@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

nathanlovestrees

@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social

Someone once told me I'm too sincere to be funny.

Full-time caregiver to a disabled brother and father interested mainly in Thoreau, Zhuangzi, animism, Kings of Convenience, and drinking tea.

Master's degrees in music theory and theology (nonpracticing), classically trained and folk musician (also nonpracticing), and I once organized and helped plant over 800 trees on abandoned mine land (I do still plant trees occasionally).

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

nash, to random
@nash@labyrinth.social avatar

you paid 40 thousand dollars? for a warhammer??

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@nash everything’s a warnail when you only have a warhammer

nathanlovestrees, to random
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

the wind is fragrant

nathanlovestrees, to random
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

Now I want to edit a collection of Thoreau’s most sensual and romantic writings

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@ira someone else? later?? hahaha

nathanlovestrees, to random
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

Thoreau lived in the Emerson household twice in his life (I think). After leaving the Emerson household for the first time to live on Staten Island in 1843 he wrote a letter to Lidian Emerson: "The thought of you will constantly elevate my life... It will be something always above the horizon to behold, as when I look up at the evening star. I think I know your thoughts without seeing you, and as well here as in Concord. You are not at all strange to me."

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

Reading those words reminded me how much Thoreau-as-lover influenced me. Thoreau is perhaps an underappreciated romance writer! Some of the most romantic, passionate, and sensual things I've read were written by Thoreau. But what is most striking to me about this segment of the letter is when he says of Lidian, "you are not at all strange to me." I was immediately reminded of the famous contact passage in Ktaadn:

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

"What is it to be admitted to a museum, to see a myriad of particular things, compared with being shown some star's surface, some hard matter in its home! I stand in awe of my body, this matter to which I am bound has become so strange to me. I fear not spirits, ghosts, of which I am one,—that my body might,—but I fear bodies, I tremble to meet them."

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

Interestingly, in 1849--after his trip to Maine--he wrote in his journal about Lidian (well, there's evidence to suggest it is about Lidian though it doesn't explicitly say): "I know her in spirit and in truth. I can more heartily meet her when our bodies are away. I see her without the veil of the body... When I love you I feel as if I were annexing another world to mine. We splice the heavens.. Whose breath is as gentle and salubrious as a zephyr's whisper. Whom I know as an atmosphere..."

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

I want to spend some more time with this (just made these connections this morning) but I feel like there is something significant here...

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@toridas_ yes!!!! I have been thinking about Thoreau as a Dionysian figure lately. It would be really cool to try to read the Thoreau/Waldo/Lidian triangle alongside the Dionysus/Theseus/Ariadne triangle…

farah, to random
@farah@beige.party avatar

Adding ‘Stay weird’ to ‘Be gay. Do crimes’ motto

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@farah Stay gay. Do weird crimes.

nathanlovestrees, to random
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

Had kind of a realization tonight, probably obvious to everyone else but… I was thinking about how I’ve said to my son when he’s upset about, say, having to leave a friend or family member he loves being around, that it is hard but good to care about people and that the hurt and sadness are ultimately good because it means you care and love them.

And then I was thinking about why being a caregiver is hard and how we’re taught to avoid the feelings that mean you love and care…

nathanlovestrees, to random
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

mighty morphology power rangers

owl, to random
@owl@u8.is avatar

pond life pond wife

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@owl happy wife, happy pond

nathanlovestrees, to random
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

now is the summer of our content

nathanlovestrees, to random
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

take a chill pill bug

iraantlers, to random
@iraantlers@mastodon.online avatar

“With its circle of warmth, the fireplace had once been the center of family life. It’s dancing light, smoky smells, and a warm crackling created an ambience that made a house more a home. And the traditions around the hearth stretched back through the ages, connecting each house to deep cultural roots. How might the solar house incorporate some of the richness of the hearth? What were the qualities of the hearth that made it so wonderful and beloved?” (1/2)

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@iraantlers 1/4 “There is a slumbering subterranean fire in nature which never goes out, and which no cold can chill. It finally melts the great snow, and in January or July is only buried under a thicker or thinner covering. In the coldest day it flows somewhere, and the snow melts around every tree. This field of winter rye, which sprouted late in the fall, and now speedily dissolves the snow, is where the fire is very thinly covered. We feel warmed by it.

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@iraantlers 2/4 In the winter, warmth stands for all virtue, and we resort in thought to a trickling rill, with its bare stones shining in the sun, and to warm springs in the woods, with as much eagerness as rabbits and robins. The steam which rises from swamps and pools is as dear and domestic as that of our own kettle. What fire could ever equal the sunshine of a winter's day, when the meadow mice come out by the wall-sides, and the chickadee lisps in the defiles of the wood?

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@iraantlers 3/4 The warmth comes directly from the sun, and is not radiated from the earth, as in summer; and when we feel his beams on our backs as we are treading some snowy dell, we are grateful as for a special kindness, and bless the sun which has followed us into that by-place.

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@iraantlers 4/4 This subterranean fire has its altar in each man's breast; for in the coldest day, and on the bleakest hill, the traveler cherishes a warmer fire within the folds of his cloak than is kindled on any hearth. A healthy man, indeed, is the complement of the seasons, and in winter, summer is in his heart. There is the south. Thither have all birds and insects migrated, and around the warm springs in his breast are gathered the robin and the lark.”

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@iraantlers from an essay called A Winter Walk https://archive.vcu.edu/english/engweb/transcendentalism/authors/thoreau/winterwalk.html

redoak, to random
@redoak@social.coop avatar

The exhausting ordeal of taking my children to do 1 (one) activity out in the world

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@redoak I only have one but I feel this in my sore and aching bones

nathanlovestrees, to random
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

a mind of one’s own

nathanlovestrees,
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

@iraantlers the rooms have minds

nathanlovestrees, to random
@nathanlovestrees@disabled.social avatar

Feeling vindicated somewhat… Finished the introduction to Father Time (I’m a slow reader and am busy caring for people) and it’s basically the argument I made in my masters thesis in 2018. From Hrdy: “men exposed to cues from babies tend to be more other-regarding and generous. Might baby-exposed men also come to prioritize the well-being of children—and the planet—above their own social status… Men first needed to be able to imagine themselves as nurturers as well as protectors and providers.”

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