Summer is slowly turning toward autumn. Only a few weeks of July remain, and then comes August: the path toward autumn.
This year has passed quickly. Too quickly. Perhaps it is because Unenkulkija has been doing a little of everything. I have tended my yard, built a fence, dug so many holes that I have lost count, and, of course, I have written.
I have written a great deal.
In the spring, I finished my first book. It had been in the making for more than a decade, although it only began to take the shape of words during the last couple of years.
The book I wrote is called The Nature Witch’s Path: Seeing, Living, and Doing Traditional Nature Witchcraft. It speaks of the way I walk my own path, in the hope that the reader may grasp an idea that helps them walk theirs.
Writing the book was, above all, a spiritual process. It wrote me as much as I wrote it—a process I hope will touch me again, perhaps a year or two from now.
The book was read through and marked with a red pen by my beloved Karhuntassu. Precise beyond precision, she pointed out the occasional faults in my stream of thought, my commas scattered here, there, and halfway up the hill, and, of course, encouraged me to publish the book and make it real.
But autumn.
Soon, we will be here again.
My beloved, most beloved season is running toward me. And although the saying, “The Finnish summer is short and has very little snow,” reminds every Finn that we are accustomed to brief summers and long winters, I do not know whether I am anywhere near ready to drag a sled full of firewood behind me through the snow again, crossing the dark yard while the frost bites at my face.
Well. Nature is what it is, and there is no arguing with it.
When winter finally decides to arrive after autumn, we must slowly nod and understand its coming. The arrival of winter is as important an event in nature as any ritual, custom, or tradition of our own. It is our sacred season of nature falling asleep after the living brightness of summer.
The evenings grow longer. The shadows stretch farther. Somewhere here beside the dead rapids, behind the yard beneath the shadows of tall trees, Unenkulkija’s fire will be lit once again.
It catches. It burns. It crackles.
There I sit beside the flames. There I sit and listen, in the darkness, in the silence of nature.
Should you happen to sit beside a man with a twig-like beard who gives a quiet grunt beneath the brim of his leather hat, you are welcome. I may even make you coffee.
If my iron griddle pan happens to be over the fire, you may get a fried Baltic herring—or perhaps two—with your coffee.
Of course, should you emerge from the darkness without warning, be prepared to meet a forest troll with at least the temperament of an angry bear. Good guests know to announce their arrival beforehand.
That assumes, naturally, that you manage to find your way to this forest troll in the first place.
May the rest of your late summer be peaceful.