Dear Curiosity Journal,
On Saturday, I traveled to the Kettle Moraine State Forest with my friends and Driftless Curiosity collaborators, Colleen and Arielle, representing their organizations, Nature’s Good Company (Collen) and Unlimited Boundaries (Arielle) for the DNR OutWiGo Green event, a day of adventure, learning and celebrating in the outdoors. Colleen, who is also a Driftless Curiosity board member, led 3 mindful outdoor experiences which invited people to notice and connect to their kinship with the natural world and it was so inspiring to hear the positive feedback from participants. Arielle shared information and spoke with visitors about our budding collaboration to host teams of changemakers on land to help grow their capacity for innovation. I love to see the twinkle in the eyes of others who connect to this idea. In honor of this year’s green theme, I shared a variety of wild and cultivated edible greens for visitors to try and was pleasantly surprised by people’s curiosity and the many meaningful conversations which emerged over a simple taste testing. Passersby popped impromptu quizzes on themselves, guessing at the varieties before them. Elders knowingly pointed out familiarities, children sensed into first time nibbles, and teenagers took brave bites of spicy mustard (which they regretted about 5 seconds into mastication). I observed diverse cultures drawn to particular greens which made them light up with a memory and a story of home and family. I felt honored to engage in such direct and genuine connection with strangers. For the second day in a row, I presented under a drizzling sky with a radically pro-rain attitude. I noticed we were the only table without a pop-up tent and professed to love the rain as the greens do when folks gave me a worried look. I hope that my radiating kinship with rain intrigues others to embrace Mother Nature in all of Her expressions and have observed some subtle and encouraging shifts.
~Joy