Month: June 2013 Page 1 of 2

It’s been a roller-coaster, I won’t lie. But so what, life is, no? Unless you choose to stay safely under awnings that will not let you feel the rain, but might not let you feel the warmth of the sun either. You need both.

That’s how we embraced another school year. Jumping in, both feet. Oh come on, you will say, the boys, they are the ones who go through it no? Yes, and I walk alongside, I hear the stories, I hear the grumbling, I am there to celebrate the great things along the way and make bad days better. So it’s us, never just them. Fortunately.

We had rushed mornings when moods were exploding and causing some collateral damage but oh, when you’re just so angry who cares? Hmm, you should, the one who is in the middle of it, you know and feel that getting angry will get you nowhere good, but how to, how to get to the other side and not drown or push someone into the deep end while swimming to safer calmer grounds? We’ve learned how to. It took a while…It will take another.

We had good hugs on the way back from school, we had sharing of this and that and we had carefully guarded secrets shoved deep in our soul pockets, let no one see them, because what if others judge? What if they don’t? We had time and opportunities to learn about trust and being there for each other, meaning well and ahem, missing the point or forgetting to just listen… We’ve learned how. It took a while…We might still forget how to, but we’re willing to learn, again.

The boys had the experience of unkind people and they were frustrated with it. Why, they’d ask, why would someone say something mean or inconsiderate? Because they hurt inside? Because they feel unsure of themselves? We never know unless we ask and someone is willing to answer. Never judge. You never know. Talk about actions, gestures, words, they can be mean. A person is… well, just like we all are, prone to make mistakes, act in haste, anger, often falling into unkind patterns and yes, stuck in patterns that could create hurt. We sighed a collective sigh and decided that learning from mistakes and wrong patterns rather than just pointing our finger at them would serve us better… Oh, it hasn’t been easy.

The importance of smiles. They matter, and that’s a fact. Our early morning crumpled moods were once smiled upon by a lady, a city worker who was directing traffic with smiles, plus some dancing. We looked at each other and de-crumpled. I thought “Ha! It’s that easy…” and then I said out loud “See? She made it look so easy…It must be.” The boys nodded and smiled. It was that easy. It will be a memory we’ll always hold dear. Smile, dance, sometimes silliness is how we attached ourselves to warmth.

We’ve learned that the old “a journey of a thousand miles starts with a step” (Lao-tzu?) is always true. Modern versions address the same topic as question and answer, but the meaning is the same. How do you eat an elephant? Bite by bite. It figures. We would never eat an elephant, they are too majestic and yes, threatened by extinction in some areas (too many areas like that?…)

We’ve learned to never forget to celebrate all victories, and we now know that big or small, they all matter in no particular order of importance.

Patience, understanding, kindness, being quiet and listening, being reminded that listening is when you just listen and what a gift that is… all of that and more. We’ve learned.

We laughed silly laughs on our way to school and from school, and talked about all the things I never thought I’d be able to talk about so openly. I was also reminded that when one is past the age of ? (care to come up with a number?) we hug discreetly, or just as discreetly allow the mother to place a much needed but “what if my friends see that” kind of kiss on the older boy’s head, a much needed and enjoyed by both “see you later.”

Learned that hugs are to be had, never to be missed because when you do miss them, no matter the reason, your heart stings a little. Or more. Hugs are precious.

We’ve learned all of that.

To be continued…

On a Friday: The yellow butterfly came by, again, at 13.30, again. Sharp little fellow set on a mysterious timer, which is just one reason why we should protect such critters. Killing them is akin to smashing a nice watch with a big fat hammer… You’d agree perhaps?

I saved a bee from drowning. We made a small recovery station out of three Campanula purple cups and he ate pollen from every one of them. We spent a good ten minutes watching him eat and clean his head and antennae. Truly fascinating.

We dug for new potatoes today. We have purple ones. They are still small and not even close to forming a side dish. But so what. Colors are tempting around here. Green, red, orange and purple. Tasty, all of them.

