Do you want to go on an adventure?
Moments from my wild and injured life (April 5-11)
Hi friend! If you’re new here: most weeks, I send out a little dispatch from my daily life in the UK. It’s a collection of stories and things I’ve noticed—at home, in books, on my walks, in the world, and within myself. I send them all from The Lighthouse. My hope is they feel reflective and calming, and inspire you to notice more in your own life. Writing them certainly helps me notice more in mine… 🕯
April 5, 2025
It’s mid-afternoon and we’re halfway through a walk, finishing the ice cream bars we stopped to buy along the way. “Do you want to go this way?” I ask and motion right. “And stay in the sun a little longer?” This way takes us through one gate, across a bit of grass, then through a second gate. Before opening the second one, I see a sign attached to it: BIRD FLU DETECTED HERE.
I have never seen this sign before. Not here, not anywhere, especially in a public place. We are not walking through a farm (though sheepies are often in the next field over). We are walking by a small body of water occupied by birds: ducks, geese, swans, etc. The sign says to report any dead birds found, and not touch them or even their feathers. A minute later, we walk past a huge carcass… of maybe a goose!? Though the feet look more like an owl. It’s hard to see what it is/was. Looks like a fox dug into it. If it was infected, that could be bad news for the fox. It’s definitely bad news for the bird(s)…
April 6, 2025
“Do you want to go on an adventure today?” I ask the preteen in my life. You have a preteen in your life!? you might be wondering now, and the answer is yes. I have a preteen and a teenager in my life, and that’s probably all I will ever tell you about them, friend. Because they aren’t my kids to talk about. They are Tall Man’s. I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about how kids are put on the internet more broadly, but trust we can only ever do what feels right for us. What feels right for me is to not talk about his kids, or these two autonomous humans. But I am interested in exploring what it means to be an adult in kids’ lives. And when I realized the preteen and I would have 6+ hours alone together with zero plans or time restraints, I asked the most Cait question I could think of:
Do you want to go on an adventure?
This was naturally met with some follow-up questions. I had no predetermined plans or ideas around this, friend. I was just making it up on the spot, the way all my friends who are parents admit they do every day! “Do you want to just get in the car, get some snacks, then you can tell me to go left or right, and we’ll see what happens?” That got a very big YES.