the sowthistle can’t help but stand in all the phases of its life at the same time.
and i wonder what wisdom it can impart by doing just that – standing simultaneously in bud through flower through feathery seed into senescence.
being able to see the stage that is next, the stage that was before, the stage that was the beginning, the stage that will be the end – perhaps this is perspective-arranging, perhaps it zeros one in – on what is right now.
i wonder if the sowthistle thinks about any of this. does it base any of its thistling decisions on this omnipresent view of the arc of life, on the conglomerate-rock plant approach – or does it just live, detached from stressing, disconnected from the mindset of striding through stages upon which it has little impact?
and what about us? what if we could see our whole life right in front of us? what if we knew – from beginning to end – how it would all shake out?
don’t we, though? sort of?
don’t we know that we will somehow travel through these stages – the beginning, the middle, the end – that we will somehow grow and change and celebrate and grieve and jump and hang back and be active and sedentary, brilliantly productive and passively idle, bowled over and resilient, profoundly angst-filled and radically happy, loving and beloved, young and – hopefully – old.
is the sowthistle consistently sanguine, glass-half-full, amazed at simply living?
as we hiked by this bit of meadow, sowthistle wild on the side of the trail, i was struck by the all-in-one-frame of thistle – all its life cycle – a life arc in one tiny space of dirt.
and in the way that nature reminds us – all the time – i was immediately aware of my own life arc, my own mysterious timeline.
and mary oliver whispered – once again – this time from the tangle of buds and flowers and seeds – because she can never ask this enough – “what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
the heat index was 106 degrees. it had finally gotten a tad bit cooler and we were lounging – relatively motionless – in the gravity chairs mid-evening. watching the birds busy at the birdbath and the squirrel ecstatic at the barney-buffet, we suddenly were aware of two stunning dragonflies zipping around us and then landing on the piece-o’-our-beloved-tree branch on the deck next to us. just a couple feet away from us, they stuck around for a long time, gently flexing their wings and repositioning but not leaving. it’s like they wanted us to notice they were there.
it was shocking how close they allowed me to get to photograph them…so close that my iphone blurred some of the insect images – the depth of field of the camera instead opting to clear-focus on something further away.
dragonflies – are associated with messages of “transformation, joy and living life to the fullest…are often seen as gentle nudges to release worries and embrace the present moment.” it is also popular that they are “a gentle reminder that guardian angels or loved ones who have passed are watching over you…bringing…comfort…during transitional times.”
good grief, this is a good time – in countless ways – for a connection between heaven and earth.
i’ve been around big water most of my life. the ocean, long island sound, the gulf of mexico, lake michigan. dragonflies are drawn to bodies of water, so it would make sense that i would have had plenty of first-person experiences with dragonflies. clearly they have been around and i have admired their flight nearby. but i can’t point to a moment before when i was as viscerally aware – in a sharing of the same vibration-frequency way.
this time was different.
in a time that is fraught with so many uncertainties, i feel like any nod to reassurance or comfort is worth noticing. i feel like any “omen of power, bravery, transformation” is buoying. i feel like anything that might connect us to greater good is paramount.
the aerial (adult) stage of a dragonfly – the time this beautiful creature flies on these iridescent wings – is typically short — weeks to months long. most of its life is spent in its previous nymph stage, up to five years in the water. once airborne, their wings cannot repair, and high speed flight and other perils of tattered-wing damage blunt their ability to fly.
the dragonfly’s primary goal – their evolutionary goal – is “for the insect to disperse, find a mate and lay eggs near water“. their compound eyes – as many as thirty thousand of photoreceptor cells – take in everything around them and help them have a prey rate of 97%, one of the most successful predators currently on the planet. these fleeting creatures are stunningly impactful, successfully passing on life to their next generation.
we have limited time with the iridescent wings of our own lives. it would seem that we are – indeed – in our aerial phase…the phase of transformation and embracing the present moment. it would seem that our job – no longer nymphs – is to pass on a world that is worthy.
