Mary Taylor Young’s nature journal revealed a changing landscape

Mary Taylor Young has been writing on the landscape and natural communities of Colorado and the West for 37 years. She is the author of 23 books. Young received the 2020 Lifetime Achievement Award from the Colorado Authors League, 2019 induction to Colorado Authors Hall of Fame and was the 2018 Frank Waters Award honoree for a canon of writing that communicates a deep understanding of the West. 

SunLit: Tell us this book’s backstory. What inspired you to write it? Where did the story/theme originate? 

Mary Taylor Young: We’ve kept a nature journal of sightings and experiences on our property in the southern Rockies for 25+ years. At first I thought to use the journal as the basis of a story about renewal and joy being close to nature. But as I re-read decades of entries, I realized how much had changed, and continues to change. I realized the story to tell was about change. My journal is a chronicle of climate change in my special place in Colorado.

SunLit: Place this excerpt in context. How does it fit into the book as a whole? Why did you select it? 

Young: Though “Bluebird Seasons: Witnessing Climate Change In My Piece of the Wild” is about climate change, it is absolutely a personal story, one of joy and sadness. This excerpt begins with a joyful episode witnessing elk on our land, explains what has been happening over the decades leading to changes — meaning we now see fewer elk, and much less often.

SunLit: Tell us about creating this book. What influences and/or experiences informed the project before you sat down to write? 

UNDERWRITTEN BY

Each week, The Colorado Sun and Colorado Humanities & Center For The Book feature an excerpt from a Colorado book and an interview with the author. Explore the SunLit archives at coloradosun.com/sunlit.

Young: I am a career nature writer, so my entire adult life has been devoted to witnessing the natural world and capturing that experience—the wonder and joy I feel in nature—in ways that will touch the minds and hearts of my readers. My professional craft skills along with decades of observation, and my professional knowledge that allowed me to understand what I was witnessing, allowed me to be able to write this personal memoir that is a love letter to the landscape that is changing.

SunLit: What did the process of writing this book add to your knowledge and understanding of your craft and/or the subject matter? 

Young: After 37 years, I had the craft side of writing covered, but to understand the years of change I was seeing within a broader, indeed global, context, I delved deeply into climate science, ongoing research and studies about climate change and research that quantifies what I was seeing so it was more than anecdotal.

SunLit: What were the biggest challenges you faced in writing this book? 

Young: To maintain hope and not live in a dystopian funk! I was reading constantly on the growing and devastating impacts of climate change happening globally and the challenges that often seem insurmountable, along with the political paralysis preventing our country and much of the world from taking adequate action. 

Then, how to end the book with hope, authentically, because if there is no hope there is no point to writing the book. But there is always hope, I just had to think broadly and listen to wise voices and decide what realistically applied to my story.

SunLit: What’s the most important thing — a theme, lesson, emotion or realization — that readers should take from this book? 

Young: That the climate crisis isn’t some vague thing happening in far-off places like Antarctica and south Asian rainforests. It is happening right here, right now in our own backyards and special wild places. It is affecting us and our state right now and the dire impacts to our world and daily lives will only grow. And that it is up to us to push for change because those with power and wealth are not going to do it.

“Bluebird Seasons”

>> Read an excerpt

Where to find it:

• Prospector: Search the combined catalogs of 23 Colorado libraries
• Libby: E-books and audio books
• NewPages Guide: List of Colorado independent bookstores
• Bookshop.org: Searchable database of bookstores nationwide

SunLit present new excerpts from some of the best Colorado authors that not only spin engaging narratives but also illuminate who we are as a community. Read more.

SunLit: What can we do, in our lives, to help fight the climate crisis?

Young: A quick Google search will turn up many suggestions for helping the climate. But my suggestions are:

1. Get involved at some level with efforts in your community to advocate for climate action.

2. Ask yourself how climate change is impacting your own life—are your landscape plants dying? Is the local pond or lake going dry? Are you worried about wildfire or flooding in your neighborhood, have you been evacuated or even lost your home?

 Share your story, as I have in “Bluebird Seasons.” Story has great power to engage and persuade people and to trigger action and change. If we tell our stories, we have a voice. People want to hear authentic voices, and we can be part of the fight against climate change by telling our stories.

SunLit: Tell us about your next project.

Young: A dual timeline novel set during World War II and the Afghanistan War in 2012. A young woman whose husband has been killed in Afghanistan discovers a vintage Red Cross uniform with a letter indicating the owner’s husband was missing in action during World War II. She becomes obsessed with learning whether the husband returned alive from the war, magically thinking that if that woman’s husband came home to her, then her own husband may also.

A few more quick questions

SunLit: Which do you enjoy more as you work on a book – writing or editing?

Young: Writing!

SunLit: What’s the first piece of writing – at any age – that you remember being proud of?

Young: In the fourth grade, our teacher gave us random pictures to write a story about. Mine was of a group of kids that looked like small town America in the 1940s. I wrote an elaborate story about these kids during World War II when their dads were off to war and they discovered a mystery to solve. 

SunLit: What three writers, from any era, would you invite over for a great discussion about literature and writing? 

Young: Maya Angelou, Willa Cather, Ta-Nehisi Coates

SunLit: Do you have a favorite quote about writing?

Young: “Don’t tell me the moon is shining. Show me the glint of light on broken glass.” – Anton Chekhov

SunLit: What does the current collection of books on your home shelves tell visitors about you?

Young: That I’m a nature nerd —  huge library of natural history books and creative nature writing! And I love historical and “book club” fiction, but not most mass market fiction.

SunLit: Soundtrack or silence? What’s the audio background that helps you write?

Young: Silence.

SunLit: What music do you listen to for sheer enjoyment?

Young: Very mixed. A little jazz, some classic rock from ‘60s,’ 70s, ‘80s, ‘90s and contemporary female vocalists like Maggie Rogers and Lana Del Ray. I also love Taylor Swift – I’m a proud 68-year-old Swiftie!

SunLit: What event, and at what age, convinced you that you wanted to be a writer?

Young: No one event. I wrote when I was a kid, but drifted away from it as a young adult. But after several career changes I wanted to spend my life outdoors and watching wildlife. I decided capturing what the natural world meant to me in ways that would move readers to feel that, too, and care enough to support preserving it, was a joyful, creative and rewarding path to follow. I had started and sold a small business, giving me a small income that allowed me to start a new career as a freelance writer.

SunLit: Greatest writing fear?

Young: Honestly after 37 years I don’t really have any writing fears. I am pleased and content with my writing career and my accomplishments.

SunLit: Greatest writing satisfaction?

Young: Having made a career and earned a living as a freelance writer, writing about what I wanted to write, and that I have touched and moved many readers. And having published 23 books, from which I didn’t really make a lot of money but which have the biggest and longest-lasting impact of the probably thousands of pieces and projects I’ve written.