//Learning to Live Outdoors

Learning to Live Outdoors

Reflections from the Longest Year

Since March, aside from speedy grocery runs and a few medical appointments, I’ve hardly been indoors. When I’m inside, the announcement that played in airports after 9/11 rings in my head: The threat level is…orange. When I step outside, I feel relief, filling my lungs with the sweet, safe breath of the natural world. 

Until this year, I considered myself fairly outdoorsy, getting into the woods on weekends, enjoying sunny days with friends on porches (preferably screened), and walking to the grocery store when weather permitted. And then 2020 turned our lives upside down, sounding its clarion call of you ain’t seen nothing yet.

In the spring I took several walks a day, circling the neighborhood and watching the world closely. I saw buds form and open, smelled each bloom. I heard the whine of table saws and marveled as decks, garden beds, and chicken