🌱 The Honorable Harvest as Writer's Ethos
Reciprocity and community are possible online; who knew?
Hello from Maryland. We’re moving this weekend, which is equal parts stressful and joyful. Not surprisingly, house and home have been on my mind—witness recent writing on tiny houses, Thoreau’s cabin, and shelter.1
I think of writing for Building Hope like hosting a dinner party. I imagine the dishes; assemble the ingredients; start cooking; invariably arrive at an impossible moment like “marinate overnight” when the guests are due in two hours; add an additional dish because why not; choose the wine (no, not the Pinot, a Cab Franc and a nice Côtes du Rhone); run out of time for that second dessert and the edgy appetizer I’ve never made before; and finally throw open the doors to welcome my guests. Will they enjoy the food, the wine, the setting? Should I have gone with the good silver instead of the everyday flatware? Will they enjoy each other’s company?
I’m cooking up some changes here that will likely include a new name. It’s exciting. Meanwhile I invited a bunch of my favorite nature writers here to participate in a yet-to-be-named interview series. Their enthusiasm has been wonderful. Look for those in July. If you’re interested in being interviewed, DM me. If you’re not yet a subscriber and would like future posts to come right to your inbox, you know what to do.
It’s been another rich week of community building here on Substack and in the analog world. We’re all finding our own place of belonging, and I’m grateful for several sweet encounters that gave me new insights and reminded me to stay the course. To trust the process.
convened a live reading of his final episode of his delightful serial novel, Harmony House, and treated us to a demo of how he mixes the theme music. Following his reading, the seven of us gathered had a lovely chat about writing, serializing, and the creative life.2 DM’d me with an offer to help me hash out ideas to refocus and rename my newsletter. We talked for 90 minutes on zoom about teaching, writing, and publishing, and I got to meet one of her daughters and one of her cats. Our time together gave me a much-needed boost.’s latest post shares her impressions of one of my favorite books, Thermal Delight in Architecture, a love song to the ways that sunlight and breezes and warmth and cold work on our animal bodies and emotions, even when we’re inside. And while she was at it, Sal generously recommended my recent tiny house nerd-out. We had a lovely back and forth in the comments that led to further insights. Maybe I’ll assign it to my students again.3 wrote a juicy lessons-learned post about editing Substack Reads.4 It got me thinking about finding my place within this vast landscape. We’re all familiar with nesting scales of family, neighborhood, district, town, metro area, county, state, country, etc. Architectural history taught me that Greek city-states were limited to 50,000 because that was a manageable size for people to get along in community. If the population grew beyond that, a group would crack off to go and found a new city-state.In response to my comment on his post, Sam agreed that once you get to a certain critical mass, you're no longer a community and it's difficult to form a coherent structure. He suggested it's more like living in New York than in classical Athens. You wouldn't expect to know everything that's going on. You find your place within it.
It’s a fitting analogy, though for someone whose FOMO flares up more often than I care to admit, it can be nerve-wracking to wade through all the marvelous offerings here. I have to remind myself not to worry about what I’m missing, and instead enjoy what I’m reading and cherish my interactions here.
In the spirit of small is mighty, the tremors from the launch of
set off a tidal wave of enthusiasm. Truly a case of an offering meeting a need. It seems that many of us long to hold tight to a community, to know and be known.Another way I visualize finding my place in the greater Substack megatropolis is inspired by how nature works with niches and ecotones, smaller zones and intersections within ecosystems and bioregions that are adapted to micro variables of weather and geography.
I’m circling how I might define my niche of writers and readers who are awed by nature’s design brilliance. We write from a desire (or need) to share our love for the world—and for some of us that includes people, however misguided and frustrating (and destructive) we can be. Our wonder is an outward expression of our love. Our writing is tender, laced with delight and with grief. Touched by loss and abundance.
As much as I long to live open-hearted and to write from that place, it can be too much sometimes. I fall back to skimming the surface out of fear or weariness or sadness. When I walked in the world hours after my father died, and eight months later when my mother followed, there was light everywhere. It shone from people’s eyes, their faces, their torsos. It sparked every leaf on every tree and reminded me of when, at age twelve, I put on my first pair of eyeglasses. Stunned by how bright, how crisp and crystal clear the leaves were. And by what I had been missing. I always want to see like that, even as I shrink from it when it hurts.
It takes effort to build one’s community, whether upon moving to a new place as I did last year, or online. My attempts online have taken many forms. I launched a website called GOforChange to document and celebrate people and organizations working to make a positive difference; was active on Facebook until Zuck’s smug narcissism enabled a propaganda war we’re still reeling from; dabbled on Twitter among brilliant journalists, urbanists, academics, and climate activists; half-heartedly tried Instagram (all those ads!); wrote daily on my blog Thriving on the Threshold; and still maintain my LinkedIn out of noncommittal habit.
Substack is the first place where reciprocity is tangible, almost measurable. Giving and receiving is real here. And that feels good.
In the spirit of reciprocity, I’ll wrap up this post with a consideration of Robin Wall Kimmerer’s “Honorable Harvest,” which is the best framework I’ve found to guide just about any human enterprise. Whether farming, logging, community-building, designing or building a house—or, in this case, writing on Substack.
Braiding Sweetgrass’ Honorable Harvest as Substack Ethos
“The guidelines for the Honorable Harvest are not written down, or even consistently spoken of as a whole—they are reinforced in small acts of daily life. But if you were to list them, they might look something like this:”5
Know the ways of the ones who take care of you, so that you may take care of them.
Introduce yourself. Be accountable as the one who comes asking for life.
Ask permission before taking. Abide by the answer.
Never take the first. Never take the last.
Take only what you need.
Take only that which is given.
Never take more than half. Leave some for others.
Harvest in a way that minimizes harm.
Use it respectfully. Never waste what you have taken.
Share.
Give thanks for what you have been given.
Give a gift, in reciprocity for what you have been given.
Sustain the ones who sustain you and the earth will last forever.
When I thought of drafting this essay, I imagined I would take each of these in turn and speculate how it applies to Building Hope on Substack, and how it would guide my refocused newsletter with the new name that I’m excited about (and Tara is, too).
Seeing them now on the page, I’m inclined to leave them be. I’m more curious how they land in you. Maybe that’s the Substack equivalent of Never take more than half. Leave some for others.
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Did a particular Honorable Harvest guideline speak to you about writing here on Substack? Or about another aspect of life? How are you finding and building community here?
From Kimmerer’s marvelous book, Braiding Sweetgrass, p.183, which is a textbook for my Ecological Design Thinking seminar. I love seeing architecture, computer science, criminology and business majors light up when discussing her stories and teachings.
Have you ever noticed that compliments on your hair tend to arrive the day before a haircut? I like Building Hope. It can accommodate a range of themes. I’ll be watching for your changes with curiosity and hope.
Thanks for this, especially the braiding sweet grass reference/connection! And I was moved by your writing about the death of your parents and how everything was bright and vivid. So beautiful, and such a gift to have this reminder to appreciate my parents while they are still alive. Thank you.