if we merely sit still – silent, timid, withdrawn, inactive, self-focused – it is possible our fragile wings will last a tad bit longer.
but if we fly – bold and brave, eyes wide-open, risking tatters – we will have simultaneously touched the sky – even heaven – and lived on earth.
even in decline, the day lily is stunning. even as it prepares to fall – its veined petals listing toward the ground, stamen curled and ready to release.
even in decline, it is beautiful, the bloom looking more like the wings of a butterfly than the petals of a vibrant lily, heralding summer.
even in decline, it participates in the garden, granting space to those blossoms that are just starting, buds that are just bursting, tiny green treasure chests on the stem just begging for attention.
even in decline.
my sweet momma – and i have told this story – used to tell me that she was astonished when she looked in the mirror. she would grab her red lipstick, carefully lining her lips, applying it, and would look at me – in horror – saying, “i look like an old woman!”
it was impossible to convince her – even as i insisted – that she was absolutely beautiful – which she was – those creases and lines in her face worn in by life, the sparkle in her blue eyes that never faded, the worry lines earned by worrying about those she loved. even in decline – her beauty in the mirror and in the world – was palpable, was real, was undeniable.
but i am beginning to get it. such an emphasis placed on youth – and how that manifests in our minds and hearts – the way aging reveals in our bodies vs the way youth looks on our bodies – it’s an insanity to think that static is the only way to see beauty. so now, when i look in the mirror, i – like millions of other women – are maybe measuring what we see, maybe counting the wrinkles, maybe frowning at the dynamic changes through which our individual lives are expressing in our bodies, maybe bemoaning what we are taught to think of as flaws.
instead, i just want to remember.
i want to remember how entirely gorgeous the daylily in our little garden – in all of its stages. how much i welcome every last dewy bud, blossom, gossamer-wing-petaled bloom, the dropping petals. how much joy it brings, this simple cycle of life, evidenced along the fence, not-so-flawed.
it would seem that i should grant myself the same grace i grant the daylily.
it would seem that as each day unfurls into the next i am – indeed – learning that it is ever more beautiful than the last.
a full box of crayolas at my side, i, too, in my itty-bitty chair at the itty-bitty table, would outline the image on the coloring book pageand then color it all in. like there was some artistic reason for outlining – making a definitive and clear break between the image and the background. for a non-artistic-in-the-sense-of-drawing type, it seemed to make my coloring page look better, cleaner, more striking. i’m not really sure. but it was a popular thing to do – this outlining thing – and, though i don’t know who initially suggested it, nearly everyone colored their pages that way. you could see it on the ever-important bulletin board wall.
if i were to pick up a coloring book and crayons now i might even just fall back into old patterns, grasping the crayola stub in my hand tightly, pursing my lips and concentrating on not drawing off the line. then i would color it all in – in the lines – and my page would be neat and tidy and whatever other adjective might apply, synonymous with success.
when i color in “adult-colored-pencil-coloring-books” i have found that i don’t do this – i just color with my pointy pencils – no outlines, no outlining. is it the difference between the paraffin wax/powdered color pigmentcombo of crayons and the pigments/binding agents/fillers/casing used in pencils? is it some leftover art lesson from elementary school – where the emphasis was on some sort of impossible sought-after perfection for our coloring sheets? and why – knowing me – did i not color out of the lines? well, i can answer that one. back then i was an in-the-lines colorer, going with the crowd, hoping to get my picture on the bulletin board wall.
i move up close to the peonies in our garden out back. they stand their ground as i move around, right in their little peony faces, alternately snapping photos and taking big whiffs of their intoxicating scent.
there are no outlines here. everything up this close blurs as my depth of field changes, my point of focus changes, my intent changes.
were i to make this photograph a coloring sheet – an accurate coloring sheet – it would require fuzzy lines – no clear outline – instead, a fade of one color into the next, maybe difficult to capture with a stub of crayon looking to make something definitive.
but life is more like that. less definitive, more fuzzy. it is less distinct and more out-of-focus. it is less green and white, and more grey. there are no outlines and, if you really get it, there’s no ever-important bulletin-board-wall upon which to hang up your life.
it just is.
and the moments we get to sniff peonies or color out of the lines, to allow the unfocused to swirl around us, to not get all caught up in the bulletin-board-wall – those are the moments to grasp, to hold onto, to store away as balm for those other moments – the ones that test us, that hand us crayons with impossible confidence-taxing expectations, that, somehow, in all the chaos, make us forget that peonies exist. craziness.
and so, no outlines. just color.
