For The Wild - TERRY TEMPEST WILLIAMS on Sacred Rage and the Battle for Public Lands ⧸54

00:00:00.000 For the Wild podcast is listener-supported. Please go to forthewild.world to make a donation

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00:00:30.000 Wishing for something the world is denying

00:00:34.160 Out in the wilderness somebody's crying

00:00:39.320 Somebody wishing for something to happen

00:00:52.620 Wishing to tell, wishing to help

00:00:56.040 Someone was listening, someone who cared

00:00:59.860 never despaired. Someone to lean on and someone to trust. Who needs your assistance and finds your

00:01:09.620 disguise?

00:01:19.480 Hello and welcome to For the Wild podcast. I'm Ayanna Young. Today we are speaking with Terry

00:01:26.220 Tempest Williams. Terry is an American author, conservationist, and activist. Williams' writing

00:01:32.940 is rooted in the American West and has been significantly influenced by the arid landscape

00:01:38.020 of her native Utah, in which she was raised. Her work ranges from issues of ecology and wilderness

00:01:44.280 preservation, to women's health, to exploring our relationship to culture and nature. She has

00:01:50.800 testified before Congress on women's health, committed acts of civil disobedience in the

00:01:55.840 years 1987 to 1992 in a protest against nuclear testing in the Nevada desert, and again in March

00:02:03.460 2003 in Washington, D.C. with Code Pink against the Iraq War. She has been a guest at the White

00:02:09.760 House, has camped in the remote regions of the Utah and Alaska wilderness, and has worked as

00:02:15.000 a barefoot artist in Rwanda. Williams is the author of Refuge, an unnatural history of family

00:02:21.120 in Place, An Unspoken Hunger, Stories from the Field, Desert Quartet, Leap, Red, Patience

00:02:29.800 and Passion in the Desert, and The Open Space of Democracy.

00:02:34.080 Her book, Finding Beauty in a Broken World, was published in 2008 by Pantheon Books.

00:02:39.200 In 2006, Williams received the Robert Marshall Award from the Wilderness Society, their highest

00:02:45.080 honor given to an American citizen.

00:02:47.700 She also received the Distinguished Achievement Award from the Western American Literature

00:02:51.720 Association and the Wallace Stegner Award given by the Center of the American West.

00:02:56.300 She is the recipient of a Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction and a John Simon Guggenheim

00:03:02.260 Fellowship in Creative Nonfiction, and a columnist for the magazine The Progressive.

00:03:07.820 Williams was featured in Ken Burns' PBS series The National Parks, America's Best Idea.

00:03:13.340 In 2011, she received the 18th International Peace Award given by the Community of Christ Church.

00:03:19.620 She divides her time between Wilson, Wyoming and Castle Valley, Utah, where her husband, Brooke, is field coordinator for the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance.

00:03:29.020 Wow, goodness. Thank you so much, Terri, for joining us today.

00:03:33.340 It's a pleasure, Ayanna. Thank you so much for having me.

00:03:36.760 Terri, I wanted to start off by again thanking you, but specifically for your work as an artist, a writer, and an activist, and how you have taken political measures personally to protect public wildlands.

00:03:51.340 And I think it's absolutely critical right now that we all learn from each other about how to stand up for these public lands.

00:04:00.280 And to think up to, I think, 21 national monuments are a threat right now.

00:04:05.880 And Trump appears hellbent on dismantling public lands to the full extent as he is able.

00:04:11.980 The largest among the monuments under threat is Bare Ears, which many predict will be the next Standing Rock if this goes forward.

00:04:19.960 So I'm wondering if you could talk a bit about this latest chapter of the assault on public lands and why this has got to be stopped.

00:04:28.380 and how we can find those fissures of opportunity to creatively resist and safeguard these last intact treasures.

00:04:39.120 It renders me speechless because I still can't wrap my arms around what's happening.

00:04:44.700 But I think it's important to take a long view, both backwards and forwards.

00:04:49.940 You know, in a sense, this is nothing new.

00:04:53.740 For the past three decades, we've been fighting for our public lands, especially in the interior

00:04:59.940 West, in Utah, particularly, whether it's the Sagebrush Rebellion that we saw in the

00:05:07.760 70s and 80s, whether it was the forest wars that we saw in the 90s.

00:05:15.200 this is just a reoccurring theme and incarnation of the desire for the extractive industry

00:05:24.880 to privatize our public lands. And the thing that makes this incarnation so frightening is

00:05:32.320 we have a president who not only doesn't care about these public lands, I doubt he's ever

00:05:38.140 set foot in them. And in that sense, people like Orrin Hatch and Rob Bishop and Chaffetz,

00:05:45.740 who are Utah's delegation, have exorbitant sway. And then you have someone as weak as Interior

00:05:53.020 Secretary Zinke, who pretends that he's in the likelihood or in the same fabric as Theodore

00:06:00.480 Roosevelt, and nothing could be farther from the truth. He rides in on his first day in Washington

00:06:05.640 on a horse. In fact, he lives in a gated community in Santa Barbara. So I think we have to put things

00:06:12.980 in perspective. In terms of the monuments, again, this is tailored for Utah. The parameters of these

00:06:21.300 27 monuments that are under review begin in 1996, and they end in 2016. This was tailored and

00:06:31.680 fashioned by Orrin Hatch. It begins with Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument in 1996,

00:06:37.840 and it ends with Bears Ears. He's never gotten over the fact that these lands were protected.

00:06:42.400 And, you know, these are acts of revenge and pettiness and nastiness, all at the pleasure

00:06:49.320 and profit of the oil and gas industries. So that's sort of my take on the background.

00:06:57.060 I also think it's really important for our listeners to actually hear these names because there's power in names and just to contemplate where these are and what states they belong to.

00:07:13.360 And in fact, they belong to all of us.

00:07:15.220 Our public lands are our public commons.

00:07:18.360 So these are monuments with over 100,000 acres and in many cases, several million.

00:07:27.060 Basin and Range, Nevada, Bears Ears, Utah, Berryessa Snow Mountain, California, Canyons of the Ancients, Colorado, Carrizo Plain, California, Cascade Siskiyou, Oregon, Craters of the Moon, Idaho.

00:07:46.860 That was established in 1924. It's just hard to imagine.

00:08:16.860 Santa Snow, California, San Gabriel Mountains, California, Sonoran Desert, Arizona, Upper

00:08:24.720 Missouri River Breaks, Montana, Vermilion Cliffs, Arizona, and we can add Katahdin Woods

00:08:31.300 and Waters in Maine.

