1869, Ep. 127 with Rachel Dickinson, author of The Loneliest Places

4:37PM Jan 26, 2023

Speakers:

Jonathan Hall

Rachel Dickinson

Keywords:

book

mediums

grief

rachel

jack

squirrels

writing

people

nature

walnut tree

journey

home

spiritualist

loneliest

watching

feel

place

loved

gave

sharing

Welcome to 1869, The Cornell University Press Podcast. I'm Jonathan Hall. This episode we speak with Rachel Dickinson, author of The Loneliest Places: Loss, Grief and the Long Journey Home. Rachel Dickinson is a travel writer, essayist, artist, and award winning author. She is the author of six other books, including American Dynasties, Notorious Reno Gang, and Falconer on the Edge. We spoke to Rachel about the physical, emotional, and spiritual journeys She took after the unimaginable and heartbreaking loss of her son to suicide, and how traveling in unfamiliar territory, and spending time deep in nature helped gradually bring some solace to her sadness. Hello, Rachel, welcome to the podcast.

Well, thank you for inviting me, Jonathan. I'm very happy to be here.

Well, it's our pleasure. And I look forward to talking with you right now, about your book, The Loneliest Places: Loss, Grief and the Long Journey Home. Tell us how this book came to be.

Okay, um, well, now, almost 11 years ago, my son Jack, who was a 17 year old at the time, died by suicide. And it was a shock to everyone who knew him and particularly to his family. And I, prior to that had been a travel writer for quite a while and had written several books. And when Jack killed himself, I thought, I will never be able to write another word, I won't be able to do anything. And for several years, that was true. I pretty much just sat in a chair, or I ran away from home, I had two modes, and one was to leave. And the other was to just stay but be completely isolated in a chair. But I did start writing. I did a lot of reading of other people's literature about grief and loss, like Joan Didion, and CS Lewis. So, you know, I just would read widely and I wasn't reading self-help boos, I was reading memoirs and people who are really trying to grapple with their grief through words. So I decided that I should try to just put down some thoughts and that just kept going and going, until I finally had almost enough for a book.

Well, you had, you had mentioned reading different authors to get their take on grief and you chose one of the greats TS Eliot, in the beginning of your book you state. TS Eliot wrote the line "These fragments I've shared against my ruins" toward the end of his 1922 poem, The Wasteland. And while there isn't agreement on what exactly this line refers to, I like to think that the fragments are bits and pieces of our past we should be collecting to help make sense of the world around us. This is what I've done in The Loneliest Places." How did collecting these fragments of your past help you process the incomprehensible pain and grief of the loss of your son.

I knew that I felt much more comfortable kind of dwelling in the past, in a way. I live in Freeville, which is a tiny village outside of Ithaca. And five generations of my family have lived here. And but my family goes back in Tompkins County to a Revolutionary War deed, land deed from service in the Continental Army. So my family has been here forever and I, I really feel this place, but I feel it in a fragmentary way myself. And I drive through I recognize things, things remind me of other things in the past things that both I experienced or that my ancestors might have experienced. I am, I feel like the molecules of my very being, are really kind of entwined with the molecules that swirl around in my village. So it's all fragmentary to me. And I knew that by trying to put some of these things together on the page, past history, family history, geological history, I might be able to make sense of what had happened to me .And then I didn't know how that was going to work. But my instinct was to just try to write my way out of the whole thing. And so but it started as fragments, and including I spent one year writing really bad poetry. And none of that is included in the book. But it, it did help me with my visuals, I think, because I would sit at Dryden Lake, which is kind of like a big pond really near where I live. And I would just look at the birds and I watch the clouds. And I would sit there and just write down my, my little, these little fragments of things I had seen. So fragments became really a way that I was trying to deal with the past and move forward into the future, hoping they would all just coalesce at some point.