“…you write about my flower as if i think and see what YOU think and see of the flower – and i don’t.” (georgia o’keeffe)
i could get lost in just gazing at this spot where greens converge. i find myself breathing deeply, taking it in, appreciating how utterly extraordinary the nuance, how textural, how life-affirming.
it has been a week. with multi-layered challenges, personal and nationwide.
in the middle of the week, neck spasms – which i had in february for the first time in my life – and which sent me to the emergency room – returned with a vengeance. to say that i was laying awake all night, fearful of the way these manifested in my shoulders, my jaw, my chest, my neck, would be an understatement. it was downright scary. and so painful – even for someone with a relatively high pain threshold.
when it finally slightly eased up for a bit in the morning – after a long, sleepless night – i was exhausted and overcome with how it must be for people who are in chronic pain. the chronic pain of disease, of life-altering treatment plans, of hunger and thirst and of not-enough, of homelessness, of psychological and emotional scars, of addiction, of deep, all-consuming worry. thinking of others always puts one’s own pain in perspective.
for a bit of time – the bit when the spasms did not refer to all these other parts of my upper body – i could breathe more deeply. and so i went outside to our deck and little potting stand – to look at new growth, to soak in the colors green.
in wednesday’s news there was much headlining about a quiet interview that the speaker of the house had on a tiny radio station in his home state. and, in that interview, he revealed the intention of this administration – to fix (read: gut) medicaid, medicare and social security in an effort to free up money so that this government might be able to make a dent in the country’s trillions of dollars of debt which is – clearly – attributed to mountains of tax cuts for the ultra-wealthy.
so. their goal? take away from the most vulnerable and the eldest in order to further bankroll the gluttony.
it is hard to wrap your head around this kind of whoring of humanity. the word “disgusted” barely touches it.
again, i say, there is no reverence. they have reverence for nothing.
i wonder what our communities, our states, our nation, our world will look like once they have eliminated all that is good, all that is natural, all that is lawful, all that is compassionate, all that is life-giving or life-affirming. what will be left after the land and the natural resources and the regular folk and the goodness are decimated?
as i stood and looked at our tiny vegetable and herb garden, i was filled by the beauty, wrapped in the essence of green, and a sense of balance was restored in me.
though the spasms started up again, this is not about my neck spasms. when they re-started, i felt slightly more equipped to deal with them, carrying into the pain the knowledge that they would – in time – ease up.
but for some, there is no easing up. there is only long-term pain, without ceasing.
there are people intentionally hunted down for their ethnicity, people intentionally taken off rolls for food assistance, medical assistance, housing assistance. people removed from jobs of science and education and journalism so that the country ceases progressive forward-movement and so that the only narrative going forth is vile, self-serving propaganda. there are people targeted by the brandishing of bigotry. there are people whose chronic pain – no matter what it is – no matter the umbrella under which it falls – seem a nuisance to this administration, an administration without a heart or a conscience or any sense of reverence for anything other than self and money and retribution.
were i to be given a choice – live acknowledging simplicities – like the nuance of green OR live inside the insanity of always-wanting-needing-hoarding of moremoremore – i would go with cherishing the tomato plants and herbs and lavender and licorice plant every time.
i would go with the convergence of green, the convergence of goodness, the convergence of growth, the nuance of breath, the affirmation of life, living and reverence for it all.