We painted, again, for no other purpose than well, painting. It’s like a big warm blanket to snuggle in with your children. Transforming to say the least. Addicting.

Played paparazzi with two pollen jocks that Sasha spotted on the way from school.

We played a silly ball game with no rules, floppy arms that never caught the ball except by mistake, we laughed our hearts out and called it a night. No photos were taken with a regular camera. Plenty of soul shots.

Decided to add yard-growing Tragopogons to meals. Why not? Living off the very land we’re stepping on, literally. They say the roots are edible. The name itself is edible enough, it has a crunch to it. Try saying it out loud. See? It shall be called yard cultivar. I know I am abusing the very term, but allow me for now.

Ate yellow watermelon for dinner. It was yellow when I cut it. Paired with yellow (non-GMO) corn and there you have it: Sunshine dinner.

Added a dolphin mobile to the plum tree in the back yard. No purpose whatsoever but if you could just see how the sunset hugs every clear dolphin. You’d understand. There’s six of them. Just hangin’…

Tomorrow we will resume and set an even higher stake for impractical, lovely and amazing things to do with our time.

There is a yellow butterfly that visits our front yard every day; at noon or so.

It’s been more than a week since it started visiting. It’s big enough to make itself noticeable as I sit at the dining table and write. A yellow butterfly*, a rare sight these days.

On Saturday the boys saw it too. It seemed to favor the yellow heads of the Tragopogons among others, hence we postponed mowing the lawn. By now our front yard has a mix of veggies in a small bed, and a whole bunch of wildflowers growing every which way, making friends with the wind, ladybugs and the yellow butterfly.

Whether it is the same butterfly or a different one every day makes no difference. I’d prefer the quirkiness of our garden being visited by the same yellow butterfly every day, but I’d be pleased to know there’s a small army of them stumbling upon our wildflowers collection, because they are a worryingly rare sight these days.

It is one of the well-suited fellowships in nature, bugs and flowers. They need each other and we need them both. With the awareness that, by playing God with many plants and with the chemicals we use to grow some and get rid of others, we’re starting to tilt the balance towards eradication of necessary insects that have for ages worked to ensure our well-being and that continuous sense of wonder we cannot afford to lose.

Today after school we leaf through a book with art by various artists in the Pacific Northwest. It was put together a while ago with the purpose of showing the amazing our province barely or untouched beauty we could lose, should the Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline project go through.

The project has since been rejected by the government of BC, let’s hope not just postponed, so our perusal is done with a light heart and allowing to simply enjoy the art and the source of inspiration behind it.

It is only logical that our perusal urges us to bring the painting supplies out. We paint and talk. Colors abound on paper and in our discussions. I choose to pant butterflies. Yellow.

Why so happy to see that butterfly the boys ask smiling. Because there’s fewer and fewer left. Genetically-modified crops that contain toxins that are supposed to kill pests also kill butterflies, directly by having them eat the toxin and indirectly by killing milkweed, one of their preferred plants. Perhaps we should plant some of their favorite treats from now on. They are a treat to us, no? Visual, of course.

Bees, ladybugs and some other helpful insects are also dwindling in numbers due to pesticide use and toxin-containing genetically modified crops. It’s a sad state of affairs for both humans and the environment. Science is a delightful place to be, but it has to be bridged to the understanding that when we decipher its secrets we owe it to ourselves and those around us to make it purposeful.

We talk about this often. The goodness we can bring to the world with the knowledge we have, but how conflicting interests and upside value systems make that harder to achieve.

A few weeks ago I attended a remarkable woman by an equally remarkable speaker: Diana Beresford-Kroeger. She is a botanist and a medical biochemist.

The talk was inspiring. She talked about disappearing trees and how plants hold the power to heal us. She talked about having dialogues with people of influence who can provide financial support for dreams that have to become reality in order to save our planet.

