"To be afraid is to behave as if the truth were not true."
~Bayard Rustin

This morning, the wee cottage is still wrapped in the quiet embrace of dawn.

A strong cup of coffee rests beside me in my beloved Leona mug, its warmth rising with the fragrant promise of a new day. A small pool of light from the desk lamp spills across these pages while Caroline Shaw's and the Swallow drifts gently through the room. Outside, another June morning is awakening. Inside, I find myself thinking about courage.

Today is Pride Sunday.

For many, it will be remembered through rainbow flags fluttering in summer breezes, joyful parades winding through city streets, laughter shared among friends, and strangers becoming family. Those celebrations matter. Joy matters. Laughter matters.

But Pride has always been more than a celebration.

Pride is remembrance.
Pride is gratitude.
Pride is resilience.
And Pride is hope.

Every rainbow carried through a city street is also carried upon the shoulders of those who walked before us—people whose names history remembers and countless others whose names have been lost but whose courage remains woven into the fabric of our lives.

The story most people know begins with Stonewall in June of 1969, when ordinary people finally decided that enough was enough. Among them were remarkable souls like Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, whose courage helped ignite a movement that continues to shape our world.

Yet here in Wisconsin, our own history tells another story that deserves to be remembered.

Eight years before Stonewall, patrons of Milwaukee's Black Nite tavern refused to surrender their humanity.

When hatred came through the door, they stood together. Josie Carter and dozens of others defended one another—not because they sought a fight, but because they believed they had the right simply to exist in peace.

That quiet act of collective courage echoed far beyond one tavern.

It whispered to frightened young people hiding pieces of themselves:

You are not alone.

Those words still matter.

Perhaps they matter now more than ever.

We live during a time when hard-won rights can feel uncertain. Public debates often speak about LGBTQ+ people instead of listening to us. Some voices seek to erase our stories, narrow our freedoms, or convince us that authenticity is somehow dangerous.

History teaches something very different.

The truth has never disappeared because someone tried to silence it.

Love has never ceased because someone tried to outlaw it.

Human dignity has never vanished because someone refused to recognize it.

Throughout history, every generation has been asked a question:

Will you live in fear...or will you live in truth?

Bayard Rustin, one of the great architects of the American civil rights movement, answered that question with extraordinary clarity:

"To be afraid is to behave as if the truth were not true."

The truth is beautifully simple.

Some of us are gay.
Some are lesbian.
Some are bisexual.
Some are transgender.
Some are queer.
Some are nonbinary.
Some are still searching for words that fit.

Each life possesses the same immeasurable worth.

No government grants that dignity.
No court creates it.
No majority vote can erase it.

It belongs to every human being simply because they are human.

If you are young and reading these words today—perhaps quietly, perhaps wondering whether there is a place for you in this world—I hope you hear this above every other voice.

There is nothing wrong with you.

There never was.

The world is infinitely larger than the walls that may surround you today.

There are people you have not yet met who will become your family.

Friends who will celebrate your victories.

Neighbors who will welcome you.

Communities where your laughter will be ordinary and your love will never need apology.

Hold on.

Your story is still unfolding.

As for those of us who have traveled a little farther down life's road, perhaps Pride asks something different.

It asks us to become the people we once needed.

To stand beside those who feel alone.
To protect those whose voices are still trembling.
To widen the circle until no one stands outside it.

Because liberation has never belonged to only some of us.

Justice that leaves anyone behind is unfinished.

Belonging that excludes another heart is incomplete.

Pride reminds us that the fullest freedom is one we build together.

As I finish this second cup of coffee, Caroline Shaw's music continues to fill these humble rooms, and the first light of morning has begun to soften the darkness outside my window.

The day has only just begun.

So has the work.

Not the work of hatred, but of hope.
Not the work of vengeance, but of courage.
Not the work of becoming someone else, but of living honestly as the people we already are.

That is what Pride has always been.

To stand in the light without apology.
To tell the truth about who we are.
To leave the door a little wider open for those who come after us.

And perhaps that is a lesson for every one of us, regardless of who we love or how we identify.

For every human heart longs for the same simple blessing:

To be seen.
To be welcomed.
To be loved.
To belong.

May we build a world where no one has to earn those gifts simply by being themselves.

Happy Pride.

Stand tall.

Stand together.
​
And never let anyone convince you that living truthfully is anything less than a beautiful act of hope.

~Wylddane

"The grand show is eternal. It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never all dried at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor is ever rising. Eternal sunrise, eternal sunset, eternal dawn and gloaming..."
~John Muir

This morning the coffee tastes especially rich.

Outside my window, the birds have already begun their morning chorus. The fountain in the garden burbles with its familiar music, and the gentle air drifting through the open window carries the promise of another mild summer day. Dawn has quietly unfolded across the northwoods while I sit here, hands wrapped around a warm mug, watching the light slowly find the world once again.

Yet my thoughts are not entirely here.

Yesterday evening, at precisely 6:11, a dear friend slipped beyond my sight.

It is a strange thing to awaken into a sunrise while carrying the memory of someone else's sunset.

Perhaps that is why this old photograph came to mind.

I took it years ago at Rockaway Beach in Pacifica on New Year's Day. The sun was sinking beyond the Pacific, bathing the cliffs and water in gold before quietly disappearing beneath the horizon. Standing there, I remember feeling both sadness and wonder. It looked like an ending.

But it never truly was.

