Book Club

Animal Dialogues

My worn paperback copy of The Animal Dialogues lives on the “dad” shelf of my living room bookshelves. Most of the spines happen to be black, brown, or gold (dad colors, right?) and have either been given to me from my dad or remind me of him. Some I picked up on our road trip through Alaska ten years ago, others are his old bird identification books, their covers tattered from use. Most are about wildlife, adventure, or nature in some way, books I’ve read and loved and sent him for his birthday or Fathers Day so he could read them too. A simply framed box, given to me on my 28th birthday, holds four sharply cut arrowheads found by my dad or my grandfather and rests on a pile of books in the center of the shelf. A carefully detailed account of when and where each was found tucked behind the casing. Other little items that my dad has passed onto me through the years are carefully placed between the books like one of his high school report cards (his best grade was in Biology) and an old engineer’s handbooks from the 1940’s. My grandfather was a train engineer and I love flipping through the delicate blueprints of steam locomotive systems that fold out of the books. One could learn much about my dad and his interests from this shelf, and consequently, much about myself and the traits I get from him and my grandfather.

So needless to say,  I was thrilled when mountain guide and adventure writer, Charlotte Austin, recommended reading this book and collaborating with her online book club, Adventure Grapes. I first read this book about a decade ago and I could immediately and vividly recall the Raven and Mountain Lion chapters. I was excited to revisit it and since Craig grew up in Arizona and many of his stories are set there, it would pair nicely with an upcoming road trip to his home state. We planned our May book club outing to Icicle Ridge, a nice early season hike near Leavenworth. Laura invited us to camp at her family’s nearby cabin so I brought the whole family- my husband, Evie, and doggie Nali. It’s been awhile since we’ve all been out on an adventure together.

We were greeted at the cabin with hugs and bug spray. I was secretly hoping that we would have some epic wildlife encounters over the weekend and I was encouraged when I spotted a coyote trotting down the railroad tracks next to highway 2 on our drive to the cabin. BUT, as the saying goes, be careful what you wish for. We did have an epic encounter with an animal highlighted in the book. Unfortunately, it was with a less desirable species: the mosquito. I played it cool for awhile and nonchalantly swatted the bugs while I listened intently to my friends, concentrating on making eye contact and nodding in agreement, uh-huh (slap, slap). This lasted a little while until I couldn’t take it anymore. I  jumped up and really sprayed myself with bug spray this time, hovering the bottle for a long time over my limbs and head. I felt like Craig’s friend who had gone crazy from the mosquitoes in Alaska. We had been at the cabin for approximately 30 minutes. Ugh.

Laura and I and some others who had arrived decided to take refuge in the car and head over to Lake Wenatchee for a short hike while the sun was beginning to set. We lingered along the shoreline, basking in the fresh and bug-free air until we got too hungry and headed back to the cabin for dinner. As we drove, it started unexpectedly raining. Then it rained harder. Our husbands had stayed behind to keep a fire going and we found them huddled on the porch out of the rain. The fire still burned and they found round pieces of bark to place on the fire grate that made perfect little houses to cook our sausages. The rain dispersed the bugs, the porch kept us dry, and we ate via lantern light as we told our own scary wildlife encounters. This was after hearing the news that someone had been killed by a mountain lion that morning in an area where we all regularly hike. It was the first fatal attack by a mountain lion in Washington in nearly 100 years. Sadly, the victim had done everything they were supposed to do. It was a sobering reminder that we too have a place in nature’s food chain.

The next morning we headed to Leavenworth to fuel up on caffeine at the adorable Argonaut Espresso Bar. We met the rest of our group at the Icicle Ridge trailhead and headed up the trail through a thick stand of green maples. The lushness soon gave way to the typical dusty trail lined by ponderosa pine, lupine, and balsamroot (that magical combination again!). It was warm and getting hotter by the minute on the exposed trail. But the views of the Icicle Valley and the Wenatchee River below were getting better and better. I slogged up the switchbacks, happy to have time to clear my mind. That’s the thing about hiking, you don’t have to make many decisions. You just follow the trail. I thought of the part in the book when Craig yearns to be an animal with no plans, no quarrels, just sticks and stones.

