Seasons of the Soul

A curious thing happened the summer just passed. It started with the finding of one curly yellow feather on the land at home - a cockatoo crest feather! Then my partner found another - a coincidence? Then 10 year old Nadia found two more in the neighbourhood. A pattern. Within a few weeks, our family collected eight! We wove them into a birds nest onto our seasonal altar. And started asking questions. 

Is this molting season for the sulphur-crested cockatoo? Do they always shed crest feathers this time of year? Are they stressed in the long dry of this Biderap season? Or is something else going on? Questions led to more questions. I surfed a new curiosity wave (a bit like falling in love) and committed to starting a family Nature Journal, to track better the seasonal indicators in our new 'hood.   

Tracking the seasons. My mate Andrew Turbill on the mid north coast of NSW registers that it's no longer winter when the rose robin calls in the rainforest canopy sometime in August. My neighbour Bill Pheasant heard the masked lapwings calling from bed last week for the first time this year, signalling their return for winter. The swift parrots have been sited in Melbourne, like most migratory birds, returning to the same hollows and foraging areas each year. The saffron milkcap mushrooms have been waiting for the first soaking rains to pop up. 

Seasons shift not to a calendar date but when patterns shift in the landscape. Imagine the sense of belonging when tracking home like this.

I meet people who want to have mystical and deep experiences in nature but haven’t taken the time to develop ecological literacy. Just like human kin, the other-than-human takes time to reveal themselves. Ecological awareness includes knowledge of the particular beings of a place and the relationships between the beings, the geology, the water shed, the weather patterns, the creatures who might have been eradicated from that place and so on. And it includes seasons and seasonal indicators. We don’t need to be experts, just curious to know the land. 

Turning Ground, a pioneering Melbourne organisation dedicated to cultural change is hosting a series of events called Seasons of the Soul, to honour both the inner and outer seasonal shifts throughout the year. The inaugural event is coming up this Saturday (26th) and I’ll be reflecting on inner and outer seasonality as part of the evening. 

What are you noticing about seasonal change? Let me know, I’m curious! 

Wildly, 

Claire 

P.S This winter I’m offering a Women, Earth and Soul online course in collaboration with Animas Valley Institute guide Rebecca Wildbear. See below for more details. 

P.P.S I had a spirited conversation with elder and neighbour Jane Ormonde as part of the annual Equinox Talk for the Centre for a Compassionate Society a couple of weeks ago. You can Listen to the recording here.