For the past month, since the murder of George Floyd, my inbox and social feeds began filling up with messages of solidarity from any organization I'd ended up on a mailing list for. It numbed me into a silence, even though I get the message that silence is violence, that silence is complicity, that silence … Continue reading How do we navigate revelations of systemic racism?

Thanks to Kera Willis, amazing writer, singer-songwriter and founder of the Mountain Horse School, and a constant inspiration for me, for permission to share this poem with you. Photo by Guliz Unlu. I want us to dance with the impossible and win:Not the way we win a war, with the swordof a conquistador, or the … Continue reading What I wish people meant when they talk about “winning” – encapsulated in a beautiful poem by Kera Willis

For the past nine weeks I’d felt a low-level thrum of stress about the winter-mess of my garden. It would spike when I saw other people, in March, as the Prime Minster was giving his briefings in a snowstorm, who were pandemic-proofing their future by getting in loads of soil, going to physically-distanced plant sales, … Continue reading What if Nature loves you back?

https://www.instagram.com/p/CBdVMDvHsme/ When I realized the medicine that was in plaintain, I stopped seeing her as a weed, and starting appreciating the magic that was on offer, all around me. Currently, I have a piece of plaintain wrapped around my toe, like a band-aid, to draw out a rose thorn I stepped on. I've rubbed it … Continue reading Plaintain for mosquito bites

This, via Kat Ast, offered me one concrete and tangible response to the question that often rises up in me when my heart feels breaky-achy, "but what can I do?" Well, how about give blood? Go to https://www.blood.ca/en and next time you're in Vancouver, schedule a donation too.   Bo was 0-, the universal donor … Continue reading Got blood? Wanna give some? Join Team Bo.

There are two things that have been a big part of my COVID coping kit these past three months: barefoot wandering and meditation with Susan Reifer. The barefoot walks were inspired by Kera Willis, the founder of Mountain Horse School, and a post she wrote for Traced Elements, when our isolation practice began and she … Continue reading Meditation with Susan Reifer June 23, July 8

via the Squamish Lillooet Regional District Within the regional district’s population of 42,665 residents, more than 3,000 are First Nations. We co-inhabit a region that is also traditional and unceded territory for several Nations, including the Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), St'át'imc and Lil'wat. Small parts of the SLRD also overlap with the traditional territories of the Stó:lō, … Continue reading Message from SLRD Chair: It’s time to move towards more respectful relationships

There is so much to be said, in this time, about systemic racism. There is so much to be acknowledged, this day, this month, that has been declared National Indigenous History Month and National Indigenous Peoples Day. There is so much to be done, every day, every moment, to move into right relationship with our … Continue reading Ceremony at a distance: a learning circle with elder Gerry Oleman

This landed in my in-box and created such a lovely opening in my day, in my thinking, in my heart, that I wanted to share it. Read her entire post, via Asia Suyler, One Willow Apothecary Solstice Ritual for Changing our fate For our ancestors the summer solstice was a profound moment of community re-weaving, … Continue reading A solstice ritual for weaving a new story