It is the wish to be an animal again, to have the eyes that I have lost. No presuppositions. Just sticks and stones. I want something that is gone, something unacceptable, irrational. Where it is known when to sleep, where to seek food, which direction to turn. Where it is understood, without quarrel or reason. I want to lose my fingers and plans and I want to fly.

We gathered at the top of the ridge in the shade and lingered a while. We marveled at our new view of the Wenatchee River raging through Tumwater Canyon, a stark contrast to the lazy version flowing through town. Waterfalls blazed white on the far reaches of the ridge and carved their way down to the river in impressive ribbons. We all agreed that it seemed early for the amount of snow melt happening already this year. We walked along the ridge through balsamroot to the overlook, Leavenworth spread out below, and asked someone to take our picture. We had sunglasses and hats on, full of mosquito bites and sweat. Ah, it felt like summer.

I wanted to share the discussion questions I came up with for Adventure Grapes, you can see them here. I would love to hear your thoughts on the book. It is one of my favorites and brings up so may fascinating questions about our relationship with wild animals. We can’t possibly know what goes on in an animal’s mind, but I know that we are not the first animals to think, remember, love, and see beauty and we should treat them accordingly. As Robin Wall Kimmerer says in her book, Braiding Sweetgrass, we have so much to learn from these species who have been on the earth much longer than us.

The life of an animal lies outside of conjecture. It is far beyond the scientific papers and the campfire stories. It is as true as breath. It is important as the words of children.

 

The Animal Dialogues by Craig Childs

 

Book Ends
Book Club

Skywoman Falling

She fell like a maple seed, pirouetting on an autumn breeze.

I put my hand on my heart, my shoulders relaxed, and took a deep breath. This simple opening sentence to Braiding Sweetgrass invited me in like an old friend or favorite relative. Robin Wall Kimmerer unfolds the origin story like a warm blanket. The woman falls from the sky until she is caught on the wings of geese. They carried her downward until they could no longer hold her above the water that encompassed the earth. Other animals rose to help her: otters, beavers, fish, and a great turtle offered its back to rest on. The others, understanding that she needed land to live on, dove to the bottom of the sea to find land for her. Many tried and failed until a little muskrat gave it a go and after a long while returned with a small handful of mud. The mud grew and grew as the woman gave her thanks for what the animals had done for her. Together they formed what was called Turtle Island.

I can’t help but wonder how the world would be different if we all were told this origin story.

Our book club camping weekend started out much less gracefully. The pirouetting skywoman would have been rudely blown off course if she was heading for the Columbia Gorge on this day. Laura and I stepped into the wind tunnel that would be our home for the next two nights with literally the highest sustaining wind speeds I think I’ve ever felt. We worked together to pitch the tent next to the fence-like structure that may otherwise seem out of place on a non-windy day and made perfect sense on a day like this. It helped. I told Laura the wind would surely die down. It did not. We took refuge in the tent as a few others arrived and even some rain came to keep us on our toes. We were in good company though, and talked books in the tent for awhile.

I wanted to see the shimmering threads that hold it all together. And I wanted to know why we love the world, why the most ordinary scrap of meadow can rock us back on our heels in awe.

The next morning I woke early in the morning. Now that I have a 1-year-old I have apparently (and very reluctantly) become a “morning person” and wake promptly at 5:55am and cannot go back to sleep for the life of me. So I got up and went for a drive up the Dalles Mountain Ranch road to see how the flowers were doing. I found fields of goldenrod and aster. Well, actually it was lupine and balsamroot, but it was the same gold and purple pair that Robin describes with an entire chapter in the book. Science makes these colors attractive to us, and more importantly to bees, so that they will more likely pollinate the flowers. I waded through the tall grass and sat on a rock. I noticed that next to me was a small indentation in the vegetation where the tall grass was laid flat, where another animal took refuge. I contemplated, like Robin, the purpose of beauty and I gave myself space and time. To be grateful. To ponder. To listen to the plants to hear what they had to say.

Beginning with where our feet first touch the earth, we send greetings and thanks to all members of the natural world.

