Turning to Mould

49° F / 10° C / Rain

24 October 1837

Every part of nature teaches that the passing away of one life is the making room for another. The oak dies down to the ground, leaving within its rind a rich virgin mould, which will impart a vigorous life to an infant forest. The pine leaves a sandy and sterile soil, the harder woods a strong and fruitful mould. So this constant abrasion and decay makes the soil of my future growth. As I live now so shall I reap. If I grow pines and birches, my virgin mould will not sustain the oak; but pines and birches, or, perchance, weeds and brambles, will constitute my second growth. [Henry David Thoreau]

There’s so much varying advice out there about how to optimize and economize and to be your best self and to stop giving a f*ck. Yet nature gives us the exact same advice every year. 

Trust and let go. The trees let their leaves fall. The leaves feed the future. The future arrives like clockwork. There is joy waiting on the other side. 

Or, as Thoreau says more eloquently, “the passing away of one life is the making room for another.”

As I learn to make my way in this new place, I am letting the fallen leaves of one life impart a new life to my next. I am holding tight to my core, my trunk, my solid branches, and I'm letting go of the leaves of the last season — parts that served me in the past, but no longer.

And as I work to recover from the emotional scurvy of that season, I want to write more about what has inspired me and brought me joy so I can bring more of that forward with me.