Return: A Journey Back to Living Wild

Description

In this stunning memoir, beloved internationally acclaimed earth advocate chronicles her journey to reconnect with the earth, offering a model for how we all can nurture the wild around and inside ourselves. In 1991, twenty-four-year-old Lynx Vilden crawled out of a sweat lodge covered in mud, her face streaked with tears, and whispered a promise to the earth: “I will love you and cherish you, I will learn how to live and share what you teach me.” That promise became Vilden’s life purpose: to return to the ways of our oldest ancestors, to a simpler life, and to listen deeply to Earth and what she has to say. Over the next thirty years, Vilden’s mission would lead her far from the city streets and punk bands of London and Amsterdam where she was raised, on a long and winding journey spanning continents and seasons, and filled with indigenous wisdom, Stone Age hunting skills, and important lessons from nature. In this illuminating memoir, Vilden shares the joys that await all of us when we reconnect with the earth, when we recognize what has been lost, and understand what we gain by meaningfully returning to our roots and become rewilded. Return is a glimpse into her extraordinary world—from stories about mentoring Silicon Valley millennials at her Stone Age immersion in rural Washington State to adventures traveling among Sami reindeer herders in Arctic Sweden to detailing the intricacies of just how to pursue and survive a wild lifestyle inspired by Stone Age humans. This extraordinary debut ultimately invigorates our hunger to renew our bonds with the earth and awaken our wildest, most primal selves. Dedication Preface Part 1: Lost 1: Smoky Mountain Preparation 2: Listening 3: Shape Shifting 4: Nuclear Kids 5: Awakening 6: Alchemy 7: Blackbird Part 2: Searching 8: Smoky Mountain Embarkation 9: Summer Child 10: Last Frontier 11: Cave of Angels 12: Quest 13: Rain Part 3: Transformation 14: Smoky Mountain Absorption 15: Becoming 16: Ishi 17: Afloat 18: First People 19: Pilgrim 20: Hidden Lakes Part 4: Revelation 21: Smoky Mountain Exodus 22: Caterpillars and Moths 23: Reentry 24: Two Worlds Epilogue: When I Am an Old Woman Acknowledgments About the Author Copyright About the Publisher