The Wisdom of Wolves by Jim and Jamie Dutcher

 

 “Each and every wolf has a story to share. Can we be trusted to listen?”

 Marc Bekoff

 Every member of a pack of wolves is valued by the others and recognized as a unique individual who makes a special contribution to the group. Their bonds are deep.  Jim and Jamie Dutcher spent six years living in a tent beside a pack of wolves by the Sawtooth Mountains of Idaho. The Wisdom of Wolves shares their knowledge and experience of living side by side with the Sawtooth pack of wolves, taking us into an emotional journey of countless surprises.

 Jim and Jamie Dutcher describe the wolves’ compassionate nature; they admire their curious courageous spirit. Wolves care well for the most vulnerable in the pack, and they do what it takes to keep everybody safe.  Jim and Jamie examined their relationships and paid special attention to the ways wolves communicate. They also learned how wolves keep each other in check to maintain harmony in the group.

  The authors give each wolf a name and describe their fascinating personalities. Besides, they explain how wolves interact with other species.

  When a person kills an old wolf, the survival of the group as a whole is threatened because old wolves have invaluable knowledge and experience that help the pack. Furthermore, the loss of any member of the group causes deep pain among the wolves. The Wisdom of Wolves elucidates how they grieve.

  The book was published by National Geographic. Both Jim and Jamie Dutcher raise public awareness about the true nature of wolves by writing books, making documentaries and giving talks in educational settings.

 

 The authors debunk the myth of the so-called lone wolf: “We often hear the term of the ‘lone wolf’ in reference to a person who acts alone, cares for no one, and craves no companionship. Sadly, like so many negative things falsely connected to wolves, the term has now come to mean a loner who wishes to do us harm. Such a state is an aberration among humans, and it’s equally rare among wolves.”

  It is important to clarify the concept to avoid misunderstandings and confusion. The truth is that a lone wolf in nature is a temporary phenomenon. Biologists call him a disperser. In reality “the lone wolf in nature is a wolf in its third year or so who has decided to leave its birth pack and strike out in search of new territory and a mate. What does a lone wolf want? It wants to stop being a lone wolf. It wants togetherness, to be part of something bigger.” It is not the aberration that the misused term alludes to.

  The term “lone wolf” should not be used to describe people that have no compassion and empathy for others because it perpetuates an attitude of ignorance toward wolves. It tarnishes the reputation of wolves and is dangerous. Another relevant fact to highlight here is that when the ecosystems where wolves thrive are respected, wolves don’t attack cattle.

   During the fourth year of their project, Jim and Jamie encountered all kinds of threats. They received anonymous letters in their mailbox asking them “to get rid of those wolves or we will." Authorities put pressure on them to make sure they would move out of their wolf camp. They were persecuted in different ways.

 “Somebody posted signs near our camp warning us to be gone or ‘wind up in the Custer County jail.’ Even a former governor weighted in, saying our project was nothing more than ‘wolf propaganda’ and should not be allowed to exist. Jamie and I were painfully aware that we were responsible for the lives of these wolves, but our ability to keep them safe seemed increasingly beyond our control.”

  In view of the stress they faced, Jim went out for a walk to sort things out. During his walk, the leader of the pack, Kamots, stayed close to him. He would disappear into the trees, and then he would emerge again, trotting and exploring the territory, until something amazing happened.

 As Jim sat and talked to himself, wondering what to do, Kamots approached him.

 “In a gesture I’d never seen before, he raised his paw up to me. I put out my hand and pressed it against his paw, and we sat there like that for a minute in silence. I felt as though he was assuring me that if we held up our end, he would hold up his. We should continue to deal with the human world, and in his calm, strong, confident way, he would keep his pack stable and safe. He was that kind of leader.”

 

The wolves gave Jim and Jamie a very special gift: the gift of trust between species, and through this gift they learned a lot about life, love, and compassion. You can visit their website to learn more about their work:

If you enjoyed this post, you will probably welcome my writing on these books:

Second Nature: The Inner Lives of Animals

Untamed

Unforgotten

Notes from the Pen: A Collection of Essays, Poems and Thoughts from Prison

 

“Mistakes have the power to turn you into something better than you were before.” Anonymous

  The seeds of change are inside every person. The willpower to change, grow, thrive and blossom is a personal choice.

   I used to be baffled whenever I heard somebody say that “people don’t change,” but then I understood that those who make such comments are projecting their own self-imposed limitations and insecurities onto others.

   Notes from The Pen, by Jacob Keiter, is a collection of essays and poems about the days of his life in prison. He wrote most of these essays while he was in Schuylkill Federal Correction Institution in Pennsylvania. Drugs and alcohol had led him to make bad choices that landed him in jail. The circumstances of his arrest are described in the book.

