The Peace of Wild Things
"When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief.
I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”
- Wendell Berry
Over the last several weeks, I have cultivated a daily cold water swim practice. It started in October when a friend of mine, who happens to be in her 70s, peer pressured me to go. She had responses to all of my excuses as well as an extra swimsuit in the back of her Subaru. I love being in the water. The ocean especially, but as it turns towards autumn, I usually put away my swimwear until our New Year’s Day plunge.
As we eased into the icy sea in our matching suits - keeping our hands in prayer so that our fingers didn’t numb - I asked my friend what inspired this new practice. She said that the world was just too much right now. I agreed. Though it wasn’t a complete thought, it’s one that I fully understood. The chaos and the heartbreak is all too much. Nothing makes sense as we bear witness to so much suffering. Not a thing.
The cold plunge is a practice that is having a moment. I can’t help but wonder what the forces at play are that have called so many folks to soak in community.
It could be the immediacy of it all. It brings you right into your body and the present moment. Or maybe it's the euphoria you feel as your body begins to warm? The communal aspect is for sure a draw. So is being held in nature, saturated in it.
And for me, there is also an element of rebellion. Of doing it wrong. Of doing it backward. Of being a middle-aged woman with so much responsibility doing something so unproductive. An attempt to relax my tight grip on what does and does not make sense anymore.
As this year draws to a close, we will continue to reflect on the past 15 years of our studio and how grateful we are to live and work together in creative partnership in the place we love most.
These past twelve months, we created work that we are deeply proud of. It pushed us to explore new scales and imagine new ways to be beneficial. We also opened our studio to many new faces and ones we haven’t seen in years. We gave presentations to students, community groups, architects and designers and told our story in new ways.
We grew our team and did some essential housekeeping to ensure that we could respond to your needs for UL-certified lighting and help with fast-moving projects by adding an in-stock section to our site. We also marked our first B Corp anniversary by sharing one of the most empowering things we learned during the certification process: how we bank matters.
We will celebrate the solstice today by thinking of Wendell’s words and by searching out the peace of wild things. We wish everyone - everywhere - safety, good health and peace.