"Hank once told me that if I am to live this close to the wilderness, I will need to accept its gifts. At that time, I was living in a cabin near his. Anya and Linnea, his wife and tiny daughter, often brought me food. There was venison pizza and a jar of wild strawberry jam. Smoked salmon on pasta. Homemade bread. A bowl of highbush cranberries. Finally, I said, 'Hank, I can't accept any more of these beautiful gifts. I have no way to give them back.'

"He addressed me quite sternly. 'Then you will have to learn to accept gifts,' he said, 'and a good way to learn is to practice.'

"I was so surprised.

"But I practiced that evening, receiving a russet potato dug fresh from the ground by a little girl in red boots. I practiced that night on the scent of sea-fug as the tide sidled up the salt creek. When rain awakened me, there was the weft and warp of willow leaves on the window.

"And now this moonlight, and this trembling path across the water.

"The Earth offers gift after gift — life and the living of it, light and the return of it, the growing things, the roaring things, fire and nightmares, falling water and the wisdom of friends, forgiveness. My god, the gift of forgiveness, time, and the scouring tides. How does one accept gifts as great as these and hold them in the mind?

"Failing to notice a gift dishonors it, and deflects the love of the giver. That's what's wrong with living a careless life, storing up sorrow, waking up regretful, walking unaware. But to turn the gift in your hands, to say, this is wonderful and beautiful, this is a great gift — this honors the gift and the giver of it. Maybe this is what Hank has been trying to make me understand: Notice the gift. Be astonished at it. Be glad for it, care about it. Keep it in mind. This is the greatest gift a person can give in return.

" 'This is your work,' my friend told me, 'which is work of substance and prayer and mad attentiveness, which is the real deal, which is why we are here.' "