My self-prescribed assignment was to pay attention to nature as I walked to the beaver pond where I planned to conduct an hour long sit spot.  I needed this.  I felt strangely depleted.  Nothing life threatening bearing down, but just a lot of different, mostly good, things to get done; morning and afternoon webinars to deliver over the next two days, clinical case reports to proof and edit, road construction and tree removal bids for the borough to review, and yard work to complete before leaving on vacation.

Managing multiple time-bound projects always seemed to create exponentially high levels of stress for me leaving me feeling as if I was trying to juggle four balls without dropping any.  I hoped that this nature excursion on an early spring evening would provide the rest and rejuvenation I needed.  I was reasonably confident that if I followed the step-by -step procedures of sensory awareness I would merge into a rejuvenating state of mindfulness.

Yet I hoped for and frankly needed more, something to get at the root cause of my stress, something to create a deeper, self-correcting shift, a therapeutic message, a nature-guided insight to restore my inner balance.  I wasn’t nearly as confident about obtaining this benefit as it would require a deeper immersion in nature, a unique kind of full attention.

Mark Nepo describes this type of attention in The Book of Awakening.  “So the purpose of full attention is to invite through personal surrender the particular example of life force in whatever is around us to show itself:  a truth of being for a truth of being.”  Given my current state I wasn’t sure that I could achieve the needed degree of personal surrender.

Walking

I walked across the backyard, slowed my pace, softened my shoulders, relaxed my jaw muscles, took several deep breaths and tried to let go of all purpose driven concerns about distance covered or time taken.  Widening and softening my gaze, I glanced up at the top branches of a sugar maple where tiny, just opening leaf buds created a delicate, minty, spring green sheen, a hint of the forest green canopy to come. 

On other days I might have been staring at the path ahead, walked by this tree and never noticed this burgeoning promise of summer, this leafy pledge of rebirth.  Pausing to gaze at the green I felt a shift in my emotional state.

I continued my walk through a stand of slender ash trees and onto the wide path that led down a long hill past scrub brush and second growth trees to the beaver pond.  I heard the songs of the recently returned migratory songbirds.  A phoebe sang a scratchy, hoarse fee-bee, fee-bee.  A pair of grackles flew overhead, chack, chack, chack.  A catbird called a plaintive mew, mew, mew.

Walking past a tall white pine festooned with pale green growth tips I inhaled its fresh piney aroma.  Stepping beneath an archway of drooping willow branches I felt as if I was crossing the threshold of a nature cathedral.

Sights and Sounds                                                      6:57 p.m.

I found a suitable spot near the edge of the beaver pond and set up my camp stool behind some tall stems of last year’s grasses, a spot that afforded me a bit of camouflage yet also allowed an open view of the water.  I settled in and systematically directed my attention to the sights and sounds around me.

A mourning dove cooed softly, cooo, cooo, cooo.  A robin sang cheerily cheer up, cheerily cheer up.  Red-winged black birds sang their familiar spring song, konklaree, konklaree.  A cardinal whistled a clear whoit, whoit, whoit. From across the pond I heard the chiming calls of peeper frogs.

Gradually my hearing grew more acute, more tuned into subtle and distant sounds.  I heard a jetliner whoosh far overhead. I picked up on the soft, soothing, swooshing sound of water flowing over the beaver dam. 

On the surface of the pond I saw concentric circles spread whenever an insect touched down.  Past the pond on a hillside hayfield five deer grazed peacefully on newly greened grass. A breeze, so soft that I couldn’t feel it against my cheek swayed the tan stems of grass in front of me.

FOY                                                                            7:07 p.m.                                            

Looking down I noticed green shoots of grass, delicate narrow blades sprouting amidst last year’s dead stems.  I pictured the vast network of roots that propelled this new growth skyward reaching for the spring sunshine, heralding the return of Persephone, the Greek goddess of spring, of growth, of flowers rising once again from the underworld.

Little by little the spring peeper frogs, apparently recovering from the disturbance of my footsteps, resumed their chiming calls, a pure tone peeep, peeep, peeep that rose in pitch.  More and more peepers joined the ritual spring chorus.  Their combined songs sounded like the chiming of sleigh bells, a chiming that grew louder and louder.

The peepers sang so loudly that I found it hard to pick out other bird songs.  I could barely discern the queedle, queedle, queedle of a blue jay.  Then behind the din of the peepers I thought I heard a soft musical trill.  I listened carefully.  Ah!  There it was; chinga, chinga, chinga, the musical trill of a swamp sparrow, a first of the year (FOY) song for me.

This dense, grassy, weedy, marshy area around the beaver pond was ideal habitat for swamp sparrows.  I heard them here every spring and summer so it was with a certain welcoming feeling of joy that I listened to this familiar song.  Maybe the bird singing was last year’s resident returned from the southeast states, the gulf coast, or the Yucatan Peninsula.  Maybe it was one of last year’s brood returning.  Maybe it was a new swamp sparrow that spotted this ideal terrain and flew down to set up housekeeping.

Reflections                                                                 7:17 p.m.

