Publisher’s Note
Torrey Douglass
Co-Publisher & Art Director
An herbalist friend once pointed out how we can weather the change of seasons more gracefully if we mimic the behavior of plants. Spring is for letting creative ambitions out to play, then guarding and guiding new growth, while in summer you pare back what isn’t working in order to allow the strongest contenders to flourish. Then there’s the crescendo of effort in fall to deliver the harvest, followed by some well-earned partying. And after that?
After that … rest. This is the time of year when plants let go of what isn’t needed—parts that have served their purpose die back and fall away. The energy is pulled inward, down into the earth, where it can abide safely while winter dances upstairs with boisterous, cold feet. The green life force is not dead and gone, but sleeping. On quiet winter afternoons when I walk through the forest, I like to imagine I can feel the rumble of its snores through the soil.
But what do humans usually do this time of year? Make a hot drink and put up our feet by the fire? Hardly. We keep up the pace, ignoring the counsel of plants and opting to add on an extra bushel of demands—on top of our home responsibilities and 40+-hour work week—called The Holidays. And what’s the result? Our bodies revolt, undermining our determined productivity with sniffles and coughs. Friction shows up in interactions large and small, and even just within ourselves as we hit the inevitable roadblocks life brings.
I don’t really have an answer for the late-year hurry-and-hustle we all go through, but it does bring to mind a comment Father Greg Boyle made in an interview that has stuck with me, in which he recommended that people “Hold life lightly.” The bumps in the road are easier to endure when we are not gripping the wheel with blanched knuckles. Let’s give ourselves and each other a little grace, defaulting to the assumption that everyone is just doing the best they can with what they have and who they are in the moment.
This grace is on full display at The Restaurant of Mistaken Orders, a pop up project in Japan that is staffed entirely by people with dementia. It’s evident at the Parents & Friends garden, a program supporting adults with developmental disabilities, and also at Bee the Change Microfarm, where Susanna and Ian are creating the infrastructure and expanding their managerie to make their vision of a regenerative farm a reality. It’s sadly absent in the tangle of regulations that have brought legacy cannabis farmers to the brink, according to farmer and owner of The Bohemian Chemist, Jim Roberts. But it’s embraced by the wise, balanced approach Gowan now brings to winter at Fortunate Farm as she awaited the birth of her first child (now happily arrived, and all are well).
I wish all of you a peaceful and happy holiday season, and a grounded start to 2024. It’s an election year, and there are going to be a lot of feelings that come out of the swirling madness that ensues. But if we all give each other a little grace—and keep a dollop for ourselves—I trust we’ll get through it okay.
Torrey Douglass
Co-Publisher & Art Director