Three weeks ago, I had a spiritual awakening while photographing raccoons.
It all started 23 years ago. I am lucky to have been raised in Yukon Territory, where our population of around 40,000 is immersed in a patch of wilderness larger than California. Opportunities for connecting with the land are plentiful, and nature generously served as one of my primary caretakers and educators throughout my childhood. I learned to trust the trees, whose strong branches offered perfect perches for people-watching. I was taught spoken word by the ravens and their many musical calls. I was humbled by the massive, resolute power of the Yukon River, whose waters cracked and crumpled the winter’s ice each spring. Now, looking back, I realize that this wild playground also facilitated my healthy psychological development. It provided endless opportunities for happy play and mental stimulation. The amazing complexity of these ecosystems fostered my strong connection to and curiosity toward the environment. Above all, nature gave me the sense that I have an unalienable place in this world. This protective factor has supported my health in ways I may never fully understand.
When I came to Montreal to pursue my studies, I watched Mont Royal’s leaves burst into autumn colours with the same bright eyes with which I had watched wild cranberries glow translucent in the crisp morning light that follows the first frost. But soon, as I navigated the process of prioritizing my seemingly endless academic, work, and social responsibilities, I slowly forgot to make space for my relationship with nature. Under the stress and obligations that can accompany a busy student life, I lost touch with my love for the land.
Then, earlier this month, inspired by Peter Mather’s work on urban foxes, I was struck by the urge to photograph raccoons in and around the city. So one night, my trusted adventure partner Nate and I set out for the Camilien-Houde lookout on Mount Royal’s northern slope. As we walked along the park’s trails, the forest’s canopy shielded us from the city’s lights. We heard the scuttling of squirrels in overflowing garbage cans. Nervous flashes of fur leapt across our path, indicating that we had stirred up a resting rabbit. Branches scratched eerily as they danced in the breeze. Finally, we arrived at the lookout. After an hour of sitting on a cold bench, eating delicious chili and sipping local brews, out of the bushes came two raccoons. I scrambled to get my camera, snapped a few pics, and revelled in the raccoons’ polite curiosity. When we had gotten our fill, we made our way back down the mountain, giddy with success. Back home, lying in bed, I realized that our adventure had reawakened a feeling in me that had been dormant for too long. Spending time in the park had not only rekindled my connection with the land but also inspired me to investigate others’ experiences with urban nature.
Curious about what value urban nature brought to different people, I reached out to Lisa Mintz, an environmentalist who has been involved in multiple projects aiming to save green spaces from construction in Montreal. Like me, Mintz’s appreciation for nature began at home, having had access to a cottage and a large green space near her home in Toronto. However, when she moved to Montreal, she felt a void. She eventually realized that losing access to those green spaces deprived her of the psychological and spiritual benefits they had once offered.
Then, she discovered the raw, tangled beauty of the Saint-Jacques escarpment, a strip of forested land four kilometres long which, according to Mintz, has hosted over 70 species of birds, as well as deer and brown snakes. In 2015, Mintz was shocked and disturbed to see that a section of this forest had been levelled by bulldozers. She joined with other community members who shared her appreciation for the green space, and together they moved to protect it. In this process, Mintz founded Sauvons la Falaise!—an initiative that at first cleared pathways, removed garbage, documented wildlife, and filled bird feeders in the escarpment. In doing so, the group’s members made this stretch of urban nature their own and demonstrated just how valuable its preservation was to their community. Finally, in 2020, the City of Montreal announced that a green corridor would be added to the base of the escarpment, that trees and other vegetation would be planted to extend the forest, and that the area would eventually be designated as a grand parc.