   His arrest was a turning point in his life; he committed to become the best person he could possibly be. Amid the despair of the situation he found himself in, he drew strength and hope from his wife’s love, and both turned to their faith to move forward.

 “As I sat in a jail cell I began to reflect on the decisions I made that led to the situation at hand. After my mind was fully cleared from the drugs I was finally ready to let that lifestyle go. After a few weeks of sitting in a cell I was granted pre-trial bail to attend a therapeutic community. Immediately after I completed the program I was indicted by the federal government.”

 On January 18, 2018 he had to self-surrender into prison. It was one of the toughest days of his life:

 “As my wife drove me to the facility, we held hands the entire car ride, not wanting to let go of the present in fear of what the future may hold.”

 It was interesting to read about the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the prison system. Jacob was thankful for the fact that he was offered the vaccine soon enough, but he was also shocked to learn that many inmates refused to get vaccinated; they did not trust the vaccine. Conspiracy theories spread like wildfire in the prison setting.  Eager to follow the CDC guidelines, Jacob was disappointed that others did not care to take the necessary precautions, risking the health of others.

  Jacob cultivated various talents during his stay in prison. Unlike other inmates who spent time watching TV, he preferred to write regularly and he endeavored to strengthen his emotional, mental, physical and spiritual health. In doing so, he supported others as well.

   In his book he mentions that there is a kind of established racial segregation in the way inmates are expected to interact with each other, and I feel he could have elaborated further on this issue to delve into the repercussions of this.

   Jacob worked for an electronics recycling factory 40 hours a week. There is a special program that allows inmates to develop work skills for successful re-entry, and he excelled at it. Even though he only earned 1.15 dollars per hour, he valued the experience and expertise he gained from it.

  What makes his style of writing so compelling and engaging is his honesty. I think this story will inspire others to make good choices to rebuild their lives. Every reader, regardless of their situation, will feel the warmth of hope in the message he offers.

   The four years he spent in jail were not easy, but they became the foundation of his wisdom and resilience. From the vicissitudes of prison life, he forged a new path, one that would enable him to become the best version of himself. 

   Throughout his ordeal Jacob always counted on his wife's love and steady support.

    At the time of his release his words convey how his appreciation for freedom had acquired a new dimension:

 “I will no longer take for granted the little things that make up my daily life. I will appreciate every second spent with my wife. I will cuddle my rabbit until she has had enough and kicks away from me, and I will soak up the fresh air around me. I have a newly found high appreciation and a new personal meaning for the word ‘freedom’. As of today, everything I’ve been preparing for officially begins. I can finally be the friend, brother, son and husband that those who love me deserve for me to be.”

  Jacob Keiter writes regularly for his local newspaper, The Sun. His writing has also been published in American Bee Journal, Referee Magazine, Graterfriends, and Prisoner Express. His book Notes from The Pen was released in January 2022.

 

Upstream: in the Alaska Wilderness by Eric Wade

 

Boreal forests have always been intriguing to me.

 

 In Upstream, Eric Wade and his wife of 44 years, who is a talented photographer, welcome us into their life in a cabin on a river, amid birches and willow trees, where they share reflections, adventures and observations about the plants and animals in the area.

 Eric Wade paints vivid pictures with words, capturing the touch of the seasons. The simplicity of his days summons up memories, and encourages him to appreciate those memories through the lens of experience and wisdom.

   He expresses a certain ambivalence regarding the aging process. He ponders over his health issues, which he attributes to aging, and acknowledges the limitations that these ailments impose on his body and mind, but he also affirms that aging does not fade the zest for accomplishing one’s goals. He cites various examples of people who made significant accomplishments in their senior years. Nola Ochs graduated from Fort Hayes State University in 2007 at the age of 95 with a degree in general studies; Lew Hollander, an ironman who competed in triathlons in his eighties; Peter Roget published his famous thesaurus at age 73. Grandma Moses began painting in her seventies. She died at age 101 after painting more than fifteen hundred masterpieces. I am adding Nikki Kenward to his list: she became a trapeze artist in her sixties… and the list goes on if we care to research this.

  Eric Wade and these people inspire us to cultivate tenacity and perseverance in every aspect of our lives.

 

 Eric Wade’s life experience regales us with musings and introspection, engaging our senses and restoring hope despite the obstacles and difficulties we may have to contend with. He ventures to contemplate life from a new dimension of curious humility: “Lots of decisions are influenced by the myopic views we hold because we seldom venture from our daily line. We don’t know where we are or who we are and, ultimately, we end with regrets. Perhaps that’s why we don’t like one another. How can we like what we don't know? If I don’t know about you, why should I ever care about you? If I don’t know about the wilderness, why should I care about it? If I don’t know about the short lives of food I eat—plant or animal—why should I give it a second thought?”

