the future is outside

Walking in the woods is a little like reading a book, privy to lives different from our own.
Like eavesdropping on a conversation, like companionship, like participation in a larger world. 
The boys drift toward whatever looks interesting, the restorative theater of nature offering tender scenes: light that dapples, a decaying trunk, anything slithery. 

Aside from the chance to recalibrate, the value of paying attention to the environment may be its reminder that we are meant to survive.