At one point in Dave Greschner’s 40-plus years as an outdoor writer and columnist, a critic complained that his columns were shifting from being “actively engaging” with nature to a more “observational and introspective tone.”
Greschner took it as a compliment.
In his debut book, Soul of the Outdoors, Greschner engages nature by donning snowshoes, hiking boots, or running shoes and taking to the fields and forests of the Barron County landscape he’s known since childhood. But his writing also takes a deeper dive into what he finds, opening himself up to nature’s messages and meaning, while marveling at its mysteries, too.
Structurally, the book follows the calendar year, beginning in the winter and coursing the seasons’ march, two months at a time. The focused,138-page book contains essays and journal entries, revealing a writer who bears witness to the natural world not as a romantic but as an appreciative, sympathetic, and curious participant.
Greschner cares as much about his words as he does his subject. In the essay, “Morning in the Marsh,” he hunkers down on a steep ridge overlooking the cattails and sedge grass to absorb the dawning day. He sees a heron appear, carrying a single stick and heading for a nest high in a dead tree.
The heron’s mate stretches out its neck to receive the stick. “The stick is exchanged deftly and slowly, as if it’s a long-stemmed rose from one lover to another.”
While the natural world remains the focus, Greschner deftly weaves in his own life story to great thematic effect. During a long run on a woodland trail, he watches a snapping turtle laying eggs, and vows to keep track of the spot throughout the summer, hoping to see the hatch. In the interim, life goes on, including phone conversations with his brother and making plans to get together in September.
His brother dies suddenly in early August. It is a month before Greschner finds the spirit to make the long jog to the turtle eggs. “The nest was no more,” he writes. “The spot was a small crater sprinkled with bits of white shells. I couldn’t see it, but somewhere there was new life.”
Throughout his book, Greschner regularly calls upon writers, thinkers, and artists temporally both near and far: Sigrid Olson, Annie Dillard, Heraclitus, Cat Stevens and others. All serve to reinforce his main message: Slow down, take it in, wonder at it all.
Soul of the Outdoors is not a book to read once and retire to a shelf. It’s a work you’ll want to keep handy, a literary reminder of the birdsongs, blooms and other stories awaiting if you just step outside.