At that exact moment, somewhere beyond that horizon, another shoreline was awakening. Somewhere children were rubbing sleep from their eyes. Somewhere fishermen were preparing their boats. Somewhere another soul was stepping outside to greet the first light of a brand-new day.

The earth had not lost the sun.

It had simply turned.

Perhaps life is more like that than we realize.

We often think in absolutes. We speak of beginnings and endings, arrivals and departures, births and deaths. Yet nature whispers a gentler truth. The seasons never stop; they simply change places. The tide that leaves one shore is already returning to another. Sunset and sunrise are not opposites. They are companions, occurring together in the same eternal moment, depending only upon where we stand.

Maybe our lives are like that as well.

Childhood gives way to adulthood, not because one has vanished, but because another season has quietly arrived. Careers end so new purposes may begin. Relationships change their form but often leave love itself untouched. Even grief, painful though it is, slowly becomes gratitude wearing quieter clothes.

And perhaps death itself belongs to that same mystery.

James Dillet Freeman expressed it more beautifully than I ever could:

She has put on invisibility...
I do not doubt that You are there as here,
And You will hold her dear.

Then comes the line that has remained in my heart ever since I first read it:

"...she will find it is not death but dawn."

None of us can say with certainty what lies beyond the horizon of this life. Every faith, every philosophy, every hopeful heart reaches toward that mystery with different words.

But I have always found comfort in this image: the sun never dies. It only passes beyond our sight.

Perhaps love does something very much the same.

This morning, as I sip this second cup of coffee and listen to the birds greeting a world made new, I realize that grief and gratitude can sit together quite peacefully. One reminds us that someone is absent from our eyes. The other reminds us that they remain present in our hearts.

The light they gave us does not disappear.

It continues traveling through everyone whose life they touched.

So if today finds you saying goodbye—to a loved one, to a season of life, to a dream that has run its course—remember the lesson of the sun.

What looks like sunset from where you stand may, beyond your sight, already be someone else's dawn.

Perhaps that is the deepest hope we are given: that love, like light, is never destroyed.

It simply changes its perspective.
​
And somewhere, just beyond the horizon we cannot yet see, morning is already breaking.

~Wylddane

"Keep your face always toward the sunshine—and shadows will fall behind you."  ~Walt Whitman

This morning arrived softly.

Clouds drift across the northern Wisconsin sky, muting the early sunlight into a gentle silver glow. The air is wonderfully cool, the kind that invites deep breaths rather than hurried steps. My mug of coffee warms my hands as much as it warms my spirit, and somewhere beyond the patio a chorus of robins, wrens, and orioles announces another ordinary miracle—a brand-new day.

Along the edge of the patio, beneath the broad protective branches of the old oak tree, my white clematis has quietly come into bloom.

Its blossoms seem almost luminous against the darker leaves, as though they have gathered what little light there is and chosen to reflect it back into the world. They do not complain that the morning is cloudy. They simply bloom with the light they have been given.

As I stood there watering the flowers, listening to birdsong and breathing in the freshness of the morning, I found myself thinking about a quote I had recently read:

"Every negative thought is a down payment on your failure. Every positive thought is an investment in your future."

The words lingered longer than I expected.

Perhaps because they are not really about success or failure at all.

They are about cultivation.

Every gardener understands this. We cannot command a flower to bloom, nor can we force an oak to grow overnight. What we can do is tend the soil. We water. We nourish. We remove weeds before they spread. Day after day, often seeing little immediate reward, we simply care for what has been entrusted to us.

Our inner lives are much the same.

Every fearful thought left unchallenged is like allowing another weed to take root. Every resentment we choose to rehearse grows stronger with repetition. Every act of gratitude, every quiet moment of hope, every small decision to believe that goodness still exists becomes another seed planted in the garden of our hearts.

The future we eventually inhabit is often built from these tiny, nearly invisible investments.

Not because life suddenly becomes easy.

Storms will still come.

Loss will still visit.

Cloudy mornings will always have their place.

But hope has remarkable roots.

Like this white clematis growing beneath an ancient oak, hope learns to bloom even where shadows linger.

Perhaps that is why I treasure these early morning rituals so deeply.

A cup of coffee.
Watering the flowers.
Listening to birds greet the day.
Opening a good book whose pages promise new ideas and old wisdom.

These moments are not interruptions before life begins.

They are life.

They are quiet investments in becoming a little more patient, a little more grateful, a little more awake than I was yesterday.

By the time the rest of the world begins to hurry, something within me has already become still.

And maybe that is today's invitation—for me, and perhaps for all of us.

Before we rush into meetings, errands, obligations, or worries that have not yet happened, let us spend a few moments tending the garden within.

Plant one encouraging thought.
Offer one word of kindness.
Notice one beautiful thing.
Read one page that nourishes your soul.
Listen to one bird.
Take one slow breath.

Small investments, faithfully made, have a remarkable way of becoming tomorrow's quiet abundance.

The white clematis beneath the old oak reminds me that beauty does not wait for perfect conditions before it blossoms.
​
Neither should we.

~Wylddane

"I love the woods: they calm my storms, leaving peace in my eyes."
~Fabrizio Caramagna

This morning began with the gentle sound of rain.

Before the sun rose, before the coffee finished brewing, before the routines and responsibilities of another day stirred awake, there was only the soft whisper of rain against the world outside my window. It felt less like weather and more like a blessing—a quiet reminder that the earth is forever renewing itself.