 

  His inquisitive nature and his humble attitude inspire us to become curious about the natural world: “This large birch enjoyed a view of the entire homestead. What messages was it sending and receiving? I know I don’t have the capacity to learn what goes on in the natural world, certainly not. Aldo Leopold put it this way ‘Only the mountain has lived long enough to listen objectively to the howl of the wolf.’ Perhaps I could work a lot harder.”

 

 I don’t agree with him when he associates beauty with deception. The purpose of thorns in roses is not to cause deception. The way I see it, every rose, no matter how beautiful, has the right to defend herself. By the same token, owls do what they need to do to survive, and nobody should blame them for this.

 Upstream was published by Shanti Arts Press.

The photographs for this post were kindly provided by Eric Wade.

 Eric Wade is a writer, teacher, musician, naturalist and outdoorsman. He is also the author of Cabin: an Alaska Wilderness Dream. He earned a bachelors in English education at Southern Oregon University and a masters in Journalism from the University of Oregon. He served as a public-school teacher, principal and director of non-profit corporations for more than forty years.

 

  If you want to do something healthy and fun to support refugees from Ukraine, check out this. I learned about this idea from Love is Stronger blog.

 Kudos to Marina Ovsyannikova for her bravery and courage to speak up against the atrocities that dictator Vladimir Putin is causing in Ukraine.

 Thank you for reading this blog.

 Till next time.

Second Nature: The Inner Lives of Animals

 

  

 Soon after I wrote my post on “Unforgotten” an interesting synchronicity took me by surprise: I came across the book Second Nature: The inner Lives of Animals, by animal behaviorist Jonathan Balcombe, in which he points out that referring to animals to insult humans is rooted in deep-seated prejudices and lack of knowledge. It is also an act that debases both humans and non-human beings.

  With clear evidence, Balcombe shatters the prejudices that have dominated the minds of people for centuries, and this makes me wonder why this book did not get the attention it deserves.

 

Are you aware, for example, of the altruistic behaviors of vampire bats? Balcombe’s book details how vampire bats share and help each other in times of need. You will probably be astonished to learn that rats restrain themselves when they know their actions would cause pain to another individual.

 “Research has shown that rats would stop pressing a bar to obtain food if doing so delivered an electric shock to a rat next to them. Another experiment confronted rats with a fellow rat who was strapped tightly into a suspended harness. By pressing a lever, the witnessing rat could lower the other to the floor. This is what the witnessing rats did.”

    The facts he shares afford us the chance to reflect.

  

  It is not uncommon to hear stories that vilify sharks. Yet there are less than ten attacks on humans by sharks worldwide per year, whereas humans kill between 26 million and 73 million sharks per year.

   You may have been told that animal groups are autocracies. Evidence is mounting to prove the opposite; animal societies tend to function as democracies. Studies by Tim Roper and Larissa Conradt from the University of Sussex found that when a group of animals makes a decision to move somewhere, they respond to the “vote” of a majority (about 60%). In deer, the individual vote is expressed by standing up. African buffalo vote with the direction of the gaze. Whooper swans use head movements.

  Democracy also guides actions in social insects. For instance, when honeybees decide they need to move, the decision is democratic in nature.

 The mainstay of the survival of species is based on cooperation, not competition. When Jane Goodall discovered the behavior of sharing among chimpanzees, she awakened a new perception in scientists, who, from that point on, began to acknowledge sharing behaviors in other animals. You can learn more about this from Jonathan Balcombe’s book Second Nature.

 

 Balcombe sheds light on the ways animals cooperate with each other,  express gratitude and are prone to choose peace over violence. He gives examples of compassion among animals and on how they do  selfless acts for no tangible benefit to themselves. Their individual experiences, emotions and feelings play a role in their lives and in the ways they interact with each other.

  It has always been convenient for human beings to consider animals as irrational and savage to excuse the exploitation and abusive treatment of them. (Indeed, people may choose to believe what they want to believe, but this does not make humans morally superior).

  If you encounter people who think that cruelty against animals has nothing to do with societal human violence, you can let them know that various studies have shown there is a link between the two. Research done at Yale University has shown that there are strong associations between adult criminal behavior and childhood histories of animal cruelty.  Secondly, when cultural anthropologist David Levinson surveyed violence against women in ninety different human societies around the world, he found that victims were significantly more likely to be permanently injured, scarred, or killed by their husbands in societies in which animals were treated cruelly.

  Last but not least, “an extensive analysis of 581 American counties with and without slaughterhouses found that, compared to other industries, slaughterhouse employment increases arrest rates for violent crimes, rape, and other sexual offenses, presumably because the worker is desensitized to violence and cruelty.”

  Are humans morally superior? Jonathan Balcombe, animal behaviorist, does not think so. 

  Second Nature offers research and entertaining anecdotes that illuminate the inner lives of animals and inspire human beings to open their minds and hearts to the paths of wisdom, empathy and curiosity, and to become humble in this process of discovery.