00:08:33.560 So that's the list.

00:08:35.300 And for those of us who know and love these places, it's more than a heartbreak.

00:08:42.020 It's a tragedy.

00:08:43.580 But what's interesting to note is that over a million citizens have sent in their comments already and have said, we do not want these monuments rescinded or reduced. We want them protected. So the question remains, will these open spaces of democracy remain open?

00:09:03.000 that was so powerful terry to hear you speak the names and the locations of the monuments thank you

00:09:12.320 for speaking the names aloud and i just felt chills all over my body imagining i've been to

00:09:20.260 many of those incredible gifts that i feel that they are on this planet for us to care for and

00:09:27.280 steward and be inspired by and be fed by so thank you again for that and i want to also question

00:09:35.260 how can we find those fissures of opportunity to creatively resist and safeguard these last

00:09:42.460 intact treasures and i know that you and tim to christopher and many others have found those

00:09:48.740 fissures and i'd like to speak on that for a bit and any ideas that are swirling in your head for

00:09:54.380 those people in the audience who want to take a grandstand?

00:10:00.140 You know, I'm not sure the grandstand is what is needed.

00:10:03.040 I think that small, deliberate, focused acts within our own communities and the places

00:10:09.020 we call home, in many ways, are the most powerful, Ayanna.

00:10:13.100 And, you know, going back to Bear's years, it's been such a potent experience for

00:10:19.740 conservationists in Utah and really around the country, because what we've been able to witness

00:10:25.820 and learn from and be inspired by have been the tribes and the tribal leadership that has come

00:10:33.040 forward through the five intertribal commissions that has led the way for Bears Ears National

00:10:41.060 Monument and that President Obama responded to, as did Sally Jewell in 2016. You have

00:10:48.500 the Navajo, you have the Hopi, Zuni, and the two Ute nations who have come together and said,

00:10:55.260 you know, these lands are sacred. These are the lands of our homecoming. These are the lands

00:11:02.220 where the bones of our ancestors are buried. And in those canyons that rise upward like praying

00:11:07.680 hands, we can still hear the voices of our ancestors singing through the wind. This is

00:11:14.320 where their ceremonies take place. This is where they gather their medicines. And, you know, over

00:11:20.000 a hundred thousand different artifacts are buried there, exposed, hidden in the alcoves. There is a

00:11:28.520 painted language that resides on the walls in petroglyphs and pictographs. So it is a powerful

00:11:37.260 country, the tribes have led the way. The fact that Secretary Zinke showed up for four

00:11:45.000 days, let's give him five, do you know how long he spent with the tribal members? He

00:11:52.500 spent one hour in a room without windows in Salt Lake City. He and his entourage with

00:12:00.680 Orrin Hatch, Rob Bishop, county commissioners from San Juan County, arrived at the airport

00:12:06.940 in Blanding, they were met by another county commissioner who had five horses and five white

00:12:12.760 hats ready to go. The hats that read, make San Juan County great again. Who do you think he

00:12:18.800 listened to? And after being there for four days, he came out and said, it's too big. It's too big

00:12:25.360 for protection. It's too big for the tribes, too big for the community of the wild, the animals, 0.82

00:12:33.100 the plants, but it's certainly not too big for the oil and gas industry that has its claim there.

00:12:40.880 So I just wanted to go back to your original question of what's at stake. So what can we do?

00:12:47.320 I think that each of us, with the gifts that are ours, in the places we call home, need to stretch,

00:12:56.780 expand and deepen our engagement. You know, so often we think, who is our leader? We're looking

00:13:04.080 for one person, when in fact, I think in the 21st century, it's not about one person or one grand

00:13:11.220 gesture, but I think it's about community and all of us working together, again, with the gifts that

00:13:17.820 are ours, each in our own time, each in our own way. To me, that is the way forward.

00:13:26.780 I agree with that, Terry, that if we're using our own gifts and passions locally, we have a lot of power in that way.

00:13:37.240 I want to start directing the conversation from the monuments to some of the other issues that have plagued the Southwest, which is the relationship between environmentalists and ranchers.

00:13:50.880 And you wrote something to the effect of, quote, a sense of place leads to an ethic of place, end quote. And the ranching community clings to an ethic of autonomy, an ethic of self. And as they grab for more and more public land, but without a knowledge of ecology and the ethics of stewardship, the short-term gains are finite.

00:14:15.280 And it seems we are now reaching that limit. Would you agree that ranchers versus environmentalist battle is now verging on obsolescence as climate pulls the rug from under ranchers with land degradation, water shortages, and economic breakdown, etc., outweighing the tepid threat environmentalists had posed in the past?

00:14:41.620 You know, I actually don't agree with that, Iona. I think it's too simple. You know, I don't think it's fair to label all ranchers in the form of the Bundys.

00:14:55.680 You know, we saw their standoff, that family, that clan at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.

00:15:03.700 And some of them have been sentenced.

00:15:06.020 Some of them have not.

00:15:07.720 One of them was killed.

00:15:09.560 You know, it was a terrible situation.

00:15:11.520 And we all were very aware of the injustices.

00:15:14.360 I mean, we're talking cowboys.

00:15:16.660 And I mean that in the most rogue sense. 0.99

00:15:19.740 And, you know, if those had been Native people, if those had been environmentalists, if those had been Black people, Brown people, 0.93

00:15:25.680 we know that it would have a very different outcome. So there's that. And I think they're 0.92

00:15:30.760 on the extreme. I know so many ranchers and farmers who love public lands, who pay their fees,

00:15:38.640 who are really trying to work with land trusts and easements to be good stewards. So I think

00:15:46.880 it's complicated. You know, certainly there are those that aren't the best stewards, but I just,

00:15:51.680 I don't see them as the enemy. I really don't. I think what we have to do in our communities

00:15:57.720 is work together. I think environmentalists, conservationists, ranchers, farmers, and I would

00:16:04.260 even argue developers and the different agencies, the Park Service, the BLM, the Forest Service,

00:16:09.820 we all have to come together and really say, what is a sustainable vision? And that takes time.

00:16:15.600 It takes affection and commitment. It has ground rules where we may agree to disagree. And there are some things maybe we won't compromise on. But that's the process that I'm interested in seeing.

