Home in the Wild, Together

by Natalia Kemmerich Jaspeado

Our Annual Family Canoe Trip

We do a canoe trip every summer: my husband, me, and a rotating crew of friends and family, with a different mix every time. Four days, moving from one campsite to the next, sometimes through portages of 600 to 800 metres, camping near natural springs, with no cell service and a sense of quiet that creates an unwavering knowing of peace.

This year, for the first time, my mom came too. It was her first canoe trip ever, and I was anxious about it, honestly. I wondered whether she would like it or if it would be too hard. But there was this whisper inside me, under the anxiety. There was a quiet knowing that it wasn't just going to be fine. It was going to be transformative.

For a long time, I thought I needed to be someone else to deserve my mom's love and care. It turns out that all along, this canoe trip would be the answer to that longing. She trusted me all along.

Finding the Rhythm of the Forest

On day one, at the end of our first portage, we got blessed with a storm. Just under an hour of it. The sky went heavy and magnificent, clouds stacking like they were building something. What an arrival. Nature was inviting me to let go, and in that rain, my perfectionism was rinsed away.

As we kept canoeing and the painting of clouds passed us by, we entered a stream with several rainbows over the water. We were called to pause. I immediately got in the water and came up to my mom's canoe. Getting to see my mom's eyes as both of our cheeks filled with tears and indescribable joy, I knew nature was welcoming us both into its wild.

We proceeded to find a campsite. I had “planned” to assist every step of the way. I was willing to protect her and carry the uncomfortable parts for her. But as we arrived, I felt compelled to give her space. We set up the tents and the food station, along with a dishwashing area made of a bucket, lake water, and biodegradable soap.

Time had not fully stopped yet. It was noticeable that we were still close to civilization, so much so that we saw boats passing us by, and nature was not quite coming to life yet.

Canoe Camping Beneath a Meteor Shower

By day two, paddling became second nature. A portage took us into the sounds of birds in the evening, with only splashing water as external noise. We found a campsite with a big stone at the edge of time. It felt like we all physically sighed. The island was there, all to ourselves. We settled, swam, canoed, and fished.

Our wet clothes slowly looked lived in, and yet again, nature had a surprise for us. During the nights that followed, we got comfortable lying on the stones, giggling and cheering at the sight of every shooting star under meteor showers. Actual showers, streaks of light bathing the sky while we made wishes on them like kids.

By day three, our eyes looked like the wilderness around us. We smelled like firewood, and our nails were polished with dirt. At this point, the recollection of any of the nerves I had before the camping trip felt like a faraway dream, and I was in awe. My mom arrived on this trip not knowing where we were going or even what a portage was, and she was there, openhearted, truly settled into every single second of it.

Then, the night before our last full day, my mom told me she'd found the rhythm of the forest, of camping, of just being there. She wanted to take the lead and make breakfast the next morning.

Building a Campfire in the Rain

We woke up to a gentle, soothing rain. I was helping my husband take down the tent, and at some point, I noticed my hands weren't needed. So I asked him, “How can I support you right now?”

He said, “Maybe go help your mom with the fire.”

I walked over to where she crouched, puzzled, over a pile of damp wood. I showed her what moss to look for and how to peel curls of birch bark, the way it lights even when it's wet, almost wanting to catch. We built it together, gently, and it caught.

She looked at it and said, “But it doesn't look beautiful anymore.”

And I said, “It's all in our perspective. I think it is beautiful because it is going, keeping us warm, and it will heat up our food.”

I slowed down enough to see her smile in between. She proceeded to make some oats for everyone and prepared coffee with her boyfriend by the fire.

I now wonder: What if the beautiful version of something is the truest version of it? Smoky and uneven.

The Trust Underneath the Fire

I keep turning that exchange over. My mom, looking at a fire doing exactly what it was built to do, burning, smoking, a little chaotic, and seeing something that had lost its beauty. And me, looking at the same fire, seeing something whole.

Time stopped. That’s when I understood the whole shape of how she raised me, and I had never seen it this clearly until that morning. Growing up, she let me struggle, sometimes emotionally frustrated, tying the same knot of my consciousness forty times before it held. She didn't rescue me from the mess of learning something, and at the time, I sometimes read that as distance.

In that moment, seeing the fire catch, I finally understood. Her mothering was actually reflecting trust. What if her holding space for my struggle, instead of distracting me with an action to solve it, was actually an invitation to allow the “un-pretty,” in-progress version of me to thrive at its own pace?

This realization dawned on me like a full moon reflected in a dark night. She had taught me to sit with myself, to wait, to know that the chaos was worth staying with, and that learning to do so would bring me the deepest joy I could possibly feel. That’s exactly where feeling at home in the wild came from for me.

Sitting on a branch, watching her cook, letting it all in, my heart felt full. I had a flash of all the times as a kid I had climbed trees and proudly counted my scratches because they had taught me how to move in that tree, or how I couldn’t help but jump in the ocean every time we were out on the water. I didn’t want to stay clean or tidy. I wanted to stay me. And she embraced me and trusted the process. She learned and unlearned, and grew herself.

I wonder how many of us are still holding a version of that. What is something a loved one watched you struggle through? What if there was trust hiding underneath it?

On this canoe trip, I saw my mom crouching in wet moss in her fifties, carrying gear over hills and wet stones, learning to cook with an active fire, not knowing what she was doing, and building something worth staying with.

Motherhood From the Other Side of the Fire

I keep thinking about how much of life isn't about keeping things tidy. It's about staying present while something finds its own rhythm, even when it's smoking and uneven and nothing like the photo in your head. What if the most honest version of ourselves is the uneven one?

My husband calls canoeing “type 2 fun.” He says that it is the type of fun that requires achieving a challenge first, which makes the reward so much sweeter after. I don’t think it is a coincidence that on the fourth day of this canoe trip, there was an ongoing storm all day. The water was heavy and choppy, the waves hugging us to the point of squeezing into the canoe. Paddling felt eternal. The portages were slippery, and the rain trickling down inside our clothes felt like flashes of unexpected lightning. Arriving at the car, getting to wear warm clothes, having the most magical dinner, and sleeping in our bed felt like a gift after that hard day.

I wonder if allowing the “unpretty” parts, a new skill, a hard season, a version of myself still catching, is what makes the journey worthwhile. I don't think my mom is done learning it either, and there's comfort in that. What if part of life’s biggest adventure is learning to reimagine what is still catching? What if the reimagined version feels whole?

I think about the quiet knowing I had before we ever left the dock: that this wasn't just going to be fine. It was going to be transformative. I understand now. It was never about teaching my mom to canoe. It was about understanding her mothering from the other side of the fire. Underneath everything else, I am so deeply grateful.

I don't know what your version of that fire looks like. But I'd bet you have one.

If This Resonates

• Trust the Storm: Let the storm move through before you rush toward the rainbow. Both parts are the gift.
• Unweave Your Version of Beauty: The prettiest version of something has many definitions. Find the one that mirrors your reality.
• We Are All Works in Progress: Even though we might not share it openly at times, we are all human, and part of that can be chaotic and uneven. That is okay.