Seeking connection

With the days getting warmer, we’ve been watching for salamanders. Probably they have already appeared in some places, but around here none have been spotted. (Sorry.)
In my mind I hear the sweet voice of Sarah Harmer singing, “Salamandre, Salamandre, / Il faut m’aider comprendre / Touts les mystères de la forêt, / La carte secrète, l’arbre d’oré, / Patiemment, je vous attends.”
In this plea for deeper knowledge of the natural world, the words are actually addressed to the elusive amphibian: “You have to help me understand / All the mysteries of the forest, / The secret map, the golden tree, / I’m waiting for you patiently.”
In the next verse, the singer continues: “Tout les deux ensemble, / Ma solitude et mon ennui / Ont disparu pendant la nuit. / Ca fait si longue, ma vie soit lente, / Salamandre.”
It’s an appeal for connection: “The two of us together, / My solitude and boredom / Disappeared overnight. / It’s been so long, my life is slow, / Salamander.”
Sure enough, winter can seem tedious, and many of us are eager to see signs of new life. With salamanders, as with so many other critters, what gets things moving in spring is the seasonal imperative to mate. They make their way to breeding ponds, sometimes by the thousands. The males perform a kind of courtship dance known as a liebesspiel, which sounds like a lot of fun. (For some reason I picture them wearing sexy lederhosen, but that’s probably not scientifically accurate.)

The presence of these creatures is a good reminder to protect vernal pools in the woods. (Wet areas that dry out in summer do not support populations of fish, so salamander eggs and larvae developing there are less vulnerable to predation.) One of the unusual aspects of the Spotted salamander’s reproductive cycle is the presence of a green algae (Oophila amblystomatis) in its eggs – a unique symbiotic relationship that allows embryonic salamanders to tap into the powers of photosynthesis, through which they receive oxygen and nutrition.

Salamanders are also known for their ability to regenerate lost organs and limbs – a process now being studied by medical researchers who hope to gain an understanding of how healing is affected by the presence of senescent (“zombie”) cells. They’re a bit magical – and oddly beautiful, for an animal that spends most of its life underground. Salamanders probably have much more knowledge to impart, if we pay attention.

**** Grousing about winter is futile, and also tiresome for those who have to listen to my complaints, but perhaps it enhances my enjoyment of spring. Through the dark months, there is a sameness and a slowness. Now, at last, it feels like things are happening more quickly. There may be a few false starts, but spring staggers onto the scene with a bit of drama, as the birds and the bees start doing their thing. What must it be like, I wonder, for people who live at latitudes where there is very little seasonal variation in temperature and daylight hours? Their psychological and emotional makeup, their view of time and life itself, might be quite different. We so little understand the inner lives of others.

In these parts, you certainly notice more people getting outside and exerting themselves. Even before there’s any gardening to be done, we seem to have a great zeal for yard work. A somewhat goofier song that comes to mind is “The Lusty Month of May,” from the musical Camelot, which celebrates this time “when everyone goes blissfully astray.” Maybe all the wheelbarrowing and raking is a means of sublimating other impulses.

Whatever form of physical exercise turns your crank, there’s no denying the benefits. In his book Norwegian Wood: Chopping, Stacking, and Drying Wood the Scandinavian Way, Lars Mytting recalls an early spring day when he watched his elderly neighbour begin stacking the load of firewood that had been dumped in the driveway of his rural home. Having hardly left the house all winter, the old man appeared extremely frail – but as he methodically stacked his firewood, and may 2023 RURaL DELIVERy PAGE 7 • days turned to weeks, he was gradually transformed. After a month of slow and steady stacking, his gait and his posture had improved, and he exhibited renewed vigour. Even for those of us who are not yet truly into our senior years, the body feels a bit creaky after a long winter, and then it loosens up with more regular exertion. But Mytting suggests it’s not just the physical work; it’s the sense of purpose, and the satisfaction of preparing for the future.

This past winter brought relatively little snow cover in Nova Scotia. In mid-April, deep in the woodlot, I found what was likely the last little drift. The flow in the brook was pretty low, which suggested the possibility of limited water supply in summer. For years, we have been warned that water will become the big issue of our time. Many farmers around the world would agree that this has come to pass. Jean-Martin Fortier, the charismatic market gardener who appears on page 38 in this issue of Rural Delivery, has talked about how climate change will affect agriculture globally, and he has been frank about the anxiety he faced in 2021 when both the well and the pond ran dry on his farm in Quebec, forcing him to purchase tanker loads of water. Eventually, a larger pond had to be dug – a project that came with ecological as well as financial costs. Fortier deserves credit for inspiring many young people to get into farming – and for acknowledging the real challenges, instead of pretending that a life in agriculture is all sweetness and light.

A final thought on physical and mental wellness. Don’t worry, Rural Delivery is not going New Age. However, we have decided that health care warrants more attention, especially from a rural perspective – so we’re going to give it a shot.

This topic seems to bring out divisions between those who espouse personal responsibility and those who lean more toward basic empathy – but surely we need both. I don’t buy into the whole “food is medicine” thing. Wholesome food is good for you and junk food is bad for you, and regular exercise can certainly help to tip the scales in your favour, but genetics and dumb luck also play an outsized role in health. Whether you take good care of yourself or not, you might get sick, in which case you deserve professional medical care.

We need to figure out how to do a better job of this, including treatment for addiction, a health issue addressed by Matt Jones on page 34. We do not fully understand why some people fall into drug dependence; it happens for a myriad of reasons, and sometimes for no discernable reason, and those afflicted deserve help. (I am reminded of Jane Purves, the whipsmart Nova Scotia cabinet minister who had the courage to speak about her past heroin problem. Perhaps she recognized that social privilege helped to ensure her recovery.) Addiction is part of the human tragedy – another of the civilizational failures that ought to inspire an attitude of humility in our interactions with other species. DL