00:16:29.220 There's also the issue of tourism. And Abby was a great advocate talking about industrial tourism. And anyone that has been to Yellowstone National Park or Arches or Zion in Utah understand what that is. Yosemite, Grand Canyon, we're loving our parks to death. Why? I would argue because the need is greater than it's ever been. Certainly there are more of us.

00:16:53.640 So I think it's this mosaic. And how do we really look at all the pieces and create a whole? That's, to me, the real issue, especially as you suggest, with climate change, with drought, with all of the compounding issues that are facing us at this moment in time.

00:17:11.920 yes i think coming together and this mosaic framework that you speak about is really the

00:17:20.780 only way forward in so many ways and i absolutely agree that it is there's no simple way forward but

00:17:30.320 many voices need to be at the table and not just the people in power in the government but local

00:17:38.160 people, tribes, ranchers, environmentalists, so that there can be face-to-face conversations

00:17:44.240 to bring everybody's gifts and understandings and experiences so that we can move forward.

00:17:51.840 Because with climate change and industrial tourism, and the list goes on and on, we are

00:17:57.800 losing the resilience of these places that we love. And I'm wondering, speaking of that,

00:18:05.600 How has the ecological health of the Great Basin fared within the web of extraction and development?

00:18:13.340 And where does her resilience lie that we can get behind as we face climate extremes and other stressors brought on by humanity?

00:18:22.860 It's such a good question.

00:18:24.600 And, you know, I'm not a biologist and I'm not a scientist.

00:18:27.500 Just, you know, when I think about the Great Basin, you know, what I really think about are all of the nerve gas that's buried out there.

00:18:36.620 I think about the munitions that are buried out of there and the kind of surreal tanks that are out there in army maneuvers.

00:18:46.280 You know, certainly in Utah, we're facing drought. Great Salt Lake is at its all time low.

00:18:50.840 The birds are not there in the numbers that they used to be.

00:18:53.420 The pelicans are taking a huge hit because of predation that hasn't been there for decades

00:19:00.880 because Gunnison Island, which is their nesting area, has been an island.

00:19:04.920 It's not an island anymore.

00:19:06.140 So you've got coyotes crossing the lake bed and ravaging the nests.

00:19:12.600 And then you have the juvenile pelicans that are then flying prematurely

00:19:16.560 but can't make it to freshwater where their parents are.

00:19:19.460 And so last time I was out at Great Salt Lake, I counted over 60 dead juvenile pelicans, and I couldn't imagine what had happened.

00:19:27.920 And talking to the Division of Wildlife Resources learned this is the situation.

00:19:32.000 So stress is the right word.

00:19:34.880 The Colorado Plateau, that's another story.

00:19:37.600 You know, if we had a raven's point of view, an aerial view, it looks like an exposed nervous system with all the infrastructure, the roads, the pads, the oil and gas rigs, the flares at night.

00:19:49.320 It's a heartbreak.

00:19:50.940 You know, you go into the Uinta Basin and it's worse.

00:19:54.140 You see fracking, infant mortality rate has skyrocketed because of fracking, water poisoned in states like Wyoming.

00:20:04.160 Again, it's connecting the dots.

00:20:05.680 It's not just one community, but when you start looking at the collective in the interior West, I can't believe what I'm seeing just in my lifetime.

00:20:16.660 Again, I think it's why public lands matter so much, Ayana.

00:20:20.760 You know, they're breathing spaces in a society that is increasingly holding its breath.

00:20:26.520 So I do think we have to fight for these lands.

00:20:29.280 And I'm so encouraged in that this is front and center of a new conversation.

00:20:37.600 There's people in the East that have no knowledge of what public lands are because it's privatized in the East.

00:20:43.060 They don't exist. Same with the Midwest. They've been plowed under.

00:20:47.520 So I think people are finally coming to understand that we have a great heritage.

00:20:53.520 These are not just public lands, but there are public stories.

00:20:57.280 our natural histories and our cultural histories.

00:21:00.760 And that's very, very powerful to the identities of Americans.

00:21:27.280 Satsang with Mooji

00:21:57.280 The American Southwest has inspired and moved many people

00:22:17.780 as it's home to the pinyon pine and the juniper forest

00:22:22.460 that have inched their way to old growth almost in slow motion.

00:22:28.720 You know, a 60-foot juniper can be hundreds of years old

00:22:31.560 and support an ensemble of over 450 plant species.

00:22:37.100 And I believe that the first wholesale assault on the Great Basin ecosystems

00:22:41.980 was by the charcoal industry, which peaked in the late 1800s.

00:22:46.300 Forests were gobbled up whole, clear-cut.

00:22:48.720 And since the land has been slowly healing and regrowing, until more recently than the BLM and the Forest Service made the claim that this new growth is invading greater sage grass habitat and wetlands, and thus a new wave of destruction has come into the basin.

00:23:04.560 You know, in the meantime, the lowly handsaw has been trumped by more imaginative means of destruction. And I am horrified and was horrified to learn that the most common way these ecosystems are clear today is by stretching a battleship anchor chain between two enormous earth movers and tearing up anything that protrudes from the earth's surface.

00:23:29.100 So I'm wondering, how is this abomination justified? And are you aware of any other strokes of brilliance in this field of ecocide?

00:23:39.480 you know i remember it must have been in the late 80s early 90s in moab when ken slight alias

00:23:48.700 seldom seen of edward abby's monkey wrench gang where many of us stood in front of those bull

00:23:55.200 dozers that were going to do exactly what you're speaking of that chaining and you know again i

00:24:00.760 just am rendered speechless it's it's the flavor of the day in terms of management and i think

00:24:08.020 you know what concerns me most is I just again I can't even find the words it's it's not one thing

00:24:16.480 but it's all of the things and I just keep thinking as a child there was so much sage

00:24:23.820 it put me to sleep you know you drive and you drive and you drive and the tallest you know

00:24:29.120 tree or plant on the horizon was sage you know and then you'd see the magnificent juniper

00:24:34.520 twisted and gnarled, shaked by the wind, or the beautiful pinions that would yield those

00:24:39.960 wonderful nuts that we would gather as children. And now, just what you're saying, the sagebrush

00:24:45.920 steps is an endangered ecosystem. And here we have an administration that wants to undo the

00:24:52.800 protections that were a collaborative means of conservation management, you know, through the

00:24:59.340 state government, through the federal government, through conservation, the tribes and local

00:25:04.900 communities to protect the sage-grouse. Now they want to undo all of that. Why? A few years ago,

00:25:10.640 someone in Washington, D.C., a ludicrous question, but they said, who do you think is the most

00:25:15.100 powerful person in the West right now who has the most influence? And I said, the sage-grouse.