After returning to the group, we headed to the Columbia Hills State Park’s pictograph tour. The wind had calmed down a little bit (thankfully!) and we met more members of our group near some petroglyphs on display. The petroglyphs were carved into the rock by an ancient people about a mile from where we stood in a cave that had been flooded when the Dalles Dam was constructed in 1957. One of many dams of the Columbia River, this is the one that also flooded the famous Celilo Falls, a series of fast-moving cascades through this area of the river. A guide led us to see pictographs, which in contrast to the petroglyphs, are painted onto the rock surface using pigments and dyes created from nearby natural materials. The pictographs vary in age from 300 to 1000 years old and have been preserved in their original locations. These were created by a different group than those that carved the petroglyphs. Our guide told us that the pictographs were most likely painted by young men who went off from the village (located near the river that is also now flooded) up into the hills on vision quests. They would sit in a spot on the rocks for days until they had a vision. They would then draw pictures of their visions which most often came to them as an animal. The animal that appeared to them would give them clues to their strengths. If they saw a skunk, they will be a good parent, if they saw an owl, they would be a good hunter.  We saw owls and bear-like faces, sometimes with zigzags emanating from the animal face. The zigs above the animal connected them to the spirit world, and the zags below grounded them to Mother Earth.

The main attraction here, though, is Tsagaglala, or She Who Watches. She was the chief of the nearby village when Coyote came. Coyote asked her what kind of chief she was and she replied that she taught her people to live well and build good houses. Coyote told her that change was coming to the village, some good and some bad. A new people would come and with them bring tools that you can’t even imagine. But they would also bring death and destruction and women would no longer be chiefs. The chief told Coyote that she wished she could watch over her people forever. Coyote, the trickster, then turned her to stone and said, “now you shall stay here forever, watching over your people and the river.” So surely she’s been watching.

Like Coyote predicted, she watched new people, the Europeans, come to the village and with them death and disease. Our guide told us that they don’t know much about the pictographs and petroglyphs simply because almost the entire tribe of people had been killed by disease. Tsagaglala has also watched the construction of the railroad and later the dams that would flood her beloved people’s homes and history. Our guide was there when the dam flattened the falls in 1957. He was just a boy, but he remembers standing next to the tribal elders as they watched and shed tears.

A major theme of the book is gratitude and I could not have been more grateful for the group we had at Columbia Hills. It was our biggest group outing yet and these women (and one brave and wonderful and kind man) made my heart melt with joy. Each and every person in the group was a badass in their own way and inspired the crap out of me. Some came all the way from Bend, Oregon, some woke in the wee hours of the morning to drive hours and hours to get there on time for the pictograph tour. Some are moms, some are not, some in their twenties, others in their fifties and anywhere in between. We came from many different backgrounds and we all got along so well. You could say we were each a unique strand of sweetgrass that weaved into the perfect basket.

While reading the chapter where Robin describes her youngest daughter leaving for college and her cousin leaving eighteen thoughtful gifts to help her transition to her new life without kids in the house, I cried. It was such a beautiful gesture and I could only hope to have such a thoughtful friend when that time comes for me. I know I have like 16 and 1/2 years to go, but when one of our members brought me a small beautifully woven basket she made and said it was for me, I couldn’t help but think of that story as tears welled in my eyes.

Today we have gathered and when we look upon the faces around us we see that the cycles of life continue. We have been given the duty to live in balance and harmony with each other and all living things. So now let us bring our minds together as one as we give greetings and thanks to each other as People. Now our minds are one.

On Saturday evening we wandered over to Horsethief Butte for a sunset hike. The short trail loops up onto the butte through balsamroot and boulders painted in lichen. Tall grass rustled in the wind at a comforting pitch. At the top, the way opens up into what I can only describe as a cathedral. Massive rocks surround a relatively flat area full of flowers. I immediately felt like I was in a very special place. As we investigated more, we found an area of fallen rocks blocked off with a sign. The sign said that these rocks were not to be disturbed. They must have been special in some way. Maybe they were part of an ancient pictograph? I stood in silence and felt the urge to speak only in whispers. Our group split up and half of us climbed up one side and the rest climbed to the other side as the sun spilled it’s glow on us. We waved to our friends on the other side, silhouetted in the last of the day’s sun rays.

The next morning we headed to the Dalles Mountain Ranch for the grand finale of the trip. Part of the Columbia Hills, the Dalles Mountain Ranch is a large swath of land up in the hills above the Columbia River. The ranch dates back to 1866 with several owners until it was sold to the DNR in 1993. The most interesting thing about the park is the number of deciduous trees despite the arid landscape. The trees were actually planted in response to the Timber Culture Act of 1873 which gave homesteaders an extra 160 acres of land if they planted at least 40 acres with trees. The idea was that trees would bring rain to the area. Of course, this didn’t really work and the idea was later abandoned.