That's beautiful. And thank you also for sharing your family history. I didn't, I didn't know the deep roots that your family has. I think it's interesting because you there's this, you mentioned in these deep roots, and every atom and cell in your body is connected to the land. And yet you also describe your father and yourself as peripatetic, which I had to look up, Greek for "walking about." And I think that that's interesting, that you learn to see more clearly by leaving your deep roots. And that is something that some people have more than others. You know, I think that in many ways, our, you know, ancestral past deep ancestors, you know, were nomadic. And but there's also, you know, up until the modern day, there's also the sense of pilgrimage. And that there's, you know, the pilgrimage of the Australian walkabout or Homer's Odyssey, or, you had mentioned you had spent some time on the island of Iona, and that there are pilgrims that go to that island. Tell us how this journey of way allowed you to have a journey back inwards.

I think initially, it started as a way to run away from home. Although I I had always been a very eager traveler and which led me to do travel writing in the first place. I I knew that I felt really comfortable when I was in these, what I call the loneliest places in some ways. So five weeks after Jack died, I found myself in the Falkland Islands, and this is 6000 miles away from home, it's as far away from home as you can get basically, you know, way down south in the south, the South Atlantic Ocean. And this was a journey I had arranged in November. So like, you know, four months earlier, and all of these moving parts had to be put in place, I had an assignment to write about the 30th anniversary of the Falklands War. So I was going there, you know, with the intent of really talking to people who had been alive, you know, when the island was invaded by the Argentinians and but I didn't quite know what I was walking into. And I found that I loved loved the landscape. It was really reminded me of being like in, in the islands of in the Outer Hebrides, you know, very windswept landscape where it was just filled with animals like, you know, elephant seals, and really interesting. Penguins dip five different species of penguins. So it's like the it was familiar, yet not familiar to me. But the one thing I did realize when I was there, that I would not be seeing jack out of the corner of my eye, I had gone to a place where he had never been, and for some reason, I kind of established this rule in my mind that if I was someplace Jack had never been I would never see him. And so that made traveling, really the only way to feel some relief of the just crushing grief and sorrow that accompany me when I was sitting at home. So but what I also found in Falkland Islands, it was ironic that I was there to really talk to these people who had been invaded. I just found that a whole lot of People going through post traumatic stress syndrome. And I would look at their faces, I'd listen to their stories. And I, my mind would wander as if you'd hear the breaking of the penguin behind you. And I would just think, Wow, I'm looking at someone who I recognize this. Look, this is someone who has been really damaged in some way, by something that happened to them that they will never get over. And I felt like I was looking in the mirror. So I didn't always feel that way, obviously, when I went other places, but I did have this yearning to just get away. And periodically, and I know that it worried members of my family, I think they're like, Why is she not home? Why is she insisting on going to the Falklands or to Iceland, or these various places, and I always just went to these very lonely places that had more nature than human habitation. So it made me feel better. That's why I did it.

Yeah. That makes it makes it makes sense. I mean, it obviously didn't make sense at the time necessarily, and your family, I read in the book there, what's going on? Why is Rachel leaving us and it caused a rift within the family. But in hindsight, it certainly makes sense. Particularly, as you were saying earlier, you know, that with your family connection, your family history, the ancestors, that you could feel viscerally of many generations there, you couldn't, can't escape it that as you were saying that you could see Jack perhaps out of the corner of your eye, going to a place where Jack has never been reduces the odds of that happening. And that brings up the idea of a spiritual journey as well. And so I was really fascinated to hear of your visits to the spiritual community of Lilydale, which I've visited a couple of times myself as well. And I just find that place fascinating. And for those listeners that don't know Lilydale it's a community of spiritualists. I think it's been around since the maybe mid 1800s. Or what was it?

Like? Yeah, probably 1880s

1880s. Okay.

Yeah, yeah.

It's basically a place where a lot of spirit mediums are psychic mediums who have the potential to communicate to the other side, the veil, the other side. And yet you were connected with a medium name Drew Kali. And in the book, you said that he stated, while he was in trance, that the message I'm getting is for you to stop observing, and be willing to participate. And so I was curious writing in your book is, is doing that you know, you are observing and being self reflective, and participating in detailing your story and detailing your inner world to the outer world. And you're also participating with a larger community. Now you're sharing your story to the group rather than just keep it to yourself. And by doing so, you offer a way to help others who are trying to survive tragic events, suicide of a child or even though the individual as you were mentioning, in the Falkland Islands, so anyone that's experienced a trauma, and you're trying to live with the intense emotions that come from that. And in that vein, what spiritual insights are you willing to share that helped you or could help others find peace amongst the sadness?