00:25:22.000 And they laughed and they said, no, no, I'm serious. And I said, so am I, because the sage-grouse

00:25:26.220 has been the only species, the only individual between the health of the land and the absolute,

00:25:34.100 abject, rapacious appetite of the fossil fuel industry. You take out the sage grass and it's

00:25:42.000 open field development. So those are some of my concerns. And again, just what you're saying,

00:25:47.560 you know, add drought to that, add development to that, add climate to that, add cows to that,

00:25:53.680 alongside, you know, these kind of antiquated practices of chaining. And, you know, you've

00:25:59.440 really got an abused landscape. When I think about the abused landscape that you're speaking of,

00:26:06.580 and I connect it to the abused landscapes of the Pacific Northwest forests, the temperate

00:26:12.360 rainforests, the old growth that's being slaughtered there, down to the Amazon, up to

00:26:17.620 the Boreal we are in a time of mass extinctions and in your talk of Bioneers you spoke of the

00:26:27.540 need for connectivity of wildness for evolution and resilience to continue and you said this quote

00:26:35.940 that has chilled me since I heard it and it was that quote death is one thing but an end to birth

00:26:43.720 is something else, end quote. So can you speak of the end of biological evolution? And how deep

00:26:55.340 into the unraveling process do you believe we're in? And I mean, can we even know from our vantage?

00:27:04.300 You know, that quote is from the great conservation biologist Michael Soule. And that was a revelation

00:27:10.420 to me, too. We talk about the end of species, but rarely do we talk about the beginning of new

00:27:15.200 species or the evolutionary process. And that's what he's talking about. And, you know, I want

00:27:20.720 to say to you, Ayana, how much I appreciate your courage, because we're talking about really hard

00:27:27.540 things. And, you know, I think it's in our nature to want to be helpful, to want to be optimistic.

00:27:34.240 But I think unless we really face the reality of where we are at this moment in time, in

00:27:40.160 call it the Anthropocene, where human beings do have this extraordinary press on the planet right

00:27:45.680 now, then we really can't go forward with the courage and the open eyes and open heart that

00:27:53.620 is going to be required to make the necessary changes. You know, I honestly, I've taken hope

00:28:00.640 out of my vocabulary. It's not that I'm not hopeful, it's that I don't think it's helpful.

00:28:05.300 And rather than hope, I choose to think about faith. I have tremendous faith in our capacity to change. I have tremendous faith in the power of consciousness. I have tremendous faith in the works of people to make very quick changes.

00:28:22.800 But we're up against a capitalistic society, not just the United States, but China and every other country that wants the same kind of lifestyle that we have.

00:28:37.020 So when Donald Trump says that the G20 gathering, you know, Western civilization is at risk, he's right, but not in a way that he thinks, you know, and he said our lifestyle is at risk.

00:28:49.440 He's right, but not for the reasons. If we want to survive as a species, in fellowship with other species, we are going to have to shift our point of view and become more empathetic, become more unselfish.

00:29:05.160 think about what sacrifice means in a spiritual sense

00:29:10.240 and what the spiritual implications are of climate change.

00:29:14.560 But we're still in the stage of denial.

00:29:16.480 We're in denial of death.

00:29:17.980 We're in denial of where we find ourselves now

00:29:21.220 and that there is a real world and it is really dying right now.

00:29:24.680 And what concerns me most are those that have no voice.

00:29:28.300 And those are the birds.

00:29:29.420 Those are the plants.

00:29:31.200 Those are the moths.

00:29:32.220 Those are the elephants.

00:29:33.660 all of the creatures among us who are struggling.

00:29:36.880 And that's what I'm concerned about.

00:29:39.740 So how do we come together?

00:29:42.920 You know, how do we take, on one hand, all that modernity has given us?

00:29:47.780 And how do we take, on the other hand, a spiritual reality that we must begin to embrace,

00:29:55.820 that we are not the only species that lives and breathes and loves and grieves on this planet?

00:30:00.760 And how do we bring these two hands together in prayer?

00:30:04.420 I'm not talking about religion.

00:30:05.880 I'm talking about a spiritual consciousness that I think we are going to have to embrace

00:30:10.540 if we are going to evolve to a species that dares to love, even in the face of death,

00:30:18.180 even in the face of mass extinction, even in the face of our own complicity.

00:30:24.720 That was so beautiful, Terry.

00:30:26.560 And it has been feelings that I have felt so many times, whether it's seeing this collective denial that I myself was grown and conditioned into breaking away from that and then learning how to not shy away from the truth.

00:30:44.360 because I felt very early on when I started to awaken to the realities of the world that

00:30:49.880 for me to love the world that meant I had to understand what was happening and not shy away

00:30:56.180 from the pain because the earth and the all creatures are feeling this pain at least I

00:31:01.820 believe that and I wanted to actually show up in a relationship that I could hold not just my own

00:31:08.340 pain, but the pain of the other species as well. And so I think it's almost this intense gift to

00:31:16.400 learn to love in the face of collapse and how passionate and alive I believe humans can feel

00:31:25.200 when we start really awakening to these realities and being present with them. And

00:31:31.240 i think about this biological cessation that you were mentioning earlier and the end of birth is

00:31:41.160 something else and i i certainly think that this cast a new light on the human experiment

00:31:47.240 and now you know not only have we seen a slowing or a ceasing of biological evolution

00:31:54.360 but a deep regression in cultural evolution and so I'm wondering how are wild spaces and

00:32:03.640 wilderness fundamental to our creativity as a species and to our sense of direction amid the

00:32:12.720 confusion it's such a great question you know I think of a story not long ago I was talking with

00:32:20.820 a young woman who grew up in the Western Everglades in Florida. And she said, you know,

00:32:26.340 we used to have two seasons in the Everglades. And as a child, I look forward to both. We had

00:32:32.340 the dry season and we had the rainy season. And in both, you know, there were gifts. Now we have

00:32:38.920 only the wet season. And she said, what am I supposed to do, Terry, as I watch my own home

00:32:47.160 ground flood. And I know that in the not-so-distant future, the Everglades, which is my identity with

00:32:55.420 these long-legged birds, you know, how am I to grieve? You know, how am I to move forward knowing

00:33:02.000 what is going to be lost? And I really didn't have an answer for her. You know, all I could say was

00:33:08.400 To bear witness is not a passive act, but an act of conscience and consequence.