Now the rain has passed.

Sunlight spills across the yard beneath a cloudless blue sky. Music drifts through the rooms of the wee cottage. A warm mug of coffee rests comfortably in my hands. The day has opened itself like a welcoming door.

And my thoughts wander to the woods.

There is something irresistibly inviting about a path disappearing among the trees. Even in a photograph, it seems to beckon. It promises no destination, offers no guarantee of discovery, and yet it calls to us all the same.

Perhaps that is because a walk in the woods is never truly about where we are going.

It is about remembering who we are.

The modern world urges us toward speed. It celebrates productivity, rewards constant motion, and fills our days with endless noise. The forest speaks a different language. At the edge of the woods, time itself seems to slow. The trees ask nothing of us except our presence.

Crossing beneath their canopy feels like stepping through a doorway.

Our stride naturally shortens. Our breathing deepens. The restless chatter of the mind begins to soften. The rhythm of the forest becomes our rhythm.

A walk through the woods is a moving meditation.

And sometimes the most important part of that walk is stopping.

Standing still beneath a great tree, looking upward through branches and leaves, we discover a sanctuary both intimate and vast. The filtered sunlight becomes stained glass. The canopy becomes a cathedral ceiling.

The sky itself seems closer.

What we call silence reveals itself to be anything but empty.

A leaf rustles nearby.
A bird calls from somewhere unseen.
A breeze stirs high among the treetops.

The forest is always speaking.

If we close our eyes and listen, we can begin to hear its many voices—the sounds nearest to us and those far away, carried on the wind. We hear our own breathing. We hear the pulse of the living world around us.

We become less observer and more participant.

Perhaps this is what the Ojibwe have understood for generations.

In Anishinaabemowin, trees are not spoken of as objects. They are animate beings. Not "its," but "whos."

What a remarkable shift in perspective.

To see a tree not as a thing but as a presence.
To recognize an ancient pine or towering maple as a relative rather than a resource.
To understand that some trees, having stood through decades and centuries of storms, droughts, winters, and summers, possess a wisdom earned through patience and endurance.

Grandfathers.
Grandmothers.
Silent elders rooted deeply in the earth.
​
There is an old teaching that if your heart is heavy, you may sit against a tree and speak your troubles aloud.

The tree and Mother Earth will receive them. They will hold what you can no longer carry alone and return a measure of peace in exchange.

Whether one takes this literally or symbolically matters little.

Most of us have experienced something similar.

We enter the woods burdened.

We leave feeling lighter.

Somehow the forest absorbs our worries and returns perspective.

Perhaps that is why I find myself returning there again and again.

The northwoods are more than scenery surrounding the wee cottage. They are companions. Teachers. Quiet friends who ask for nothing and yet give so much.

The Ojibwe express this beautifully:

"We do not live in the forest. We are the forest."

The longer I sit with those words, the more true they seem.

We do not go into nature.
We emerge from it.

The same breath moving through the pines fills our lungs. The same sunlight nourishing the leaves warms our skin. The same earth supporting the roots of the trees supports us as well.

We belong here.

Perhaps that is why a woodland path feels so magical.

It is not leading us somewhere unfamiliar.
It is leading us home.

This morning, as music drifts through these humble rooms and another sip of coffee warms my hands, my mind follows that winding trail into the woods. I imagine the scent of pine and damp earth. I imagine sunlight filtering through leaves. I imagine the quiet companionship of old trees standing watch over the forest floor.

And I am reminded that we have much to learn from the Ojibwe, from the trees, and from the woods themselves.

So let us begin this day—and perhaps all our days—with a walk in the woods.

Not merely to see the forest.
​
But to remember that we are part of it.

~Wylddane

"Live in the present moment. It is the only moment available to us, and it is the door to all moments."
~Thich Nhat Hanh

This morning, a soft summer breeze drifts through the open window beside my desk. Piano notes tiptoe through the rooms of the wee cottage while sunlight slowly gilds the tops of the trees. My coffee is warm. The day is young. And outside, the clematis is blooming.

Its royal-purple blossoms seem to have arrived almost overnight, climbing and weaving through the weathered wood of the trellis with an effortless grace. Yet there is nothing effortless about what it has done. Every blossom is the result of countless small acts of reaching—one tendril at a time, one twist, one careful grasp toward the light.

The clematis is often called the climbing queen. It cannot stand tall on its own. Instead, it finds support where it can and wraps itself around what is sturdy. In the Victorian language of flowers, it symbolized ingenuity and the beauty of the mind. Its clever tendrils know how to navigate obstacles, find pathways upward, and transform simple structures into living works of art.

As I watch it sway in the morning light, I find myself thinking about the people who have done the same in my own life.

Like the clematis, none of us truly grows alone.

Some people entered our lives briefly, leaving behind only a memory or a lesson. Others wrapped themselves around our hearts so completely that even years later we still feel their presence. Parents. Friends. Teachers. Lovers. Neighbors. Kind strangers. The people who encouraged us when we doubted ourselves, who shared our laughter, who sat beside us during grief, who helped us become who we are.

The clematis reminds me that our lives are intertwined in ways we often fail to notice. We support one another. We steady one another. We grow because others have helped us reach places we could not have reached alone.

Perhaps that is why gratitude feels so natural on mornings like this.

Not gratitude for grand achievements or extraordinary moments, but for the simple and sacred reality of connection.

