“I have a belief that if people just spend enough time outside listening, they will be taught things. This is why science can be magic.”
That quote is from PennElys Droz, who spoke on the panel “What is meant by decolonization?” at the Decolonizing Economics Summit this past week. There’s a lot to consider in that last short sentence—how the experiential, observational acts embedded in some ways of practicing modern science can open us up to the types of relational ways of knowing embedded in TEK (traditional ecological knowledge) as well as to the knowing and doing that some might call “magic.” But science is not always magic, and much is lost when moving from observation to objectification and the persistent push to isolate, separate, or downright deaden whatever one might be studying.
Droz, as it happens, is an engineer and natural builder, doing such work through the group Sustainable Nations and the Indian Design Collective, running natural building projects in Indigenous communities. (She’s also on staff at NDN Collective.) Perhaps that’s why I was tempted to immediately apply the quote as a description of my recent experences with natural building techniques, though that’s not what was under discussion just then. But it still seems right: there’s a different result from the act of building when one begins by stepping outside the boxed-in version of the human world, looking to the land and its creatures first for guidance. There’s a completely different relationship to a structure when the first step in the process isn’t reading ads on Zillow, but kicking a shovel into the ground to learn if you’ll be building more with sand or clay. Or when one opts to walk a stretch of land, again, and again, getting to know its own rhythms, before imposing one’s own vision, while asking: what kind of structure wants to live here, and what kind of building might the land want? what can be of this place and return to this place when time sees fit?
Of course, there are plenty of folks who learn these techniques or take the kinds of workshops I have been who aren’t having that kind of conversation. They have the dream house all planned out and are shopping for parcels to match. Certainly, I have my own sketches going, though they tend to be scaled down to what I think I might actually be capable of attempting on a first try, and small enough to dodge any need to interact with building inspectors. No elaborate schemes over here just yet.
When others ask me about what I plan to build, I usually talk about restoration instead—the chance to care for a place burned or discarded, that others don’t want; to not move in right away, but instead visit and see what plants can be brought back, what soil can be rebuilt, and only then beginning to integrate a more steady human presence.
Whatever happens down the road, I do think that this basic act of being outside, and being in thoughtful interaction with nonhuman things, is teaching me much. To look a little more carefully, and see how the curve of rings on a board naturally pulls it this way or that. How different levels of clay feel on the fingers. How firm a wall of straw can be, once it is bound. Or the many different ways something so simple as a strand of straw can feel and look and smell.
And a little bit of creative magic has transpired as a result. One surprising example is the set of short poems below. During the timber framing workshop at Canelo, the subject of haikus came up because one of the participant’s names is a rearrangement of those same sounds. I was posed the challenge, as the proclaimed writer in the group, of writing a haiku.
Now normally, I find many modern haiku to feel rather contrived; there’s an imitation of past experiences with the broader natural world, a copying of what a haiku is meant to look or sound like. I’d say that of most of my own personal attempts, too. But, fresh off many days outside with a shared community and many hours working with the same material, the poems just came out, simple and quick—truly, only a matter of minutes—and clearly borne of our shared experiences. I didn’t draw the connection until I was listening to Drolz speak, but I thought, yes, that’s it: extended time outside and with the world and the magic that alchemizes into the results of human creativity—be it science, building, or poetry—is that much easier to channel. Not that there aren’t other ways to engage in creative process, but I think we would do well to consider the benefits of this method.
A little more fortuitous alchemy: Kai (whose name inspired the conversation) took it on himself to translate the pieces into Chinese.1 Which I can’t read, but some of you on this list can, so I’m delighted to be able to share his translations as well as the originals. Many thanks, Kai!
Three Haiku for Canelo Project – Timber Frame Workshop 2023, Written by Meg Wade March 31,2023.
Chinese version (2023.04.09) translated by HMK
1.
Whack mallet, chisel
Wood peels until knot blocks
All day at last smooth
榔槌击钢凿
木料剥落至节疤
终日方平顺
2.
Twin holes, crescent moon
Fit peg through line, strong aim
Watch the building rise
双孔露月牙
目标合榫穿一线
眼见构架起
3. For Athena
Base coat, bevel it
Clay straw, straw bale, long strand straw
“This line will be beautiful”2
写给雅典娜
倒角涂底料
草碎草捆长草绳
线条多美妙
I’m still here at Canelo, about to go into another week-long workshop, this time with a focus on natural plasters and earthen floors. Here’s hoping I pick up the knack for making those beautiful beveled shapes. Knack or no, it’s another week outside learning to attend and attune to the qualities and latent possibilities within the very dirt upon which we daily walk.
Thanks for reading Unsettling.
Until next time,
Meg
Yes, haiku were traditionally Japanese. Yet just as the form has been adapted into English and many other languages, so too it has been taken up by poets in China.
This poem specifically draws on descriptions given by Athena Steen during her tour of the buildings at the Canelo Project. “Basecoat” is what they call the simple clay-straw mix they use on building walls, including on top of straw bale walls, and as a sculptured element with many applications.