22 Comments
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Diane Porter's avatar

I enjoyed this rummaging through "nature's litter." Well done.

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Michela Griffith's avatar

Thank you Diane.

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Margaret O'Brien's avatar

Michela, your writing is wonderful - I may have said this already, several times. But really, your use of language heightens the mystery of the natural world in a very beautiful way. I come away enhanced and entranced.

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Michela Griffith's avatar

And I will continue to thank you Margaret, for each time you say it is as special as the first. I greatly appreciate your comments; they are tremendous encouragement to me to keep going, and to try new things.

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Stay Slick's avatar

Nice piece!

There's so much we can grasp indeed, and so much we can't, in nature's wisdom...

My own piece on it echoes yours with a jungle and ecology bent: https://open.substack.com/pub/heyslick/p/think-like-a-jaguar-speak-like-a

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Michela Griffith's avatar

Thanks! Very true.

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Sarah Savage's avatar

Your story about noticing the bones of the roe and then noticing how they're changing over time really resonates. It's similar to what I think you're saying about moss. There is something going on out there all the time, and like you, I want to know all about it, internalize it somehow.

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Michela Griffith's avatar

Thanks Sarah. Perhaps we notice change more when it’s something less familiar. Much we are accustomed to—daily cycles of light, seasonal shifts, and so on—but it’s been the rate of change that has surprised me.

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Sophie S.'s avatar

I always slow down a little when I come to your posts, listening to you talking to us while walking, while the roebuck calls in the background. These photos are stunning too!

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Michela Griffith's avatar

Thanks Sophie, it’s good to know that they allow you to do so. And I quite like giving the words that the landscape prompts back to it, as if to say thank you!

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Ernest J. Schweit's avatar

I love the detail in your writing...almost as much as I love the detail in your images...nicely done

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Michela Griffith's avatar

Thanks very much Ernest, I’m glad you enjoyed both.

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Stacy Boone's avatar

Your writing ... so beautiful. Reading takes long breaths to consume all the images. This - "the moss seems impatient" instantly struck a cord. I want to dig under the snow and look.

Thank you for sharing 020.

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Michela Griffith's avatar

Thanks Stacy, that's very kind. I love being able to share favourite reads; I never expected to find such richness here.

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Juliet Wilson's avatar

Lovely post, thanks. I love the word ginnel, where I grew up there was a ginnel nearby, so i was familiar with the word from a very early age! Now I live in Edinburgh and of course as you say, the ginnels are all vennels.

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Michela Griffith's avatar

Thanks Juliet. Somehow vennel had slipped from my mind at the time of writing. And then I remembered a project that took us to The Vennel to sketch or some such on a cold day. I thing our tutors at Edinburgh College of Art enjoyed sending us out that first year!

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J. Paul Moore's avatar

Another beautiful piece of writing! More and more, I am drawn to the small things in nature. Those small things that whisper and invite us to look more closely.

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Michela Griffith's avatar

Thanks Paul. Glad you enjoyed reading this. Whisper is a good way of putting it.

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Jan Elisabeth's avatar

Love the perspective of this -- and this line "The moss resists familiarity. It is relatively small, but at the scale of its parts it seems infinite." Thank you

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Michela Griffith's avatar

Thanks Jan. The more I learn, the more I realise how little I know. It’s a good lesson, I think.

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Manuela Thames's avatar

Your writing is beautiful! I loved reading this.

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Michela Griffith's avatar

Thanks so much Manuela, I’m happy that reading gave you pleasure.

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