In addition to her efforts to ensure the escarpment’s preservation, Mintz has enabled more people in the community to learn and reap the benefits of green spaces. She also co-founded UrbaNature, an organization dedicated to outdoor education, promoting the mental, physical, and spiritual benefits of being in nature. UrbaNature hosts university researchers and offers programming for people of all ages, including nature walks and summer day camps. All of these programs are run in green spaces around Montreal, often within the Saint-Jacques escarpment. Mintz, who teaches some of them, noted that kids have expressed their amazement at discovering the wide range of activities nature has to offer. Ultimately, her work illustrates the invaluable role that green spaces play as sites of education, recreation, and healing.
The psychological and spiritual value found in the outdoors was echoed during my interview with Chris Barrington-Leigh, an associate professor at McGill, jointly appointed to the Department of Equity, Ethics and Policy and the Bieler School of Environment. One branch of his research focuses on the economics of well-being, where he measures people’s subjectively reported life satisfaction to better understand the effects of various economic and social conditions, changes, and policies. I was excited to learn that Barrington-Leigh also loves to spend time in nature, including climbing gnarly routes in British Columbia’s Bugaboos mountains, cross-country skiing, running, and bird watching in Montreal’s green spaces.
Interestingly, Barrington-Leigh reported that the most important predictors of life satisfaction are social, referring to factors like our relationships, sense of identity, and feelings of belonging. He emphasized that these predictors must be defined broadly. For example, “relationships” should extend to include connections beyond humans, like how Nate and I bonded with the raccoons. Similarly, our understanding of both “identity” and “belonging” should include our connections to the land. This more comprehensive definition of what it means to be social informs a better understanding of well-being and life satisfaction.
It seems then that green spaces are ripe with opportunities to develop connections that can support our life satisfaction. And for people like me, who come to the city with an already-established relationship with nature, where else can we go in the city to maintain this connection? It’s abundantly clear that urban nature has great value. Although grassroots activists like Mintz and the team at Sauvons la Falaise! can undoubtedly have a major impact and successfully protect particular green spaces, change needs to occur at the policy level to ensure that these areas’ value is recognized across the board. This could, for example, ensure that residents don’t wake up to find the forests they once bird-watched bulldozed without warning.
I spoke with Kwetiio, who is one of the Kanien’kehá:ka Kahnistensera (Mohawk Mothers), an important voice in the struggle against the New Vic Project. When she looks at the nature that remains in the city today, whether that be the rising expanse of Mount Royal Park or simply a flower growing from a crack in the sidewalk, she wonders if the people around her understand how they came to be on this land. Do they know the rich and long history of the Kanien’kehá:ka in these green spaces, and if so, do they realize that hostile settler colonialism led to the cold urbanism that surrounds us today? To her, the roots of the big trees in Tiohtià:ke tell this history well. Their connections to this land go much deeper than those of two-and-a-half-inch trimmed grass. In Kwetiio’s eyes, the manicured nature we have today is a painful souvenir of what she and the Kanien’kehá:ka Nation had stolen from them.
But Kwetiio also sees urban nature as a beautiful reminder of the connectedness of all nature—of Creation. It reminds her that everything—air, water, earth, life—depends on one another to exist in harmony. Today, most people disrespect this relationship by using the land without recognition of all that it provides. Kwetiio believes that everyone has a responsibility to be grateful for the beauty, nourishment and connections that nature offers.
Looking forward, Kwetiio envisions a world wherein people look deeper into the land, to read the history and lessons written on its roots. She dreams of a more harmonious society, in which we allow green spaces to grow wild. Let us celebrate the beauty of Creation, instead of trying to control it. Instead of mowing down grass to get rid of mosquitoes, Kwetiio suggests we plant corn. She encourages us to garden, and in doing so, learn to lovingly tend to plants like they are our children. Kwetiio knows, and as a professional gardener I agree, that in raising plants, the more you respect them, the more beautiful they become. This is the kind of social knowledge that we stand to gain from engaging in reciprocal relationships with our green spaces. Let us nurture these spaces, and in turn, cultivate a culture of mutual caretaking and stronger communities.
In the end, it’s not just about what nature does for people, it’s also about what we can do for it.