How Important is Nature to You?

Hi there!
I noticed I now have some readers in Japan; oh...goody! Japanese people have something which interests me very much: shinto.
There is something extremely appealing to esthetic and natural beauty, uncluttered and pure.
And although I am not a religious person as such (I do not bow to any religion), I do feel amazed by the universe, its energy, and am very interested in what makes other people do bow to religious beliefs. And I feel overawed by nature.

Look at the pot above. It is in my favourite colour. But when I dream, I usually dream about green.

Green is probably in my genes, coming from The Wetlands, where rain is plenty and leaves and grass are abundant. When the grass starts growing in Spring, it lifts my spirit. When the trees lose their leaves in Autumn, I seem to dwindle as well. 

One of the predominant memories of my youth is walking through the woods near my childhood home, and looking up at the crowns of the trees, and watching the sunlight filtered through them, and hearing the cawing of the jackdaws who had made their nests there. I was completely and utterly at peace and happy there.

This photo is definitely NOT from my country; we do not have trees like that nor flowers like that. But it does evoke those memories for me. Peace. Natural beauty.

There you are. This IS in my country. I took this in Limburg, our most Southern province. And just by looking at this, I can call up the feeling of tranquility I felt when I walked past this post, watched the barbed wire put there to keep the cows in, and the wild campanula growing there. 

Travelling into Rotterdam every work day makes me appreciate my home environment even more. I live on the edge of suburbia; only 5 minutes walking and I am in the meadows and fields. They grow potatoes, fodder maize and grains near my house. But there are cows and horses there as well. And hares, partridges, pheasants, swans, ducks, geese, and lots of small birds and rodents. (The photo above isn't mine, by the way!)

This one is. Because when I walk the other way, only twenty minutes walking takes me to the sea arm called the Haringvliet, and these huge flowering plants grow there (they are 1 m high). I think they are gorgeous. 

Sure, I like the sea, and water, especially running water and waterfalls. But it is to the woods, trees, that my heart is drawn most.

How about you? How important is nature to you? And what do you prefer? Woods? Fields? Mountains? Desert? Sea? 

I will leave you with a little, beautiful film about nature. Enjoy!

Shinto