Well, I grew up, I grew up in Freeville, the village I still live in, and I attended the Methodist church there. And when I was older, when I was an adult, I was the choir director. So but I never, I was never baptized, I never embraced it fully. I had this real problem in believing, you know, making that leap of faith, which is embracing faith itself. So I was more interested in kind of the rituals of religion. And I loved the music that was associated with the Methodist Church. But on the other side of my little village was a spiritualist camp, which was occupied in the summer with Mediums who would come and stay in these little cottages. But they would give readings at this tiny auditorium that was on the camps and we would just kind of stand in the back of the room as kids and just listen to what these mediums were saying. And it wasn't it was just kind of this kind of cool parlor trick in a way when I was a kid. It was fascinating. I was I'm always fascinated with it. But when I got older, and I did have a chance to go to Lily Dale, and I've been there several times now like yourself, I, it's like I can't get enough of it, there's something about being able to go from place to place to place in Lily Dale, where you will find mediums who have gathered at these places to give these little public readings, there would be like three mediums who would stand out at the Temple of Truth or the inspiration stump, and hello crowd, we'd be in front of them and a medium would look at someone been pointed at them and say, May I come to you. And then you have to answer aloud so they get a sense of your voice. And I got so I could figure out who were the really good mediums and who weren't, by the kind of detail they were giving. And, you know, things that made sense to me, there were there were ones who I didn't think were very good, who really were listening to various cues that they would get from what someone would say. So, you know, I knew to just keep my mouth shut, basically, and listen to what they were saying. But I really got a feeling that some of them just made shivers down my spine, because I knew what they were saying, had come from some place that was not known to me. And when Drew Kali, I happened to be in a course taking a course from him on, you know, developing your mediumship as if I had any. I should be so lucky, I think. But he was talking to us about colors and auras and seeing various things. And he just stopped in the middle of this. And he pointed at me. And he said, I just have to tell you, I see this old band standing behind you. And he's holding his head, and he's not very tall. And he completely described my father. And, and he, he said, Did he die because of something with his head. And I said, Yes, he had a stroke. So I mean, like he and he gave me these little clues about who this person was. And it kept going. He said, well there other people crowding around, including there, someone I didn't know the name that begins with J. And I was so thrown off by my father's appearance. They said, Well, he was married five or six times, and all of the women he married, their names began with the letter J. And he said, That's not it. This is someone who's very musically gifted. And I said, Oh, could have been my mother, Jane, you know, completely forgetting that my son Jack was very musically gifted, and was somewhere in in the afterlife. And it wasn't until much later that my cousin pointed out, he was coming to you to tell you about Jack gap was there and wanted you to participate more in life, basically. And so it was just this shocking revelation that I had been spoken to in some way. So it made me feel better that, like, I, it gave me some kind of proof that there was something beyond where I was, it kind of ripped at that veil that I always kept between myself and faith. It's so I don't know, you know, it's my whole notion of spiritualism. And spirituality really comes from my relationship to nature, and to the land. And I have spent the last 10 years really observing both of those things, and really taking in the landscape of every place I go and noticing what's around me, and what's around the animals. And to me that that's the real touchdown. And that's the thing that I think really helped me get through this past decade more than anything else was being in so just being able to go outside and look I have a huge walnut tree in my backyard. And I one year I took a photo every single day from the same window of this walnut tree in this little playhouse and I put it on Facebook every day and Instagram. And I the walnut tree had a huge following at that point because and we would watch it go through the whole the change of the seasons and if I became so kind of entwined with this walnut tree. And for me, that's what gave me kind of a feeling of grace and a feeling of just contentment in a way it was watching closely watching this one tree go through four seasons. So that's where I turned to. And the spiritualism in spiritualist stuff is just kind of the icing on the top of the cake for me is the yummy part, you know that I get to go and just, I have no preconceived notions about this stuff at all. And I thoroughly enjoy it when I am at Lilydale I thoroughly enjoy it.

