September 14, 2026 · 7:40 AM

The goldenrod went to seed along the whole east side of the trail, and the asters moved in while I wasn’t looking. Purple the entire length of it. I stopped counting bees somewhere around 30.

The moon was still up in the west when I started. Thin as a fingernail paring. Barely there and already committed to the whole month ahead of it.

I wasn’t going to write about you this morning, . But I got to the bend where the river flows with more oomph, and there you were, the water singing your name to me.

Your year with me ends this month.

I’ve been sitting with that. A full turn of the wheel, every cycle of it walked with such bravery and intention, and you’re standing at the far end holding things you didn’t have last October.

I always knew you’d find your voice and your footing again.

You went down into it. You brought things up, you looked at them square, you didn’t flinch when it got heavy. And when you did flinch, you caught it in real time. That was the year you needed.

So the next one starts in the present, and we’ll spend 12 months finding passions, joys, connections, and the things that take our breath away.

The Wheel of Your Wild Becoming opens October 25. Four arcs, and every bit of it points forward. Pleasure. Audacity. Mud under your fingernails. The animal you’ve been keeping polite for about 20 years now.

We’re going out to meet what’s already happening, . No shovels. Only buckets that get filled.

Here’s what I can tell you without giving away the good parts. You’ll get 40 Wild Papers throughout the year, and my own field journal running alongside them week by week.

There’s a stone wall on the trail I walked this morning. I keep eyeing it. It feels different than it did a year ago, and I have a suspicion about it I’m not ready to write down yet.

We meet live 20 times. Hedge School for the teaching, Fireside for the talking, and four rituals you build and lead yourself while the rest of us witness. Plus all the other goodies that come with your annual membership.

And by next September you’ll have a table with a year of evidence laid out on it. The proof, in your hands, where you can pick it up and turn it over.

You walked the hard year, . Come walk the alive one.

P.S. The crescent I saw this morning will be full on the 26th and dark again by mid October. Enrollment closes October 23 and doesn’t open again until January, and January only buys you three quarters of a wheel. I’d rather have you for the whole turn.

Dakota