Songlines 2025: celebration

In a year filled with small and large celebrations, I’ll start at the top of the list. Jackson Douglas Perrier was born on February 6. I’ve been a happy step-grandmother for 25 years, and now the youngest is a junior in college. So, Nana-wise, starting from the beginning again is heaven.

He is a sweet and happy baby and has brought endless fun and joy into this year. And it was so moving to see my son and daughter-in-law, Luke and Genevieve, being such loving parents.

His arrival meant several happy trips to Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, where they live. In fact, it turned out to be a year of trips.

I was back in the Anza Borrego Desert in March. The dates coincided with the 10th anniversary of The Soul of the Earth, which I started when I was there in 2015. I collected various desert posts and galleries into Born in the Desert to celebrate.

“I was forty-six when I first saw the desert and I’ve never been the same since. The lush, green landscapes I had known all my life peeled away. What was left was spare in all ways.

In that bright, fiery world, I felt that some large truth was hovering, and here was the only place I would find it. I knew I would go back.” I feel the same every time I’m there.

I spent May and June in Connecticut helping a dear friend recover from heart surgery. Not a wildflower season, but she lives in a place with lots of beautiful, informal gardens. All the blooming inspired Beautiful, wild, intelligent: loving iris.

“I’m indiscriminate in my love for flowers. There are few that I don’t like, and many that I love. But there is something about my feeling for irises that sets them apart. I’m not alone in this.”

There were a couple of significant environmental anniversaries to celebrate this year. Pope Francis’ Laudato Si was issued ten years ago. It is one of the most important environmental statements of our time.

Back then, I paired quotes from the document with photos of the gorgeous planet he was advocating for. To mark the 10th anniversary, I chose some new quotes and photos for Laudato Si: celebrating a 10-year epic.

“Every word in Laudato Si reflects Pope Francis’ deep concern for the plight of the poor. For the devastation of war and political corruption. The dignity and necessity of meaningful work. His belief that all living things have dignity and worth far beyond their use to humanity.”

Another environmental anniversary followed. The Earth Charter celebrated its 25th anniversary. I toasted the group in Ever inspiring, the Earth Charter celebrates 25 years.

In a world that is lurching backward on environmental goals, I take comfort and courage from the quiet work being done by millions of people worldwide, the Blessed Unrest. Those who work tirelessly underneath all the noise to create a just and sustainable world.

“Those dedicated millions will not stop advocating for the good they want to see even if, for now, destruction seems to have triumphed. Most likely, they will work ever harder for the Charter’s vision of peace.”

I wrote about a wonderful example of blessed unrest in From lawn to alive: creating a Homegrown National Park.

It’s the brainchild of entomologist and advocate Doug Tallamy, who is launching a movement to foster gardens as ecosystems. Living places where insects, birds, invertebrates, and small mammals — the basis of biodiversity — can find what they need to thrive.

On the website, gardeners are led through the steps needed to identify their ecoregion, their native plants, and how to plan and plant a garden. People all over the country then post their gardens on the ever-growing interactive map.

“Although most people garden with beauty in mind, our landscapes are not only visual elements. We, and the land we garden or farm, are active participants in Earth’s life. We continue to evolve the living world through our gardens. Our choices matter if we want to rise to the call of protecting this vibrant planet.”

Every September, churches all over the world focus on protecting Earth. And I take it as an opportunity to pair poetry and prose with photos to celebrate the Season of Creation. This year I chose flowers as the theme in The Flowering of Delight.

When I contemplate flowers, which I so often do, I am ever reminded that they are “far more than their pretty faces. They are the creators of seeds, one of the most important tasks on the planet. They are the miracle of fruiting, which means they power the entire breathing Earth.

These ancient beings are expressions of the immense cosmic forces that shaped, and continue to shape, the universe. Like them, we are formed from stardust woven into bone and breath.”

As I sit here on the seventh day of wind and rain, I might question celebrating winter. But earlier this year I did just that in The King in Winter. Nature in winter is full of quiet treasures, and I not only photograph them, but draw them as well.

“The quiet and subtlety of nature in winter is deeply appealing, especially in these difficult days. Yet, as is common with spells of quiet, a lot happens, above ground and below, inner life and outer. Life’s creative forces are never still.”

“There are always gifts of beauty and curiosity, new life and old, wonder and mystery. Showers of blessings that mend our souls and nourish our energies to protect the world we cherish, the beings we live among.”

As with the quiet surprises of winter, you never know what will come along to inspire small celebrations. There was a sudden flurry of interest in my essay on fireweed. I found out that the state of Alaska issued a new license plate with the gorgeous, ubiquitous flower on it.

That had me going back and updating my essay to include the fun of the contest to design the plate. You can see the six finalists in Fireweed: Alaska’s glowing icon.

You also never know when you’ll find yourself in the midst of an unexpected celebration. In Samhain in New Jersey, I told the story of finding myself honoring Samhain some years ago. I hadn’t even known such a day existed. An ancient Celtic ritual, it has morphed into all the end-of-year holidays, from Halloween to New Year’s.

It was a gorgeous October day. I was in a place that meant the world to me, Genesis Farm, honoring a time my ancestors celebrated.

“Not only are we not separate from the ground we walk on, we’re not separate from the people who walked it before us. We carry them in our cells, hitchhiking on our DNA. We reenact their customs, even when we’ve lost their beginnings in the intervening centuries. All the richness of our ancestors flows through us into the future.”

The one essay that had me pondering disaster this year was Ashes to petals: wildfire and rebirth. We are living in disastrous times. I was heartbroken by the news every day. It’s hard to comprehend the scale of greed and cruelty we are living through. My friend’s recovery from heart surgery was long and complex.

It was a difficult year in many painful ways. But when I sat down to write about it, what kept showing up were celebrations, large and small.

It helps to start the year with a baby! It also helps to know that disastrous forest fires are the beginning of a new cycle in the forest. One that keeps the forest alive. Without fire, there would ultimately be no forest.

The mix of cataclysm and rebirth that keeps our planet alive is a difficult reality to live with. I am an optimist by nature, and in the midst of disaster, I look for new leaves. The forest never gives up. It enters into renewal even as it lives through upheaval. Beauty flowers from ash.

Earth has been at this a long time. She takes a very expanded view, knowing that life has triumphed over and over despite the losses. She is asking of us impatient, anxious beings, in the poet Rilke’s words, to “Let everything happen to you. Beauty and terror. Just keep going.”

May we all keep celebrating against the odds.

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