I KNOW IT’S A BOLD STATEMENT to say you’re about to read the best (human) nature story you’ll read all year. It might even be unwise for me to do so. Who am I to tell you what your “best” is? Still, I think it’s true. Even if the phrase “nature writing” makes you head to the nearest shopping mall, I think you’ll be moved by the human story behind “Home and Free.”
It was years ago that I first heard writer Rosette Royale tell the story of his ventures into Olympic National Park with nature photographer Bryant Carlin, and it was the kind of story that wouldn’t let me go.
Someone had recommended I reach out to Rosette to be a guest speaker in my University of Washington writing class because they’d heard him speak on storytelling at the Search for Meaning Book Festival. I invited him to my class, and my students thought he was the best speaker I’d brought in all year. So I brought him back again the next year, and the year after that.
Then I moved here to Portland and asked him to write a version of the story for us, and I asked if we could include Bryant’s photography. Seeing through Bryant’s eyes is an important element of the story, as was making sure we paid Bryant for his photography.
There was some uncertainty to this endeavor. Bryant was dealing with homelessness, and Rosette’s correspondence with me was honest about how Bryant was facing some obstacles: Bryant’s phone broke, so Rosette wasn’t sure when they’d be able to connect; Bryant’s backpack had been stolen at one point, and with it, some photography; Bryant didn’t have a mailing address or open bank account.
But we figured it out. Working with Rosette and Bryant has taught me something about solidarity and taking risks for our fellow human travelers and taking risks for our own growth too. And the writing. Wow. The other feature stories in this issue offer me the same example, human-integrity-wise and qualitywriting- wise. These stories throw me toward a kind of hope.
— Jessica Murphy Moo