This morning, before going to lead my Wednesday morning writing workshop, I walk in the woods and tune into what am I feeling – what awareness, what guidance will I carry into the writer's room with me? How will I lead us into creative expression in a way that will be stimulating and responsive to the week we are having of a heartsick country, reeling from senseless wreckage?

My thoughts jumble and ramble and rush, all my body wants is to run, but my spirit, my spirit asks to move slowly. Slowly, quietly. Look, in front of the fog rising from the river, notice the fern, stretching its fronds, it has lived through a spring and a summer, it is realizing, fall. Morning is soothingly soft like this, veiled in fog, so I'm feeling such tenderness toward the little living plants who will be browning so soon, but not yet, not today. Today, under a blue sky that is opening, I see who they are and I feel the decency they embody. Yes, this, this is what I want to bring. There is more than this tenderness, this being so moved and touched by this innocent beauty. There is the thundering rumble of anger, my spirit attends to this too. Yes, we will be tender, we'll write beautifully what is true, and there will be anger to write into the room with strong women today.

All photos and text by Kelly DuMar 2017