00:33:16.000 And to have the strength not to avert our gaze, as you said, to not look away.

00:33:21.840 In the same way when those of us who have been with loved ones who are in the process of dying,

00:33:27.400 we don't walk away and we stay and we hold them and we listen to them and we cry with them.

00:33:35.740 And we know this is the process of life that we are in.

00:33:39.780 Half of my family is gone.

00:33:42.000 And I've had the privilege of being with them in those dying moments.

00:33:45.720 It's not easy.

00:33:46.940 But it is about being present.

00:33:49.460 And the gift of the consciousness of knowing we are finite.

00:33:55.020 I have no doubt that the earth will survive us.

00:33:58.000 But it will be a changed earth.

00:34:00.180 And it's not without its sorrow.

00:34:03.020 You know, I'm reading this terrific book.

00:34:05.000 maybe you've read it, Staying with the Trouble by Donna Haraway. And she talks about the importance

00:34:10.740 of multi-species justice and how our task as human beings right now is to make trouble. And I love

00:34:17.900 that. You know, whether it's direct action, whether it's buying oil and gas leases, whether it's

00:34:23.780 committing civil disobedience, whether it's holding prayers, as so many did, and also offer

00:34:32.380 support and presence at Standing Rock, what may be asked of us with bear's ears, to really look

00:34:39.600 at this kinship that is ours and how we are redefining family. And I know for me, my sense

00:34:47.100 of family is not just exclusive to my own species, not at all. When I hear the hermit thrush singing

00:34:55.900 in the morning and at night, even between intervals of thunder. That is my kin. That

00:35:02.600 is my voice too. I just imagined thunder being kin, and my heart picked up a beat. I wanted

00:35:12.660 to read a quote that I had written down from you. Quote, cynicism thrives in air-conditioned

00:35:18.880 rooms like any true place the desert is a risk end quote and elsewhere you write quote desert

00:35:28.480 strategies are useful in times of drought pull your resources inward when water is scarce

00:35:35.720 find moisture and seeds to stay strong and supple send a taproot down deep run when required

00:35:44.300 hide when necessary when hot go underground do not fear darkness it's where one comes alive

00:35:53.720 end quote and it's just reminding me of what we were talking about with not shying away from

00:36:01.760 the darkness and this fear of death and as desertification is becoming an undeniable

00:36:10.260 pattern of civilization this advice if taken literally could be life-saving for a lot of

00:36:16.600 people you know i do suspect however that there is a more metaphorical layer under these words

00:36:24.120 like most of us do fear darkness and the end of cheap energy and life as we know it

00:36:30.200 our screens going dark and civilization gives us the option to burrow in our comfort zones

00:36:37.880 But in the wild, fear and risk make you think fast and act fast and with courage. So what would be the upshot if we all learned to embrace risk taking and fear as creative forces?

00:36:56.280 I love that

00:36:58.280 you know who knows I mean that's the thing

00:37:00.760 you know each

00:37:02.600 landscape each ecotone

00:37:04.560 each ecosystem

00:37:06.140 you know I view them as our

00:37:08.580 teachers and

00:37:09.740 the key word for me is

00:37:12.620 being humble which

00:37:14.480 has its root in

00:37:16.060 hummus earth and

00:37:18.320 being teachable

00:37:19.560 we think we know so much we think we

00:37:22.540 we have these

00:37:24.400 brains. And it's true, we do. But I think more than that, we're still animals. And we still

00:37:31.340 are part of something so much larger than ourselves. And to remember that, you know,

00:37:36.680 the desert is not a void, it is my unknowing. And I think it's that unknowing that puts us

00:37:43.640 on equal ground with other species. And that's a beautiful thing. And the world is so beautiful.

00:37:50.060 And every day I set for myself some encounter with wildness, whether it's a praying mantis in Manhattan, whether it's, you know, hearing the wingbeats of ravens in Castle Valley where we live, or, you know, watching bison in the Lamar Valley or the grunion rum, you know, those flashing scales coming up with the tide on the Pacific coast.

00:38:15.040 I mean, it's just, it's endless. Spring peepers, you know, in the Northeast, I mean, the Indiana Dunes, I mean, we are so blessed by these wild spaces. And I've come to really cherish how beauty is its own form of resistance, to have a living knowledge of beauty and wildness, and that sense of humility, that sense of fear that you speak of, and darkness, where we're on our edge, and we can use our night vision.

00:38:43.800 and instinctively follow our senses rather than just, as you say, watch our screens.

00:39:13.800 Hey!

00:39:43.800 i'd like to read another quote quote our fear of being touched removes us from

00:40:03.920 a sensate world the distant self becomes the detached self who no longer believes in anything

00:40:11.240 end quote. When you look around a crowded street and see how alienated people have become from one

00:40:18.600 another and from their own selves through hyper consumption of empty products, and you see how we

00:40:27.640 have no command of our autonomy, it's beyond choosing between products or careers or religions

00:40:34.860 or politicians. So could you speak about the illusion of choice in modern society and

00:40:43.180 give some advice to the huge contingency of millennials who don't believe the myth of

00:40:49.620 progress and seek a radically different reality? You tell me. I'm so interested in the millennials

00:40:58.580 and I, you know, I know my students and I love them so much. And in so many ways,

00:41:03.460 are so much farther ahead than I am. So I turn to you, because I think you're speaking a different

00:41:09.840 vocabulary. And I think you're on so many levels, so much braver than certainly my generation.

00:41:15.900 How old are you, Ayanna? Well, I am turning 30 in a matter of days.

00:41:22.340 I mean, to me, your wisdom, you know, your beautiful ambition to talk about these ideas

00:41:28.520 and to have this forum, I mean, I am just in awe of you.

00:41:33.140 And this is what I'm seeing with your generation.

00:41:36.380 And that's why, you know, I bow to you.

00:41:38.860 I mean, you are my teachers and I am so aware of what I don't know.

00:41:44.020 You know, in many ways, I think my generation's task is to get out of the way

00:41:48.160 so that you can flourish.

00:41:49.920 And, you know, what I see is that you are holding this pragmatic vision.

00:41:55.980 I see you as pragmatic visionaries.

00:41:58.520 So, talk to me, you know, talk to me. What are you seeing? What is it that you want to create?

