My Garden, My Soul-Part 6: Gardens in Glass

*** Photo: Lemon Balm Tea, steeping, fresh from the garden

As every herbalist knows, once we start growing herbs, harvesting or drying them and making tinctures, teas, vinegars and all manner of preparations, we start collecting glass containers to keep them in and especially so we can SEE them.

What that leads to are closets compulsively filled will bottles of different shapes and sizes, saving interesting jars that originally  contained pickles, jams, mustards, condiments, or liquids like wine and spirits.  We cannot…CANNOT…. resist a pretty bottle or jar…!

We also cannot resist the magic of the herbs either and so hopefully we are engaged in the making of lovely herbal delights for healing, culinary temptations or gifts for bath and beauty. Thus…. A Garden in Glass!

*** Picture: Dark Moon Tea/Dreamers Tea (recipe at the end of essay)

The garden is not producing veggies yet, but the greening herbal leaves are abundant and ready for preparations like flavored vinegars. One of my daughters just asked for a family favorite which I have not made in recent years… my Italian Lovage vinegar in a light red wine vinegar (like Pastene), also adding fresh parsley, basil, a few..just a few!..hot pepper flakes and a smashed garlic clove. LOVAGE is a strong herb…I describe it as a kind of cross between parsley and a medieval celery.  This first tiny batch will start us off and more will be steeping as summer progresses. These smaller glass jars originally held Major Grey’s Chutney.

Summer goes by so fast, as does life, which we do begin to realize when our children go through major passages like graduating college, getting married, becoming parents themselves while we become grandparents. Capturing the essence of the greening seasons of the garden and  those in our lives seem to be a desire to hold on to the experience or the memories through tasting, savoring…sometimes in photographs, sometimes in food…and sometimes in glass bottles to remind us of the seasons of life and love. Our Gardens in Glass …a little bit of magic…!

 

***Recipe:  Dark Moon/Dreamers Tea

A blend of dried mugwort, rose petals and perhaps a little spearmint or lavender… To your liking.  A teaspoon per cup, steeped for about 10 minutes, strained with honey for a social tea with friends. Stronger…a longer steeping time (an hour), 2-3 teaspoons per cup to drink before bed to stimulate and remember dreams…. (make sure to write those dreams down in the morning!)

 

From Christine, The Greening Spirit

My other blogs:

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My Garden, My Soul- Part 2: The Virtues of Borage

The Virtue of Humility:  “Having the proper sense of oneself in a universe of wonders!” ~ Sister Joan Chittister

Those whose gardens are the sanctuaries of herbs know that humility is a Virtue.  We often refer to herbs and their “virtues”, a medieval usage of  the word, describing their merits and usefulness subtly hidden in their at-a-first-glance smallness. Theirs is a humility defying the flashiness of showy and commanding Divas, but instead, tended in the green world by the elusive but ever present plant “Devas” whose mission it is to oversee and communicate the virtues inherent in each plant. Indeed that humility might almost render a clump of borage invisible except for tiny quick flashes of blue if we are moving through the garden mindlessly and in a hurry.

The herbal kindom require us to slow down and practice the soul-virtues of stillness and deep seeing. Looking closely into a patch of tiny blue flowers amongst their soft but prickly leaves, we observe a tiny magnificence of color, complexity and imaginative shape. The borage flowers are beautiful…another of the plants that exhibit the 5-pointed star in its form. If we moved quickly and mindlessly by a patch of this plant, as so many humans do in our largeness and speed, we might miss the complex but delicate blossom design.

Borage has many “virtues” and gifts for us. An herb of “good cheer”, it was thought to dispel melancholy and pensiveness (Culpepper) which actually happens when taking a true look at its richly colored flowers and their display.

A slight taste of cucumber in its leaves and blossoms offers a cooling effect…it can be used as a tea, or added to salads.

Herbs and their uses come in and out of favor in different time periods, but truly their virtues are always present whether acknowledged or not. I find that something shifts and awakens in me when I am hanging out with the herbs…something mysterious, wondrous, and alive…as if under an enchantment.

Enchantment… a virtue of Soul accessed through the magic of deep-seeing and discernment.  A rather nice way to live….whether one be a a plant or a person.

