reverse threading

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Tag Archives: dill


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dill sacrifice. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

i could imagine it. dill roasted potatoes. dill on salmon. dill pasta salad. dill in pesto. dill risotto. tzatziki sauce. deviled eggs. the recipes are endless.

so we added dill to the potting stand. a big clay pot with good dirt and lots of sun and a splendid watering wand. and it grew and grew…into a dill tree with lovely willowy branches and fragrance that inspired. until it was ridiculously rainy, ridiculously hot, ridiculously sunny and then – pushing back on the stuff i didn’t know about dill – my dill-ignorance – the dill bolted.

i diligently clipped off the bolting parts, hoping that would suffice – that the dill would forget and resume its normal-growing-program. but – once bolted, always bolted.

so when i saw the tiny caterpillars on a sunday on the dill, i kind of smiled. it made me a little bit happy that they – these half-inch long critters – were munching on this plant.

imagine my surprise when i saw these hefty caterpillars on friday, merely five days later. these are some serious black swallowtail caterpillars. with such quick lifecycles and growth, i am now looking for the chrysalises (yes, i looked up the plural form).

i’ve given over to them. the bolting dill will no longer focus on producing leaves and so my time as a homegrown-dill chef is over for now. next time, i will know to move the dill to a shadier spot, for our potting stand does receive full sun much of the time. next time, i will be more alert, more responsive, more informed.

but for now – well, our $3.98 dill is strictly to support the lives of these two caterpillars and their transformation into butterflies (and maybe others i am unaware of as well). a worthy sacrifice. and one of these days, when i see a couple black butterflies dipping and sailing over our backyard, i will know that we were part of their metamorphosis.

and i’m thinking that $3.98 is not too big a price to pay to witness – and be reminded of – rebirth, new beginnings, positive change and hope, new chapters in life. it’s not too big a price to pay to witness the magic of flight. it’s not too big a price to pay for two happy caterpillars.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this NOT-SO-FLAWED WEDNESDAY

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wilted. [kerri’s blog on flawed wednesday]

there are definitely days – many of them – during which we would love to just run away. go to some far away remote place and hole up together, sans current events and other people. because it is all sometimes unbearable.

a writer and former pastor, john pavlovitz said it well, “the greatest tragedy to me isn’t him. it isn’t the reality that the person in the highest seat of power in our nation lacks a single benevolent impulse, that his is impervious to compassion, incapable of nobility, and mortally allergic to simple kindness. the greatest tragedy is how many americans he now represents – and that he represents you.”

there are too many “you”s.

and, like this dill in the middle of the heat-dome-heat, we are wilted. because it is exhausting. utterly exhausting.

i don’t honestly know how this country can ever regain its heart.

i don’t know how we got here – though one can certainly track lines of bigotry and hatred and violence through history. the ebb and flow of the heartless seeking of power, control, profit through any means whatsoever, without any scruples, ethics, or conscience.

the things that are happening, the things that people champion – people i have known or loved or cared about – the things that diminish support for others, marginalize groups, perpetuate cruelty…it’s just too much.

and…the grief. not just the grief of the arc of this history, but the contemporaneous grief. it is exhausting. utterly exhausting.

no amount of water will unwilt this dill. it will turn yellow and then brown and these stems will die. for these stems – in the extreme heat – have reached the point of no return. i must be more vigilant to protect the rest of the plant, to – figuratively – keep its heart beating and its spiny stems upright.

so it is here – in the middle of this reeling and this vigilance and this burning grief and this already-deeply-bone-aching tiredness i wonder how – exactly – we can keep the heartbeat of democracy when the moral spine of this nation is so compromised.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this FLAWED WEDNESDAY

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buymeacoffee is a website where you may directly impact an artist whose work directly impacts you.