“in contrast to our frenetic, saturated lives, the earth offers a calming stillness. movement and growth in nature takes time. … there is something in our clay nature that needs to continually experience this ancient, outer ease of the world. it helps us remember who we are and why we are here.” (john o’donohue)
this must be what’s missing. as we get besieged with new news – all pretty horrible, the stuff of gluttony, haughty entitlement and bigotry truly beyond belief – i have wondered what it is in these people that is missing, what it is in these people that doesn’t grok the evanescence of life, what it is in these people that drives them to push for – or cheer for – a world without natural beauty, a world that seems twisted, that convolutes nature – botoxing faces and bodies, annihilating parks and resources, canyons and forests, waterways, wildlife, wildflowers that will never bloom.
if you never stand in nature – still – never even for a moment in the tiny – or vast – space just outside wherever it is you hang your hat, you miss the air that swirls around you, the recognition of another-day, the exquisite velvet softness of a peony petal in the growth stage of a bloom when it has just begun to open.
how can you carry that – the grace, the scent, the unbelievable creation of peony pink – and be anything but awed? how can you watch the play of light on tight buds opening before your very eyes and consider your self-serving dystopian game more important? how can you ignore the explosions of color, the frequencies of sound, the vibrations under your feet and all around your body even when you are still? how can your gaze glance over beauty and not have any pondering about who you are and how you – a humble minute being of clay and stardust – fit in with all the rest? how can you breathe air – feeling the world in your lungs – and be unconcerned about the air and the world future generations will breathe? what is missing in these people?
“when you take the time to travel with reverence, a richer life unfolds before you. moments of beauty begin to braid your days.” (john o’donohue)
we took off our sunhats. it was a hot day and we had been gardening for hours. the purchased plants had been potted, all the transplanting in the yard was done. it was that golden hour after all the work and before making dinner. we poured a bit of cool pinot grigio, took a tour around the yard and then settled into our adirondack chairs in the shady corner of our deck to gaze out at the yard – one of our favorite pastimes now.
the daisy path – as d has aptly named it – is slower. it doesn’t require the striding or racing around of earlier years. it is a – rather, The – sweet phase and we are trying our best to hone it. we never expect to perfect it, so we are doing everything we can to appreciate it, be grateful for it, honor it.
every night last week we sat on our patio or on our deck, just sitting. at the end of the day – after having dinner al fresco – we – truly – just sat.
and we talked. about anything, everything, nothing.
earlier in the day – on one of the days – i got ready to plant one last sweet potato vine. d had spray-painted a plastic pot and it was ready for the transplant and to be hung on the old ladder in the corner of the deck.
d asked me if he could get me a chair – as i have found that placing a chair on the patio next to the raised deck makes planting easier on my back. i thanked him and said that i was only planting this one pot.
but then i was struck by how generous this offer was. for in the middle of everything he was doing, he was concerned that it might be easier for me if i had a chair – as i had used while potting other days – and he was going to drop everything to go get me one if i wanted or needed it.
and so, it was then – one of those rare moments you remember – not because you don’t appreciate each other all the time, but because sometimes a very intentional wave of gratitude is easy for your brain to snapshot into your memory.
i walked over to where he was weeding the cracks in the patio and bent down. wrapping my arms around him, i told him how much his kindness meant to me. it wasn’t even a few seconds and dogga was there, right in the middle of our embrace, pushing his head up into the armwrap hug, his face even with ours, in the middle of so much love.
i whispered to d, “memorize it.”
of course.
we three stayed that way for at least a full minute, which is a long time for a busy aussie. it was a magical minute. definitely daisy-path stuff.
our old dogga stuck close for a bit more, to get kisses and pets and butt-butts. he didn’t see the tears welling up in our eyes as we committed it all to visual and visceral memory.
d went back to weeding and i potted the sweet potato vine and hung it on the ladder.
it seemed right that this sweet potato would keep vigil over our little corner on our deck. my sweet momma’s words, “live life, my sweet potato,” ring in my ears.
sweet potatoes and the daisy path. sunhats and glasses of wine, a checkered tablecloth and adirondack chairs. our dogga and a sanctuary of peace. love and gratitude.