That's great. That's great. That's beautiful. Oh, yeah, it's so much to unpack. But yeah, we don't we don't need science to tell us this. But I know that, that there's this whole idea of nature therapy or florist therapy, I think the Japanese call it forest therapy. And the scientific studies that they've done, they show I think they looked at cortisol levels and different indicators of stress. And they said just 10 minutes of being in nature, radically reduced people's stress. Just hearing your story I love I love what you did. When you take a picture of the same scene over and over. I've seen people do that as well. But to have it tied to nature and seeing the the tree blossom, and then there's its leaves and then the darkness of winter. Like it. It puts you in. I think why nature one of the reasons why nature is so healing is that you realize that there is this natural intelligence and there's a natural cycle. And we're a part we are even though we like to think some of us more so that we are somehow removed from nature. We're not we are nature, we

are part of this, this whole continuum. Yeah, like watching the life cycle of this tree is very interesting to me. And I've watched it grow. We've lived in the same house for 20 years. And so I've really witnessed 20 years worth of growth on this tree. And I've also witnessed 20 years of how it the effects of living with a wall, a black walnut tree in particular, because you can't grow certain things that are within its range shadow. So I have a garden that I have to keep moving back as the tree grows larger. And that's been fascinating to me just like okay, you know, it's doing its thing.

Yeah, yeah, It has a lot of territory. It's,

there's a lot of territory there at this point. So I've just loved that. There's an I do feel completely at ease. When I'm by the walnut tree. It is my tree. There's no doubt about it. But I, you know, I'd love walking through any kind of natural environment and always aware that I could break my ankle everywhere, you know, because it's like, Okay,

We had a black walnut in our yard and the squirrels would Oh, my God, they were some of the biggest squirrels in the area.

Oh, yeah. They would throw walnuts at you.

They could target you. They were like experts. If I was underneath there, they would, they would find a way to try to drop them on me. I couldn't believe it.

Exactly. It's like, why are you wasting those? It's like, up there. Yeah, we I've loved watching the squirrels, but we have gray and red squirrels here. And we also have one black squirrel, which has been fascinating. And they all just kind of share this tree during certain seasons of the year. And it's it's great to watch. And the birds are amazing as well.

Nice. Nice. One last question I had was, you know, I do think that as you were saying before that you sharing your story has had the opportunity to help others who are going through similar situations. If you had an opportunity to meet someone who has gone through what you have done, gone through or experienced some sort of trauma, and you were handing them your book. Do you have any... what would you say to them?

I would say this is one person's experience of going through the worst thing that can ever happen to a parent. And I feel like there are things in this book that really touch on universal truths. And that I found that I was soothed by reading other people's memoirs about their journey through these, through this terrible time, and watching how they grew stronger over a period of time, that's my hope for this book is that people will pick this up and say, they do say, oh my god, it's, you know, you start out is just so intense. And then I, as time goes on, the writing gets a little looser, their humor comes into it, you know, a, you could, it's literally like watching me unfurl from being, you know, tight, like a pine cone for a lot of it. And I finally they just kind of relax the little things on the pine cone, and I let more of the world interact with me and me interact with the world. And I think this is something that everyone goes through this just I have a different way of saying it. And so there are a lot of books on grief out there. But each one has its own little way of talking about it. And I'm hoping that the way I describe grief and my journey will be helpful to someone else.

That's great. That's great. Thank you for sharing your story bringing us on your journey. And I know your words have helped bring healing to yourself, and they will certainly will do the same for the many readers of your book.

Thank you, Jonathan. I really appreciate your kind words about the book.

That was Rachel Dickinson, author of he Loneliest Places: Loss, Grief and the Long Journey Home. You can follow Rachel on Twitter @rachelbirds, and view her photos and artwork on Instagram @geology26. If you'd like to purchase Rachel's new book, use the promo code 09POD to save 30% on a website -cornellpress.cornell.edu If you live in the UK, use the discount code CSANNOUNCE and visit the website combined academic.co.uk Thank you for listening to 1869, The Cornell University Press Podcast.