Embracing nature’s rhythm

Fall is here, and away with summer flew this year’s family of Barn Swallows. I miss their chattering already, seeing them outside our front door each night, returning to “The Ranch” for R&R as the sky darkens.

We track their migration into and away from our neighborhood each year, monitor their behavior, count their eggs, and log when their chicks hatch and fledge. 2024 marked the third year of Barn Swallow stays on our front porch in a nest built in 2022 by “Choco” and “Godiva”.

Each year, this little mud cup grows as each new Barn Swallow couple adds mud and renovates, plucking out old feathers and fishing line, and installing fresh nesting material. We give each bird a name as we discover their individual quirks, and each year, I fall deeper in love with these amazing creatures.

They’ll be back next March, I hope. But for now, our home has become much quieter; like a home when all the kiddos return back to school. Their absence is a reminder to me about the role that seasons play in our lives: seasons for chatter, seasons for quiet. A time for action, a time for rest.

I’m on the tail end of a very busy summer. While I am not fond of winter, I am trying to embrace the benefits of heading into the colder months by accepting the role of returning inside – and inward. Spring and summer are filled with activity, and fall and winter tend to usher in a natural cooling down of all that freneticism.

I have a stack of books I’m looking forward to reading, a year-long course on perspective I’ve been excited to start, and lots of overdue tinkering sessions on my radar (tech stuff and art kit stuff).

This spring and summer, I prioritized getting outside as much as possible rather than trying to cram every kind of activity into every day. I did my best to balance the Wild Wonder Nature Journal Educator Program while preparing my class for this year’s Wild Wonder Nature Journaling Conference (I taught a class on Painting Watercolor Skies), and figured whatever other extra-curricular computer stuff I had on my mind could wait until I would soon be stuck indoors.

I didn’t want to languish away inside at my keyboard any longer than necessary whenever the chance of being outside under a tree with my nature journal was an option. It was a shift in my thinking and behavior that felt overwhelmingly right and natural, and now, it’s time for the other half of those seasons to run their course.

Perhaps embracing this balance and welcoming it for the stillness it will bring will introduce some optimism about the cooler months ahead – even if only a little.

I peek open the door every morning and every night the Barn Swallows are on our porch to greet them and say “Goodnight” (except when I am away from home). I will eagerly await their return next year - likely right around March 14th - Pi Day - checking each day for little signs of their return.