Black Girls Forage… oh God, I hate this title

I do hate this title, but hear me out.

I’m a Black girl and I love to forage. Not just for the food, but for the connectedness to spirit. The God-Soul alignment it brings. I walk quietly in nature, careful not to trample the flowers that feed the bees, the plants that feed the animals, reverence for every blade of grass and every plant. And then I enter a meditative space.

I’ve lost hours foraging, routinely and easily. I’ve walked 10,000 steps that felt like no more than 50. I’ve tracked through parks and now have a sense of where edible food can be found. I’ve heard my ancestors in the wind - you are always somewhere for a reason.

I know this all sounds very dramatic, but when I say I love to forage; I love to forage.

But as an 8th generation Black American woman, who grew up in the South, and pushing 40 pretty hard, there’s a few ingrained truths that kept me from finding this new passion years ago.

And they pretty much go in this order:

First, never eat off the floor.

Second, white people are liable to eat off of the floor - avoid such activities where that takes place.

And third, they make grocery stores for a reason.

Growing up a hippy as a little girl in the 90s artistic back-to-Africa bohemian community, I should clarify that I wasn’t explicitly told not to forage. But picking random food from a park and eating it wasn’t exactly on the agenda. Farming, yes. A food garden in your backyard, double yes. But foraging? “We come from a high society little sister, we brought complex agriculture to the world.” So the implicit message - why would you scrounge like an animal when you can grow your own food?

The idea of venturing into nature, to ingest untamed, uncultivated, and truly wild food for common consumption wasn’t something I really understood or considered.

And in all honesty, I wasn’t the most natural girl. I actually thought people who focused too much on everything being from the earth were actually a bit paranoid. I was both intimidated by natural living as much as I was intrigued with it.

When I was around the non-bohemian Black community (which is the majority), I was subtly taught to maintain a distance from nature, viewing it as something reserved for those with leisure time or as a last resort if you were struggling financially. People who still had gardens were “country” and they were just one step above the people who went into stores without shoes.

And then there’s the germs, especially those produced by wildlife and humans. My mom, as natural living as she was, had her limits. She thought just about every place in the wild had been urinated on; heck, she thought everywhere that was public had the potential of urination. I was deterred from park benches and had to smell phone booths before I entered them.

So there was always this lingering unspoken fear of germs and wilderness-associated dangers, perpetuated by societal stigmas, stereotypes and the degeneration of the built environment.

By my late teens/early-20s I became interested in sustainability. Incinerator toilets to eliminate sewage; solar panels; wind turbine; banning of chemicals; removal of nuclear power; recyclable materials; etc. etc. etc. All very technology driven, all from a standpoint that humanity broke it, so humanity will fix it with more technology. And that is true in some respects.

Yet, why hadn’t it occurred to me that humanity would fix the destruction of the earth by returning to the earth?

Nothing highlighted that something was really wrong like the C-19 pandemic. My God, did it ever. And that’s where all the dreams, all the passions, had to be addressed. I became hyper focused on natural living.

Curiosity turned into intrigue, turned into passion, until ever notion I had in the back of my mind and the forefront fell away. This including my understanding about animals, the planet, our climate, God, alignment, health, community, and everything in between.

And four years later, a year into my naturopathic medicine and herbalism course, I signed up for my first foraging event.

Now, when I’m into something, everyone else fades away. After the course I realised that I was the only Black woman there. And if there wasn’t a lovely older Asian man, we would have been the only people of colour. Everyone was lovely, gave me tips on plant identification apps and made sure I was able to take a look at the plants.

Yet, what about my sisters and brothers who have been made to be self-conscious as a result of racism and prejudice. The ones that fear when stepping outside of their communities: Do I truly belong here? Would I be judged or looked down upon? Is this a dangerous place for me?

First off, I know that I’m blessed to live in the UK, where the kind of rampant unhinged racism that I remember from home doesn’t really occur as often as it does back home in the US. And I’m not minimising the plight of people of colour in the UK; there is rampant, unhinged racism among certain groups, but it isn’t something I would expect at a foraging event, and therefore I didn’t get it.

Refreshing, is what you find among people truly attempting to return to an in-depth commune with the earth, are people immersed nature's bounty. I doubt these people aligned with every political or spiritual value I hold; and that didn’t matter.

We were all there as humans, away from the trappings and obsessions of the day-to-day life, searching for the wisdom of this beautiful planet, together.

Nature does not discriminate. It welcomes all who are willing to embrace its majesty and accept being spoiled by its abundance. There should be no stigma surrounding poverty; nature is the richest thing this planet has to offer, and it’s free to all. There should be no fear of animals or germs; we are all here at this season witness and feeding from the bosom of our great Mother Earth.

As I handled wild plants with care and reverence, and saw others do as well. As I saw the guide confidently pluck a plant and pop it into her mouth and chew, straight from the ground, I began to understand that nature is not inherently dirty or dangerous. It is only as dirtied as we make it; is our perception or our treatment of the planet.

Yeah, this Black girl loves to forage. And that’s because everyone, man, woman, child, culture, should be foraging. What would a Black girl be any different?

Foraging is a journey of self-discovery, peace and connection. Reclaiming my connection to nature and ignore any narratives or perceived narratives that keep me from seeking what I need to live and thrive. God put us all on this earth to live our lives as fully and freely as possible - that is in our birth right.

My journey as a forager continues, fuelled with curiosity, passion, with Mother Earth, who I’m now apologising to for being away from home so long.