A Harvest from Grief
by Chris Doran

I put up four hummingbird feeders that summer,
Tammy loved to see them drop by.
None visited.
It was her last summer.

In her final days, Tammy told us to look out for signs she would send to show that her spirit was still with us. Songs, animals, birds. She was determined to convince us ‘atheists’ of the afterlife.

On August 7th, 2020, in the morning, as Tammy’s body was taken from our home,
I sat outside on the deck...and,
yes, I saw a hummingbird.
The next day, Conor saw one..
...and the following day...Christian.
And that wasn’t the end...
Following her funeral we put all the flower bouquets in the garden and...yes...
yet again, a buzzing little beauty visited.

‘The hummingbird- a messenger of joy, love, and good luck.’

It was the last one we saw that year.

We honoured Tammy by spreading her ashes at seven trees on a trail route we had walked together as a family. ‘Tammy’s Memorial Tree Trail’ we call it and each October we have a beer and kilt run/hike on the route in her memory.

I’d been a trail runner for many years before, zipping down the trails, loving my exercise in nature experience. Tammy wasn’t interested in running, but as her health deteriorated she asked me to take her on the trails so she could just sit and meditate. I was there in the environment I loved, but I was no longer charging through, I joined her, and sat, and stopped, and breathed. A gift she gave me that later I would become aware of and appreciate as a life changer.

After all the hummingbirds were gone, and life flipped, and the ugly death grip of grief took hold, I somewhere, somehow, came across this..

Shinrin Yoku...slow down amongst the trees, heal, reconnect, learn to live and love again, sit, stop and breathe...and it was from Japan.

We had met in Japan.

Months later, a spiritual advisor who knew nothing about me, told me she had a message from Tammy,

‘You will find me in the trees’

And many months later, I find this in a notebook she had kept in her final months,

'The hummingbird - High spiritual vibration’

And many, many, months later, the first Zoom meeting of my Forest Therapy Training course and a couple of participants have a visit from a hummingbird.

‘The hummingbird- a symbol of beauty, playfulness, and resilience.’

Coincidence, serendipity, a sign?
For me, it was two giant feathered thumbs up, mixed with a kick up the ass, a hug, and a big shove forward.

I will walk Tam’s whole tree trail again to celebrate my graduation as a Association of Nature and Forest Therapy Guide and to honour her for inspiring me to step on this new pathway and cross the threshold to a new way forward...
..and I will sit, stop and breathe...and give thanks.

The harvest from the last two years wasn't a bumper crop,
but every harvest starts with a seed,
and every seed starts with hope.