*** These pictures were taken in the garden of good friends….

From Christine, the Greening Spirit

     Hopefully, my other blogs will enchant you as well!

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My Garden, My Soul: Part 1- The Season’s Beginning

Being a Taurus Sun Earthkeeper person, I have always had gardens where I live. The cycle of the seasons in a 4-climate region has captivated me since childhood…each turn full of magic, myth and mystery.

Growing up in an inner city in the northeast USA, I was not exposed to posh gardens in the concrete environment even though I lived in an apartment building on Ash Grove Place which still had a genteel air leftover from earlier times when the neighborhood was lined with ash trees before cars. The plants that came through the cracks and between the buildings in ally-ways were the wild things…dandelions, poke, yellow dock, plantains and the flowers of grasses. Of course back then, I didn’t know their names but I was called to them because they were green growing living things tucked in and around the hardness and grey of city asphalt.

There were two “garden” situations however that served our city spirits. One was the chain-link fence bordering the back parking lot behind our apartment building. In spring and summer, the tall fence was covered by the climbing vines of morning glories. The blue flowers were a never-ending delight…the tight spirals of the buds before opening, which we would pick, blowing at their now- tiny opening at the base .. and out they would flare into full flower by the power of our own mini-godlike breath. Picking the full flower itself , we would also suck at the small opening at the base of it, pulled from the vine, to taste a delightful delicate sweetness,  coming to understand what the bees were collecting while visiting its center!

The second garden was for viewing only through the openings in the chain link fence to the back lot of the next-door neighbor. A German immigrant with a thick accent, he was a crabby terrible tempered territorial old man who yelled loudly and threatened any and all kids who might attempt to climb over the fence to receive a ball gone astray in the air, landing in his green sanctuary. But he was an amazing gardener and it was like peering into the Garden of Eden or a guarded oasis in the middle of the hood between buildings. As an adult, I now understand his fierce and protective personality preserving the peace and order of his sacred garden from a pack of potentially disruptive and invasive neighborhood kids….

My own gardens from marriage, parenthood, divorce, partnership and singledom on have varied. My first planting was of Lamb’s Ears (stachys officinalis) which first captivated me in a re-created colonial apothecaries’ garden at Mystic Seaport in Mystic, CT when I was age 21. The gardens that  followed throughout my life started with herbs and their charming and healing mystique, and later, flowers and vegetables. Always always green around me.  

( One of my earlier gardens )

Several years ago, serious vision problems with early cataracts began to develop and it became impossible for me to see in sunlight and also to just see clearly at all. For the past three years, that, plus a couple of stressful, attention-stealing life situations blocked the ability to garden. I thought that was okay. But there was a flatness in my spirit as a result…unrecognizable to others…but known to my own self. A loss of some sort of energy and meaning. A loss of “veriditas”.

Now, with much excitement and gratitude, my eyesight has been restored through surgeries,  and with the renewal of vision, I could not let another year go by without tending the “Green”.  Three years of not taking care of the yarden turned it into wildness except for the front. This year, I invested in Grow Boxes, not having the time or energy to tame field and woodland and in planting them and situating them in my yard,  I realized that in not gardening the last three years, I had lost some part of SOUL….my own “Greening Spirit/Veriditas”… by not participating in the cycle of the seasons in person and not tending the plants. But now! My Soul has come back home to both the inner and outer gardens!

A week or so ago, as I walked through the front border to the road, I stubbed my toe on an exposed corner of a flat rock buried under moss and matted grass. I bent over to scrape away dirt and plant matter to find a garden plaque that my partner David had placed in my new herb garden almost 20 years ago when we moved in. I had at that time also been teaching a nine-month internship in folkloric herbalism, natural foods and earth spirituality, called “The Sacred Garden”.

How synchronistic was its surprise emergence from “under” to welcome my SOUL back home as I became a “gardener” once again.

They are BACK! My garden, My Soul !

Veriditas! from  Christine, the Greening Spirit

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Grow Box Memories: Me and my Moveable Garden

End of season/Glorious Autumn: empty Grow Boxes awaiting our move

 

This past December I moved from my home of 18 years, voluntary “releasing” my sanctuary, house, wooded land and garden to greater power structures after a number of years struggling to keep it going in a time of financial crisis for many. There were a number of upkeep challenges as in most home ownership situations that could not be addressed but beloved beauty as well.

