by Jason Smith
One thing that makes the human brain unique, for better and worse, is its ability to label. Everything in our human world gets put into neat little boxes as a way of classifying, explaining and describing for ourselves and those we interact with. The labels aren’t just for objects, places and ideas. They also extend to people. Race, religion, gender, and economic status are just a few of these boxes used to determine what is culturally “normal.” Disabled is another of these that segments the population. Slapping multiple labels on a person is like being put in a sieve and filtered down until that person is left to feel totally separate from the regular world. This is what living with a disability can feel like sometimes.
Nature teaches me a much different lesson. A forest can be unruly and messy and also a robust community that helps all species in it to thrive. Nature could not care less about our labels and structure, even as we try and label it. A maple tree root is not worried about your freshly laid sidewalk. The deer were not on the e-mail chain that designated your garden as human food only. The birds flying in your local Home Depot are still, and will remain, forever confused about the concepts of inside and outside. The lesson nature has taught me is that I can comfortably live outside the boxes and that, furthermore, the boxes don’t really exist anyways.
The labels we create are not all bad. As a wheelchair user the labeling of a trail as accessible lets me know that I can safely navigate it. While I am grateful for this, it has unintentionally created another box that I am to fit in. By designating a trail as accessible, the world is inherently telling the mobility-challenged community that they belong here but not there. With so few trails being labeled as accessible it can be isolating and discouraging for those of us that want to reap the full healing benefits that the natural world has to offer. In recent years I’ve decided to heed the lessons taught to me by my forest ancestors. No boxes please. While I appreciate our ever-evolving society showing me the areas that are deemed available to access with my wheelchair and even understand the safety concerns, I am fully capable of making my own decisions about the trails I am told are not for me. I’ve regularly turned back 100 feet into a trail, or even before I get to the trailhead, and I’m at peace with that. I get to make that decision myself and strip the power from the label so that I am free from society’s boxes.
One of my favorite trails today is a 4.5 mile bike trail that snakes the shores of a local lake. The park map tells me this trail is probably not for me and on muddy days, they are absolutely right. On other days I have done the full loop. There are a few spots along the way where I can be still for hours, communing with nature and all the beautiful beings that allow me to feel connected to a world that doesn’t always make me feel that way. I am forever grateful for those labeling more and more trails accessible every day but when I get the chance, I like to make sure they didn’t miss one.
