Almost every morning I am out in the woods near my home, walking the dogs. I feel lucky to have a little strip of nature near my house despite the nearly constant rumble of cars and trucks nearby. Along my walks I’ve seen lots of wildlife: otters, owls, a salmon, red tail hawks, and wild rabbits, to name a few.
If you walk out into the forest right now you can feel the changing of the seasons. There is a stillness in the air that suggests all the efforts of spring and summer growth are coming to an end – flowers turning to seed, green grasses turning golden and crickets singing their song of summer’s end. For me there is an equivalent feeling in my body, marking the change – a desire to slow down, be still, and acknowledge the ending of another cycle of life.
This time of year I often get nostalgic, thinking about other autumns in my past. Some say as you get older that you spend more time thinking about your past than you do your future. I think I have begun to notice this lately as I reflect on the many cycles of seasons I have watched come and go. This time of year I usually start thinking of my home in Maine – feeling homesick for a place and a time that no longer exists. When I was in my 20’s in particular the fall always represented a lot of change and transition. Tourists departing, the town would shrink back to a size where you recognized nearly everyone you passed on the street or bumped in to at the grocery store. Life would slow down. Preparations for winter would begin.
One of the things I miss most now is the feeling of community and belonging. Getting together to make cider, stack firewood, help my neighbours put their storm windows on. I know I am romanticizing a bit when I reflect back – life was not perfect. Still there was this feeling that we were following the rhythms of nature and that we shared in some sort of common life. Even more, a sense of belonging that came from being seen, being known in one way or another.
Myself I am an orphan of many places. I moved to Maine when I was two, so was never a “true” Mainer. My family came to North America from Europe like so many of us, which makes another layer of orphan here – disconnected from my roots of family, culture, and traditions. Living in a small town we clung to any sense of belonging and community we could.
I’ve lived in Victoria now for 20 years. I consider it my home even though I still feel like a visitor. I have served my community for that entire time so I can often now walk down the street and recognize familiar faces and share a greeting. Still I miss that sense of belonging that comes from living in a rural place.
I believe a sense of belonging is critical for our health and wellbeing. I think that is why I enjoy practicing community acupuncture so much. Over time hemma has become my small town – seeing familiar faces, listening to the tales of everyone’s life – the joys and the hardships. Even if you are strangers to one another, for an hour or so, you share in a common practice, a common focus, of rest, care, and healing.
Thanks for being part of my little town.