As Frances Hodgson Burnett wrote in The Secret Garden, there is something magical about the "swinging sprays and tendrils" that weave themselves over walls and trees. Nature seems to understand a truth that humans sometimes forget: growth is rarely a straight line. It twists. It climbs. It adapts. It finds unexpected routes toward the sun.

And so do we.

Life asks us to weather storms. It asks us to endure losses, disappointments, and seasons when growth seems impossible. Yet the clematis teaches another lesson. Even after the winds have blown and the rains have passed, it continues its quiet ascent. It reaches upward not with force, but with persistence.

There is wisdom in that.

So often we believe happiness waits somewhere in the future. We tell ourselves we will fully live when circumstances improve, when goals are achieved, when problems are solved. Yet standing at the window this morning, watching sunlight touch the purple blooms, I am reminded of Dr. Wayne Dyer's words:

"Make a commitment to live joyfully in the moment. Stop dreaming about the future and get back to the only thing any of us have."

The only thing any of us have is this morning.

This sip of coffee.
This breeze through the window.
This music drifting through the room.
This blossom reaching toward the sun.
This beautiful ordinary day.

The clematis does not spend its energy wishing it were already at the top of the trellis. It simply continues growing toward the light available to it right now.

Perhaps that is enough for us as well.

And so, with gratitude for those who have wrapped themselves around my life, for the lessons learned from both joy and sorrow, and for the gift of another summer day, I take another sip of coffee and watch the sunlight spread across the world.

The clematis climbs.

The morning unfolds.
​
And here, in this moment, there is more than enough reason to be grateful.

~Wylddane

For Father's Day

“It doesn't matter who my father was; it matters who I remember he was.”   ~Anne Sexton

This afternoon I found myself gazing at an old photograph of my father.

The picture was taken when he was in his twenties. He is handsome, confident, and standing at the threshold of a life he cannot yet imagine. Looking at the photograph, an idle thought drifted into my mind:

Did I ever really know you?

I know the broad outlines of his story. I know that he and my mother loved each other deeply. I know they built a good life together. I know he worked hard, provided for his family, and raised his children with a mixture of discipline and devotion.

But who was the young man in this photograph before he became my father?

Who was the man who swept my mother off her feet?

What made him laugh? What dreams did he carry? What fears did he quietly wrestle with? What did he imagine for himself as he stood at the beginning of adulthood with his whole future spread out before him?

The older I become, the more I realize how little children truly know their parents.

As a child, I knew him through moments.

I remember my sandbox when I was four, five, and six years old. The sand was unlike any other sandbox in the neighborhood. While other children had ordinary sand, my father went to sandstone cliffs and personally gathered soft white sand for mine. At the time, it simply seemed normal. Only years later did I recognize what it really was: an act of thoughtful, intentional love.

I remember sitting on his lap while he read to me.
I remember his rules.
I remember the way he expected things to be done.
I remember thinking he was strict.

What I did not fully understand then was how much love can exist quietly, without announcing itself. Some forms of love do not arrive wrapped in words. They arrive as white sand in a sandbox. They arrive in books read aloud. They arrive in long hours worked and sacrifices never mentioned.

Then came the teenage years.

We locked horns more than once.

There were arguments.
There were sharp words.
There was the certainty, common to adolescence, that I knew things he did not.

Later there was college and returning home for holidays. There were conversations, laughter, awkward silences, and all the ordinary moments that become precious only after they are gone.

Some memories still make me smile.

Others still make me wince.

Such is the nature of family.

Then, when I was twenty-eight years old, he died.

I remember the last weekend I saw him alive.

He was seriously ill and confined to a hospital bed.

At the same time, I was living through a crisis of my own. My faith had collapsed beneath me. Questions had replaced certainties. Belief had become doubt.

A minister stood beside the bed and began to pray.

Several of us gathered around him.

Heads bowed.
Eyes closed.
Everyone praying.
Except me.

I stood there staring out the hospital window, unable to pray, unable to believe, unable even to pretend.

Then my eyes drifted back toward the bed.

My father's eyes were open.

He was watching me.

Not the minister.
Not the others.
Me.

It is a moment I have never forgotten.

Even now, after all these years, I wonder what he saw.

Did he recognize my struggle before I could name it?

Did he understand me far better than I understood myself?

Even while facing his own mortality, was he still concerned about his son?

I never asked.
And now I never can.

The older I become, the more I understand that relationships are mysteries. We spend entire lifetimes beside one another, sharing meals, holidays, laughter, grief, and love. Yet there are parts of every human soul that remain hidden, even from those closest to us.

I knew my father.

But did I really know him?

I know he loved gardening.

Gardening was his gift.

It was never mine—or so I thought.

Yet somehow I inherited his green thumb.

Plants thrive under my care despite my frequent uncertainty about what I am doing. They bloom and flourish as though they know something I do not.

Years ago, when I lived in northern California, I was potting plants on the deck one April afternoon. I wore shorts, a T-shirt, and a gray cardigan sweater that had seen better days.

As I worked, I happened to glance at my reflection in the glass door leading into the living room.

For a moment, it startled me.

The person staring back was not me.

It was my father.

Not literally, of course.

But the resemblance was unmistakable.

The posture.
The expression.
The gray cardigan sweater, worn and comfortable.

Suddenly I remembered him working in his garden, dressed much the same way.

And I smiled.