  “When we make compassionate personal choices according to how they affect another, we are practicing Second Nature. The distinguished American biologist Edward O.Wilson coined the term biophilia to describe the connections that human beings unconsciously seek with the rest of life. Biophilia is the natural affinity—literally the love for life—that we may feel for a forest, the sound of ocean waves rolling onto a beach, the open sky or a butterfly.”

   Second Nature is a conscientious form of biophilia that happens when we extend this affinity to all individuals, recognizing that they have lives of value and that they want to live as much as we do. In Balcombe’s own words:

 “Extending our empathy and concern toward all who experience the ups and downs of life is neither strange nor radical. It is, after all, Second Nature.”

 This is the kind of book that leaves you thinking long after you finish it.

 

 I am horrified by the atrocities Vladimir Putin is causing in Ukraine. I stand with the people of Ukraine in their fight for freedom, life and liberty.

 

 

 

From a Black Girl to All Black Girls

 

“Excellence and elegance with every step I take,

Labels are something I transcend, nothing holds

Me back,”

Alexa Christian, from the poem “My Little Brown Self”

 

  Showering her readers with the confidence drawn from the love of her foremothers, Alexa’s words are bold and vibrant.  Her verses and monologues plant a seed to be watered and nurtured with the courage of creativity.

“From a Black Girl to All Black Girls” is a collection of poems, monologues and a play by Alexa Christian, a very young poet from Tennessee. Through her writing she pays tribute to the wisdom of her foremothers—“mothers, mommas, nanas, grannies”-- while inviting girls to express themselves.

 Alexa’s poetry kindles our curiosity to learn more about her ancestors, and I hope she will continue to write about them in future books.

  After sharing her own poetry, Alexa provides space and ideas to unleash the readers’ creative energy. Alexa urges her readers to honor their dreams and their own voices. Her poetry book also contains a literary glossary and reading recommendations.

 Alexa is convinced that fostering a love for poetry early on should be a crucial aspect of education.

  Opening up to a diversity of voices will pave the way to more fair societies. In various subtle ways the voices of women of color are often ignored or distorted by biases and prejudices, and this can undermine their right to full expression.

 It is also necessary to enrich school curricula by acknowledging and celebrating the contributions of women of color.

   Today I have the honor to interview Alexa Christian, author of “From a Black Girl to All Black Girls”. Thank you, Alexa, for your contribution to this post.

 

Julia:  What is the purpose of your book? What inspired you to write it and publish it?

Alexa: The purpose of my book is to ignite and fan the interest of poetry in students - primarily in the levels of kindergarten through grade 3. Yet the love of poetry, monologues, and playwriting are for every age. My inspiration for writing and publishing FABG Vol. 1 was the simple longing for people (other than my mother who has always been a gracious audience) to read, and understand, and relate to the complexity of my feelings and life during early 2020. My purpose is also to give others a chance to write their own thoughts with the provided space in my book. 

 

Julia: In your book you included a play that grabbed my attention. It is about Ella, a woman who is compelled to write a book and publish it, but there are unexpected forces at play that try to restrain her. What gave you the idea to write about it?

 

Alexa: The story behind Ella (who was named after my great-grandmother, the mother of my mother's father) and the play was given to me by my then unnoticed hidden desire of publishing my intimate thoughts. The writing process was interesting for me to explore how to go about the storyline, I gave a non-happy happy ending, which surprised even me. From a true lover of 'it all works out beautifully' story tropes. 

 

Julia: How would you improve school curricula to allow the voices of black women to be heard? Do you think schools teach enough about black women writers, artists and scientists?

 

 Alexa: I would improve school curricula to allow the voices of black women to be heard by requiring books written by black writers in several subjects. And by integrating poetry and sign language, which statistically raises reading comprehension and focus. Covid-19 hit and is still affecting students in both apparent and invisible ways. Scholars deserve a revised, more in depth and purposeful curriculum. Schools do not presently teach enough about black women writers, artists, scientists but making this change will give exponentially positive results across all levels and demographics. 

 

Julia: What are your goals for the future?

Alexa: My goals for the future are for all demographics whether in public or private schools to get the best instruction and a presence of poetry and sign language embedded into multiple grade instruction. 

 I have been blessed in my life to be instructed to present a report on Maya Angelou, who authored my favorite poem - In & Out of Time (4th grade). I enthusiastically participated in a mandatory class-wide Reading Iditarod (5th grade). My school gave my classmates and me field trips to see the movies 42 and Hidden Figures (7th + 8th grade) and it certainly doesn't hurt to have a cool English teacher for a mom who encouraged my love for summer reading. I can't imagine not pouring back into communities. 

The From A Black Girls Series is available on Alexachristian.com 

 Thank you to Julia and to all the readers!

 Thank you so much again for believing in me and my book.