The ranch is still home to lots of deciduous trees and countless numbers of wildflowers. Arrowhead balsamroot and lupine dominated the landscape but there was also phlox, prairie star, desert parsley and countless others. We hiked a loop through the park and ooo’d and aww’d at the views. Mt Hood never quite revealed her full self, but once in a while we’d get a little glimpse of her.

At the end of the hike we said our goodbyes and gave each other hugs. I was a little sad that this amazing weekend was coming to an end, but I was also incredibly happy. We were mostly strangers in the beginning of the weekend and now we left as friends. Robin talks a lot about reciprocity in the book, if you take care of the earth, it will take care of you. This weekend, I’ve learned that this also applies when it comes to friendships. When you are willing to get out of your comfort zone and open up to others, wonderful friendships will blossom.

We are showered every day with gifts, but they are not meant for us to keep. Their life is in their movement, the inhale and exhale of our shared breath. Our work and our joy is to pass along the gift and to trust that what we put into the universe will always come back.

Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

 

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Outdoor Life

We Hike To Heal

We watched them take off, one by one. Air filled the thin sheets of fabric transforming them into birds. A group of mostly strangers, we collectively held our breath as the paragliders ran off the side of the mountain, into the unknown.

It was March 30th, and women all over the world were taking to the trails for the 2018 #wehiketoheal empowerment and wellness campaign. Our local WA grassroots branch of the Outdoor Women’s Alliance held a group hike to Poo Poo Point, a popular paragliding location near Seattle, to participate in the movement. I think it’s safe to say that it was a powerful, moving, and ultimately healing event for our little group. It’s wonderful to know that we shared this experience with so many others at the same time. I soaked up inspiration from these women and had so many great takeaways. Here are a few.

Give Yourself Permission

We started the hike by setting an intention. We literally wrote permission slips to ourselves allowing us to enjoy our hike with no judgement of ourselves, to be at peace, to breathe, and to be in the moment. The words in my head along with the stress of week gathered on the page and stayed there. I put it all in my pocket, and out of my head, for the day.

 

Sometimes You Just Have to Jump

While we watched the paragliders run down a small strip of turf that disappeared into the sky, I noticed how they ran without hesitation, without turning back. I imagine they don’t think about what they are doing too much as they run. Just commit and go. One foot after the other. We discovered in our group discussion that we often find more success in accomplishing goals this way. There is something about just going for it and not having a plan with expectations, that is freeing. One woman in our group lost nearly 100 pounds by simply deciding to go for a hike to Wallace Falls one day. She let go of the voices in her head telling her she couldn’t do it and she just went for it, one step at a time. Once she proved to herself that she could do it, she was unstoppable. After just a few years of being on this journey, she has hiked all over and is now training to climb Mount Rainier. We are capable of so much more than we know.

Embrace Your Vulnerability

I wasn’t surprised that Brene Brown came up a lot during our hike and discussion. And for good reason. We reminded ourselves that its okay to be vulnerable. Its okay to ask for help. It’s okay to let go of perfection. We reminded ourselves to watch our self talk. Would you talk to your best friend the way you talk to yourself? Keep it in perspective. All things that Brene Brown tells us, all things we should tell ourselves everyday.

 

The Outdoors is the Great Equalizer

The cedars don’t care if you’re pretty or skinny. The granite doesn’t care about your political or religious views. The lupine don’t want to hear about your job and accomplishments. The sky doesn’t care about the color of your skin. In the outdoors, we are all equal. This is why the outdoors is so healing. It is elemental to our being. In the outdoors we are free of everyday distractions, phones, media. We can simply be.

Healing is a Journey

Our hike leader, Bethany, is a self-described Loss Momma. She lost her daughter on the day she was born to a terminal condition. She is passionate about the outdoors and finds healing in the forests and mountains. I admire the crap out of her and her ability to share her story so generously and openly, simply so that others may know that they are not alone. Remember that everyone you see on the trails, everyone in the perfect Instagram photos, every woman on the cover of a magazine, has their struggles. We all have struggles. You are not alone.

Learn more about Bethany and her journey of healing on her blog All The Passion Strings. She also runs a Facebook group called Hiking to Heal.

