I consider myself fortunate to have grown up in a time and place where I was free to roam the woods—to build forts, taste wild plants, and wander until I was deliciously lost. Much of my childhood was spent on my paternal family’s land, with Forest Service acreage stretching endlessly beyond our backyard. I was sent out to “play” in the morning and expected home by dark. Every day held discovery.
On my maternal grandmother’s side, there was a cabin on land claimed in 1862 through the Homestead Act, bordering hundreds of acres of forest. I carry vivid memories of wide-open meadows, timbered hillsides that seemed to go on forever, and miles of pristine creeks to explore. Walks with my grandmother were filled with stories—about plants, about the land, and tales of Mother West Wind’s forest animals. Those stories fed my curiosity and rooted me deeply in the natural world.
My paternal grandfather was also a man of the land. Later in his life, he lived simply and frugally, gathering ferns, mushrooms, and Cascara bark. He was a quiet man who taught through example—how to love the forest and soil, how to harvest ethically, how to be grateful with less. And always, he would bring home a small bouquet of wildflowers for my grandmother.
Yet I was born into a time of modern convenience. The Cascara and Willow Bark of my grandparents’ generation were replaced by capsules from the store. I still remember the glass jar of Cascara bark in their medicine cabinet—and even at ten years old, I knew what it was used for. Still, something had shifted. Though my connection to the land remained, the lineage of plant medicine had begun to fade.
That changed in 1998, when I moved onto this land with my two-year-old daughter. That is when the invitation came.
At first, it was subtle.
What is this plant? This tree? That bird?
I haven’t seen this before… I wonder…
And so it began.
I found the old Mother West Wind stories again and read them to my daughter, rekindling my own childhood wonder. The animals we shared this land with came alive in a new way. I could hear them differently. I began to recognize their voices. I knew exactly what Sammy Jay was calling about.
Then, in 2014, I met a woman who knew the plants. I invited her to my home, and together we walked the land. She introduced me to the medicine of the beings growing all around me, and the invitation was rekindled—stronger this time.
I studied with her and learned that many of the “weeds” I had been pulling from my garden were, in fact, powerful medicine. But perhaps most profoundly, I felt the cyclical call of the forest—a remembering returning, threads being rewoven, a rebraiding of something ancient within me.
Reciprocity creates relationship, and relationship is what life is built upon.
Plants give us so much, it can be difficult to know how to give back. We need them—they do not need us. They offer us food, shelter, medicine, and the very air we breathe. They teach us how to bloom where we are planted.
For me, giving back has become a practice of listening—of perceiving through the heart, attuning to the ecology of place, and weaving together science and spirit. It is a path of stepping more fully into my natural self.
It is, once again, an invitation.
A remembering.
A rebraiding.
And in that spirit, I invite you to step into your own remembering.
Join me for a forest walk:
March 7th | 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM
March 14th | 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM
There is no charge.
If you feel called by the plant beings, I will also be offering The Medicine of Place—a deeper class journey beginning the weekend of the Spring Equinox and continuing through the Summer Solstice.
You can find more information [here], or feel free to reply to this email or reach out to me personally.