Earth Emotions

I’m here to tell you, baby, your Eutierria is strong

Note: Dan Szczesny is an award-winning New Hampshire journalist, author, and speaker. His latest work, The White Mountain, along with all other things Dan can be found at his website here. For the month of November, Dan is publishing “live essays,” such as this one, on his Facebook feed. We are grateful for his permission to reprint some of these essays here at Monadnock Underground over the next few weeks. You can find the original post, from November 3, here. — CJD

We are deep into our hike up South Pawtuckaway Mountain — no longer summer and not yet quite fall — when you pause in mid stride, bend over and rummage through a pile of leaves, branches and stones. I pause, as I always do when you get some notion into your head, and watch you work.

We are nearing the conclusion of our fire tower quest — hiking a series of short, friendly hikes all of which lead to an active fire tower. The quest has given us a chance to explore our state, learn a little history and get you moving on trails. You’ve begun to turn into what I hope will be a life long hiker. The fact that there is a cool tower that we can climb and picnic on at the end of these hikes is a bonus.

I’ve also had to relearn a lesson from my time hiking with my other daughter, Janelle. Slow down. Everything here seems to fascinate you. Every tiny stone, flower, bent branch, mud, footstep, frog; every other hiker, every dog, the clouds themselves, the sound of wind. You ask me question after question, some of such depth that it never even occurred to me there would be a question.

“Why is the moon and the sun in the same sky?”

“How much water does a frog drink?”

“How many trees are there?”

I don’t know, baby, jeez! I make a list as we go and we look these things up later. As I usually do when in nature with a child, I feel woefully, deeply clueless. But the day is mild, my pack is thick with snacks and I don’t have to have all the answers right this moment.

“Look daddy!’ you squeal.

The treasure you found turns out to be a thin strip of birch bark, nearly a perfect U shape and you have placed it on the top of your head like a hair band. My first reaction, I’m embarrassed to say, is to grab it off the top of your head. “Ugh, no that’s dirty!”

Two things happen then. First, you begin to tear up, your mean dumb father having deprived you of your moment of Earth connection. Second, the ghost of Thoreau shows up and punches me in the arm.

But ticks! But mold! ‘Nope, nope,’ says ghost Thoreau, ‘give her back her tree bark before the moment passes.’

So, I do. “I’m sorry, honey, I just got worried that there might be bugs or something. Just check for bugs ok?”

You stare at me.

“Just, look, make sure it’s clean because…”

More stares…

I sigh. “Here’s your bark hat, baby, it looks beautiful.”

And it does. You tuck the ends behind your ear and flakes of bark and dirt scatter deep into your hair and it’s filthy, but you smile and the forest seems to bend toward you in approval. You wear that thing for an hour.

The environmental philosopher Glenn Albrecht developed a language by which to approach natural connection, and a specific word for what you’re doing, baby. He calls it Eutierria, meaning feelings of good and positive connection to the Earth and its life force. The word is assembled from the Greek prefix Good and the root Earth.

And I’m here to tell you, baby, your Eutierria is strong.

Beside the birch head band, emboldened by my allowances, you collect a branch you say looks like the letter Y, a handful of bird berries you wish to feed the birds at the tower and several colorful stones you insist are jewels. By the time we get to the top, you are filthy, your hair a tangle web, your hands and face streaked with mud. And one last indignity — we discover a hornet next along the stairs leading up the tower. We can’t climb.

So, we spread out our picnic near the trail entrance to the summit and you take it upon yourself to warn approaching hikers of the deadly stinging insects. “Excuse me,” you exclaim to hikers, startled to discover a miniature ranger at the top, “but you can’t go up the tower, there’s hornets up there!”

No one questions your information. Every single person nods solemnly, takes you seriously. One couple, dressed in leather biker gear, huffing and puffing from the hike, asks you to show them.

“I can’t see too well little lady,” the man with the bushy beard says. “Can you show me the hornets?”

I watch you walk over to the tower and point. “Well I’ll be,” says the man. “Thank you! You may have saved me from getting stung!”

You wander back. “Daddy, I saved that man!”

“I heard, baby! Good job!”

The day melts on. We eat all our carrots, strawberries, crackers and a brownie I smuggled in. A boy scout troop comes and goes, and you make sure they know about the hornets. You pet dogs. And in time, a grasshopper alights on your shoulder and you show remarkable restraint in letting him be. You’re rewarded with its company for 10 minutes; you, a grasshopper whisperer.

In the end, we are the first ones up, and the last ones down. As the bearded biker dude was leaving the summit, you waved and said, “See you later.”

“Hope so!” he said.

Now, it feels like we’re the last hikers off the mountain. We may have eaten all the food, but my pack is heavy with twigs and bark. And sure enough, as we reach the parking lot, we come upon the bearded biker, just getting into his car to leave.

He calls you over and kneels down to eye level. “See,” he says, “told ya I’d see you again!”

You laugh, and the woods echo, and for some reason you reach down and pluck a twig off the road and hand it to him.

“A gift?” You nod. “I’ll cherish this!” he says.

And the Eutierria draws us together; the woods and the birch and the buzzing hornets above. We are all children.