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Every Natural Fact: Five Seasons of Open-Air Parenting

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One of the most moving passages, toward the end of this book, addresses our biggest challenge. Amy Lou Jenkins says: " How do we, and how will our children, understand how to have dominion over a natural world (in which our attitude has moved from survival, to comfort, to avarice) when we only know summer nights by the comfort of lying in bed in a sealed room while the air conditioner blows away the feelings of the season? Most of us don't hear the loon call at sunset.....the baritone gulp of the bullfrogs."

The author shares problems she has had with her former spouse, religion, parents, suburbs, decaying cities, a distant daughter and an unresponsive educational system, but it is her inspired trips with her eleven year old son that pull us outside to experience nature. He represents us, the skeptical audience, who she patiently mentors in the history, images and sensations of the natural world and away from a world of controlling relationships and hollow consumerism.

I would have opted for a more memorable title, but the writing itself is wondrous. Every generation has needed an Aldo Leopold or Thoreau to waken us from the weariness of the day-by-day. Amy Lou Jenkins is our John Muir and we never needed what she does more. She writes, "We who are drawn outdoors are trying to understand the community to which we belong; we are seeking spiritual awe; we are hunting wholeness. This is why we walk." Or, as Muir once observed, "I only went out for a walk, and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in."

- John Lehman, Rosebud Book Reviews
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I grew up on a farm in Minnesota, hunted and fished and camped my whole life, majored in biology in college, and have participated in various environmental research and restoration projects. Still, I learned at least a hundred new things from reading Every Natural Fact. More than just a collection of information, this book is a reminder of the spiritual nourishment nature offers us.

As a parent whose kids are almost grown and on their own, one particular passage (among many) resonates with me: "Biologically, if not spiritually, my raison d'etre is to care for and protect the earth, so that my life will flow and reside in future generations. ... The mall and television fail to draw my attention. What calls? The chickadee and the hawk, the ice and snow, the changing hues of the sky, the naked trees and the pines, the lakes, and the shifting celestial bodies. I reside in phases and tides."

Beyond her content, Amy Lou Jenkins is a master craftswoman in the art of writing. Each sentence is an adventure. Most of her literary experiments succeed, but even when they don't they reflect an artist willing to take chances. I look forward to her future books. There are not a lot of women in the pantheon of American nature writers that includes Henry David Thoreau, John Muir, Aldo Leopold, Rachel Carson, Sigurd Olson, Edward Abbey and others, but With Every Natural Fact Amy Lou Jenkins has her foot in the door.

The great outdoors have a lot to offer the world and a parent should try to teach their children that. "Every Natural Fact: Five Seasons of Open-Air Parenting" is a collection of reflections on five seasons where Amy Lou spent with her son in the outdoors of Wisconsin and the lessons that she and her son learned along the way. With plenty of poignancy and thought, "Every Natural Fact" is a read that any nature loving parent will want to consider when sharing that nature with their children.

It is said we are all products of our environment. Amy Lou Jenkins wanted more for her son DJ than playing video games, watching TV, being on the computer or talking on the phone. She wanted to create a stronger bond with him, and to help him to learn some of life's lessons he would be facing someday. That was the beginning of their nature walks together, across Wisconsin.

With each new trip or adventure DJ was learning to love the magic of nature. Watching a bird that had been on the endangered list, or learning about plants and seeing trees as they changed was something DJ came to love. The history of an area or the folklore fascinated him.

When Amy would talk about her family or different experience's, she was teaching him the importance of not only family but of man and nature to connect. That it is our responsibility to take care of our planet. To ensure it is just as beautiful for the next generation to come.

They also enjoyed the fun they had just being together. Laughing and learning new things on each trip they took. To me, what I enjoyed so much was the descriptive way the author talked. I was able to learn also. This book is a great read for anyone

I was one of those privileged to see this extraordinary book in its infancy. These seven years later, the portraits of nature conveyed in those first drafts--the cranes especially stand out--remain in my memory in all their vivid, sensual relief. The completed work brings even more--fascinating excursions into the history of conservancy, and to places the reader may never before have heard of, such as Kettle Moraine state forest in Wisconsin, where "Our trail...snaked across the terminal moraines of the Green Bay and Michigan lobes of the Wisconsin Glacier and also crossed the ancient drainage ways, leaving behind a severely textured land." There's humor, too: "What's a stupid attraction," asks DJ, her son, on visiting Ripley's museum after a day in the field, "without a crappy keepsake?" Which leads me to what, for some, may be the most lasting gift of Every Natural Fact, the years-long interplay between mother and son, itself a portrait of what is possible between parent and child. That she is able to put so much into this small volume, yet leave the reader wanting more, is the mark of a generous, and outrageously gifted, writer. --John R. Coats, author of Original Sinners, Why Genesis Still Matters

In John Lehman's review of this book, he says, "Amy Lou Jenkins is our John Muir and we never needed what she does more." Amy Jenkins doesn't preach or scold, she simply opens the door and invites us to come along, to see and feel the deep woods and quiet places. When my husband picked up my copy of Every Natural Fact, he immediately started reading. His comment, "This is really well written."