 

Nature, Love, Medicine: Essays on Wildness and Wellness

This compilation of essays written by an intriguing group of writers, artists and scientists, pulls together insightful thoughts and theories on the healing powers of nature. Robin Wall Kimmerer, a botanist with Native American heritage, writes about the literal healing properties of medicinal plants while Lauret Savoy writes about going to the mountains to escape the racism of the city. Some speak of spending time in the outdoors as a means of physical healing, others speak to ways that we can return the favor and heal the Earth. All of the essays speak to a deeper sense of being and belonging in the natural world.

Book Club

The Messy Business of Reclamation

This month we hiked along a river reclaimed. Just a few decades ago, the Middle Fork Snoqualmie River was a dumping ground for all things expensive to dispose of: old campers, cars, trucks, construction materials, appliances, tires, etc. That changed when a community-wide effort launched to clean up the area and restore it to its natural state in the late 1990’s. A coalition of volunteers spent years cleaning up the valley and looking out into the crystal clear water today, you would have no idea of its storied past.

It’s hard to argue that these extraordinary efforts were not worthwhile. But, as we learned in our March book selection, Reclaimers, reclamation is not always so black and white as good or bad, beneficial or detrimental. Even the definition of the word is not entirely clear and seemingly contradictory.

Reclaim:

1. to recall from wrong or improper conduct

2. to rescue from an undesirable state; also: to restore to a previous natural state <reclaim mining sites> b: to make available for human use by changing natural conditions <reclaim swampland>

How can reclamation mean both restoring to a natural state and to make available for human use at the same time? And what does improper conduct and undesirable state really mean? Ana Maria Spagna went looking for these answers by traveling back and forth, up and down the west coast from Seattle to northern California in her aging Buick. She met some incredible people (mostly women) who were fighting long, hard battles to reclaim just a little bit of land that nourished their people for thousands of years. These were the Timbisha Shoshone whose ancestral land was in the middle of Death Valley National Park, and the Mountain Maidu who reclaimed the sacred Humbug Valley near Mt Shasta from a large energy company.

Where is the moral high ground? And who decides? Judgments cycle. Fire is bad, fire is good. Predators are bad, predators are good. And with the judgments, so go our actions: Put out fires, start prescribed fires. Eliminate predators, reintroduce predators. Like Sisyphus on a hamster wheel.

Much of the book is also focused on rivers and dams. Recently, there has been much effort taken to remove dams that are not useful or are harmful to fish, such as on the White Salmon river and the Elwha River. But is it always best to remove the dams? My gut reaction is to say yes, but as I learned from this book, the best solution is far from clear. Ana describes this dilemma as hammering a nail into a tree and then pulling it out. The hole is still there. With dam removal comes careful monitoring to get the right amount of sediment and the proper reintroduction of fish. There is so much focus and energy spent on how to perfect the conditions to return to some original state. Is it possible to think we could just make the dams better for fish?

…the lesson I kept relearning about reclaiming is that it’s not about what we’ve lost, how to retrieve or re-create it, but how best to move forward.

It’s not about what we’ve lost, but how best to move forward. This quote is what will stick with me most from the book. We must get away from the ideals of “returning” land to untouched, pristine wilderness. These romantic notions are naive and it devalues the contributions and knowledge of the Native American people. Rather, we should learn from them and take note of their traditional land management practices that sustained people for thousands of years without depleting or destroying natural resources. And then, with much debate and thought, maybe we can work together to find better solutions.

I would love to hear your thoughts about the book and the idea of reclamation. Have you, like me, struggled to find a balanced opinion regarding these issues? Do you agree with Ana’s conclusions in the book?

 

Reclaimers by Ana Maria Spagna

 

Book Ends

Book Club

H is for Hawk, E is for Eagle Owl

Our February book club outing got us up close and personal with the subject of the month’s book, H is for Hawk. We met John the Falconer, who introduced us to a Saker Falcon named Benedict and an Eagle Owl named Lady Bird. John ushered us inside to gather around the fireplace while he brought out Benny and talked about the history of falconry and how it works. Looking at Benny, I couldn’t help but think of Helen’s description of her Goshawk, Mabel.

In the half-light through the drawn curtains she sits on her perch, relaxed, hooded, extraordinary. Formidable talons, wicked, curved black beak, sleek, cafe-au-lait front streaked thickly with cocoa-coloured teardrops, looking for all the world like some cappuccino samurai.

