When I was younger I was obsessed with nature. The glint of sunlight kissing the top of a lake; the colour journey the leaves pass through every year; the whispers that travel on the wind, entwining themselves with strands of my hair. I would spend hours lying on the grass, gazing at the passing clouds, my fingertips dancing along the flower buds. I observed the seasons moving with glee, finding beauty and comfort in the changes each would bring. If a late autumn heatwave took hold, I found myself fascinated by the trees' determination to shed their leaves still, paying the rising temperature no mind. I lay there in silence, straining my ears, desperately trying to tune in to the secret language I knew was being spoken all around me. I longed to hear advice thundering out from a gushing river, secrets hitchhiking around on floating pollen, and gentle consolations uttered from the dirt below my feet.

As I grew older and became more attuned to my body, to the steady rise and fall of my breath and the blood flowing in my veins, I started to notice a change of my own. Spending more time immersed in the vast forest around me, measuring the passage of time not with a clock, but with the seasonal flow, finally I began to hear each unique tune. I stopped longing for a specific, simpler season, one who’s song was clearer than all the rest. Instead, I could differentiate between the sweet song of summer and the woebegone whisperings of winter, each new voice my faithful companion.

Now, as I continue to grow, I have become accustomed to nature's secret languages and I have learned to change myself along with the seasons. It is summer presently, and most nights I lay silently on the grass and listen to the trees argue, lulled into a sweet sleep alongside their soft murmurs. Lying here as I did as a child, atop the field, burrowed among the flower bed, my gaze lazing on the stars above, I know I am where I belong.