00:42:05.620 well personally i am married to the temperate rainforests and my vision is to serve

00:42:16.620 the land in whatever way they direct me and so far that direction has been in the form of a

00:42:25.920 native species nursery to enhance biodiversity to sequester carbon and help with climate

00:42:32.700 mitigation. So I see this interplay between the philosophical wanderings and this cultural shift

00:42:41.560 that can happen in meetings and celebrations in combination with tangible restoration of land,

00:42:50.400 in combination with tangible conservation of land. And I think that I am very lucky,

00:42:58.700 very privileged to even be able to consider these things because I think a lot of people,

00:43:05.680 whether they don't have the privilege or they're just stuck in the conditioning of this dominant

00:43:11.540 lie of abundance that isn't true abundance or this, you know, these choices, if you do these

00:43:18.880 choices, this will bring you fulfillment. But the fulfillment that the dominant culture is selling

00:43:25.020 us is all about really narcissism. And I have never found that just serving the self is fulfilling

00:43:32.600 at all. And so I think that is this large lie held over many people's heads to just focus on

00:43:40.380 the self or the nuclear family and to have these certain steps, certain chapters in your life that

00:43:46.400 you get to this, whether it's the white picket fence and the two kids or whatever it is, but

00:43:51.620 it doesn't make sense in the reality that we're facing and not to say that we can't have families

00:43:57.840 but it's more than that and what we're facing is monumental and so it's this monumental challenge

00:44:05.760 of creativity at the same time how are we going to step up to the task that we are being handed

00:44:12.020 in a way that is in love and in rapture and in passion and focused and clear and intelligent

00:44:19.640 and you know one thing that i've really been learning a lot lately with building this native

00:44:24.320 species nursery is even if you do have good intentions even if you want to make all of the

00:44:31.140 best choices and the most integrity the system that we are in does not make eco quote eco-friendly

00:44:38.700 choices affordable convenient easy it's just amazing even just to grow trees how challenging

00:44:46.000 it is to make decisions that are not hurting another land somewhere else so i've been thinking

00:44:52.780 about this question a lot just what are our choices at this point and how do we not get stuck

00:44:59.200 and so how i move through the anthropocene is falling more deeply in love every day with what

00:45:07.500 is still here and with what I can imagine coming back if we support and tenderly care for the land

00:45:16.800 and I think about the word wildness and I know it's come up a lot you know in your writing and

00:45:23.600 I think I mean it's for the wild so I very much connected to that word but I've heard from some

00:45:30.320 people the word wildness can be construed into a lot of different meanings I've heard from some

00:45:37.320 other people I've had in the podcast, like, oh, well, the wildness is this term used from

00:45:42.800 colonialist or people that aren't familiar with the land. And so it's separating. If something's

00:45:48.900 wild, that means we're not wild. And wild is something that you don't touch or humans don't

00:45:53.800 touch. But then I think about Tending the Wild. There's a book about California Native people and

00:45:59.100 how they were able to steward the land and actually enhance biodiversity. And so I wanted to talk to

00:46:05.760 you about your connection to the word wild and your connection and your definition of what you

00:46:14.160 feel when you hear that word. First of all, I just want to thank you because I just think

00:46:19.600 you have shared such wisdom and again, practical and visionary. And I just so honor what you're

00:46:28.940 doing. And this is what I'm talking about. I think what you know we need to hear. And

00:46:35.280 I will talk about wildness and wilderness. But I have a question just to follow up after listening

00:46:42.420 to what you have just so beautifully articulated in terms of your own life's work. Do you feel

00:46:48.640 angry? I call it sacred rage. And yes, I feel angry. I feel my blood boils, but I take that

00:47:01.700 anger and it honestly just turns into this passionate love because I don't know if this

00:47:09.980 is what a mother bear feels like, but yeah, I feel angry. But the anger is so much energy

00:47:16.740 and that energy can be used to just push something forward.

00:47:22.840 So I'm not upset when I feel that,

00:47:24.300 well, I don't know if upset's the correct word,

00:47:26.240 but it doesn't get me down.

00:47:28.280 It just fuels my fire.

00:47:30.520 I feel the same way.

00:47:32.060 And I too call it sacred rage. 1.00

00:47:33.980 You know, how many times as women 0.50

00:47:36.260 have we been told, calm down? 0.85

00:47:39.020 You know, you're irrational, you're angry,

00:47:41.540 et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

00:47:42.600 And I just want to, I am angry. 0.95

00:47:44.140 I'm fucking furious, you know? 0.96

00:47:46.280 and over the winter especially with the election and knowing what was coming down I thought okay 0.99

00:47:51.920 I've got to get a grip everyone says I'm just I've got too much fire I'm too angry and then I

00:47:56.280 thought with a name like Tempest I'm hopeless so I went and ordered I swear 12 books on anger you

00:48:01.640 know dance of anger anger and compassion love your enemies I mean you should see my library

00:48:06.960 and I started reading them with you know my red pencil and really being studious about it

00:48:12.120 I got so angry at what I was reading, I just thought, okay, stop. And I do think anger is a focused force. And I do think if we can take our anger and channel it into something powerful and direct, it does and it can become sacred rage and sacred acts of resistance.

00:48:31.800 And I also feel that, you know, there is fire in the wild, in forests, you know, in the

00:48:38.360 desert.

00:48:38.740 It's a hot fire and it roars and it's fast, you know, in grasslands.

00:48:43.220 And I think there's a real purpose for that in the same way that there's a purpose for

00:48:46.860 water.

00:48:47.480 It's all elemental, you know, water seeping into every crack and cranny, you know, to

00:48:53.540 where it has the power to crack stone.

00:48:56.140 So, again, all these elements around us that give us clues. You know, you asked me what is my definition of wilderness or wildness, and it's Thoreau's 200th anniversary this year. And, of course, in Wildness is the Preservation of the World, he writes.

00:49:14.720 And I understand the critics who say that wilderness has become irrelevant before it's become resolved and wilderness is a political term, a colonial term, but I also think it's a limitation of language.

00:49:27.580 And when I think about wild country, big country, the country that we still have in the West and in our forests and deserts and mountains and meadows and wetlands and oceans and seashores and rivers, to me, this is the taproot of consciousness.

00:49:45.740 It is where we have evolved and it is where we are continuing to evolve and we cannot separate ourselves from it.

00:49:53.680 And I think that's the key. It isn't something outside of human beings. It's inside us as well.

00:50:01.380 And I think it's this convergence of the inner and outer wilderness that is so crucial right now to make peace with.