But most of all, she made the air in the room – and it was a big room – buzz with the urgency of one particular goal: To stay connected.

Connected to the world that we have and have to hold onto, connected to our roots, wherever they may be – because they are somewhere, forgotten or ignored as they may be, connected to trees that make our next breath possible and pleasurable; connecting to ourselves and to what is to become of us. Connected to the insects that keep plants alive, and us fed by pollinating them.

We have become, too often and too many of us, separated from the essence of what it means to be alive. Trying to find an answer that almost annoying age-old question “Why are we here?” and redefining the purpose becomes almost tangible when we allow ourselves to be swept into the wonder world our children see and try to make us see.

We painted till late that day, had a late dinner dominated by a bowl-full of greens from the garden and lots of fresh carrots the boys cannot have enough of. Our paintings have lakes and butterflies and wild berries in them. Trees and bushes too, and memories of that day. No particular day really, but as utterly precious as the next one.

Whether we think of it this way or not, our actions today paint our children’s world. It’s only fair that tomorrow should have as many butterflies and trees and beauty as today does, wouldn’t you say? As many colors as possible just about does it…

*It was pointed out to me that the yellow visitor is not a Monarch butterfly but a yellow swallowtail (Papilio glaucus). Equally fascinating…

(Originally published as a column in the Kamloops Daily News on Saturday, June 22, 2013 under the same title.)

At first I only wanted to photograph the potato flowers. Because you see, you think potatoes and it’s taste that comes to mind. You think of the somewhat boorish, tasty nonetheless, dirt-dwelling potato, but the flowers… A much elegant exponent of a plant that’s part of a mysterious sounding group, the Nightshades.

It has been cloudy for the last few days. Rain came in buckets. Until today, that is. The garden abounds with whooshes and buzzing. Flowers open. The story begins.

What’s next? The resident ladybug crawling up the sunflower hairy stalk, the bees and all those grasshoppers who have a most favorite spot near the carrot bed. They don’t come in small numbers.

I might never keep the weeds under control in here, not with all the rain and sun bursting out every few days. But if you get close, weeds are beautiful. They are delicate and strong at the same time. Resilient, that’s something to be proud of. As a human, too, I mean.

Tragopogons‘ roots, I just recently read, are edible. They taste like oysters. Imagine that, of all things, oysters. Their fluffy heads pretending to be dandelions, but they’re humongous. They truly make fluff look glamorous. That only works for plant heads.

Tomato plants are in bloom too, they’ll be doing that all summer long. The air around them smells like ripe tomatoes, amplified by piercing sun rays. Tricksters.

I pry the bean bushes apart. It’s damp and warm and green in there. A dandelion’s airy head is balding; some of its umbrella seeds took off and now they’re stuck on bean leaves. Nature’s velcro gets you every time. I remember that since I was little and picking crisp yellow beans. Leaves always stuck on me; you gotta know your way…

More weeds, more ladybugs – some of them are males, but what giggles when I tell that to the boys. Mom, that’s so unfair, they say. More yarrow flowers that smell slightly bitter and taste the same but what a good helpful herb if only you can stomach the tea.

I peek behind the side fence and find purple bells that bear a deliciously dancing-in-green-fields kind of name: Campanula. It has a sound to it, it does, it does… Tall and slender, the stems carry goblets for stubborn, skittish butterflies that won’t agree to photographs.

Beets and berries and more weeds, more insects to love them, yellow flowers for all, wild chamomile and a few shepherd’s purse plants, carrying all the hearts I didn’t know I had. A weed some say, but how can one resent a heart-full plant.

Tomorrow the bean flowers will open up; bees and grasshoppers will be there to celebrate. Ants too, and all the trapped dandelion seeds will stay like that, suspended on bean leaf hammocks, until fall comes.

Nothing stays still here. Everything breathes and grows. Eyes stare, assess and delight. Summer.

