• October 28 2023 Work Party

    The first trees of this planting season are in new homes, tucked on the east side of Swamp Creek before it bends to find the Sammamish River. Douglas fir, Western hemlock, Grand fir, and Sitka spruce removed from pots, roots unbound and draped over mounds of soil in deep holes, rocks sifted and piled nearby, compost mixed with the earth we found and pressed firmly down. Gentle tugs at the base of 30 trunks confirm they are all securely tucked. One tree in not quite the right home. We decide to move ki a foot over, safely out of the way of passing wheelbarrows full of Himalayan blackberry and English…

  • October 7 2023 Work Party

    First meetings. Tree branches swoop to make swings. The forest swallows children, spits them out. A cardboard brigade. Small feet stomp mulch. The children become lost to the creek. You arrive. We begin as we left off, the mulch pile moved, canes cut, root balls dug. Pill bugs and spiders scrabble over rick, dark earth, a dear long-toed salamander travels from glove to arm on ki‘s way to safe shelter. Canes moved by clipper, the last ripe blackberries of the season foraged, a heavy chain pulled from the brambles, a crushed frying pan declared non-native. Our time together inevitably comes to a close and most of you have ridden away,…

  • January 28 2023 Work Party

    Thistle and yellow arch angel and reed canary grass and Himalayan blackberry. Beautiful plants from other ecosystems who have found their way to ours and managed to disturb the balance of here. We clip, dig, and pull against loss of biodiversity and habitat, dirt on gaiters and layers and foreheads, snags on sweaters, connection vibrating the space between us. Himalayan blackberry roots resist our removal efforts, breaking under the soil, absconding with the energy required to push up new shoots at some later time. Tiny spiders, deep rusty orange with two stripes ringing their abdomens, scrabble across mounds of soil that must seem like mountains, a woolly bear curls defensively…

  • November 13 2022 Work Party

    We honor, on Orca Recovery Day, Tahlequah (J35), daughter of Princess Angeline (J17), sister to Moby (J44) and Kiki (J53), mother to Notch (J47), Ti-Tahlequah (no J number assigned), and Phoenix (J57). We remember the death of Ti-Tahlequah less than half an hour after her birth in 2018. We tell the story of Tahlequah’s grieving, how she carried Ti-Tahlequah’s lifeless body on her rostrum for 17 days while traveling approximately 1,000 miles with her pod around the San Juan Islands and interior waters of British Columbia. We recount how Tahlequah dove deeply to retrieve Ti-Tahlequah’s body when the dead calf slid from her and sank, how members of her pod…

  • October 8 2022 Work Party

    A song for you. And something I am working on right now: “When things fall apart and we’re on the verge of we know not what, the test for each of us is to stay on that brink and not concretize. The spiritual journey is not about heaven and finally getting to a place that’s really swell. In fact, that way of looking at things is what keeps us miserable. Thinking that we can find some lasting pleasure and avoid pain is what in Buddhism is called samsara, a hopeless cycle that goes round and round endlessly and causes us to suffer greatly.” –Pema Chödrön, When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice…