Reading….

We are early risers in this household. By 4:30-5:00 a.m. we are up and ready to start the day. Even as a young person I wasn’t much of the ‘sleep in’ type, nor was Rick. It’s the other end of the day and trying to stay up beyond 8:00 p.m. when we begin to fade. I still like to read a bit before falling asleep. This often results in a page or two before I nod off with the book still open and my eyeglasses laying crooked across my face. I can’t blame this on the book I’m reading, it’s not boring me to sleep. I’m just plain tuckered out!
The book I am slowly making progress through is called, Braiding Sweetgrass, Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, And The Teaching Of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer. Robin Wall Kimmerer is a botany professor in upstate New York and also a member of the Potawatomi nation.“As a botanist, Robin Wall Kimmerer has been trained to ask questions of nature with the tools of science. As a Potawatomi woman, she embraces the indigenous teachings that consider plants and animals to be our oldest guides”
I like this book, Robin talks as much about her personal life as a mother, teacher, and her own experiences, as she does about some of the plants and animals that share our natural world. I do think it is important that within our ability to understand the world from a scientific approach, we don’t lose our wonder and appreciation for the spiritual gift that nature provides. As I have said before, I understand the mechanics of how a seed germinates and grows into a blooming plant….but I mostly love being forever stunned, surprised, and delighted by this process.
In Braiding Sweetgrass, Kimmerer brings these frameworks of understanding together in original ways, taking “us on a journey that is every bit as mythic as it is scientific, as sacred as it is historical, as clever as it is wise” ( Elizabeth Gilbert).
Now, if I can just keep my eyelids open a little longer at night, I can finish the last two chapters! What are you reading this summer? I’d love to hear!