The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World

The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World, by Robin Wall Kimmerer

This is the kind of book you want to make fan art about, and I've completed exactly one (1) cross-stitch project in my lifetime, so I'm seriously considering designing and carrying out an embroidery project to celebrate The Serviceberry.

It would, of course, feature serviceberries, and cedar waxwings, like the cover art. The tagline, which if you run in the same online realms I do you've probably seen quoted all over, is "All flourishing is mutual". There are a couple of other good candidates for lettering, though; highest on the list for me is, "We live in the tension between what is and what is possible," which is of course a very science-fiction-author-y thing to have on one's wall. And then there are the guidelines for the Honorable Harvest, which would be a bit long for a single embroidery project but which would, hilariously, make for a great riff on those "In this house we..." placards I always see being resold at Value Village.

(In this house we...

Know the ways of the ones who take care of you, so that you can take care of them.

Introduce yourself. Be accountable as the one who comes asking for a life.

Ask permission before taking. Abide by the answer.

Never take the first one. Never take the last.

Take only what you need.

Take only that which is given.

Never take more than half. Leave some for others.

Harvest in a way that minimizes harm.

Use it respectfully. Never waste what you have taken.

Share.

Give thanks for what you have been given.

Give a gift in reciprocity for what you have taken.

Sustain the ones who sustain you and the Earth will last forever.

Add a mish-mash of fonts, letter it on old pallet wood in gray paint, hang in the rented house of a sad gay millenial. Hilarious.)

If I do make this embroidery, it will of course take me months if not years. But it would be a very nice artwork to donate to a fundraising raffle for a leftist cause, so it might actually be worth it. I'll have to see if my skills can sustain this idea.