With a keen eye on the natural life around her, and on the development of her son, Amy Lou Jenkins has written a memoir that offers an unusual and insightful glimpse into development and change, in humans and in other forms of life.

Over five seasons of outdoor explorations with eleven-ish DJ, Jenkins shows us a boy growing: curious, absorbed, funny, kind, resisting, sometimes engaged and sometimes unwilling, a whole boy maturing in a healthy way. Though she doesn't flinch from allowing us to hear such imperfections as the pre-adolescent arrogance in his tone on occasion, her lovely and loving writing shows the noble intelligence and beauty at work in her son. In a manner both subtle and penetrating, Jenkins has created a paean to him as archetypal and individual boy, and to the natural world of which he is a powerful part.

For women who hope to bring their children with them into the wild world they themselves love, this recounting of just that accomplishment will be inspirational. Some of us err, it seems, by making such moments exceptional. Jenkins keeps it simple, frequent and low-key. Generally mother and son take a day-pack and hop in the car to explore Wisconsin, for a day or a weekend. Their conversations along the way ramble and go deep. These ventures began when DJ was very young, and are certainly meant to nurture Jenkins herself, as well as her son. Her musings on the history and ecology of place, spirituality, aesthetics, motherhood, and the details of animal and plant life are food for her own development. She adds enough fun, and like a good teacher (which most mothers hope to be for their children), she gives lots of information. She does this as she encourages you to look carefully at what is right in front of you, to approach it with respect and let its beauty stir you.

Jenkins' writing has been compared to that of Annie Dillard and Aldo Leopold. Her voice conveys her sensitivity, intellectual curiousity, passionate feeling and serious study with regard to the natural world around her. To a Midwestern landscape that can be underappreciated, Jenkins turns a poet's eye. With DJ we notice dark flyers across a winter field, a quail emerging from the summer tangle and shade of a riverbank. She also brings along her own internal scientist and gives us factual and objective data on wide-ranging topics, from whooping cranes to the sociology of Wisconsin's poor children.

From the Dells on the Wisconsin River to ice caves along Lake Superior, from the Kettle Moraine to the Marinette waterfalls and the bluffs along the Mississippi, Jenkins provides a tour of Wisconsin parks and historical places. As a sometime visitor myself, I know that her sense of wonder and appreciation for the landscape is well-deserved. I'll be sending copies of her work to folks there soon, knowing it will encourage them to explore further.

This is a rich book, reflective of an active and thoughtful intellect, yet primarily about parenting with a bent toward environmental gratitude. Clearly, Jenkins hopes to build DJ a solid foundation of knowledge and emotional attachment to the Earth and the living things that inhabit it. From that, all else will flow toward the good, and the good man. Every Natural Fact makes me believe she is succeeding.

by Susan Schoch
for Story Circle Book Reviews
reviewing books by, for, and about women

As her son, DJ, neared adolescence, Amy Lou Jenkins decided to begin a series of mother-son walks with him as a means of both strengthening their bond and better preparing him for the upcoming life changes he would soon undergo. Over the course of a host of outings that spanned the state of Wisconsin, Amy and DJ explored not only the natural wonders surrounding them, but also the interconnectedness of humanity, flora, and fauna. What resulted was a spiritual transformation that forever altered each of their individual perspectives, changing the ways in which they related to one another and the world around them.

In Every Natural Fact: Five Seasons Of Open-Air Parenting, Jenkins recounts her mother-son outings with DJ in vivid detail, sharing with the reader the applied knowledge and insight that each of them gained over the course of taking them. Combining a keen sense of history with effective parenting measures, Jenkins shows herself to be an astute student of the human condition as she shares invaluable life lessons with her son - who is inarguably better off for it. With a nod to the powerful spiritual roots that we all share, Every Natural Fact is a poignant reminder that we best enhance our own individual growth and development by maintaining a healthy deference to the inherent wisdom that lies within us all. An enlightening, spiritually fulfilling read.


Dominique Sessons
Apex Reviews