How do we live relationally when we are surrounded by polarization; when fulfilling our basic needs of food, water, and shelter are often in direct opposition to our intention to live with integrity and cause no harm? It often feels impossible; but if we look around and beyond ourselves, into the more-than-human world, examples of living relationally abound.
Recently our Registration Coordinator, Nastassja Noell, was commissioned by Dark Mountain Project (an eco-social group of writers and artists), to write a piece discussing fungal anastomosis and what we as humans might learn from this process of dismantling cell walls. What resulted is a beautiful essay that weaves together themes that were very alive at The Firefly Gathering this past June: right relations, eco-philosophy, landback, as well as blue ghost fireflies and chronic illness.
“I’m a lichenologist, and I’ve loved conducting biodiversity surveys in the alpine and intermountain west; but the more studies I’ve embarked on, the more I’ve felt like something was missing.”
Nastassja took a break from lichenology, and during that time joined the Firefly team as our Registration Coordinator, setting up the back-end web systems for Perennial Workshops and the Annual Gathering.
“Firefly is what was missing in my life; knowing the names of all our relations is important, but cultivating relationships with the more-than-human world is everything.”
We invite you to enjoy the moving essay “Spaces Between the Branches,” which just came out last week. To learn more about lichens, check out Nastassja’s article “How to be a Lichen,” that she wrote for Firefly’s blog last January. If you’re more of a fiction lover, you might resonate with her flash fiction pieces:
- Cracking Open – A Walk to the Precipice published in Dark Mountain’s ABYSS last October, about a girl and the disfigured creatures at the center of time.
- Medicine Songs, published by Bright Flash Literary Review last month, is a flash about a little boy learning to sing medicine songs as the world around him is crumbling.
“This year was my first Firefly Gathering,” says Nastassja, “and for the first time in my life, I got a clear vision of the future I’m writing towards. Thank you Firefliers, for being who you are and shining your light in the world!”
For more from Nastassja, check out her website at beinglichen.org.
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If you’d like to explore more about what the living world can inspire in your own path of living in more empowered and loving relationship with self, community, and Earth, we encourage you to join us at Firefly’s upcoming Wild Mushrooms & Fungi Identification Walk and Our Magnificent Trees: Identification, Uses, Folklore, and More with Luke Cannon.
Image: “Anastomosis: Sitting at the feet of the Tree People” by Nastassja Noell, carving on birch panel, Winter Solstice 2021.
