#oregon state

I do because, as a result of a world of screens, the wisdom of the fog and the rain and the old woods of the pacific northwest stopped having a way to speak to me. About darkness and terror, and yet magic and feeling and living.

I have a sixth sense. The veil between life and death, day and night, ordinary and obscure, plain and cryptic, is not an obstructor to me. I am a posthumous child and a soul grown beneath impossible pressure and within a miasma of incomprehensible terror. My senses know no era.

If you don't know, much like the woods of Appalachia, the old growth trees of the pacific northwest speak. They know things. They've "seen" the blood spilled. And they know YOU if you're connected to the spiritual atmosphere of this Earth.

People like us are part of a metaphysical ecosystem. The ancient trees and the earth can speak to us, and we can hear them. They need the stories of the earth to be told; the ghosts and the haunting vibrations. They must be felt.

Screens are not inherently bad. But if you are a highly sensitive person, in the way of feeling the unexplainable, your soul is offspring of Mother Earth with all Her stories She begs to be told.

That is why all-screens-all-day can make you feel torn away from reality at your very core.

And it's not just us, those who have the sense.

You need to touch the ground and smell the earth. You need naturally filtered air in your lungs. You need your hands in the soil and against the bark and along the leaves to regulate your immune system.

I love phones. I love screens. I love memes and silly videos. I love early internet culture. But by being one of the last generations to play outside in early childhood and then to exclusively sit behind screens later, I know what is missing from me. I know what I have lost.

The Oregon coast is something incredible 🤍

Anna King, who wrote this article, I love you

Image ID: A field of wheat stands straight up and lovely just uphill from the Snake River outside of Windust, Washington – but tall standing wheat can also mean that the heads are not laden with heavy grain. (Credit: Anna King / Northwest News Network)

"Golden slopes full of soft, white wheat roll and dive down along the snakey, Snake River – just out of Windust in southeastern Washington. A farmer rolls a head of his wheat between dirt-stained palms, counting the grains. Just fourteen weazened kernels remain after the chaff is carefully removed. There should be around three times that many kernels in this head of wheat."

The serenity, the disappointment.

Too late now Although conditions in fields will vary across the Northwest, the USDA report generally means the crop is lighter and sparser than Washington and Oregon farmers had hoped. Back outside of Windust, a large dead black beetle lays on wet soil between the dry wheat. A July thunderstorm passed through moments earlier. Precious drops that are too late now to do much good.