One of my biggest joys and loss in leaving were my gardens. Always over the years, the magic of herb garden, the awe and delight of flowers and the fascination, fun and nourishment of vegetables have provided much delight from seed to stem, leaves, flowers and “fruit”. Watching things grow from the invisible start, through all stages until gathering and harvest has been a reason for each day’s happiness and meaning. Photographing it all with a sense of humor (baby beanlings and escaping cucumbers) and writing about the mesmerizing life in the garden has been an irresistible form of excitement and inspiration about the stages unfolding in my own life.

For the last several years, knowing that at some point I would be leaving, I switched from in-ground gardening to the ease and inherent mobility of container gardening, specifically Grow Boxes. Last summer I finally knew that it would be the last summer at my home and decided that I would with the assistance of my Grow Box Garden, make it a celebration, although tinged with a bittersweet sense of having to let go of what was treasured, dear and familiar.

My Grow Box garden: Summer 2015

 

There are those who love the adventure of movement and change..buying and selling homes and relocating..over and over again. There are those who just cannot stay in one place too long.  And there are those who “ground” and put down roots that are so deep in spirit that to rip them up and relocate is like a mini-death. The way of a TAURUS, it is. And a Taurus I am. Like a Taurus (like the Taurean Ferdinand the Bull)..plant those flowers, lie amongst them forever, taking in the fragrance of the land, garden, field, woods that is familiar, that is “home”. Ah, Peace and Beauty….

 

My Garden, My Soul

 

Life is, however, a series of changes. I now live in the woods for a while…so many things in storage, a momentary simpler life. My Grow Boxes came with me to be my garden wherever I may be that has a patch of land under bright sunlight. For now, they have been over-wintering in the woods, the soil in them cleansed by water and snow awaiting this year’s growing season. Seed catalogues are arriving and in a couple of months, garden centers will re-open offering varieties of wonderful herbs, vegetable and flower babies full of promise.

My Grow Boxes over-wintering in the woods. A-waiting.

 

My prayer is to be able to fill those boxes once again so I may again experience the delight of the mysteries and magic of growing things.

Wherever I am, they are….. and wherever I may go, they too go with me….

From Christine, The Greening Spirit

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http://pianomistress.wordpress.com (Memoirs of a Piano Teacher)

 

Kitty in the Catmint

It’s not always faeries we spy in the garden when we least expect it, but also a face popping out of the herbs when we bend over to collect some flowers or leaves for tea. In this case, a kitty in the catmint.

You were so still down there and under the greening, even the bumble bees buzzing lazily around you seemed to think you were one of the plants. You are lucky I didn’t pluck you up along with the leaves and put you in the teapot with them!

Only when the three of us in this household came to lean over and laughingly call out to you..”Hi Sky!” did we rouse you from your deep sleep to blink and wink at us from down under, with no intention whatsoever to leave your cool and fragrant sanctuary amongst the catmint and Echinacea.

Cats and gardens seem to go together…whether it be the catmints or chives and it is always amusing to see a tiny  furry head pop out of the flowers or greenery.

Catnip and catmint share some of the same qualities of calming digestion, lowering fever and being a mild sedative. Catmint is more decorative than the weedier-looking catnip, and often planted as an ornamental. Cats are said to prefer catnip, enjoying mild if not wild intoxication merely from the scent…but from what I see here in this garden, the kitties find catmint quite suitable for “tuning-out”.

For a little more info on catmint, search for the herb on http://www.gardeningknowhow.com/edible/herbs/mint/catmint-plant.htm

From Christine, the Greening Spirit

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http://sensuoussoupsandsuppers.wordpress.com

Less is More (sometimes) : Bouquet in a saltshaker

I am living with friends who are exquisite gardeners. The gardens outside are in stages of glorious blooming…every day something new…colors, shapes, scents exploding in a sensual symphony for the eye and the spirit. Joyful, delightful, playful and soul-full!

As I walk through the gardens at various times of the day, I want to scoop it all up within my arms and bring it inside to my room to keep forever..I want to keep it ALL very close to me day and night in daylight and dark..so full of beauty and inspiration.

How greedy of me, really, because I spend enough time indoors in harsher seasons of dying off and cold. The gardens and the surrounding green-ness outside is a celebration to visit on its own terms…out there.

