BWCA: a place to connect and disconnect

I’ve gone to the BWCA a few times and there was something special about this one. Our group, Av, Livia, Arianna, Louise, Isaac, Ilsa and Myself came to this special place despite busy schedules and various levels of grinding and exhaustion. The wilderness welcomed us and held us tenderly with glassy water, cool swims, loon calls, and a few thunderstorms too. We did a lot of laughing, eating and playing. We also did some resting, wondering and thinking about what it means to have hope in a sometimes hopeless world. Here are some reflections from these fine folks!

-Maia Dalager

This was my first trip to the Boundary Waters and such a beautiful trip with a beautiful group of people. My favorite part of the experience was laughing and connecting with Maia, Av, Livia, Arianna, Isaac, and Ilsa throughout the week.

A break from the texts and emails and notifications constantly coming to me was more satisfying than I expected and refreshing.

In all honesty, the stars didn’t live up to the magnitude of what I expected to see in a Dark Sky Sanctuary but between clouds and smoke coverage, maybe there’s more than what I could see in my time there. The torrential downpour on Tuesday night was awe inspiring and well past the magnitude I expected.

-Louise Fehrman

When the soreness in your shoulders makes you aware of muscles you didn’t even know you had. Or when there are more bumps than smooth skin left on your body because you ran out of bug spray. Or when your hair resembles the eagle’s nest you saw earlier. Or when you wake up in a soggy sleeping bag with a puddle underneath you, you’re humbled in way you didn’t know you needed.

Leaving the comfort of home, the stress of work, the accessibility of life in the city, all for a simple life in the wild, we’re reminded not only of how good we have it, but of how much we’re missing too.

The work we put in out here in the wild - the paddling, portaging, fire building, tent pitching, bug battling, and pit toileting - makes us all the more aware of the play we do get to do, and to be able to enjoy it all to the fullest.

Swims soothe. Loons sing. Rocks smile. Trees wave. Food satisfies. Even the canoe feels a little lighter to carry.

So in the wild of the city, I hope I can remember how the stresses of life make the moments of play all the more joyous and beautiful. And how maybe, even just sometimes, work can be play too.

-Livia Wooldridge

We enjoyed a trip to the Boundary Water Wilderness last month with a group of young adults. Together we explored what hope looks like, navigating and embracing changes and transitions, and even sharing some unexpected talents. The loons greeted us and the weather welcomed us to Basswood Lake where we spent most of our time. We wove together ourselves, each other, and the great outdoors and came out together a new piece of Fabric. You can even tell by our woven arms in our “after” picture.

-Ilsa Lee

Humans hope, often dumbly and against odds. And they do what they must. Sometimes their hopes from the past are actualized in some way in the present, sometimes they are not. Most of the time they are not.

After the zest for life so commonly associated with childhood fades away, when humans begin to contemplate failure, tragedy, and death, life becomes about trying desperately to avoid these things. Many humans take with them from their childhoods virtues of fairness, and are disappointed when other humans violate these ideas. It makes them sad and angry. They do not understand how other humans could act in such ways. Sometimes hopes are antithetical to one another.

Human’s hopes can be seen in their actions. Hope for a better future for themselves or a collective drives them to take on different projects. So many different humans with so many different histories working on so many different human projects makes a shit storm. It is within the shit storm that every project has been started and every decision has been made. The shit storm is where every failure, tragedy and death have ever occurred. It is the only place humans can laugh, play, cry and hug. It is where humans hope, dumbly and against odds.

-Avalon Lock

Favorite moment: Louise putting three people in chokeholds…

and racing the other canoe back to the campsite after a day trip to basswood falls :)

-Arianna Hawkins

Since I was a little kid, I have been going to the boundary waters with my family, often to the same campsite. Going into this trip I did not really know what to expect. I did not know what Fabric was either. I later learned that it’s a spiritual group with an emphasis on community and connection. This trip opened up a new perspective for me on the boundary waters and gave me the opportunity to go to a place I might never have gone to with my family.

Not knowing many of the people and getting to know them in this setting is not something I do very often. I got to know people in a way that I probably would not have if I had met them in a more traditional setting. I’m very grateful that I got to go and meet amazing people!

-Isaac Harris