I’m still living (for only a week more) in the house I grew up in. She has sheltered us from many a howler, and we have loved her well. The trees on the back hill have grown so that their nearest branches brush the house, and are just outside my bedroom window, clinging precariously above the brook, so that it feels (especially in a wind storm—when the Norway spruces and sugar maples sing and wail, and the wee brook roars) like I’m living in a tree house.
“Tree at my window, Window Tree…” (oh please read Robert Frost’s beauty of a poem, you won’t regret it.)
In this snug although old and creaky house, I’m grateful for the exhilaration of a storm, and grateful when it’s over. For she which the old ones built and loved has sheltered my family these 65 years. I will miss this old home. I’ll miss the many sounds of the brook, and the leaf or bare branch wind songs. A thousand thank-yous Adam for your post of awe and appreciation which brought me fully into my heart, and brought the animate world outside my window into my heart upon my awakening this rain-speckled morning. Grounding kinship which inspires wonder is such a gift.
Well, Adam, I can confirm that the human denizens of this pocket of rural Flanders most certainly do complain about the weather (although not usually in English)!
Bless you for evoking Narnia. I experience my home (the house, at least) as playing the role of the back of the wardrobe. I step it from the street and traverse two rooms to exit out the other side into an overwhelmingly alive and communicative other reality, properly called the 'Earth', as opposed to 'the world' which lies street-side ...
I loved the narnia books! I have stopped complaining about the weather here in Australia, after reading all the substacks about winter in the northern hemisphere. We really do have a fantastic climate, even if our summers are a bit warm. Although tonight is lovely and wet!
I so enjoyed reading about your experience with the Wind that night. I have found myself lying awake in bed at night listening to Wind. It sounds so powerful and, yes, so alive!!! I visualize Wind (in a silly way) like a great transparent shape moving through the treetops above my neighborhood, tossing those treetops ferociously. I am amazed anything so large exists, that I get to be inside a house away from it, and that humans once had to relate to this terrifying force much more intimately than do we!
I think I don’t want to be quite so powerful in order to protect my aliveness. Maybe a Breeze instead.
Thank you for writing about the wind Adam! Wishing you full aliveness in 2025.
David Abram's book The Spell of the Sensuous contains a fantastic chapter titled The Forgetting and Remembering of the Air. I can't recommend it more wholeheartedly. I have drawn immense inspiration (a word that helps us remember our oft-forgotten dependence upon the air) from those pages.
We in Britain are slightly renowned for remonstrating about the weather, and I am no exception. South winds buffet the end of our house in the winter and bring rain that floods the river and inundates our lower fields. Even living in a giant lump of rock as we do, its not hard to imagine the wind lifting the house into the next field, and I often lie awake anxious about what will be found in the morning! How joyous it could be to reverse this mental strife. The word hoolie came to mind when reading your words as in 'its blowing a hoolie outside'. I just looked it up, apprently it hails from the Orkney isles, no stranger to a hoolie, and in its native Scotland can also mean a party! Perhaps another linguistic hint at our awe of the weather.
I’m still living (for only a week more) in the house I grew up in. She has sheltered us from many a howler, and we have loved her well. The trees on the back hill have grown so that their nearest branches brush the house, and are just outside my bedroom window, clinging precariously above the brook, so that it feels (especially in a wind storm—when the Norway spruces and sugar maples sing and wail, and the wee brook roars) like I’m living in a tree house.
“Tree at my window, Window Tree…” (oh please read Robert Frost’s beauty of a poem, you won’t regret it.)
In this snug although old and creaky house, I’m grateful for the exhilaration of a storm, and grateful when it’s over. For she which the old ones built and loved has sheltered my family these 65 years. I will miss this old home. I’ll miss the many sounds of the brook, and the leaf or bare branch wind songs. A thousand thank-yous Adam for your post of awe and appreciation which brought me fully into my heart, and brought the animate world outside my window into my heart upon my awakening this rain-speckled morning. Grounding kinship which inspires wonder is such a gift.
What poems, Sally. Both your words hear and those lines from Frost. I am tickled.
How beautifully written and lovely memories. Thank you for these words.
Well, Adam, I can confirm that the human denizens of this pocket of rural Flanders most certainly do complain about the weather (although not usually in English)!
Bless you for evoking Narnia. I experience my home (the house, at least) as playing the role of the back of the wardrobe. I step it from the street and traverse two rooms to exit out the other side into an overwhelmingly alive and communicative other reality, properly called the 'Earth', as opposed to 'the world' which lies street-side ...
Dear Helen, It's good to imagine you parting the coats there in Flanders. And I love the earth/world distinction. Thank you for your note.
I love this idea. I think I will incorporate it into my life. Thank you for sharing!!!
Thank you winds, for cleansing the earth and sharing breath of inspire-ation.
Thank you sir, for sharing your weavings and wonderings.
Thank you winds. Thank you.
Just wonderful writing, Adam, as nourishing as the food you offer. Thank you.
I think you're onto something Pauline. I sense there's less difference than we think between a story and a plate of food.
I loved the narnia books! I have stopped complaining about the weather here in Australia, after reading all the substacks about winter in the northern hemisphere. We really do have a fantastic climate, even if our summers are a bit warm. Although tonight is lovely and wet!
Winter's my favorite one. The best suited for writing and remembering. Best to you, Lucy.
I so enjoyed reading about your experience with the Wind that night. I have found myself lying awake in bed at night listening to Wind. It sounds so powerful and, yes, so alive!!! I visualize Wind (in a silly way) like a great transparent shape moving through the treetops above my neighborhood, tossing those treetops ferociously. I am amazed anything so large exists, that I get to be inside a house away from it, and that humans once had to relate to this terrifying force much more intimately than do we!
I think I don’t want to be quite so powerful in order to protect my aliveness. Maybe a Breeze instead.
Thank you for writing about the wind Adam! Wishing you full aliveness in 2025.
Happy New Years!
Laurie in CT
David Abram's book The Spell of the Sensuous contains a fantastic chapter titled The Forgetting and Remembering of the Air. I can't recommend it more wholeheartedly. I have drawn immense inspiration (a word that helps us remember our oft-forgotten dependence upon the air) from those pages.
You’ve mentioned it before in your posts Adam. I do plan on reading it and othered you’ve referenced. 😊
We in Britain are slightly renowned for remonstrating about the weather, and I am no exception. South winds buffet the end of our house in the winter and bring rain that floods the river and inundates our lower fields. Even living in a giant lump of rock as we do, its not hard to imagine the wind lifting the house into the next field, and I often lie awake anxious about what will be found in the morning! How joyous it could be to reverse this mental strife. The word hoolie came to mind when reading your words as in 'its blowing a hoolie outside'. I just looked it up, apprently it hails from the Orkney isles, no stranger to a hoolie, and in its native Scotland can also mean a party! Perhaps another linguistic hint at our awe of the weather.