As the sparrow inched along and pecked at the ground in its customary way, I read for the first time about “species loneliness,” the melancholy alienation of humans from other life-forms. Kimmerer writes,
I’m trying to imagine what it would be like going through life not knowing the names of the plants and animals around you. Given who I am and what I do, I can’t know what that’s like, but I think it would be a little scary and disorienting—like being lost in a foreign city where you can’t read the street signs.