But that’s why we have bouquets.

They do not have to be big.

Yesterday while walking about the gardens with my camera, I gathered tiny stems of blossoms…the purple ones of garden sage, and catmint. And then three tiny stalks of dianthus in brightest pink. Coming inside, I searched for a tiny vase to put them in, but they are packed away with all of my things in storage.

But, in searching, I found a small empty glass salt shaker…just perfect for my tiny bouquet from the abundance of flowering choices outside. And of course, silly me, I instantly knew that often.. sometimes…  Less is more.

A garden in a salt shaker is a garden of Abundance. A feast for the eye.

A garden on my  nightstand. (accompanied my a sprig of Motherwort in a jelly jar) is my indoor solarium.

 

From Christine, the Greening Spirit

Loving the World: The Art of Deep Seeing

The lovely poet Mary Oliver writes: “My work is loving the world………… Let me keep my mind on what matters,
which is my work, which is mostly standing still and learning to be astonished“.

There are days when there are hours wandering about with my camera seeking, finding and capturing mysteries, and then writing about them. It is for me a meditative time, akin to prayer, I have come to realize, for in this practice I am always in a state of astonishment. It seems it is my way at these times to “gaze” instead of “look”, and to “see” rather than “glance” for I am a Taurus and we prefer to move more slowly, and linger in order to savor the experiences wherever we are.

Which brings me to the art of Deep-Seeing nature around me which when involving astonishment triggered by Beauty makes me fall deeply in love with the world.

But in our ordinary busy-got-to-get- somewhere times, we rush by life and our environment moving so fast, merely glancing at the surface and brushing by the most astonishing things hidden in plain sight on our way to be elsewhere.

Coming in and out of the house on my way to “out there”,  hopping in the car and taking off to tasks and responsibilities, I am in my head making lists, prioritizing things to do, appointments to get to on time and all that. In so doing, I pass this beautiful red Japanese Maple right outside the door, glancing quickly as I am fiddling and looking for my car keys in the depths of my purse and am astonished when I find them amidst the pocketbook’s inner complexities and clutter!

A day or two later, when not so rushed but going out to do a task, the slant of light on this tree caught my attention as I passed, suddenly revealing the patterns of several layers of branches and feathery leaves. The greenery was multi-colored as well, green, red, purple and PINK! I was astonished, immediately stopping to dig into my purse for my camera which is always with me (forget the car keys!). This sudden switch of vision to deep-seeing mode captured a Mystery that captivated me, took my breath away and surrounded me with a feeling of the holy, the Whole-y, the Sacred, The Magical.

But it’s not over, this Astonishment. There is never any end to how deep we can go with the art of Deep-Seeing in the world around us, in the people we meet or live with, or in the desire and seeking for Truth. How powerful is your curiosity? How hungry are you for depth and meaning,  for the seeking of Soul in the world,  and for the deeper mysteries of beauty hidden everywhere when we stop to linger, gaze and be present?

Standing there, lingering with this tree, looking down at its flattened crown from above, I noticed a small opening in its branches. Bending closer, I was charmed and astonished as I looked deeper through the opening and down to the ground under its trailing limbs … there..brightly colored, lush, textured and shiny..a whole luxurious community of greenlings…broad  shimmering violet leaves and delicate sweet woodruff (an ingredient in May Wine)…a combined vibrant palette of pink, purple, green and pale yellow.

It is true that some of us, when astonished, are inspired to make art, sometimes writing poetry, sometimes creating a painting, sometimes a story written or told, sometimes a photo composed and edited for making magic trying to capture and make what we have seen immortal…all irresistible components of falling in love.

I come to know that while teaching piano and  spiritual well-being to earn a living, that my real work is, and ever will be, loving the world and daily being astonished, sharing that Good News wherever I can.

From Christine, the Greening Spirit

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My Garden, My Soul: Part 15-When the Plants Speak (The Christ Plant)

 

Planting flowers in the vegetable garden brings color and good cheer to all that green while we are waiting for the fruition of the harvest, and so with happy planning, I raised the multicolored nasturtiums from seed and waited with goodly anticipation for the bursting open of those flowers of red, orange and yellow.

