Moss And Peace

Posted on Tuesday 4th of August 2026 at 22:56

This has been posted as part of Blaugust 2026

As I mentioned in a recent post I am trying to refocus on this site a little, and I'm leaning on Blaugust to do this. Seems to be working so far, which is good.

It goes deeper than that. It's not just this site I'm trying to focus on. I've alluded to this recently, but for a while now work has been somewhat overbearing, and in July, after a month or so of things seeming like they'd actually turn out okay, they took a 180 and retracted straight back to difficult. Not 'hard to do' difficult, difficult on the mind. Stressful, uncertain, anxiety-laden. The work is unending, the available resources are either dwindling or outright non-existant, stress is incredibly high for everyone, and to top it off I'm back to the uncertainty I had at the start of the year where redundancy is looking more likely for me in the near future. Not certain, but likely. If I knew either way I'd be better than where I am now, in the unknown. Job stability purgatory. To top it off, the job market is... let's say, not the best it's ever been in tech, so I'm anxious about landing something else too.

Consider that I'm feeling like this in August, and I work in education. Everything is closed, we've got a long list of projects to be getting on with (and no budget, mind) and most critically the staff and students aren't even there, and I'm like this. September is historically the most stressful month for us, so if I don't do something about this, I may well burn out.

Unlike the situation last year and early this year, however, I am expending effort on refocusing in general. Specifically, I am reorienting what I consider, my energy output, into 'life stuff' instead of 'work stuff'. I have been giving work everything, and I can continue to do that to a point, but it isn't healthy. I've been feeling the creeping claws of burnout since I last wrote about it in the Absent post I linked previously, and they're ramping up a bit recently. Things need to change. Including me.

So, a realignment. I am making active change. Sure, I will retain the pride in my work and I will work hard, but... I'll take it a little less seriously. A little less personally. Find headspace for other things, like blogging more, working on this website more. Reading more. Having more positive energy for the family. I won't bring work home. I certainly won't bring the stress of work home, my family don't deserve that. These changes aren't simple switches I can flip, I need to form new habits, take into account me prior to getting involved or worked up. Set more stringent limits. Form new habits.

So with that in mind, both yesterday and today I decided to go for a walk during my lunch break. I used to do this, years ago. At some point I stopped, and eating lunch became an annoying interruption in a hectic day of getting shit done. When did that happen?! Why did I let it?

Near my workplace is a little bit of woodland, and I strolled around it yesterday at a pretty rapid pace and got back to work. I did a walk, I am a good boy. But... As soon as I walked in the door I regretted the speed at which I had charged around. So today, I took a different route through the trees and actually stopped to look at stuff.

At one point next to a well trodden path sits a tree on a slight hump in the ground. The hump is covered in a thick and reaching layer of moss, it's like... an inch deep, and covered in leaves and sticks and other natural detritus. I bent down and touched it, just for a moment.

Yesterday I also saw this moss, but I walked right by without giving it more than a huh, that's kinda cool thought, and then it was out of my mind. Today, I appreciated it a little bit. I even took a couple photos on my phone - here's one:

A close-up photo of green moss covering the floor, atop which sits crispy brown leaves and other woodland bits. The depth of field is narrow, resulting in an angled stretch of the moss in focus whilst the immediate foreground close to the camera, and the trees in the background, are out of focus

Moving on at a slower pace, I poked around trees, found an old gnarly tree root, heard plenty of insects and birds, and not a single human. I did notice more moss, however, clinging to the floor and the tree trunks all around. One falled tree in particular sat in dappled sunlight, covered in a deep green coating of moss. I took some pictures of this too, but my phone has decided to try to enhance the image way too much so it looks a bit... artificial.

An even closer-up photo of a different type of yellow-green moss covering a fallen tree. It's arguably a macro photograph, though the camera (a phone) has tried to compensate for the zoom and added artificial features to the moss, which sits in dappled light on a log. A brown leaf is in focus, resting lightly atop the mossy jacket.

I don't own a proper camera - I tried it like 20 years ago, and I wasn't very good with it - but I do have a set of lenses that clip onto my phone. One in particular I like is the Macro lens. I use it quite a lot. I didn't have it with me today, but I think I'll start taking it out with me, to work, for my walks.

I found this walk quite restorative. It was hot (around 30c, which I enjoy) and sunny and until the end of the walk I didn't see another human. It's not like I don't ever go on walks - I do, with the family, quite often! But I don't walk out of work at lunch. I can't walk away from it all, right? Wrong. I'll be walking away more often in the future.

In my quest to realign my personal energy usage and allocations, a lunchtime walk in nature is a great tool to reduce the pressure from the workplace.

Oh, I have a little bonus - whilst getting a picture of the log moss I thought to myself that I could write about it on the blog later. Which I am now doing. So I took a moment to consider if there was anything I could do to add a little pizzaz to the post and decided on a short video of nothing but moss. I recorded this by hand, so it's both short and a little wobbly, and I blocked the mic with my hand so I've not bothered to include audio. But next time I'll do something similar, including sound. I find it kinda peaceful.

It got a little windy and it looks sped up, but it is realtime!

I believe taking a moment to appreciate things outside of your normal experience - both the big and, especially, the small - is a surefire way to feel just a little bit better about things. It helps to put things in perspective. I have realised today that whilst I knew this, I had forgotten that I knew it.

I am going to try to remember it.