Sometimes the acorn does not fall very far from the tree.

The years have taught me something I could not have understood when I was young. The people who shape us continue living within us long after they are gone. We hear them in our laughter. We find them in our habits. We discover them in unexpected reflections on ordinary afternoons.

Perhaps we never fully know our parents.

Perhaps we only spend our lives gradually discovering them.

And perhaps, in the process, we discover ourselves.

So today, as Father's Day arrives once more, I find myself looking at this photograph of a young man who became my father and wondering about the parts of him I never knew.

Yet I also find myself grateful.

Grateful for the white sand in a little boy's sandbox.

Grateful for books read aloud.

Grateful for lessons learned, even the difficult ones.

Grateful for a lifetime of memories.

And grateful for the realization that, in ways both seen and unseen, he is still part of who I am.

Happy Father's Day, Dad.

I remember you.
​
And I love you.

~Wylddane

"The light is amber, the air still; the daylilies have folded in on themselves. Soon, the hooded blue of dusk will fall..."
~Elizabeth Berg

Yesterday was a day of thunderstorms.

The morning began with coffee and conversation among friends. As we sat together, mugs warming our hands, I mentioned that the daylilies in the garden of the wee cottage had begun to bloom. Some thought it seemed early. Others weren't quite sure. Truthfully, neither was I.

Flowers have always kept their own calendar.

They bloom when they are ready.

By afternoon the sky had darkened, thunder rolled across the countryside, and rain came pouring down. Standing beneath the shelter of the porch, I watched the garden bend beneath the downpour. Between gusts of rain, I managed to capture a photograph of one orange daylily, its petals jeweled with raindrops, its brief beauty shining against the grayness of the day.

Now it is morning.

The storms have passed, but the clouds remain. Outside my window the world is wrapped in a soft darkness usually reserved for dawn or evening. The lamp upon my desk casts a gentle circle of light that feels almost like a lighthouse beacon. A choral piece drifts through the rooms of the cottage. Beside me sits a fresh mug of coffee, warm and fragrant, offering comfort against the coolness beyond the glass.

It is a quiet morning.

The sort of morning that invites reflection.

Perhaps that is fitting, because the daylily itself is a flower of reflection.

Its botanical name, Hemerocallis, means "beautiful for a day." Each blossom opens with the dawn and fades by nightfall. Tomorrow another bloom will take its place, and the cycle will begin again.

There is wisdom in that.

The daylily does not lament yesterday's blossom, nor worry about tomorrow's. It simply opens itself completely to the day it has been given.

What a remarkable lesson for human beings.

We spend so much of our lives carrying yesterday and fearing tomorrow that we often miss the beauty unfolding in the present moment.

Yet the daylily blooms anyway.

The flower's roots are strong and resilient. It thrives in difficult places—along roadsides, in neglected gardens, in poor soil where more delicate flowers might fail. It multiplies quietly, steadily, returning year after year with little complaint and no demand for applause.

It reminds me that resilience is not hardness.

Resilience is the courage to bloom again after every storm.

As I sat with my coffee this morning, another thought returned to me. A small poem I recently encountered lingered in my memory:

"I found God
but he wasn't at church.

He was
where pain met wonder,
where loss met love,
where broken things
learned
to
bloom.

I found God
in the dirt,
in the graveyard
of me."

Those words stayed with me because they speak to something many of us eventually discover.

Life rarely unfolds as we imagined it would.

Dreams change.
People leave.
Hearts break.
Certainties crumble.

The versions of ourselves we once were slowly fall away.

Yet somehow, in those very places—in the dirt of disappointment, in the graveyards of old identities, in the spaces where loss and love coexist—we discover something unexpected.

Not an ending.
A blooming.

Perhaps that is why I find the daylily so moving this morning.

Its blossom lasts only a day.
Its petals will wither.
The raindrops will dry.
The storm clouds will move on.
But the roots remain.

And tomorrow another bloom will open.

Maybe that is true of us as well.

The people we once were are not failures. They are roots. Every joy, every sorrow, every mistake, every triumph, every version of ourselves that has come and gone has fed the soil from which today's life emerges.

We do not find meaning by avoiding brokenness.
We find meaning by blooming through it.

The older I grow, the more I suspect that grace is not found in escaping life's storms. It is found in standing afterward among the wet petals and scattered leaves and realizing that something beautiful still remains.

This morning, as clouds gather once again over the northwoods and the soft light of a desk lamp glows against the darkness, I find comfort in that thought.

The daylily asks nothing extraordinary of us.

Only this:

Open fully to the day you have been given.

Trust your roots.

Bloom while you can.

And when evening comes, rest knowing that tomorrow carries the possibility of another flower.

Another beginning.
​
Another chance to bloom. 🌼☕

~Wylddane

“The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness.”
~John Muir

The rain drummed softly against the windows of Bean & Birch as the Friday morning coffee gang gathered around their usual table.

Outside, a cool June mist lingered among the pines of Lone Pine. Inside, mugs steamed, pastries disappeared, and conversation drifted comfortably between weather forecasts and garden reports.

It was Toby who cleared his throat.

"Well," he said, lifting his coffee mug, "I've got a story for you."

A collective smile spread around the table.

Toby's stories were rarely ordinary.

"What kind of story?" asked Erica.

"The kind that starts with a blizzard and ends with a question nobody can answer."

That immediately earned everyone's attention.

Even Maren paused behind the counter.