we have a relationship with mason jars. ball, kerr, various other brands, it doesn’t matter. we even have a relationship with faux mason jars – the smuckers jelly jars that we used to use for wine, the bonne maman jam jars we currently use as water glasses.
at our wedding we had dozens of mason jars, daisies tucked into all of them. some were ours and we borrowed some (does that work as something borrowed, something blue…?) because way back when – when i first moved to wisconsin – i got hooked on these jars.
my dear friend linda and i would attend the late 80s/early 90s craft fairs, peruse antique shoppes. her home was a celebration of all-things-vintage and i fell in love with it. there were textures and stories – a distinct warmth – everywhere and buying-vintage became a viable – and smart – option for me. we have several metal flour sifters as a result of that and a collection of old wooden textile mill spools and bobbins (from the 19th and earlier 20th centuries). when other people were buying cutesy painted tchotchkes, i was lusting over old wooden boxes, lidded crates and blue mason jars.
we stopped at a couple antique shoppes recently, looking for a small wooden garden table for a plant or two on our deck. we had purchased one last spring but then d loved it so much outside he brought it inside in the fall to serve as his bedside table. now he is a devotee to this little peeling-paint garden table and we are on the hunt for another.
i don’t suppose many people would have brought this table inside – or the old glider – or the chunks of concrete – or the birdhouse – or the chiminea. but in an effort-that-is-no-effort to have a home that doesn’t look like it’s staged-and-ready-for-sale or is a furniture-outlet showroom or magazine piece, we dive into our intuitive to use the things that really speak to us, that are organic, that have stories. i maintain that everyone should be required to purchase mostly used things – there is just too much stuff in the world and i can’t imagine why we need even more manufactured stuff. but i digress.
in that same vein, though, we have started regularly using the things that we have found in our going-through the basement, the attic, the closets. we are eliminating plastic here and there and choosing the cut-glass vessels for our carrot sticks and salty snacks. we are soon going to reconfigure the stuff in the cabinets under the counter in the kitchen – to make access easier to the old pyrex, the fenton hobnail, the cut-glass.
we have found we have no real need to purchase many things. i’m not sure if that comes with age or if that comes with a bit of wisdom – or if those are one and the same. our inclination is to use what we have, to not save things for “good” (which is particularly difficult for me), to minimize as much as we can.
every now and then we find something that just pokes at us, prodding us to bring it home. there is a raw rough-hewn clay pot from northport, a couple linen napkins from the same boutique. there is a new peace sign button hanging in littlebabyscion. but way more has gone out than come in – donated, sold on marketplace or poshmark. less is most definitely more. especially in these times.
the blue ball jars all lined up at this shoppe made me smile. the proprietor clearly loves organization; everything there was in categories, lined up or gathered for ease of perusing through. we had no impulse to buy anything, but loved our walk through.
because each time we walk an antique shoppe, we have stories to tell – about the stuff of growing-up, about things we have previously owned, about stuff we never had or never wanted, about – well – life.
if you have never taken a walk through any vintage shop, you might consider it.
it’s generative in a way you might not expect, with sudden glimpses into the decades that have past, with moments when your heart surges – focused on a memory, with a wistfulness that reminds you of how fleeting it all is and how very much we need to “wring out every ounce of life, breath by breath, [all] that this world has to offer.” (words from a text from dear friend lisa.)
“because of some strange little voice inside, i zigged where i was expected to zag…”(anna quindlen)
aging is a funny thing. you come screeching to a halt at this place – a kind of dr. seuss waiting place – and you have the chance to make some decisions. which way do you go now? what route do you take? where are you headed?
or maybe you come screeching to a halt – having been on this one solid path – to a place – a kind of dr. seuss waiting place – and you linger there, looking around, out of breath and a little bit tired. in front of you, choices fan out, beckoning you. you sit down, in the lazy boy of havinggottenthere and you ponder, panting, exhausted.
