Dearest of Readers,
What is new in life and practice? What is this season revealing? What’s it obscuring?
I’m four weeks into fall quarter (quick recap: I’m in graduate school, studying for an M.A. in English, working in the Writing Center), and I think the most correct way to describe life right now is that my crock pot is getting the workout of its life. That is to say: the days are full, but I’m continuing to prioritize rhythms and slowness. Along those lines, if you have a favorite vegetarian recipe for the slow-cooker, please share!
I have been using Slow Cook Modern, by Lianna Krisoff, but I could really use more vegetarian options.
We grew pumpkins this year for the first time. Because it was an experiment, we planted seeds in three locations: one of our raised beds in the south-facing, full sun vegetable garden; my freeform medicinal plant and flower garden in the north-facing, full morning-sun side yard; under a dogwood tree in the front yard, late afternoon sun. The dogwood plant fizzled early, probably due in part to the lack of consistent sun and protection from little feet (human and dog, probably rat, raccoon and possum). The proper garden patch plant produced one pumpkin, which grew on the bark chips outside the bed (this pumpkin grew big and orange first). The big surprise was the plant in my medicinal forest grew three (3!!!!) pumpkins after spreading its vines in every direction, touching so many other plants: motherwort, mullein, sunflower, indigo, gardenia, zinnia, lemon verbena. Those pumpkins emerged somewhat later, but now they are just as big and almost fully orange as well.
All of this is to say that the garden is still going strong due to the elongated summer we have had. I thought the Farmer’s Almanac must be wrong in rainy, rainy June when it predicted a long, hot summer, but it really happened. I’m so grateful to the land we live on and the plants, soil and elements for teaching me.
I’ll write a letter solely about motherwort soon, but I just mixed up a flower essence from plants I grew from seed in my own garden this year, and it is bringing me a lot of joy and fortitude: motherwort, sunflower and marigold (marigolds were such a surprise love for me; now I can’t imagine my garden without them). It really distills the courage/coeur-age of summer for me: persistent, comforting and joyful. As we move into the much anticipated, much needed rainy season, I’m thankful to bring some of those qualities with me.
One thing I’ve noticed my whole life (it feels like a Sagittarius-rising situation, but it could also be more universal, so feel free to holler if it’s true for you, too) is how I will always seek out a counter-balance to whatever is predominating in my life. Right now, for example, as I’m in a phase of reading, discussing and writing a LOT of theory (which I love), my need to make art every day is strong. Back when I was teaching a lot of yoga and meditation, this manifested as a need to organize learning into courses and curricula. When I was a lawyer (remember those seven years?!), I kitted out my office as a restoration station with a humidifier, soft lighting options and a humidifier. The lines “life seeks out, and finds, what it needs” came to me after meditating in the woods outside of Sisters, Oregon as I watched ants searching among dried leaves and felt the ant-ness of my own experience: finding, examining, carrying, abandoning, moving on.
Tell me about you.
LOVE TO ALL+++
Kelly
READING + RECOMMENDING
I am currently reading The Thorn Birds. Yes! The one that was made into a mini-series in the 80s. If I had to encapsulate this book in one sentence, I would say it is an epic novel chronicling the intergenerational trauma of one family, Catholic politics/maybe theology and environment of Australia. Somehow, I remember a few scenes from the mini-series, though I was five years old when it ran in 1983, and there are a few themes that I’m recognizing had lodged themselves deep into my psyche. Have any of you seen or read this work?
On the flip side, kind of, I read and LOVED This is How You Lose the Time War, by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone a month or so ago, but I don’t think I mentioned it here. This book is a time-shifting epistolary novel that reads, in part, like a prose poem. It is a book I felt was specifically written for me (futurism, the power of love, poetry, letters… I know more than a few of you on reading this may feel as if it were written specifically for you, too! What a dream for us to experience together!), which is a pleasure I do not take for granted for one moment. I read this book as slowly as I could, and will go back for another drink soon. (Here’s an interview with the authors.)
ARCHIVING MYSELF
Here’s an Instagram post I keep coming back to, even at this point in the pandemic. I think I want to write more about it.
The caption text reads: Nourishment.☀️🌸 “We share organs. It’s the model that separates.” I have many times paraphrased & quoted Gil Hedley here when describing a path toward understanding interdependence//inter-being. We are not separate from the air we breathe, the water we drink, the company we keep. We are not separate from unseen people and processes that we depend on without knowing it every day. I am here, but I am also over there, and I am also in here and out there. #ohsurya #interdependence #diealittleeveryday