They did magnificently, and grew with such vibrant largesse and color in a special patch in front of the bush bean bed. I don’t think there was ever such a beautiful display of their large rounded leaves and multi-colored blooms (both edible btw) in any of my former gardens.

One morning a friend stopped by to see how my garden was coming along and we walked through this particular fenced-in and highly organized cluster of beds. She was taken by the lushness and beauty of the nasturtium patch which was really quite stunning, delighting each of us…

When she left, I drove into town for a quick trip to the market, and upon returning, stepped into that vegetable garden to harvest some beans for lunch. And WHAT A SHOCK!!!!

A once- vibrant full bodied lush nasturtium plant in the center of that community lay flat on the ground, almost totally drained of life, surrounded by the rest of the nasturtiums in distress also though not quite as almost fatal as the center plant. “WHAT is happening???” I must have cried out in alarm as I rushed to the center plant, lifting its limp and floppy leaves to assess this disaster and search for the cause.

The cause was… the hatching of thousands of tiny black aphids on the underside of its once-sturdy leaves, sucking the life out of it and infesting more lightly the nasturtiums around it.

Dashing to the hose to spray off those little buggers, trying to rid the plant(s) of every last one, I gave it coos of consolation and encouragement. “Come now, you must come through this…we’ll make it all right”… and I headed out to the hardware store to purchase the soapy insect infestation wash, SAFER. Back home washing the plant, which in about 1/2 hours time, had once again become totally covered with more aphids, sucking away draining its life force. Another wash of this unfortunate nasturtium and it companions, this time with SAFER and water to cleanse the plant of these invaders.

This process continued for several days…and each time I went out there, my once most magnificent nasturtium plant..the largest and sturdiest of the group.. lay prone, flat and devastated with the continued hatching of these little black sucking pests, although the other nasturtiums began to be untouched.

Frustrated, with another cleansing of the hose…I talked to the plant…a pep talk of great energy..” Oh Dear! Please do not give up…come on, you can do it! Pull yourself up by the bootstraps…don’t let the buggers take you down….”

And then, right with the ears of my Heart, in the center of my chest, I “heard” these words:

                                           “I AM THE CHRIST PLANT”

To say that I was stunned by this communique is an understatement for really, my cheerleading was quite secular and not a prayer. But in a flash, I UNDERSTOOD the message.

The strongest, most vibrant plant in the center of the communal patch of nasturtiums had taken it upon itself, in nature, to become the sacrifice for the rest of the garden. It was the “Christ Plant”… the archetypal One who gives its life to save the others for the survival of Good. It was because of that plant that bore the intense onslaught of the aphid infestation that helped the other plants to escape relatively unscathed, and in good health.

I took great care with that plant after that, understanding something new about the mysterious workings of the garden and its inter-connected inhabitants beyond my usual knowing or bookish research. Eventually, the onslaught was over, the Christ Plant survived, never quite regaining its former unblemished beauty and the garden thrived.

It also made me think of heros and heroines in culture who in their strength of character, stand up for what is right in the midst of infestations of wrong-doing or cultural slides into wrong agendas and how often they run the risk of mockery, banishment or even danger and death. I think of goodly mothers and fathers who sacrifice much for their children and of good friends who accompany each other in times of trial.

I come to understand the bigger meaning of the archetypal  Christ Consciousness beyond religion and alive in the soul, the garden and the consciousness of the earth and its inhabitants.

*** This story is a true experience of the plant’s speaking. It took place a number of years ago, and so I have no pictures. I have substituted pictures instead from this year’s bean garden in which there is one plant in the center that looks terrible and is just not doing well, altho the plants on either side, just a little compromised, are doing well and fully productive. I have resisted the impulse to pull it out, entertaining the possibility of it being the Christ Plant, giving itself over to the infestation more fully allowing the other plants more health and resistance.

From Christine, The Greening Spirit

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My Garden, My Soul: Part 17: Hide and Seek with the Beanies

I am in and out of the house all day long as I come and go, checking out things in the garden to my endless amusement and delight.  Viewed with a quick passing glance, the scene appears static and frozen, like a snapshot capturing a still moment for all of eternity….but….

But what a false impression is THAT! The garden is dynamic and in motion each second and things are happening at an uproariously fast pace even tho we might not register it in the way we experience time as a human. Take the beanies for example.