for, all of a sudden, you don’t feel compelled to drive forward on one straight line. you are suddenly empowered by the realization that none of it – and all of it – counts. you have begun to realize that the dust you will leave behind will not be measured by accomplishment. it, likely, won’t even be remembered by accomplishment. for those things dim and boxes of those remain in the basement, ready for some thrift store or antique shoppe. mementos have gathered dust and certificates have faded on office walls. the hills you climbed, the battles you waged, they have evanesced. the trophies, the medals, the awards, the stock options – all so greatly valued at one time – have lost their lustre.
so you take stock. your havinggottenthere lazy boy slowly rocks while you stare ahead and think about what path might “align with your purpose, peace and trust in the future” (the “best path” as defined by google).
and something is itching inside you to go rogue, to take a path no one expects, to zig where they expect you to zag.
and, as it appears on the twiggy hogweed map, you can always backtrack back to the waiting place – to re-evaluate, to rest, to try something else on for size.
there is a freedom to this aging thing. (granted, there would be more of a freedom if there was not chaos.)
this freedom to explore without expectation, to try without any measure of succeeding, to grab onto more experiences – but without preconceived notions, to discard the safe path and embrace a bit of fear, to muse-work and branch-out or sit-and-stare with abandon.
there is a freedom knowing that as much as one matters, our tiny existence is yet tiny. and what we feel at dawn as we breathe in early spring-like air or listen to birds collecting at the feeder or pull up the covers for just a little longer – all that matters.
there are moments i am stunned by the ability to feel. physically. emotionally. the ability to FEEL. it’s shocking. i recognize that there have been days – maybe even weeks or months or years – when i paid little to no heed to being able to feel. lost in the mayhem of everylittlethingthatmustgetdone i missed it. we have all been racing to finish.
and yet, here we are – in this time of utter chaos – where everything seems upside down, corruption is rampant, the country is flailing while its leaders violently push it backwards, isolate it, make it a pariah – and THIS happens to be our time.
we feel bits of wisdom pop up evvvvvery now and again, evvvvvvery here and there, through fallowed earth like snowdrops or crocuses desperate to emerge. we stand up. we speak up. we speak out. we cuss. we bellylaugh. we rail. we inhale, another deep breath.
“still, what i want in my life is to be willing to be dazzled – to cast aside the weight of facts and maybe even to float a little above this difficult world.” (mary oliver)
we check on the world right before sleep these days. we feel like it is a citizen’s duty to know what is happening in our own country, what is happening because of our own country, to be aware of the chaos, to be somewhat versed in the goings-on, to try – without success – to understand where it’s all headed and to – somehow – grok why. it’s all nearly impossible. and it is overwhelming.
we check on the world when we wake these days. we feel like it is a citizen’s duty to know what is happening in our own country, what is happening because of our own country, to be aware of the chaos, to be somewhat versed in the goings-on, to try – without success – to understand where it’s all headed and to – somehow – grok why. it’s all nearly impossible. and it is overwhelming.
and we know that there is less and less probability of it all making sense. for this must be intended-chaos and the world is ever more difficult because of it.
we sat at the bistro table in our sunroom with a glass of wine. dusk had fallen, the happy lights were on, dogga was on the rug at our feet.
we talked about the unsteadiness of these days.
and we talked about our own steadiness. we talked about the sweet phase.
we talked about sitting on the rocks in the middle of the stream way up in the mountains on a cool, quiet afternoon.
we talked about the change in our own chase of success – what that word even now means to us.
in spite of the world outside our sitting room – even with all that in mind – we could feel a sense of amazement.
we listed little things – the happy lights, the chiminea in the corner, the muddy hike, the score of finding an eight dollar glass candlestick lamp, the celebration of homemade pizza.
we listed bigger things – things more personal, more close-in, adulting things, things of quiet but profound accomplishment.
we acknowledged that – despite the broken road meander of our lives – even in the weight of all the cruel, mind-bogglingly destructive actions of this planet – we can see the dazzle around us.
and that’s the thing. the dazzle.
we need to recognize its presence. we need to keep seeking it. we need to keep reaching for it. we need to wrap our freaking arms around it – for dear life.
“i don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.” (mary oliver)
reverse threading 