For my 2019 writing challenge and in preparation for the Pacific Crest Trail in 2020, I am spending the entire year reading and writing about books focused on a journey. For my first book, I dove into “Nature/Walking” by Ralph Waldo Emerson & Henry David Thoreau.

Our Relationship to Nature

As a child, one of my favorite books was “The Giving Tree” by Shel Silverstein. It painted a dire picture of our relationship to nature and leaves the reader grasping for a more symbiotic relationship between man and trees. Instead, we far too often find ourselves in a one-sided transactional relationship with nature where we take and take without much thought to what can be given in return. Nature doesn’t need us, but I think it longs for us to commune with it. We should find ourselves lost in its leaves, consuming its vistas, cooled by its waters, and hiking its trails. As we do, we give ourselves a gift and leave with a big brother mentality.

These Things Are Worth Protecting

This big brother mentality means nature is worth protecting. It is worth our time, talent, and money to set aside vast swaths of land for the sheer purpose of recreation. For all of America’s faults, one of the things that makes me proudest is our National Parks System. As a collective community, we’ve decided our most inspiring lands are worth saving from profit, greed, and those who see nothing but a means to an end. We’ve done this because we know what these places can do. They can heal, inspire, and baptize people returning them home happy and healthy.

The Joy of Walking

I have never shied away from walking. Down the street, across town, or through the woods, I love it all and cannot imagine my life without. Walking among the trees through switchbacks on warm mountain mornings may be my most favorite. The stresses of my life melt away like butter. I feel carefree and a childlike nature is allowed to roam free. No matter the level of difficulty, I am able to look back with a sense of accomplishment and wonder. Without a doubt, there isn’t a lot of places on this Earth I would rather be than on a trail.

Poetry in the Trees

On those walks and among those trees, I see and hear poetry in motion. Before me is the living embodiment of everything I hold dear and holy in the natural world. As the sun shines through clouds and snowcapped mountain ranges are revealed, I am given the greatest manifestation of “God” that I will ever get to experience. My soul experiences Zen-like peace next to hidden lakes and my troubles are drowned in creek crossings. Everything that is good and decent about me is revealed on distant trails. That is why I long to go there and would give almost anything to be there now.

Be good to each other,

-Nathan

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