The chorus of peeper calls rose in volume punctuated by loud stuttering pureek, pureek trills, the aggressive song of the peeper.  Then, inexplicably the chorus faded. In the relative quiet I picked up on more spring bird songs; the insistent kwikkwikkwikkwik of a flicker, the nasal ank, ank, ank of a white-breasted nuthatch, the lilting maids maids put on the tea kettle lettle lettle of a song sparrow.  A mosquito hummed by my face.  Two geese honked softly from a distant pond.

Looking at the surface of the pond I saw the reflection of shifting colors and patterns in the sky; white and gray cloud puffs, strands of pink and purple,  reflected rays of golden sunshine. Gazing at the water I noticed the reflection of a bird flying overhead. I resisted the temptation to look up and instead followed the reflected image across the still water.

It was a grackle in flight, the reflection as clear and revealing as the direct image.  Looking down to see up, I had learned another way to perceive.

Appearance                                                                7:27 p.m.

The peepers called more loudly from the far shore of the pond.  And then, spreading like a contagion the calls rang all around me only to subside a few minutes later.  It was as if the frogs were practicing, warming up, tuning up, waiting for some cue.

A red-winged blackbird flew over the pond and landed on a high branch, perched, and then flew on.  Something rustled in the grass behind me.  Two deer grazed at the edge of the hayfield.  A grackle flew across the pond and landed on a power line. 

Right in front of me a beaver broke the still surface of the pond. I saw it’s sleek, wet brown head, its tiny ears.  I watched it carve a V through the water paddling steadily with its tail.  It surely knew I was there and seemed to be casting an inspecting glance my way.

But the beaver showed no alarm, made no warning swat of its tail on the water. It just slipped silently below the surface.  I guessed I had passed a test.  I posed no danger.  I was blending in.

Silhouettes                                                                 7:37 p.m.

Only ten minutes to sunset.  The light was fading, the temperature beginning to drop. The chorus of frogs continued to rise and fall in volume, waves of chiming peeeps and trilling pureeeks.

I looked to the east where the first hints of darkness tinted the sky. A vulture flew by, smallish black body, long wings flapping steadily as there were no thermals to ride, a dark silhouette against a darkening sky.  Three Canada geese flew by, large robust bodies, long extended necks, strong steady wing strokes, more silhouettes.  A few minutes later two wood ducks flew by; medium sized birds, fast steady wingbeats, graceful silhouettes across the sky.

I enjoyed this view of silhouettes, a view that allowed me to better see the shape and the flight pattern of each of these birds.  Nature always seemed to provide new perspectives, new ways of learning and understanding.

I had been sitting for fifty minutes, taking in the sights and sounds of spring, seeing the unfolding of new life all around me. And as I had hoped, I was beginning to feel relaxed and restored.  Yet there had been no “Aha!” moment of insight, no instant when as Nepo writes “…other living things reveal to us the secrets of how they manage to live.”  But, I was okay with that.  Those moments of insight come when they come, are created by surrender, and simply cannot be forced

The Lesson                                                                 7:47 p.m.

The sun set at 7:46.  This must have been the cue the peepers were waiting for.  The chorus grew in volume. Peepers called loudly all around me, a chiming pandemonium.  Ah, I thought, these little frogs are all about “night moves.”

I listened to the chorus, gazed out at the darkening surface of the pond, and let go of any last hope for a flash of insight.  At that very moment a beaver broke the surface at the far edge and swam steadily towards the dam right in front of me. As it came closer I noticed that it held a stick in its mouth.  The beaver swam with a unique combination of grace and purpose. I watched transfixed as it came closer, a moment for a photo, but I remained motionless, reluctant to break the spell of a magical scene.  This was an image I would have to hold in memory.

The beaver slowed as it approached the dam and seemed to study the structure carefully.  Then as if it had made a decision climbed up at specific spot on the dam, carefully placed the branch, slid down the other side, and swam off.  The task had been carried out smoothly without a hint of tension or stress.  The beaver was expressing its true self.

I thought about the thousands of gallons of water held back by the dam.  I thought about the hundreds, no thousands, of sticks and twigs and dabs of mud precisely placed to construct the dam, a dam which created a pond that provided a home for the beavers, regulated the flow of water, and created habitat for birds, fish and animals. I felt as if I had witnessed a secret of how the beaver lives.

Instantly, the last vestiges of my fatigue vanished, the weight of my burdens was lifted.  I thought that in the future whenever I felt stressed by multiple demands I could call forth the image of this beaver working gracefully and accomplishing much for self, others and for the environment.

This sit spot was conducted on April 19, 2021 alongside a beaver pond in Dyberry Township, Wayne County, PA.

You can read about more of my sit spots and wander walks on this blog and in my book, The Stillness of the Living Forest:  A Year of Listening and Learning available at Amazon.com and through Shanti Arts Publishers.  Your feedback and comments are always welcome.

The quotes from Mark Nepo are from page 129 of The Book of Awakening, Conari Press, 2011. My thanks to my old college friend, Bruce Alexander, for sharing this book with me, a book filled with invitations to draw on the healing power of a deep nature connection.