Toby settled back in his chair.

"This one comes from the winter of 1894."


Nathaniel Reed arrived at Camp 7 just before sunset.

The storm had been chasing him since noon.

By the time he reached the logging road, snow was falling sideways.

His horse fought through drifts nearly to its chest.

Nathaniel pulled his scarf tighter and squinted through the swirling white.

The lumber company had sent him north from Eau Claire with a simple assignment.

Find out why Camp 7 had gone silent.

No timber tallies.
No shipments.
No telegraph messages.
Nothing.

For nearly three weeks.

As a surveyor, Nathaniel preferred numbers to people. Trees made sense. Distances made sense. Angles, measurements, and maps all obeyed rules.

People did not.
Forests sometimes did not.
But he trusted facts.
Facts never lied.

The first cabin emerged from the blizzard like a ghost.

Then another.

Then the cookhouse.

Camp 7.

At last.

Yet something felt wrong.

No smoke rose from the chimneys.
No lanterns glowed.
No voices drifted through the storm.

Only silence.

Nathaniel tied his horse and approached cautiously.

The cookhouse door swung open at his touch.

Inside, frost coated every surface.

A kettle rested upon the cold stove.

Tin plates sat abandoned on the tables.

One still held a half-eaten serving of pork and beans frozen solid.

Nathaniel stared.

It looked as if the men had simply stood up and walked away.

The bunkhouse was empty.
The blacksmith shop was empty.

Even the oxen remained frozen in their stalls, alive but strangely motionless, as if trapped between one breath and the next.

Nathaniel's unease deepened.

He found the foreman's cabin shortly before dark.

Inside, buried beneath a layer of frost, lay the camp logbook.

He lit an oil lamp.

Then he began reading.

The entries started normally.

Weather reports.
Timber counts.
Notes about supplies.

Then, three days before the final entry, the tone changed.

Found hollow section in giant white pine at northern clearing.

The next day:

Removed iron box from center cavity. Strange thing. No signs of rot. Tree healthy as ever.

Then:

French trader markings. Maybe older.

Nathaniel frowned.

The handwriting grew shakier.

Counted rings. Impossible result.

Then another entry.

Counted again. Same answer.

And finally, the last line written across the page in frantic strokes:

"The rings told us the date it went in, but the math says it was buried before the tree was even a seed."

Nathaniel stared at the words.

Then laughed softly.

The men had frightened themselves.

Isolation did strange things.

Especially during winter.

He closed the book.

Outside, darkness settled over the camp.

Then he heard it.

Ping.

A distant metallic sound.

Nathaniel looked up.

Ping.

Like steel striking steel.

Far out in the forest.

Ping.

Slow.

Rhythmic.

Steady.

He grabbed his lantern.

Against every sensible instinct, he followed the sound.


Snow swallowed the world.

The storm muffled everything except the strange metallic echo.

Ping.
Ping.
Ping.

The sound led him through towering white pines until the forest opened into a clearing.

Nathaniel stopped.

Before him stood the largest white pine he had ever seen.

Its trunk rose like a cathedral pillar.

Even beneath the snow, it seemed ancient beyond measure.

And around it stood the missing lumberjacks.

Thirty men.

Perfectly still.

Their faces expressionless.

Eyes open.

Breathing.

Yet utterly motionless.

Frozen statues arranged in a circle.

At the base of the pine lay an enormous crosscut saw still embedded in the trunk.

Beside it rested an iron strongbox.

Its lid stood open.

The metallic pinging ceased.

The forest fell silent.

Nathaniel approached slowly.

Inside the box lay a single object.

A compass.

At least, it resembled one.

Brass and silver gears moved beneath crystal glass.

Tiny symbols circled its face.

The needle spun endlessly.

As Nathaniel leaned closer, it suddenly stopped.

Pointing not north.

But directly toward him.

The air changed.
The forest seemed to inhale.
Then Nathaniel heard voices.

Hundreds of voices.

Thousands.

Whispers flowing through the rings of the ancient pine.

Children laughing.

Axes chopping.

French spoken beside campfires.

Ojibwe prayers.

Steam whistles.

Voices not yet born.

Voices long dead.

Time itself whispered through the tree.

Nathaniel staggered backward.

The compass needle spun wildly.

The snow around him flickered.

For a heartbeat the clearing changed.

The logging camp vanished.

Ancient forest appeared.

Untouched.

Immense.

Then another blink.

French voyageurs stood beside canoes.

Another.

A future road.

Another.

A distant century he could not comprehend.

The forest was folding.

Layer upon layer of time occupying the same place.

Nathaniel finally understood.

The lumberjacks had not disappeared.

They had become trapped between moments.

Neither past nor present.
Neither here nor gone.

The compass was the anchor.
The strongbox was the door.

And the tree...

The tree was somehow keeping all the centuries connected.
The compass began to glow.
The circle of men trembled.
The clearing shuddered.

Nathaniel realized the rift was widening.

Soon the entire forest could be swallowed.

Perhaps the camp.
Perhaps himself.
Perhaps everything.

His eyes fell upon the strongbox.

Then upon the compass.

He understood what must be done.

With trembling hands, he lifted the impossible instrument.

The whispers became deafening.

The storm roared.

The forest flickered through centuries.

Nathaniel slammed the compass back into the box and forced the lid shut.

The latch snapped closed.

Instantly everything went dark.

Silent.
Still.