Say you wake up to a scare so deep and primal that your brain is seeded with worry for the rest of the day. With fear too. Searching for a grip only takes you further down that vein of fear, all the way to the very place you’re almost never ready to look at.

Say you are faced with the possibility – even at that one percent or less – that your days could be numbered and your joy tethered to the darkest fear you’ve known. Unresolved, if not dark, but sometimes they are the same thing.

Entertain that thought for a few minutes, or for an entire day if you happen to not find the right tools to fight it off; if you need to understand its texture so you can kick it out for good, and while you do, tell me:

Would you waste any more days at all if you knew they are numbered? Would you make it so that at the end of each you could say “Well, that was not bad, not bad at all…”

Would you notice a ladybug strolling on a leaf and think for a second that you are in charge of its life, and so much more life around you depends on you because it does. Would you notice a budding sunflower and wonder at its miraculous turning after the sun, the very sun you love to but sometimes forget its daily blessing…

Would you keep doing what you’re doing now if you knew you’ll never get to wash away that waste-away feeling of yet another day of doing something you don’t like?

Would you waste an opportunity to be joyful if you knew joy could be crumpled up by forces that at least for a while would prove stronger than you?

Would you hug your children more? And more even?

Would you say “I love you” to the one who makes your world round again and again after every stumbling that gets you down and dusty?

Would you be honest with yourself and from today on, make every day count?

Would do be silly every now and then just because laughing feels so so good?

Would you notice the smallest flowers and stop to smell them too?

Would you smile to strangers and get to know someone you’ve always judged for this or that reason? Would you still judge people or simply learn and move along, wishing them well?

Would you change anything if you knew you only have that much time to make a difference? Would you let go of resentment and fear just so you can feel the plumpness of each day hugging you from the moment you open your eyes till after you go to sleep again?

Would you try any of this? Or all and more?

He did. And you may wonder how can that be.

My dad liked to tell stories so he did. Ever since we were little, my sister and I listened to countless stories about places he’d been to, people he met and things he’s seen. All wrapped up in his words like supple yet tough ribbons, big enough to encompass a whole world and sturdy enough to never break. Some stories made us laugh, some made our eyes grow round with fright, and some made us look at each other as we both said “eeww…” because, well, some stories were just like that. The repertoire was endless, much to our delight.

My dad used to smoke also. Always outside and he only liked a special kind of cigarettes with no filter and a strong smell. When we were little he used to make volcanoes out of cigarette butts he would place in a hole in the ground.

Every night, long after dinner and when the daily buzz was no more, he would step outside and light a cigarette. Often times I would follow him. The stories, you see, I knew there were more so I wanted to listen to some more. His voice was low, every now and then a small cloud of smoke would lick his face and then the dark would gobble it up. The tobacco plus dad smell lingered. Some stories were new, some were repeats. That never bothered me. I guess it wasn’t just the story line after all…

But one night… It was late summer and getting close to my leaving home to go to university, six hours or so away from home. We were walking alongside the house towards the bench under the grapevine. The moon was bright and we were both silent, listening to the cricket choir. Far in the distance there were frogs too, and though my dad was telling no stories, we were knee-deep in many. Silence had never talked clearer to us…

“See the moon? It’ll be here again and again and again… Every time I’ll come out and see it I will think of you. You will see the same moon too, wherever you will be, and you’ll think of us and home, that’ll bring our thoughts together…”

So it happened. Many moons on many nights sent my thoughts home and to my parents. The moon in the sky was never just the moon anymore. It was all the time I spent at home, my dad’s funny, scary, crazy stories, my mom’s kind presence around the house, the deep, raw fragrances of summer nights with cascades of sounds quieting our words, mornings of wonder and the many adventures my sister and I had in the house and in our wonderful, thick-green yard guarded so lovingly by a far-away moon that my dad, somehow, brought all the way down, placed in the cradle of my heart and allowed me to hold onto from then onwards.

