Be a Wild Woman

"Go out in the woods, go out.  

If you do not go out in the woods, 

nothing will ever happen 

and your life will never begin."

 - Clarissa Pinkola Estes, 

Women Who Run With the Wolves

Took the long way up to perfect packed powder bumps in Low Rider

I came across this book several years ago, as I was in the process of choosing whether or not to drop out of graduate school and move to Killington full time.   Estes wrote stories of women, not as they had been passed down and changed through the ages, but as they originally were.  These were stories of women who lived with the changing of the seasons, who spent time with their hands in the dirt and were connected to the Earth Mother.  Stories where women were wise and nothing about which to be fearful. Women were not witches or bitches, but instead strong and powerful.  

It was these women I wanted to be.  I did not want to walk upon cement, but feel the mud squishing in between my toes. I would rather know every book and cranny of the forest than how to maneuver the streets of the big apple.  

And so, I am here.  

In Killington.  

In Vermont

Please, read this book.  

Read the stories to your daughters. 

Tell the analysis to your sons and husbands.  

And be a wild woman.  

May You Find the Spirit of the Mountains within You,

Merisa