He awoke in the snow at dawn.

The lumberjacks surrounded him.

Confused.
Cold.
Alive.

None remembered what had happened.

Only that they had been cutting a giant pine.

Rescue teams arrived two days later.

The men returned home.

The company records noted the incident as a strange winter disappearance.

Nothing more.

Yet Nathaniel never stopped thinking about the tree.

Years later he returned.

Alone.

Determined to find answers.

But he never found Camp 7.

Not a trace remained.
No cabins.
No road.
No railway spur.
Nothing.

Only a clearing.

And in its center stood a massive white pine.

Growing quietly beneath the northern sky.

Embedded within one of its outer rings was a tarnished brass surveyor's compass.

On its cover were engraved two initials.

N.R.

No one ever explained how it got there.

And the forest, as forests often do, kept its secrets.

* * * * * * * * * *


"Be happy not because everything is good, but because you see good in everything."

​The rain ended sometime before dawn.

I know this because when I opened my eyes this morning, the sound of falling water had been replaced by a deep and gentle silence. The world outside the wee cottage seemed washed clean. The air drifting through the open window was cool and fresh, carrying the earthy fragrance that only follows a night of steady rain.
A lamp glows beside me, casting its warm pool of light across the room.

A mug of hot coffee rests within easy reach.
Soft classical music drifts through the cottage.

It is one of those simple mornings that asks nothing of me except that I notice it.

And so I sit here, gazing out the living room window toward the woods, thinking about the story of Camp 7 and Nathaniel Reed.

Whether such a tale could have happened is not really the point.

The question that lingers is different.

What did these woods look like in 1894?

Before highways.
Before electric lights.
Before chain saws and satellite maps.

What must it have felt like to stand among those ancient white pines, some already centuries old, and gaze upward into a canopy that seemed to touch the heavens?

The men who worked those forests lived difficult lives. Winters were harsh. Work was dangerous. Injuries were common. Loneliness must have accompanied many of their evenings.

Yet I suspect they found beauty there too.

Perhaps in the glow of a lantern on fresh snow.
Perhaps in the companionship of fellow lumberjacks gathered around a wood stove.
Perhaps in the sight of sunrise turning a frozen forest into a cathedral of gold.

Their lives were not perfect.

Neither are ours.

And that brings me back to the quote.

So often we postpone happiness.

We tell ourselves that we will be happy when circumstances improve. When the problem is solved. When the worry passes. When the future becomes clearer.

But life rarely unfolds that way.

There is always another concern waiting just beyond the horizon.

Another challenge.
Another uncertainty.

If happiness depends upon perfection, we may spend our entire lives waiting for it.

Yet this morning offers another possibility.

The coffee tastes good.
The music is beautiful.
The rain nourished the gardens.
The woods outside my window are vibrant and green.
The day has arrived carrying possibilities I cannot yet see.

Not everything is good.

The world remains imperfect.

Life remains uncertain.

But goodness still surrounds us.

Like the hidden rings of an ancient pine, it is often present whether we notice it or not.

Perhaps wisdom is learning to look for it.

To see beauty in a rainy morning.
To find gratitude in an ordinary cup of coffee.
To appreciate the warmth of lamplight on a cool day.
To treasure the people who walk beside us on our journey.

The old forests of Wisconsin may hold many mysteries.

But perhaps the greatest mystery is this:

How much goodness surrounds us every day, quietly waiting to be seen.
​
And so, as another morning unfolds beyond my window, I lift my mug in gratitude—for the rain, for the music, for the trees, for stories shared among friends, and for this beautiful day that has arrived, imperfect and wonderful, exactly as it is.

~Wylddane

"Rain showers my spirit and waters my soul."
~Emily Decens

This morning I awoke to gray light.

Before my eyes fully opened, before the day had gathered itself together, the first sounds that stirred me—and stirred my imagination—were the gentle patter of rain and the cheerful song of a Jenny wren somewhere beyond my window.

Then came another familiar sound: the quiet gurgle of the coffee maker brewing the first pot of the day.

Soon I was sitting at my desk, hands wrapped around a warm mug, watching a cool June rain fall across the yard. Tiny droplets landed in the birdbath, creating expanding circles upon the water. One ring became another, then another, until the surface seemed alive with ripples.

Soft lamplight filled the wee cottage. Music drifted gently through the room.

And into that quiet moment came a simple thought.

I am at peace.

Mid-June often arrives carrying the full energy of summer. The gardens are growing rapidly. The days are long. The world seems to move faster, urging us to keep pace with it. Yet a rainy morning interrupts that momentum in the most welcome way.

The gray light softens the landscape.

Colors become muted and gentle. The air grows cool and fragrant. The scent of rain-soaked earth rises from the ground, that ancient perfume we call petrichor. The earth drinks deeply. The leaves glisten. The birds continue their songs between showers.

Everything slows.

And perhaps that is one of the hidden gifts of rain.

Rain invites us inward.

Its steady rhythm becomes nature's own meditation, a quiet white noise that softens anxious thoughts and encourages reflection. It reminds us that not every day is meant for rushing. Some days are meant for listening. Some days are meant for noticing.

Some days are meant simply for being.

As I sat with my coffee, I found myself reflecting on two remarkably powerful words:

I am.

Whatever follows those words has a way of shaping our reality.

I am tired.
I am overwhelmed.
I am worried.

These statements settle into our minds and often become the lens through which we experience our days.

