Nature in my writing
If you’ve read my stuff, I think you’ll agree that nature plays an important role in my stories. No matter where I go in my travels, I am regularly in awe of nature’s beauty and variety—and the lessons it has for us all. And if you follow me on Instagram, you’ll already know that nature photos take precedence even over those of food and drink! (Which is saying something!)
Sometimes it’s the landscape itself that grabs me. I’ve talked about the incredible valley in Wyoming that inspired Mikele’s grotto in The Queen & the Soldier. I will never forget the first time I witnessed the stunning rise of the Grand Tetons from the plains. Glacial lakes the color of the Caribbean Sea nestled among the Swiss Alps. The breathtaking heights of the fjords of Norway. The ancient and primitive landscapes of geysers and steam vents in both Yellowstone Park and parts of Iceland.
It’s often that the sky catches my attention. The colors, the presence or absence of clouds, rain, or snow. On the plains of the US, in Idaho, Kansas, or Montana, I can remember being struck by (thankfully brief) moments of an excruciating awareness of my own smallness when standing under a particularly vast-seeming sky. There are sunrises and sunsets I can recall from thirty or more years ago. (I’m now reminded regularly of the extravagant ones they have on Waikiki Beach by a good friend’s regular Instagram posts!) Watching the Northern lights in Iceland while soaking in a natural hot spring. A night sky with such an such incredible magnitude of stars that it dwarfs any I’ve ever seen before or since, two weeks out into the Pacific, when the USS Missouri was operating under darken ship (and the magical glow of the plankton which suffused the bow wave with bioluminescence as the ship cut through the water!).
Sometimes it’s animals. A wolverine in Wyoming that acted as if we weren’t even there (so unafraid and unimpressed by my roommate and me!). A least weasel I encountered while walking alone in Jackman, Maine, near a tiny brook in a hidden dell. The vast spectrum of underwater life I’ve seen while snorkeling or SCUBA diving, from the hideous bottom-dwelling fish of Rockport, Massachusetts, to the frightening moray eels and peaceful green sea turtles of Hawaii. A phantom-like mountain lion in Montana. The great-horned owl I once freed from a chicken coop. A wood duck nesting in my sister-in-law’s chimney. The hummingbird once trapped in my garage. The gray tree-frogs I love so much to hear at night with their unmistakable call. The flying squirrel with its “baby Yoda” eyes that somehow appeared in my living room one morning!
It’s often the weather. I’ll never forget the time we rode out a terrifying storm in my dad’s 34’ trawler along the New England coast. I remember reveling in the fact that I could lean forward (trust fall style) into a steady 50+ mph wind in Leonardville, Kansas and it would hold my body upright! A lightning storm like something out of an Avenger’s movie over Boston Harbor, viewed from the 29th floor of a skyscraper at the water’s edge.
There are more. So many more. Every time I think back on a given memory of nature, another pops into my head. Some may find their way into my writing—if they haven’t already! But when I allow myself to sift through my memories for these moments, they keep springing to mind.
And yet . . . here I sit this morning, at my keyboard. All these many months feeling so trapped inside by the pandemic.
I think I’ll take a walk in the woods today.