I with a sense of fun and anticipation go out in the morning to collect some beans, eagerly parting leaves and looking for those that can be collected of the right size. I even wear my reading glasses so I can find them and not miss the ripe and ready ones for lunch or dinner. When I have collected ALL of them that I have discovered, they come in with me to add a tender crunch of green to my meal. (Did you ever notice that green beans from the garden taste every so much differently delicious that those beans you pick over and choose at the supermarket which often have an odd flavor and take FOREVER to cook to tenderness?)

I feel good to have harvested all that I found making a stimulus for more little white bean flowers and eventually new pods on those vines.

What a surprise though that same day when I go out in the evening at dusk to water the grow boxes, and check over the plants one more time…you know, just to see what’s happened during the day. SHOCKING to turn over the bean leaves just for a peek, or to survey their well-being, and find fully mature beans hidden from my morning’s careful foraging… how in the world had I missed these newly giant beans in the former harvest just half a day back?? I think they are having fun tricking me…

OBVIOUSLY, the vegetables are a playful species… loving to play hide and seek. I find myself laughing out loud… I’m game….!  🙂

I must admit that the plants and I have a very personal relationship, as if they were pets or even people. We do seem to play games together as I pay such close attention to their habit, synchronicities and unique ways and a kind of “communication” happens between us through imagination and observation. Like when after a day in bright direct sunlight, the cukes and tomato vines give up and droop almost flat to the ground, dehydrated and thirsty. The Greening Spirit, concerned,  immediately comes to the rescue to water the boxes and spray them with a fine cool-down mist setting with the hose as if I heard them gasping… “oh PLEASE…WATER!”

This same attention, awareness and sensitivity is also needed with the people and relationships in our lives…noticing who needs a little extra care, watering through compassion,  a hug, or listening when they are dry and flattened by life, acknowledging or cheerleading them on for their special appreciated talents or gifts..their “fruits”… and saying grace and thank you’s for their friendships and nourishments in our lives.

It’s all one thing, you know……..  🙂

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From Christine, the Greening Spirit

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My Garden, My Soul: Part 13- When the Plants Speak #1

Anyone who has attended an Herbal Internship knows this exercise of being sent out into the garden or fields to sit with a plant that “calls you” and just listen….. listen for a message about it or from it as an answer to a question. You most likely will NOT experience this kind of communication task at your  local gardening club monthly meeting, or the University course in landscaping and horticulture who are about things other than talking and listening to plants.

You have to hang out with the herbal people who tend to be more than a bit a-cultural or with fans of Findhorn!

We have done this kind of communication with nature often here in my own garden whether it be with other plant people or with our Dreams/Peer Mentoring Circle and no one….NO ONE…ever comes back to the group without a special message or insight. But then again, these are the kind of whimsical, open and yes, magical, people I tend to hang with.

I mention herbs first because they have such a long tradition of both medicine and magic which both push our boundaries to entertain unusual or unexpected sources of wisdom and guidance. They DO have a propensity for words sent directly to the human heart. But you can listen to flowers and vegetables too…perhaps the devas that represent them are the ones who speak, but if you LISTEN the way children…young ones under the age of six..would listen, you will be amazed.

It is good to take a notebook and write down the thoughts and inspirations as they come, for like a dream, they may fade as you come back into the mundane and ordinary mindset.

It is always exciting and amusing to compare notes afterwards as it is quite fun and inspirational to share the magic, validating that there ARE worlds around us and within us besides the one we usually think of as the “real”. Share away and enjoy…but maybe not right away at “the office”.  🙂

I find that entering the “magical mind” is a wonderful way to balance those many other complicated issues we deal with in living our lives. Escaping into a good novel, or attending a wonderful play (Think “The Lion King”) or viewing an imaginative movie (Think “Avatar” or “Lord of the Rings”) we really enter various dreamworlds that are rich resources for creative thinking. Listening to the plants is a wonderful exercise of loving connection to that green world that indeed is our ground of being.

Highlighted in these pictures: Echinacea, lamb’s ears, milkweed, arugula, blackberry brambles, sweet pea and much more hidden in the green.

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From Christine, the Greening Spirit

You know, it’s all kind of magical! Check these out too!

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