One with Nature
Lessons from My Great-Grandmother
My great-grandmother was from Cherokee heritage and a Quaker by belief. She was a quiet woman that had endured much loss, outliving her husband and all but two of her children. She didn’t like girls, she told me. Boys were worth more in a family. Yet she fascinated me with her ways. I don’t think she knew the meaning of “vacation”, as her hands were always busy, in spite of severe Parkinson’s. She crocheted beautiful lacework, with hands that shook so badly she couldn’t hold a glass of water. I watched her, listened to her, and learned without meaning to and without her knowledge.
Animals were her friends. As she pulled her apron together to gather eggs she was quietly talking to her hens, and thanked them for their yield. In the winter she’d clip greens and take to them. Even when she had to kill a hen for food, she did it without stress, and she loved them for their gift to the family. She often found wounded wildlife, some at the hands of her own sons, which she would bring in and nurse back to health. I remember the biggest owl I’d ever seen, and he had a broken wing. He recuperated in a pen out back. She fed him chunks of whatever we were eating, always speaking to him in a soft, calm voice.
One day she let him go. There was the little bobcat kitten that lived in the barn. Maw was the only one who could get close to it, again talking softly. She told us that he would come and sit with the other barn cats while she milked Old Jerze. The first quart of foamy warm milk went to the cats, including him. One day a neighbor killed the half-grown kitten because he was a bobcat…no other reason. Every caterpillar, spider, bird, or whatever lifeform happened to need her, was always cared for and released with respect. I learned….and she never said a word to me in the way of instruction. This was from her Native ancestry…she just “knew”. Was she this way with the land? Indeed!
Do you know some “wise ones”, farmers of the land, keepers of the bees, who have a special connection with the earth? We’ve overlooked these obscure people in our haste to chase the “big names”, the ones who’ve become the “rock stars” of regenerative ag. I don’t know but I’d be willing to wager that we all have some of the best soil-health knowledge right on our own back doors, if we’re willing to look, and I’ll bet their roots are that of the Native people. You don’t have to go across the country to find wisdom of the “old ones”, the ones who have always been in touch with Nature.
Maw had her own garden space. She’d go out early, always dressed the same; a sunbonnet, apron with big pockets, ankle-length dress, all which were homemade, and an ancient pair of boots with a hole cut out at the side of her big toe to make room for her swollen bunions. She tucked her well-worn hoe under her arm, and slow-but-sure, she made it to her “truck patch”.
She worked the ground carefully, noticed everything, talked under her breath to herself, and remembered what she’d need to bring tomorrow for an ailing plant. You might find her scouring the edges of the woods, looking for certain plants to use for poultices or tinctures, or maybe early wild greens for dinner. She knew the way of Nature around her, and she respected and loved all of it. I’m not sure how many generations back that her Native American heritage went, but she somehow “knew”.
Her life symbolizes patience, observation, respect, and appreciation for the earth, which provided what she and her family needed. This indigenous “knowing” is on every continent, if we look. This is what we’ve lost. This is what we need to become students of. Regenerative agriculture, in my book, isn’t just about financial gain. It’s about working with Nature, and learning from those who deeply, intuitively know Nature, to heal our soil…and maybe in the process we’ll heal ourselves.
By the way, Maw lived to be just past 100, worked outside in her flowers and garden everyday she could, and her mind was clear until about a year before she passed.
By Betsey Sorrell