Now on the other side of the world, the moon is still mine to hold, to shelf all my childhood memories in its dusty craters and take them out one by one, but just so carefully put them back.

So you see, my dad did give me the moon. You probably wondered but how could that be? Now you know. And I know too. Which is why I will thank him. Again…and soon.

I had weeded the carrot and onion bed last week, but bouts of rain and sunshine plus a family camping trip in the meantime helped weeds come back with a vengeance. They brought some friends too, they must have, otherwise I cannot explain the wild party in our backyard.

An elderly neighbor of my parents’ used to say that weeds are a sign of a good nourishing soil. If they grow, then edible crops can grow too. I guess that only applies to small scale farming though.

Weeding is this interesting process that I cannot resent in any way, as repetitive as it is. You take some weeds out, your hands are busy and so is your mind. There is something cleansing about weeding, you do it with both plants and thoughts and at the end of the day, the garden looks better and the mind feels fresh. It’s like that.

This would be a good time to mention that dandelions are not on my weed list. In early spring we use the leaves to complement greens salads or slide into sandwiches. The roots, washed and dried, make an excellent detoxifying tea. Maria Treben, an Austrian herbalist whose book was one of my favorite when I grew up, used to say that dandelions hold the key to many people’s health. If only they knew how valuable this “weed” is, she wrote.

I weed around the beets and garlic chives. It is late afternoon and the sun is still hot. My youngest son picks various leafs and some other plant parts in order to prepare a veggie feast, as he calls it. Lettuce, spinach, green onions, carrots – baby ones but big enough to feel the sweet crunch, even beet greens and garlic chives.

Will he eat them all, I ask. Of course. “We will eat it together once I’m done picking.” Things I never thought I’d see him try before his 10th birthday, such as beet greens, are on the menu.

I prune the thick tomato plants to expose the green tomatoes to the sun. It’s a bit of a guessing game still at this point, the whole gardening adventure. I remember spending time with my father in the garden as a kid; with my aunt too, observing and copying their moves. It looked so simple.

I am a green gardener though, pun and no pun. Committed to chemical-free gardening on one hand, but also a mere beginner gardener, playing the guessing game often. For now, things grow, they do so fast and they taste delicious. Confidence grows with every crunchy radish we pull out of the ground.

“Are there still tomatoes in the wild?” My son is perched on the ladder of the backyard fort, one hand holding onto the wooden contraption while the other carries a green bounty.

“There must be,” I tell him. “That’s how all crops started anyway.” People started growing them on purpose and kept selecting the best one. Taste, appearance, ability to withstand bad weather and bad bugs. “Tomatoes and eggplants are in the same family, you know…” He smiles. Kids always find the word eggplant funny.

“What about carrots?” he asks. I like this, learning happens best in nature. “They used to be yellow and red, and mostly leaves. People kept growing them and somewhere between then and now they became juicy and sweet.

“When are we going to eat the tomatoes?” Soon, very soon. I finish weeding around the tomato plants just in time. Veggie feast, in the fort, by special invitation only.

He leads the way but comes out of the little fort fast and wide-eyed. “There’s a wasp nest in the fort!” No bigger than my son’s fist, the nest spells trouble. We exit, have our feast at the picnic table and think of evacuation solutions.

Appetite unspoiled, we eat our way through various shades of green. More? Sure.

He runs to the lettuce patch and takes another handful. Wash and eat, water dripping on bare toes painted in dirt and grass stains. Afterwards we inspect the potato plants. Big leafy hats sitting on the ground, forgotten by some gnomes that sleep in the garden at night…

New potatoes should be ready soon too…Expectation of new edibles to try runs on par with appreciation. All that weeding, it sure pays off… Sometimes getting a kid to eat veggies is simply a matter of growing them. It sure beats the nagging and the pretend gagging. The way I see it, those can be weeded out too…

(Originally published as a column in the Saturday edition of the Kamloops Daily News under the same title on June 15, 2013)