Forest Backlog

Believe it or not, I’ve never done a New Year’s post looking back at the past year. I was toying with the idea of doing one, but then I visited my talented photographer friend over at My Adventure Book, and it gave me the idea of using backlog photos. And boy, do I have a lot of backlog photos!

These photos are from 2022, I think it was the first weekend of October. It was an unspontaneous little wander in the woods and I borrowed my brother’s Pentax for just a moment.

We had a 5-minute picnic, too, after which all the forest animals had fled our noisy entourage. Just kidding, no animals were harmed. But we were pretty noisy, with two active five-year-old boys and their nagging parents. Especially after the kids’ tummies had been filled, boosting energy levels to running pace. My brother was the only one not making a racket.

This is obviously not what it looks like right now, because we are in the middle of winter. This is the very middlest of all middle parts, truly, with only a brief moment of sunlight that you need to be alert to catch. I’ll post some pictures when I get the chance. Hopefully before summer!

I recently had a conversation with a woman who was annoyed that my neighbourhood, a residential part of downtown Helsinki, the country’s capital, doesn’t have a forest of its own. The neighbouring areas do, but that wasn’t enough. She’s obviously Finnish, because Finns adore their forests. To them, nature isn’t nature without a forest.

I love nature, too, and forests, but this isn’t the first time I’ve had this conversation and I get annoyed, because Helsinki is surrounded by the sea, for goodness sake. There’s nature everywhere! We even have rabbits jumping around in my area, though many people see them as pests and want to get rid of them.

Like much of Helsinki, my area is by the sea, too. Forest lovers seem to completely disregard the fact that someone might simply enjoy living by the sea and going on seaside walks, sitting and staring at the horizon, listening to the waves. Without a forest in sight.

We’re all different. I actually like living in an urban environment, and as far as cities go, Helsinki is very small and green anyway. I didn’t grow up in a forest, and I don’t think my neighbourhood needs one. We have a nice park, a strong sea breeze and you can hear the horns of ships when it’s foggy.

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These images are from just outside of Helsinki, less than an hour’s drive away. We don’t go there often, maybe once a year, because it’s a bit of a hassle and it seems family life just swallows our weekends.

It’s very quiet there, though it’s sometimes crowded with wanderers and picnickers. Ironically, though my kids are the loudest creatures in the forest, they really love its peacefulness and the calm quiet. “I really love this moment,” one of them sometimes says, in places like this.

I enjoy looking at the details: the tiniest plants sprouting upwards optimistically, the bright sunlight hitting the leaves, the unevenness of the forest hillside, with mossy rocks that look like a troll or a fairy might be living under them. But I know what actually lives under them…

Once last summer, we were visiting a child-friendly colleague of mine who lives in the countryside. She has a piece of forest of her very own and it’s full of blueberries. We did a little blueberry tour and my kids were asking her questions, loving it. They were curious and touched everything, even investigating a dubious-looking dropping of a large animal, which I obviously told them not to touch. (But they did. Ever the city girl, I happened to have hand sanitizer in my bag.)

And then they turned over a large stone, or was it a piece of bark. All I remember is that underneath, there must’ve been about 200 spiders!

Nature is everywhere. Even the sea and spiders need taking care of. Though if someone else volunteers for the spiders, I wouldn’t mind.

Happy New Year!