When Ordinary Becomes Extraordinary

nature connections can happen through even the most mundane, utilitarian objects in your everyday life

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A universe of constellations, etched in frost, engraved across the inky canvas of…

…my bedsheets. What artist works in this medium? You’re right. It’s nature. Nature does this.

Nature reaches across all the far-flung edges of its kingdom and folds the echoes of one margin lightly over the contours of another. Totally unrelated, but all connected.

What does the night sky have to do with my land-bound laundry? What do atmospheric frost crystals have to do with the incandescent residents of distant universes? And why should the patterns of the heavens be tracing paths along this decidedly dull workhorse feature of my pleasantly woodsy backyard?

This is one of my favorite things about nature, the way that disparate elements, at opposite corners of expanses, reflect the memories of each other, stacking atop one another right before my eyes, dragging my consciousness out into new terrain that reveals each of them in a new light.

They’re very unpredictable, these tiny crystals, expanding under the constraints of moisture and air movement and surface imperfections. And they’re fleeting, ephemeral, disappearing without a trace into thin air and memory with a whisper breath of warming air or the butterfly kiss of a single sun beam.

So I hung the laundry, surrounded by constellations engraved in winter runes, contemplating eternity stretched between the horizons of a speeding moment, feeling the universe echo through the heavens and onto my bedsheets, laughing at the absurd tumble of life on Earth.

ordinary things

I don’t know exactly what it is about a laundry line that adds so much unpredictable delight to the natural landscape. Some of my most surprise-giggle-inducing nature encounters have unfolded within the very mundane boundaries of hanging laundry up to dry.

I have been pranked by deer, who were completely invisible to me in the undergrowth, until their indignant huffs startled me into an awkwardly comical jump. After the huff, though my heart was still pounding in my ears, I was sure I heard muffled laughter.

I have been cheerfully harassed by flocks of gathered chirpers, who have reminded me that I had no business hanging out laundry unless I’d brought a handful of sunflower seeds to share with them. This, after all, is their world, and I should know better than to be an ungrateful house guest.

One time, I left my coffee cup on a nearby stump, only to turn around and discover that the rim had become a traffic circle in which a caterpillar had gotten stuck in an endless loop with no exits. Round and round he went, until I had mercy and delivered him back to the highway of grasses that seemed to make more sense to him.

And then there was the autumn afternoon when my rainbow of T-shirts became the fairy gathering place for hundreds of teeny blue fluff flies on gossamer wings with downy tutus.

Something about the particular combination of moisture and warmth and color spontaneously produces unexpected phenomena that might never materialize in all the wildly beautiful natural habit tangling and tumbling on all sides. And though the wildscape is infinitely more lovely than my laundry line, I would actually miss out on some of my favorite nature connections without it.

And that can be true of so many distinctly un-natural fixtures in our lives. Our cars, our garden hoses, our chain link fences, that pair of sneakers we left outside the front door.

So yes, absolutely, get more nature in your life! More wild spaces. More outdoor activities. More flora and fauna and open air and unplugging. But also, don’t forget to just be amazed by all the ways that nature shows up right in the midst of all of our mess and makes itself at home there, too :)