00:50:08.560 and yes

00:50:10.520 there's the protected wilderness

00:50:12.880 and yes we can find wildness

00:50:15.220 everywhere but I think

00:50:17.040 it's seeing the world whole even holy

00:50:19.200 and fighting for the remaining

00:50:21.000 land that is there and the animals

00:50:23.100 and the ecosystems that are

00:50:24.660 as you said stressed and

00:50:26.980 suffering in the same way that

00:50:29.040 we are

00:50:29.560 I heard the most beautiful story

00:50:32.120 may I share it?

00:50:33.900 please yes

00:50:34.740 there's a biologist

00:50:37.840 named Sue Beatty, and she's the chief botanist in Yosemite National Park.

00:50:45.320 I met her last year in the centennial of the National Park Service,

00:50:50.900 and I was so moved by her story.

00:50:53.120 As you know, the Mariposa Grove has been under restoration for the last five years.

00:50:58.260 I think it's to open this year, this summer.

00:51:00.880 Anyway, she told me this incredible story, and this is how I remember it,

00:51:05.080 that, you know, one day she was on patrol.

00:51:08.500 She was walking through the mariposa grove,

00:51:10.540 as she always does, loving the big trees,

00:51:12.980 thousands of years old, talk about elders.

00:51:15.500 And she heard something and she stopped.

00:51:19.640 And what came into her heart was that the trees were stressed,

00:51:24.220 that the trees were suffering,

00:51:26.060 that they were in fact speaking to her.

00:51:29.020 You know, how do you take that instinct,

00:51:31.400 that intuition, that feeling, and translate it into science as a botanist charged with the health

00:51:38.560 and wealth of a particular national park. The Mariposa Grove, really the first public lands

00:51:45.360 we had protected by Abraham Lincoln after the worst battle in the Civil War. 1864, he created

00:51:53.540 the Yosemite Land Act to protect Yosemite Valley and the Mariposa Grove. Well, she went back with

00:52:00.720 her team, and they did science, they did research, they did their statistics, they did their analysis

00:52:06.600 and looked at the mariposa grove and its health of the big trees, sequoias. And in fact, they were

00:52:13.340 suffering, not just from drought, but from having their roots, you know, trampled to death by asphalt,

00:52:20.180 by trams, trolleys, by cars, by millions of visitors' feet for decades over time.

00:52:29.400 So what could relieve that stress?

00:52:32.140 What could alleviate the suffering of these giant trees, these elders?

00:52:38.240 She thought, what if this sacred grove of trees thousands of years old, what if it no longer was a place of entertainment, but a place of contemplation?

00:52:57.060 What if it was no longer about recreation, but restoration?

00:53:05.480 And so with the superintendent and with supporters of the Mariposa Grove, it was agreed that over time, the asphalt would be removed.

00:53:18.160 There would no longer be the buses, the trolleys, entertainment, noise, unconscious, walking, but rather soft earth would be reinstated, the roots would be freed, new paths would be made, and it would become a place of solitude, contemplation, restoration, reverence.

00:53:43.740 And that is what is happening. So that now the mariposa grove is a breathing space and that the trees will be able to heal. Don't you love that?

00:53:56.460 I do love that and I think it's such an important understanding that land is not

00:54:06.940 there just for our recreation or for our resource extraction as humans or for anything

00:54:14.480 but it's also a relationship and when you kept saying that the trees were elders I thought about

00:54:19.660 grandparents and you know an elder needs a rest every now and then and if an elder was being

00:54:27.320 chatted with 24 hours a day and questions and made to do this that and the other they would

00:54:33.140 get exhausted and maybe ill even from that so being able to put this kinship this well this

00:54:40.740 relational understanding of land and how we can interact in a way that is loving and considerate

00:54:49.280 and respectful, and not just about our needs, but about the land's needs, is such a huge shift.

00:54:58.980 Exactly. And, you know, we keep thinking, what can one person do? Well, Sue Beatty did a lot.

00:55:04.260 And it goes back to that idea, again, what do we do? What's our gift? What's my gift? What's your

00:55:11.400 gift? How do we deepen it? How do we listen? How do we take it to the next level? Sue Beatty,

00:55:17.400 a botanist listened she listened to the trees and it made all the difference and she shifted

00:55:24.980 I mean it's like a chiropractic shift that to me is what is required so that again each of us in

00:55:31.660 our own way with the gifts that are ours can make an enormous difference in the places we call home

00:55:37.560 that truly is where my faith lies and you know that to me is the challenge it's not the the big

00:55:44.940 grand gestures, although hers was, but these small moments where we stop, we pause, we listen,

00:55:53.600 we contemplate, and then we reimagine. It goes back to what you were saying,

00:55:59.660 acts of the imagination that loom large as we make these shifts, recognizing, as you said,

00:56:08.960 that our institutions are no longer working for us.

00:56:12.360 The notion of the nuclear family is a myth,

00:56:15.360 but how do we expand our sense of family,

00:56:18.540 expand our sense of community to both human and wild?

00:56:22.880 And if we take care of that in our own sphere

00:56:25.920 and circle of reference, then the earth will be held

00:56:29.080 and we will be transformed in the process.

00:56:32.360 I really believe that.

00:56:33.480 You know, when I was in school in biology,

00:56:37.200 you know the big no-no was anthropomorphism but then now I'm thinking you know how arrogant to

00:56:44.180 assume that we're the only animals that can feel or think or dream or grieve we know that isn't

00:56:50.220 true so again I think we're in the process of reimagining everything it is painful it is

00:56:57.340 exciting it is creative it is transformative and it is absolutely essential

00:57:03.040 The Red, White, and the Blue

00:57:33.040 all were you looking on me

00:57:35.320 That I'm in OlVIDIA

00:57:36.840 that I love to see the sea

00:57:40.260 That I'm in OlVIDIA

00:57:42.200 That I'm in OlVIDIA

00:57:45.620 and I'm Harvest��

00:57:56.000 Julian at too high

00:57:57.980 and me ロ orbiting

00:58:01.400 And I love this imagination, this creativity swirling with artistry and love and kinship and relationship and political acts and being able to encompass all of these different elements that are inevitably in our lives, but perhaps people feel disempowered to engage in different ways.

00:58:28.800 And my last thought for you is, in one way, I say, absolutely, we must follow our gifts

00:58:35.560 and our passions.

