There are now pockets of brown and dark yellow along winding paths where I walked daily when I was at the countryside. Summer wildflowers closed their little petal heads and started to dry. Many of them are being covered in cobwebs and morning fog. Autumn is here, in my beloved meadow. Golden curtain is welcomed by little forest grove and hills all around.
I love to walk without mobile phone and headphones. I love to embrace nature sounds and silence even. It’s just wind and rustling leaves in my ears. If I bring my phone, it is to catch glimpses of little wonders around me, to capture that walk. A visual diary for me. Diary full of inspiration. A way to remember that foggy sunrise or the lineup of wildflowers by the field or little doe staring at me from the meadow down below.
I loved to walk as a child. Always down, in the meadows, sketching something in my little notebooks, always sitting between plum trees in the orchard daydreaming. And then, when I went to live in the city I lost all of that. I lost myself. And I always knew it was my missing piece. I stopped walking daily, I stopped painting and sketching and illustrating. I studied and then worked and felt lost all that time. Life was good, I was healthy, I had all I needed, but I missed my meadows and my countryside and my family. City simply never made me happy. It still doesn’t but now I know how to find ways to make it best for me and my family. I go for walks now by the river, into the big parks, down the roads that lead to horse farm and tiny forest groves. I find wonders now again, but once it all got lost and I didn't know how to find my way back.
When I got married and then pregnant with my son I knew I couldn’t let myself down anymore and pretend everything was fine. I was a women missing inspiration, missing painting, reading books, gardening, walking. Those things are my way of living, in those things I find peace and gratitude. I knew I wanted to raise my son loving nature, going into the nature, walking daily, finding little feathers and rocks and wildflowers and bringing them home in our pockets. I wanted him to seek simple joy and to learn how to find peace and simplicity in mundane. I wanted us, as a family to live more simply, with less stuff and more time. I wanted to practice simplicity daily and to love mundane. So I decided to go to the countryside as much as I could and to spend every morning or evening walking. I remember my first walk in that time. Moving through autumnal meadows in my sister's green boots and black cardigan. I thought to myself how did I decided to walk in this weather, on this rainy and moody day? Pregnant and alone. But after few minutes I felt such peace that I haven't in a long time. Nothing around me, just fields, pastures, forest, hills. Little doe was standing still in my favorite meadow, just looking at me. My wonder. For few seconds we were observing each others souls, and then silently she walked away from that brown grass into the forest depths. In that moment, my soul filled with gratitude, with all the things I felt were lost forever. My head started to fill with words I wanted to write, my soul wanted to say a prayer of gratitude for it all, my eyes absorbing fog rolling over hills, wildflower shadows and rain drops on the road. I picked up few wildflowers and kept them in my pocket. I brought them home, pressed them in my notebook and started to sketch. I realized how much walking and meeting with myself in that nature space meant for me and my life. Walking is like a meditation that creates the space where I feel most comfortable to allow my thoughts and feelings to truly be with me.
As writer and artist, I can forget that creation doesn't always mean putting paint to paper or pressing words on page. Sometimes, it's about refilling our soul with inspiration. Whether I’m standing in front of rainsoaked fall meadow, or a lake lined with tall grass, or in the middle of an orchard covered in thick fog, there’s nothing I love more than to absorb it all in silence and calm. And then to come home, and to write. To come home, and to paint or illustrate.
My little boy is two and a half years old now, and he adores our daily walks. He rises his little head to see flocks of wild geese departing our little countryside hills, and waves them goodbye just like I loved to do as a little girl. He stops by the wildflowers and touches their tiny heads. He picks up yellow leaves and brings them home to save them in his little box. He sits in the grass and asks me hundreds of questions about red poppies, white butterflies and antlers we sometimes find in the meadow. He loves when my sister finds him lost bird feathers, so at home he plays with them, watches them under old magnifying glass and we seek in our books which bird could it be that lost their feather. He loves to hear stories about animals and seasons changing. And he loves to hear what my illustrations represent because they are filled with our walking moments, landscapes we visited, my mom's garden, birds and little doe, our mundane moments always surrounded by seasons and nature.
So if anyone ever asked me, where did I find myself again I will say it was in all the simple things, between blades of grass, on frosted pine branch, in cobweb hugging wildflowers, in whistling wind, in waving farewell to flocks of wild geese, in little doe’s brown eyes.
Little suggestions:
Where are you autumn? Read my week diary.
Pieces of autumn. The art of slow living in the countryside.
All about collecting little wonder on my walks. Read here more.
