our daughter’s sake, taking the obligatory camel ride. We took walks through the medina, quiet and touristy at one end, bustling and decrepit at the other, and we delighted in listening for the static-filled background call to prayer. One afternoon we stretched the budget and had a long seafood lunch at a whitewashed rooftop restaurant with a spectacular panoramic view of the ocean and medina.

What we discovered in our brief excursion to this North African country is that Morocco is a land of two worlds. That many have headed to the streets to demand further reform does not surprise me, and that others have set themselves alight to protest their plight surely shows just how bad that disparity is. While reparation payments, trade, and tourism from a spiraling European economy dwindles, Morocco increasingly becomes the land of the very poor and the opulently wealthy. Go there, and be prepared to navigate that disparity.

SMILE

A disadvantaged American girl joins the military in hopes of finding a way out of her limited life prospects. She finds herself stationed in Abu Graibe prison in Iraq, however, recruited by a team assigned to soften prisoners up for questioning.

Negative Space

An adopted Canadian boy with an unknown past explores an artistic vision of his mother: a London chef fuses culinary traditions, tempted by the tastes of other cultures while forging a connection to his own. In an atmosphere of family discord, ethnic tension, and loss, two seemingly very different characters come together, making peace with the shifting, multifaceted nature of a modern identity.

Rolling Up

In this story, a novella, from which the name of the collection is drawn, a young woman searches for love and meaning in the increasingly devastated land of her youth. Moving through what is at once a euphoria inducing and disturbing landscape, from Robson Bight to the massive clear-cuts of northern Vancouver Island, she encounters fish farmers, researchers, gangsters, growers, and a natural world brimming with quiet guidance.

Please “like” my Facebook page to learn more too.

An afternoon in Open Bay on Quadra Island is like a mini vacation for me. I live on the more populated southern end of this northern gulf island. Twenty five minutes of forested country roads leads me to Michelle’s oasis. Her  cedar shingled home with vintage multicolored windows always makes me smile. Anyone who has built a home can appreciate the love that went into hers.

We have a cuppa black currant tea before setting forth on my first nettle harvesting adventure. It was much more fruitful than my previous attempts at mushroom foraging. I found that nettles, by comparison, were everywhere.

I have always been thrilled with the free food nature provides, but stinging nettle has never been high on my list of things to try. The thought of pain as part of the process of collection, and the unlikelihood that my children would even have a taste of the prickly green, left me uninspired. But I have learned over the past few years that an invitation to visit Open Bay often results in discovering something tasty.

Step one Long sleeves and gloves on. Very important as the stinging nettle leaves a painful rash on any skin surface it comes in contact with. Michelle mentions that some inhabitants of remote gulf islands have adapted a harvesting style that does not require the wearing of gloves. I don’t care to learn this advanced technique and don my garden gloves.

Step two Pinch off the top four leaves of the nettle plant leaving the thick stem and larger leaves behind. These top leaves are the tender ones.

Step three With gloves on, wash leaves, and steam as you would spinach.

Step four  Place cooked leaves in a clean tea towel and remove as much moisture as possible. Your nettle is now ready to be added to the ravioli filling!

the filling

1 leek, chopped, whites only

1 teaspoon olive oil

1 teaspoon butter

1 cup of cooked nettle, chopped

2 ounce goat cheese (Salt Spring Island Cheese Company chèvre is a tasty local choice)

2 tablespoons firm cheese, grated (I used a raw milk cheese from Kootenay Alpine Cheese Company called Nostrala)

salt and pepper to taste

Sauté leek in butter and olive oil until tender. Fold together nettle, leek mixture, goat cheese, firm cheese, salt, and pepper.

pasta

1 1/3 cup durum semolina

2 fresh laid eggs, room temperature

1 tablespoon olive oil

splash of water

topping

2 cloves of garlic, diced

2 tablespoons butter

olive oil

grated Parmesan cheese

Place semolina in a bowl and make a well in the center. Crack eggs into well and gradually combine the two. Add oil and water until a soft dough is formed. Now get your hands in there and gently knead until the dough softens, about five minutes. Let the dough rest covered with a towel for about 30 minutes.

Using a hand crank pasta machine or a rolling pin roll out a sheet of pasta and cut into two inch strips. Place a teaspoon of topping every two inches. Dip you finger in water and draw a circle around each mound of filling. Place a strip of pasta on top and gently seal around the filling removing any air bubbles. Cut out individual raviolis and place to one side on a lightly floured tray.

To cook ravioli, bring a large pot of water to a boil. Place ravioli in boiling water for approximately five minutes. While pasta is cooking prepare topping by sauteing garlic in olive oil and butter.

Remove ravioli with slotted spoon and place onto platter or serving bowl. Drizzle with garlic butter and garnish with fresh grated Parmesan. Enjoy.

The taxi driver had found the apartment easily. We had let ourselves in with the front door code and waited only a few minutes for our helpful concierge, Maite, to arrive. Peter, not much for waiting, had slipped out and discovered this bounty around the corner. “There’s more too,” he’d said, as he ripped off another piece of baguette, “chocolate shops, restaurants, cafes”. He’d found the treasure trove.

We were only in Paris for four nights, but we found the location of the apartment to suit us well. It was central and was close to the Louvre, Notre Dame, and the Seine. The buildings in the area are some of the oldest in the city and the street where Peter found our bounty was a cobble stoned pedestrian only area flanked by wholesale and retail fashion shops. It was removed from the tourist areas so we were able to see Paris as Parisians do.

We found Rue de Clery through Trip Adviser. Similar places asked for a bank draft. We opted for Rue de Clery because of the many high ratings it received, but also because we could make our payment through PayPal with Visa. If you have the chance, I’d recommend you do the same. For us, we can’t get back soon enough.

Here is the link to the Amazon page where you can purchase the Kindle edition of my book, Rolling Up.  On the right hand side of the page you can also download Kindle Reading Apps so that you can read it on your computer or other mobile device. You don’t have to have a Kindle to read it.

I really look forward to hearing what you have to say about it.

And here’s a link to my Facebook page where you can stay up to date on when I might do a reading or any other news I might have about the book.

Enjoy! Really. I hope you do.