Welcome to Forager Field Notes: What we gather when there’s no going back.

This is a newsletter for people who never got the map—or who threw it in the fire. If you’ve been told you’re too wild, too intense, too honest, or just not built for small talk, you’re in the right place.

I’m Michelle Dowd, author of Forager: Field Notes for Surviving a Family Cult. I was raised in an apocalyptic cult on a mountain, taught to trust obedience over instinct. Now I teach people how to listen to their bodies, kiss the dirt, and tell the truth without asking permission.

My work has shown up in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, and The Alpinist, but this is where I say what can’t be said in print. This is where we forage for wild truths together.

I’m also the founder of Forager Wildlife—a feral creative collective for rebels, rewilders, and pleasure-seeking survivors who want to remember who they were before the world told them to shrink.

If that’s you? Welcome home.

Join the Crew
This is for the ones who left the system, the marriage, the religion, the fake smile.
The ones who still ache.
The ones who remember.
The ones building something new.

We’re not here to perform wellness. We’re here to get dirt under our fingernails.
We’re here to howl. To heal. To make art.
We’re here to pass the bread, the playlist, and the poem.

Subscribe for dispatches from the wild edge of instinct, beauty, and becoming.

Choose your path:

Free Subscribers
For the quietly feral and creatively curious:

• Public essays & weekly sparks

• Nature-rooted reflections & creative prompts

• Book/podcast recs + occasional gathering invites

Paid Subscribers
For those ready to go deeper into the woods:

• Monthly live workshops (on Zoom)

• Access to the archive + community comments

• Playlist Drops (music for your wild moods)

• Field Notes (photos, plants, moments from the trail)

• Rituals for Reconnection (earth, body, creative fire)

• Tiny Devotions (quotes, spells, fragments)

• Love Letters to the Land

Founding Members
For the lantern-lighters and trail-clearers:

• Everything above

• Creative Coven – private cohort + behind-the-scenes access

• Wild Postcards – handwritten or digital meditations from the edge

• Seasonal salons: intimate online gatherings for the brave

No ads. No algorithm. Just real talk, straight to your inbox.

Let’s burn the blueprint and write a wilder story.