August greetings to all in our hive, wherever you might be buzzing! We hope you are doing well, staying cool, and finding moments of wonder in your life. Thank you for joining us as Jazianzza and I venture into territory that seems more important than ever to contemplate – the sheer wonder of creation itself, and what our relationship to it is.
In past newsletters we’ve seen how ingenious bees are — how bumblebees can count, recognize faces, problem-solve, and love to play. But they’re not alone in their brilliance.
Koko the gorilla built a vocabulary of over 1,000 signs and understood approximately 2,000 spoken words. One must wonder — how much more did she have to share with us, if only we had been able to meet her in her own language?
Then there is the tardigrade — an adorable, microscopic, eight-legged creature so resilient it can survive outer space, the deepest oceans, temperatures from absolute zero to boiling, complete dehydration, and intense radiation!
Enjoy this 4-minute video showing these captivating little ones:
These tiny “water bears” are humbling examples of nature’s ingenuity, far surpassing anything we humans have been able to replicate.
Beneath our very feet, an extraordinary living network is quietly at work. Fungi grow as microscopic threads through soil and plant roots, carrying life-giving nutrients throughout the plant world — all without any help from us. Scientists estimate that if this underground network could be measured, it would span 10% of the Milky Way!
You can watch this 1-minute video to discover this vast matrix:
But guess what? It’s not only beneath our feet that there are remarkable wonders, but in plants & trees, as well.
In Jazianzza’s memoir Bee-Coming Strong, apart from the sage advice from MamaQueenzieBee, Jazi is fortunate enough to have her dear friend Tree guide her through the challenges she faces. This beautiful, towering oak is a source of wisdom and compassion for little Jazi.
So, want to know what a Cork Oak sounds like? It’s not words, like Tree speaking with Jazi, but an unmistakable sound with a commanding presence is coming from this beautiful oak. One person commented that to them, it was holy. I agree. As written on the website, “these are bioelectric frequencies generated by plants and living beings.” The description says: “Today I connected bioelectric sensors directly to this ancient Cork Oak in Portugal and translated its living electrical activity into sound through modular synthesis tuned to 432Hz.” This is real and not artificially composed. I can assure you that you’ll look at (and listen to) trees in an entirely new way… Enjoy!
So, this incredible planet that we are all privileged to inhabit is teeming with life and consciousness. As MamaQueenzieBee told Jazianzza, “You are an important part of everything. We all are.” We are all connected, and what we think, feel, say, and do go out into the world, whether it be positive or negative.
We have tended to think of this as “our” world — something we own rather than something we are privileged to belong to. For quite some time now, we have been taking freely from the Earth as though on an endless shopping spree, with no thought of the bill that would eventually come due. We are now seeing that bill arrive, in the form of monstrous fires, devastating floods, prolonged droughts, and rising seas.
Most of the world’s religions teach that we are meant to be stewards and guardians of this planet, not its owners. Indigenous and native peoples have known this for millennia. As David Attenborough reminded us, “We are…totally dependent on the natural world. It is the most precious thing we have, and we need to defend it.”
So, what can we do? Jazi and I believe it starts with wonder. If we can help our children find awe in the miracle of a bee, in the fact that the building blocks of our bodies came from exploding stars, in a plant pushing up through a crack in the cement — then perhaps we can begin to truly value the gift we’ve been given. Put down the screen. Look under a rock. Help our children be amazed at the sacredness of life. A saint some time ago wrote a song whose words included, “All life is holy.” Indeed, it is.
The astronomer Carl Sagan described Earth as a tiny blue dot in space — every person, every moment of history playing out on what he called “a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.” If that doesn’t fill us with both humility and wonder, what will?
We wish you a month of daily awe — in the light in your child’s eyes, in each breath you are given, in the small miracles hiding everywhere around you, within you, and beneath you!
“If I had influence with the good fairy… I should ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life.”
— Rachel Carson