A day in the desert. On my break from the desert. 🙄 Guess I like it out there. *** "In the Western tradition there is a recognized hierarchy of beings, with, of course, the human being on top—the pinnacle of evolution, the darling of Creation—and the plants at the bottom. But in Native ways of knowing, human people are often referred to as “the younger brothers of Creation.” We say that humans have the least experience with how to live and thus the most to learn—we must look to our teachers among the other species for guidance. Their wisdom is apparent in the way that they live. They teach us by example. They’ve been on the earth far longer than we have been, and have had time to figure things out." - Robin Wall Kimmerer, "Braiding Sweetgrass" *** I just learned that Western Juniper trees can live as old as 1,000 years and that the oldest tree in Oregon's recorded history is a juniper of this area, dated at approximately 1,600 years! Although, humans have inhabited this region for at least 13,000 years, so even when this ancient tree was a wee little berry, people had been around for a good while. Likely those folks also had 1,600 juniper trees for neighbors, and so did their ancestors, and their ancestors' ancestors' ancestors' ancestors' ancestors. 🤔💥💥😮💥💥 #history (at Oregon Badlands Wilderness)