But so do other words.

I am capable.
I am grateful.
I am hopeful.
I am at peace.

Perhaps that is why these two simple words carry such power. They are declarations not only of who we believe ourselves to be, but of who we are becoming.

This morning, as rain tapped softly against the windows, I thought of something Wayne Dyer once wrote:

"Listen to your music, and do what you have to do to feel whole, to feel complete and to feel as if you are fulfilling your destiny. You'll never be at peace if you don't get that music out and let it play. Let the world know why you are here and do it with passion. You'll find your passion in what inspires you the most."

Each of us carries a unique music within.

For some it may be expressed through art. For others, through kindness, teaching, gardening, caregiving, writing, friendship, or simply the quiet way they move through the world. Whatever form it takes, peace often arrives when we stop resisting that inner music and allow it to be heard.

Perhaps that is why this rainy morning feels so meaningful.

Not because anything extraordinary has happened.
Not because every problem has been solved.

But because for a few precious moments, sitting with a mug of coffee while rain falls beyond the window, I am reminded that peace is not something waiting for us somewhere in the future.

It is something available right here.

Right now.

In the sound of a wren singing.
In the fragrance of rain.
In the glow of a lamp.
In the music playing softly through a room.
In the simple awareness that this day—this ordinary, beautiful day—is enough.

My CJ coffee mug is ready for a refill.

The rain continues to fall.

And so this lovely June day begins.

May we carry that same peace beyond this morning and into the hours ahead. May we pause long enough to hear our own inner music. May we allow the rain to wash away what no longer serves us and nourish what helps us grow.

And when we speak the words I am, may they be words that lead us toward wholeness, gratitude, and grace.
​
Today, and all days,
may we be at peace.

~Wylddane

"Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes."  ~Carl Jung

This morning began as so many mornings do.

A mug of coffee warmed my hands. Outside the window, a Jenny Wren filled the air with a song far larger than her tiny frame. A gentle breeze stirred the leaves, and early sunlight gilded the trees with gold. Somewhere in the background, piano notes drifted quietly through the wee cottage, as if reluctant to disturb the stillness of the day.

And in that stillness a question arrived.

Who am I?

It is one of the oldest questions humanity has ever asked, yet it arrives fresh and personal every time it enters the heart.

I sat with the question for a while.

The truth is, I am not the same person I was in grade school. I am not the young man who walked the halls of high school or college carrying dreams and uncertainties in equal measure. I am not the person who packed up his life and headed west with San Francisco shining like a promise on the horizon. I am not even the person I was a handful of years ago.

When I look back across the decades, there are moments when I barely recognize some of those earlier versions of myself. I see their hopes, fears, mistakes, victories, and heartbreaks. Sometimes I smile at their innocence. Sometimes I wish I could place a reassuring hand on their shoulder and tell them that things will turn out differently than they expect—and that, somehow, that will be alright.

Yet all of those people were me.

And somehow they still are.

Perhaps that is the paradox of being human. We are constantly changing, yet we remain connected to every version of ourselves that came before.

The philosopher Alan Watts once suggested that we are not separate beings wandering through the universe but rather the universe itself becoming conscious for a little while. Like a wave rising from the ocean, we appear distinct and unique, yet we remain part of something larger and deeper than ourselves.

Psychology offers another perspective. It tells us that our identity is not a fixed object but a living story—a self-concept continually revised as experience teaches us, wounds us, heals us, and surprises us.

And Jean-Paul Sartre argued that existence comes first. We are not born with a finished essence waiting to be discovered. We become ourselves through the choices we make.

Perhaps that is why the question Who am I? can never be answered once and for all.

It is not a destination.
It is a conversation.

The oak tree in the photograph understands this better than we do. The sapling that first pushed through the California soil is gone. The tree standing there today has endured countless seasons. Every ring hidden within its trunk records a year of growth. Every storm has shaped its form. Every drought has taught it resilience. Every spring has invited it to begin again.

The oak has changed completely.

And yet it remains itself.

So do we.

We are the sum of every triumph and every failure. Every love and every loss. Every road taken and every road abandoned. We carry all of it within us. Nothing is wasted. Even our mistakes become part of the architecture of who we are becoming.

That realization brings a quiet freedom.

We do not have to spend our lives searching for some hidden, perfect version of ourselves buried beneath the years. There is no secret treasure waiting to be uncovered. There is only the ongoing act of creation.

We are not puzzles to be solved.
We are stories still being written.

The person you were twenty years ago was a chapter.
The person you are today is a chapter.
The person you will become tomorrow has not yet stepped onto the page.

And that is a beautiful thing.

Because as long as we draw breath, there remains room for growth. Room for curiosity. Room for kindness. Room for reinvention. Room to become more fully ourselves.

Even now.
Especially now.

So this morning—or this afternoon, or whatever moment finds you reading these words—I invite you to sit quietly for a moment and ask yourself the ancient question:

Who am I?

Not to find a final answer.
Not to place a label upon yourself.
Not to define yourself by what has been.

But simply to listen.

Listen to the life you have lived. Listen to the dreams that still stir within you. Listen to the person you are becoming.

Then take a sip of coffee. Listen to the birdsong. Feel the breeze. Watch the sunlight move across the world.

And remember:

You are not who you were.
You are not yet who you will be.
You are this living, changing, growing moment between the two.

And that is more than enough.

The day begins again.
​
And so do we.

~Wylddane