our kith and kin –

a meditation on being

our kith and kin surround us, here, and though relating with people may dominate my mind, relationships to all living forms bring me firmly to my senses.

then i recognise the soil under my feet, and relax into it. i often forget that the earth is supporting me, grounding, rooting. now i lay down as a daily practice, to fully abandon my weight to the gravitational pull, so my mind grows very still. i don’t have to do this alone.

then i notice the air, its scents, its microbial richness, and that we are in constant exchange, that it makes me, becomes me through my lungs and blood and beating heart. that i’m not singular.

then i pause to feel the sun touching my skin, kind old friend, have i really noticed you since i was a child? and i loaf a little in it as our animal family loafs around me.

then i drink the water from the well and it becomes me, and i know my work is to protect its sweetness and clarity. i swim in the lake that sustains the island, immersed in the source.

then as i eat i think of the life cycling through, the soil we tended, the seeds we saved and sowed and watered, the gratitude for the harvest. this table tells us the story told by the land. so my body is made again each day in its image.

if i sit on a damp log under the old trees while the ducks noodle at the margins, and the goats nudge me for a scratch, and grow still and heavy-lidded blissing on it, and old pepper hen sings her quiet greeting, always standing companionably near me like a little shadow, and the hummingbird who lives in the thicket dives and calls, and the blossoms and bees are bursting all around us, then the fruit grows round and full and calls us to it, then the leaves blush bright and pattern a carpet at our feet, then the frost decorates the bare bones of it all. well, i am home, i become it.

older cultures than the dominant one which threw off the past and the land as a chain, speak of honouring one’s parents, one’s elders, one’s kith and kin. when i recon- nect like this, the relationships feel manifest. a reciprocal pleasure, to be of service to all of life.

this is one of the crossroads where we meet up with new and ancient ways of being, with a heritage that may have been lost for generations. we recognise the landmarks. a dormant sense of direction awakens, a latent awareness that there is more to life than the story of dominance and superiority, separateness and competition. that through an enormous collaboration we are alive, and that to regenerate and repair harm, the first work is to even see ourselves as embedded in life, as part of a resoundingly collective whole.

this is why a renaissance of connection empowers us simply to slow down and be present. in recognising who we are, in mutual webs of relationship, we can begin to live quite differently. the paradigm shift is primary.

it doesn’t look like doing very much at all, not at first. but the profound change we need to create for the thriving of all beings is first sowed by a vast seed-sharing of the reclaimed ideas of belonging and reciprocity.

we can start there. then we can trust ourselves to navigate by – with – the stars, find our ways by – with! – the old landmarks that still mark the way. and wherever we go next, we can bring the seeds of a heritage to revive anew,

that of being profoundly interconnected,

co-creating possible futures

with life itself.

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the heavy rain that followed days of sunshine jolted the island into vivid verdant growth. this is the mark of beltane, of the old agricultural calendar, midpoint between equinox and solstice and we all feel it. especially the hens, who vote someone in to be broody, it seems to me, every beltane. those of you who have come to the farm stay will know who i mean when i say ginger has gone broody and it is going to be interesting. what a character. i wish you sunny loafing with your beloveds, and the scent of soil at your fingertips reaching your senses in that restorative, medicinal way.

this small work is from part three of the book-in-the-works, which you can download with your paid subscription. thanks ever so much, whether you are supporting this writing and filmmaking, sharing it, or bringing me your comments. it sustains me.