My office is a field of poison flowerspurple swaying in the breeze.It is also a pathway. For a bear, whose tracks have on occasion encountered my own. Surprised by each other’s quiet presence, we make eye contact before retreat.•On the way to my desk, I traverse a shelf more mixed than lush: Throat Forest — a half failing aspen grove, green shoots among the fallen white trunks. • That which is pliant is a disciple of life: that which is rigid, a disciple of death. • Throat Forest voices this point. The living trees bend and sway, while the dead hold steady and unwavering: solemn monuments, they are their own gravestones.•This has been a year of adjustment, a season of bending and adapting. But in so, a year of life. I appreciate your presence, and this show will return soon, with more findings and searchings.