It would have been easy to feel alone today, with so many things I value rejected point blank.

Peace.

Compassion.

Justice for all (species).

Sometimes it’s helpful to look at what we know (or think we know) from a different perspective—where up is down, down is up, and the boundaries are blurred. Thus my travels in British Columbia last week, first for a spirited gathering of mesocarnivore biologists at “Weaselfest” (Best. Name. Ever.), and then an annual conference on regional habitat connectivity, called “Cascadia Connects.”

During my last research trip into the Olympic National Forest, I decided to sit tight by an unnamed lake while Robert proceeded to a nearby marten survey station. We’d already slogged nearly a kilometer off-trail, tumbling downhill through a lot of woody debris that tweaked my sprained ankle and tested my mood. When Robert and our dog, Alder, scared up a nest of ground hornets—prompting me to scream “No! No! No! No!” as we all scrambled to outrun an angry mob—I knew it was time for Alder and me to take a little break.

Were it not for the salamander, today might have felt foreboding. Temperatures so high I could almost see the glaciers melt, Mount Baker like a snow cone in the boiling sun. I could almost hear mourning in the song of the thrushes, smell fire in the firs as their needles yielded to brown. How will the wolverines survive these Hellish hot summers? I worried, their fate, like our own, tied to the future of climate change.

Truth be told, I’m not much of a birder. There’s a reason I study carnivores instead of, say, corvids—cougars and black bears are more night owls like me. When a brilliant Vermont sunrise beamed through my eyelids at 6am, however, I felt an acute case of FOMO that prompted me to reach for my phone. Was my cohort at Bread Loaf still planning to birdwatch at 7, just as we’d done the morning before? Head propped on my pillow, I read Hai-Dang’s confirmation email with enough groggy gusto to spark a supine stretch—but it was the message from Helen Macdonald that really sealed the deal.

Last fall, I visited Cairngorms National Park in the Scottish Highlands to attend the 8th International Martes Symposium. This intimate conference occurs every 5 years, inviting biologists who share a passion for members of the Martes Complex (martens, sables, fishers, tayras, and wolverines) to get together and discuss the latest science and conservation priorities pertaining to these little-studied animals.

I glanced at my phone only moments after I’d been peering across Puget Sound in hopes of seeing a distant splash, that dreamlike flash of black and white and glimmering blubber that bellows “Orca!” from the depths of my primordial brain. I’d been blessed with such a sighting a few weeks before, after my husky mix, Alder, cued me (nose in the air) that something very special was happening out there. Today there was no such indication, nor a dorsal flare. On this tragic August morning, there was only a headline pronouncing Tokitae was gone.

The morning after they stole my reproductive rights, I needed to get away. My husband and I loaded our day packs and two happy dogs into the car and headed to Olympic National Forest—about 90 minutes from home. We drove past strip malls and gas stations and American flags that had been hung for freedom.

This is my third writing retreat at the Whiteley Center, a refuge for established scholars and artists to study, write, create, and interact in a peaceful and quiet environment. The center is associated with University of Washington’s Friday Harbor Laboratories, located on the eastern shores of San Juan Island in the Salish Sea.

One reason I write is to try to evoke my experiences in nature as a source of inspiration. The experiences come readily—I need only walk in the woods, or in the mountains, or on a sweep of sand by the sea—but the writing does not. I toil to find the right words to describe a wild place, a wild moment, a wild animal, without resorting to cliché. 

Last evening, as the sun sank low in the Easter sky, I decided to take a stroll on a local beach. I hadn’t been at my best all day. The night before, while watching Minari, I received a text from a friend telling me another friend had passed.

A few weeks ago, I began to hear rumblings about a cougar on Bainbridge Island. Such rumblings are not uncommon, but this time there was supposedly photographic evidence. Sure enough, just after Christmas, a friend sent me a video clip of a large cat with a long tail approaching a wire fence and then leaping straight into it, apparently stalking a wary goat on the other side.

This week, President Biden’s German shepherd, Major, was “indogurated” as the first shelter dog to inhabit the White House. Our own regal rescue, Alder, and his best friend, Bessie, helped mark the occasion by partying like puppies in the snow. Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand woofs.

The morning began like most others during the pandemic. I woke up, read the news, wished I hadn’t, took a quick glance at email—and that’s when I saw the message on Nextdoor Bainbridge: Help! Wild animal rescue needed.

In the spirit of the March for Science that had occurred a few months prior, Robert carried a fluorescent green sign bearing the words “Science is Patriotic” penned in red and blue. The sign is still taped to the wall of our garage, where we build survey equipment for wolverines and other carnivores so we can better understand their needs.

Normally, I would try to ride it out—close the windows, turn on some piano music, do my best to focus while the engines roared. But coupled with the daily barrage of political noise and a minor construction project underway in our garage, I decided to flee.