00:58:36.500 And I think when someone is forced to do something that they aren't excited to do when they wake

00:58:42.980 up in the morning, their work, their creativity dies.

00:58:46.540 There's so much when we're forced to be something other than what we truly are.

00:58:52.340 But then there's also that balance of challenging ourselves, of pushing ourselves, of risking

00:58:58.780 that courage to go into the darkness so how do you see this balance between following our gifts

00:59:08.640 but challenging ourselves to expand into realms that seem like separate from us

00:59:17.980 you know the only image that comes to my mind and again i'm so mindful of you know privilege

00:59:24.360 my own white privilege. I go back to the tribes. I think of our own son, who's Rwandan,

00:59:31.540 what he had to do to survive the war in Rwanda. I mean, one of the acts of reimagination is also

00:59:38.840 seeing the power in our differences and embracing that and coming to grips with privilege. And

00:59:46.040 again, it's this dance, but the image as you speak, I think about this. The other night I went

00:59:52.740 to the opera and there was this one long sustained note and at first I thought my god you know what 0.96

01:00:00.260 lungs did this woman have and then I realized there was a whole chorus there and they just

01:00:05.020 kept breathing so that this this note just kept moving through the opera and I feel like that's

01:00:12.540 what is required of us right now is that we each keep singing and we keep breathing and we keep

01:00:19.300 moving this song along this song of resistance and insistence again each in our own way each

01:00:27.380 in the vitality of the struggle that is ours and that somewhere there's an intelligence and an

01:00:34.400 empathy and compassion and a ferocity that comes forward so that it is sacred rage that it is

01:00:41.980 this deep deep love of of life even in the face of death may i close with with a piece

01:00:52.180 oh yes i'd love that you know regina lopez white skunk um this beautiful woman um

01:01:00.380 from from the mute nation she said prayers have to be walked not just talked so i feel like

01:01:06.780 we need to begin walking our prayers but here's what i would say at the intersection of landscape

01:01:15.000 and culture diversity and inclusion patterns of cooperation emerge in the name of community

01:01:21.280 the power of what binds us together rather than what tears us apart becomes a shared priority

01:01:27.960 a creative tension between needs both human and wild must be considered and negotiated

01:01:35.540 An unexpected harmony begins to emerge as something to be honored and safeguarded, like water in the desert.

01:01:43.100 We, the people, have made mistakes.

01:01:45.620 We have made mistakes in our relationships with those who have come before us and the land that holds their histories.

01:01:52.780 We have made mistakes in how we have managed and misunderstood the wild.

01:01:56.260 But after spending a lifetime immersed in our national parks and monuments and public lands, I believe we are slowly learning what it means to offer our reverence and respect to the closest thing we as American citizens have to sacred lands.

01:02:12.240 we are at a crossroads

01:02:14.900 we can continue on the path we have been on

01:02:17.720 in this nation

01:02:18.520 that privileges profit over people and land

01:02:21.560 or we can unite as citizens

01:02:23.780 with a common cause

01:02:25.200 the health and wealth of the earth

01:02:27.440 that sustains us

01:02:28.580 if we cannot commit to this kind of

01:02:31.400 fundamental shift

01:02:32.400 in our relationship to people and place

01:02:34.980 then democracy becomes another myth

01:02:37.580 perpetuated

01:02:38.820 by those in power

01:02:40.380 who care only about themselves.

01:02:45.080 This is the hour of land,

01:02:46.680 and I think it is our time to listen and then respond.

01:02:52.980 Thank you, Terry.

01:02:54.500 Thank you for your exquisite words

01:02:58.320 and walking your prayer and leading by example

01:03:03.460 and courageously using your knowledge and privilege

01:03:09.760 and your gifts to protect these places that hold us all.

01:03:16.940 Thank you.

01:03:18.020 And thank you for your wisdom and happy birthday.

01:03:22.100 You know, and I just, I remember Doug Peacock at a low moment.

01:03:26.980 I just love him so much.

01:03:28.560 He's, you know, George Washington, Hey Duke,

01:03:31.880 the inspiration for Ed Abbey's Monkey Rinch Game,

01:03:34.880 the character who blew up Glen Canyon Dam.

01:03:36.940 I asked him, how do you stave off despair? And he said, surround yourself with people you love

01:03:45.060 and seek out wild places. And then he turned to me and said, we lose nothing by loving.

01:03:54.220 I believe that.

01:03:56.960 I'm Ayanna Young, and thank you for listening to the episode today.

01:04:00.460 The songs you heard were Healing Song 10 by Primo, Mike, and Atzen.

01:04:06.660 Then Zuni Buffalo Dance Song by Bernard Dawa Hoya and Hopi Singers.

01:04:11.800 Then Red, White, and Blue by Judy Trejo.

01:04:15.980 Our theme music is Silence Returns by Bo and Like a River from Kate Wolfe.

01:04:22.260 I'd also like to thank our team.

01:04:24.780 Our producer reach out, research director Madison Migulski,

01:04:28.440 and our media director, Molly Lebov.

01:04:32.840 And please consider making a donation at forthewild.world

01:04:36.460 and rating us on iTunes.

01:04:38.760 And if you want to keep informed with our other projects

01:04:41.500 such as the One Million Redwoods Project

01:04:43.300 and the Tongass Campaign

01:04:45.160 and our new reactive webinar series,

01:04:48.520 go to forthewild.world and sign up for our newsletter.

01:04:52.620 Until next time.

01:04:54.600 It's high on a mountain, the warm winds are blowing

01:04:57.720 And where the winds are blowing to, there ain't no way of knowing, the mountain grass is short, it's dry and close to burning, crying out for water as the season's turning.

01:05:15.720 Sweet smell of the pine, tall western cedar

01:05:21.720 Drifting on the wind, through the mountains like a river

01:05:27.720 I've been too long away from this wild open sky

01:05:38.840 On the concrete trails of wine

01:05:40.820 Through the canyons dark and white

01:05:43.720 The sounds of people talking

01:05:46.600 Words of blue and gray

01:05:50.060 Smells of doors and windows

01:05:53.140 Closed against the day

01:05:56.220 The sweet smell of the pines

01:06:00.940 Tall western cedar

01:06:02.660 Drifting on the wind

01:06:06.300 Through the mountains like a river

01:06:13.720 We'll be right back.

For The Wild - October 20, 2017

TERRY TEMPEST WILLIAMS on Sacred Rage and the Battle for Public Lands ⧸54

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