 

Falconry is an ancient sport that dates back to 2000 BC. It was popular in the Middle East and Mongolian Empire as well as in Europe, where it is most associated with medieval times. While falcons were used for hunting, they were mostly a status symbol. Only the elite classes had the time and money to spend on training their birds. As Helen Macdonald writes in H is for Hawk, falconry takes an abundance of time and patience.

photo by Laura Norsen

One of my favorite parts of the book was learning all the vocabulary that goes along with falconry. Helen is an austringer since she flies a hawk, not a falcon. And I was holding Benny who is a tiercel, or a male hawk, that was 1/3 smaller than the female hawk. John showed us the equipment- anklets, jesses, and hoods.

As a child I’d cleaved to falconry’s disconcertingly complex vocabulary. In my old books every part of the hawk was named: wings were sails, claws pounces, tail a train… Hawks don’t wipe their beaks, they feak. When they defecate they mute.

John especially wanted us to know about the dangers for these beautiful birds. Toxins like DDT almost wiped out the population of many birds including peregrine falcons which became an endangered species and led to the first captive breeding of the species in the 1970’s. In some countries, falcons and hawks are still seen as a status symbol which makes them valuable on the black market and vulnerable to trafficking. Captive breeding has become more prevalent in these areas which reduces the stress on the wild populations.

After we learned all about Benny, John brought out the most magnificent bird I’ve ever seen, an Eagle Owl named Lady Bird. She is truly massive, weighing about 5 pounds with a layer of feathers 2 inches deep. Her furry talons and sharp beak were intimidating, but John showed us how to rub her feathers between her eyes which she enjoyed.

After a windy and rainy morning, the clouds broke for some sunshine. I tore myself away from Lady Bird to meet up with some other members for a walk at Seward Park. The others stayed and got to meet some other birds and even fly them. John was wonderfully generous with his time and really has a deep love for his birds.

H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald

 

Book Ends

 

Book Club

Hygge Snowshoe

We kicked off the Alpine Trails Book Club 2018 season with the coziest of all book club meetups. The day started with a snowshoe to Gold Creek Pond where we encountered a nice little blizzard. Big, heavy flakes covered our hoods and packs and blew sideways across the lake, obscuring the mountain views. Tree limbs glowed white against the dark of dense forest and the blue depths of the pond provided the only color besides our rainbow of puffy jackets and packs. We all smiled with glee, snowflakes on our noses and lashes as we kept moving to stay warm.

Our co-leader Laura was gracious enough to invite us to her family’s adorable A-frame cabin for lunch. We ended up arriving early so we munched on Scandinavian inspired snacks like cheese and smoked salmon, Pulla (a braided cardamom bread) and sipped hot tea. We made ourselves comfy and sat in front of the wood stove to discuss the book and hygge.

The best way I can think of to describe hygge is to tell you about one of my favorite memories growing up in Pennsylvania. I loved when it snowed and my sisters and I would sled all day and then make hot chocolate (the Swiss Miss kind that comes in a packet with the little itty bitty marshmallows) and buttered toast (with good old-fashioned white bread). We would turn the light on outside the sliding glass door, dip our toast in the cocoa, and watch the snow fall. I still crave hot chocolate and toast when it snows. That feeling of warmth, love, and safety is the essence of hygge.

Meik Wiking lays out his Hygge Manifesto in our January book selection, The Little Book of Hygge. These 10 pillars just so happen to align perfectly with the goals of our book club. Here they are, slightly altered into the Alpine Trails Book Club Manifesto:

Atmosphere: Surround yourself with beauty
Presence: Be here now
Pleasure: Enjoy a treat without guilt
Equality: Everyone has a voice
Gratitude: Take it all in
Harmony: It’s not a competition, we already like you
Comfort: Take a break to relax
Truce: No drama, no politics
Togetherness: Build relationships
Shelter: This is your place of security

We spent hours sitting in the warmth of the cabin chatting and getting to know each other. We ate some more; pumpkin soup, spicy cranberry meatballs, and chocolate cake before heading back out into the snow. It was a lovely day that encompassed all aspects of hygge, and the intentions of our book club. We started the day as mostly strangers and ended as friends.

The Little Book of Hygge by Meik Wiking

 

Book Ends

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