"...in solitude, or in that deserted state when we are surrounded by human beings and yet they sympathise not with us, we love the flowers, the grass and the waters and the sky. In the motion of the very leaves of spring in the blue air there is then found a secret correspondence with our heart."

                                                                                                 —Shelley, On Love

Another two weeks, another Ramble. This is the epigraph that opens Upstream, Mary Oliver's collection of essays, and it struck me so deeply when I was thinking about how my attention has turned to the land during the last few challenging weeks at home. I'm glad I dug it up to compensate for completely failing to recite it from memory on my walk.

A selection of things I mentioned or said I'd link to in this Ramble, in roughly chronological order:

• Burnout by Emily and Amelia Nagoski (wonderful NPR interview about it here)
• 1000 Words of Summer newsletter archives (the current iteration of the project is now hosted on Substack)
• Cartoonist and fellow Wayward retreater Katie Wheeler 
• Recreating the infamous naked-on-a-table-eating-cake photo from my second birthday (in honor of turning 30)
• Shing Yin Khor and the Space Gnome Mercantile trading program (cartoonist and trusted trader Maia Kobabe has a good photo of the items on offer)
• Generative comics via  By the Bones (read this interview to learn more about how it started)
• The Alveare Collective's risk-taking workshop
• My glowing 2010 postmortem after attending a summer workshop at the Center for Cartoon Studies
• Cornish Fellowship at CCS 
• The Art of Asking 

I've been itching to record a new one of these for the last few days, so I'm very glad I found the time tonight. Right after I finished, on the way back to the car, I found a nest containing three adolescent birds. Magical.

I really like this practice. I hope you do too.

xo

L