I am a shade plant

Whenever the conversation turns to weather, especially the heat and scorching sun of summer, I frequently remark that I identify as a shade plant. It’s meant as kind of a joke, but in many ways it isn’t. 

Many who know me are aware that I’m uncomfortable in sun and warm weather. The bright sun hurts my eyes (and can sometimes trigger migraines), and I’m very prone to sunburns and heat exhaustion. It doesn’t help that I rely on multiple medications that make me more sensitive to the sun and heat. 

I’m glad so many people enjoy summer weather. I’m just not one of them. 

I recently returned from a short retreat in the terraces of Monte Rio, where I stayed in a cabin perched on a steep hillside deep in the redwoods. While there I saw very little direct sunlight; all of it was filtered through those deep green canopies, or shaded by tall auburn trunks. When it was 95 degrees Fahrenheit in the towns nearby, it was more like 80F among the trees, and even cooler indoors. I was able to rest outdoors without feeling like I was being blinded or slowly roasted. 

It was amazing. 

My ancestors must have thrived among the woodlands, whether it was in the lands now known as Germany or Switzerland, Sweden or Norway, Britain or Scotland or Ireland or Wales. From them I inherited eyes made for lower-light discernment, skin that’s at home in the cool, misty air of a shadowed wood. 

Some years ago I learned that there are a number of specific genes associated with red-headedness. Some of them lead to bright, coppery hair while others lend a more subtle redness; I love that my particular hair color matches the hue of redwood bark. 

These genetic differences originate in the Central Asian grasslands, and are associated with a different kind of melanin, sometimes considered a malfunctioning form of melanin, called pheomelanin. It’s why so many of us burn instead of tan, and it’s why we develop clusters of freckles rather than tanning evenly. Unfortunately, it also makes us less able to absorb Vitamin D from the sun and more likely to develop skin cancer. These days I think of those inscriptions in my yearbook — “have a good summer! Get a tan!” — with scorn. 

Often, redheads also need more anesthetic during dental and surgical procedures, as my dermatologist recently reminded me while removing an unevenly shaped bump from my arm (a biopsy revealed it was benign). 

For whatever reason, our culture worships summer and abhors winter. But we’re not all alike. To go back to plants: If you give them all the same things, most will die. Succulents often want lots of sunlight and very little water. Ferns love deep shade and cool, humid air (hi, kin). Some plants want only distilled water; others are happy with used dishwater. It’s silly to expect every person to love the summer sun and hate rainy, cloudy or cool weather. Hopefully we can all find ways to plant ourselves where we are happiest. 

Natural megaliths on the Sonoma Coast

A small rocky hill, with one of the sea stacks in the distance.

Millions of years ago, these sea stacks were underwater. Tens of thousands of years ago, mammoths and giant bison came to these tall stones to rub against them for grooming purposes. Today, groups of rock climbers gather here to test their abilities. 

They are most commonly known as the Sunset Rocks, or to some researchers as the Mammoth Rocks, because certain sections of them were rubbed to a polish by ancient megafauna. The person who introduced me to this place more than 20 years ago had another name for them, which is still how I think about them privately.

The early peoples of California didn’t build megaliths like the ones we see in the UK and Ireland, but these sea stacks have a similar feeling. As you approach the cluster of towering stones, you’re struck by a similar sense of awe, the feeling of entering a space that is sacred, other. When you find the path and follow it into the clearing between the stones, it feels like you have crossed into another world. The air is often warmer, more still, and the sounds of wind and pounding sea fade away. 

It would be difficult to overstate how special this place is. 

When I came here regularly 20+ years ago, it was often on weekday evenings around dusk, when we could have the place to ourselves. These days, I live too far away for a casual visit on a weeknight. I keep winding up here on Saturday afternoons, when the stones are covered with climbing enthusiasts. 

Fog covering the plain.

During my most recent visit, in mid-November, 2021, I was excited when I arrived, because the whole plain was blanketed with a thick layer of fog. Mists mean the possibility of straying into another world, like the stories about Avalon. But when I reached the stones, I discovered there was some kind of party or event in the clearing. Someone had set up a table with fliers, and I could hear the beep of a credit-card reader, though I didn’t get close enough to find out what they were selling. Laughter and chatter rose up from the stones, which were studded with climbers. 

I spent some time visiting the stones scattered around the main three, and on a little rocky hill nearby, enjoying the fog swirling across the landscape. I tried to imagine that perhaps I had wandered into another world, and the chatter from the Sunset Rocks was a gathering of nature spirits, but I wasn’t really convinced. I admit, I was disappointed; I wanted to go into the clearing and meditate with the stones, but that’s difficult to do when there are lively people all around you. I’ve tried.

Reading up later on the climbers who come to Sunset Rocks, I learned that, in general, they climb in a respectful way, using the stones’ own lumps and bumps for hand- and footholds, or placing anchors only in existing chinks in the rocks. Visiting this spot regularly seems to have fostered stewardship among climbers, and I appreciate that other people love and revere the stones, even though they’re in ways that are different from mine. Part of me objects; it would be disrespectful to go bouldering at Stonehenge or Avebury, but that’s not what this place is.

Somehow, I need to find ways to visit this place that aren’t peak climbing times, such as lovely (or even misty) Saturday afternoons. And I hope you get the chance to visit them too. Until then, you can read more about them, and other special Sonoma County sites, in my book “Sacred Sonoma.”