I don’t see myself in Outdoor magazine. Or on outdoor Instagrams with blonde White women with messy buns in pictures posing during a throughhike. I don’t see myself in the narrative that to be an outdoorsy person you should know how to pitch a tent with your eyes closed and not mind how hard the ground feels when you’re sleeping in a sleeping bag that’s basically a sheet separating you from the dirt.
Sometimes the imposter syndrome sneaks up on me and tells me that I’m not a true nature lover, that I’m not really an outdoorsy person because I don’t like camping or hikes that are longer than a few hours. I’ve never climbed a tree before, much less a mountain or a climbing wall. Mostly because I physically can’t but also because I’m clumsy and I’m pretty sure I’ll break a leg and my insurance ain’t that great. I’d rather watch an Everest documentary on my couch.
But then I think about how much I enjoy literally being outside, on my porch listening to the birds, or watching the fireflies light up the lawns around me, dancing a secretive dance that I get to witness. I think about how excited birding makes me and how elated I feel when I see a life bird, a king fisher or a great blue heron. I once woke up at the crack of dawn to walk to a bayside park, back when I lived in Miami, to watch the birds and was greeted with pelicans, terns, egrets, a beautiful great blue heron beckoning me to stay and watch.
I think about how I’ve loved to sit under trees since I was a kid whether it was at a park or in my backyard, lay under them and watch the light refracted from the leaves above, the canopy green and resplendent. I grew up under an oak tree, I think, I’ve never been great at identifying trees without the internet but I do remember the big green leaves and the shade that covered me as I read books, listened to music, did my homework. Here in Baltimore I have a few trees in Patterson Park that I nestle under for solo picnics when the weather is nice and when the clouds are white and full.
When I feel that imposter syndrome, I remember how much the beach, the ocean, the gulls and the terns mean to me. How I never feel as at home as I do wading near the shore and how seawater tastes like home. And the rain! Rainstorms, particularly hard rainstorms, are so exciting to me. It means I get to run around in the rain like I’ve done since I was a kid and maybe a 30 year old Latina running around during a rainstorm gets weird glances from her neighbors but to me it’s freeing, it’s liberating, it’s cleansing. In literature rain symbolizes cleansing and renewal, so I place a towel near my front door, put on shorts and a tshirt, run outside and allow nature to drench me for as long as I want, or until the lightning starts getting nearer.
So maybe I’m not in nature magazines. Maybe I don’t have hiking boots or binoculars (yet!) or an interest in foraging besides mushrooms, which I’ve only done once so far, but I am a nature lover. I do deserve a place at the figurative table because connecting with nature means so much more to me than just being outside. Connecting with nature is how I connect with myself and with the world around me, from the praying mantis on the blade of grass next to me to the stars I get to see while stargazing. A nature lover is a person who loves and appreciates nature. That’s it, that’s all. You don’t have to have an outdoor Instagram account to prove it.