This is an alluring book about moss. True to its title, Gathering Moss, this time Robin Wall Kimmerer invites us to walk in nature and gather the lustrous green carpet of mosses—plants that nature gifts to humans with their divergent shapes and purposes.

This book has remarkably made me reminisce about experiments I conducted during my college years nearly a decade ago—extracting genomic DNA from liverwort tissue. This book feels so nostalgic for me.

Gathering Moss contains scientific information about moss mixed with the author's experiences as a proficient bryologist. But reading this book didn't feel like reading a textbook, it was more of an enlightening and thoughtful read.

The more you turned the pages of Gathering Moss, the more you're amazed by how beautiful their variety is, and the more you realized how wonderful this creature that land provided for humans is, it also led you to respect their existence through the reciprocity they showed to others' lives.

I hold tight to the vision that someday soon we will find the courage of self-restraint, the humility to live like mosses. On that day, when we rise to give thanks to the forest, we may hear the echo in return, the forest giving thanks to the people.

P.S: Say hi to my most fav moss species, Schistostega pennata.