The surprise Saturday snow has melted faster than we expected, so, by the time we got to the sledding hill near the school it was mostly grass and dirt with some wet sticky snow in shady places. The kids still had fun.

The kids asked for video games and I said yes easily, because I was desperate to get out of the house while it was still sunny outside. The two Sunday traditions I love most are morning crêpes and afternoon walk around the national park. I’ve been in the park hundreds of times and it’s not even this big, but still it manages to surprise me. It’s surprises are come in all shapes and sizes: colourful mushrooms (so far, I have managed to identify about two or three dozen species), garter snakes, a concert of bullfrogs in the early summer, rare flowers in spring, a symphony of colours in the fall. Today, as I was walking downhill towards the exit of the park, I was arrested by the view of a tiny frozen waterfall. It looked like a little sanctuary.

I am thinking a lot now about natural processes and deep time, about the fact that almost all living species are older than us, better adapted and more attuned to their environment. About the fact that nature has it’s own history – it is cyclical, always old, always new. About the fact that at that very time the sun is warming the bark of the trees and the roots start releasing the sap that runs up the trunk of a tree, waking up its cells that will soon produce the wonder of fresh leaves. Although invisible, spring is already happening.

I used to go to church on Sunday. I knew so many churches over the years. Of all of them, my favourite was the Orthodox church, where I could experience the mysteries, things bigger than me without even trying to understand them. Unlike protestant churches of my youth, the Orthodox rite did not require my active participation – just being there was enough. Now I go to the forest on Sunday and it feels similar to what I used experience in church. I go to the forest, because it is bigger than me, because I can tap into an ancient, benevolent power, because I feel accepted, because I don’t feel lonely there, because I can rest. I go to the forest like I used to go to the church, but with more lightness in my step. I go there to worship.