Category Archives: Flowers

The Forest

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Here on the farm, September is still hot and very dry.  The only hint of fall are Dogwood and Tulip Poplar leaves turning yellow and red. This is a transitional month that won’t totally let go of summer but a bit of a taste of autumn. But, the last few years we have been using the dry early fall to get some work done in the forest.

My father-in-law was obsessed with trees and bought acreage many decades ago so that he could have his own forest and farmland.  Now that we live on the old farm, we are also obsessed with trees and forest. Our mile-and-a -half trail through the woods and along the meadow gets used multiple times a day. Caroline never misses a day in the woods—rain or shine, heat or cold. She considers her daily walk to be essential as food and oxygen. Hamilton usually walks before lunch and lets me know that he is off to the “enchanted forest”. I use my time on the trail as meditation, usually with some sort of soundtrack to accompany the whispering trees.

Caroline at her desk

Not long after Caroline moved to the farm in 2016, she started to roam further into the forest and found all the wonderful patches of wildflowers, mushrooms and lichen. As she combed every inch of the land, she also found cave entrances and oak and cedar trees grown together as well as the unique winter phenomena, frost flowers.  At the beginning of the 2020, we built a footbridge across the fair-weather creek so we could get to the trout lilies and phlox that bloom in March, the most magical time in the forest. But all the seasons provide their own unique beauty and difficulty.  Spring brings beautiful wildflowers but also ticks.  Summer has the lush green trees but a trail full of spiderwebs to negotiate.  Fall has the beautiful golden leaves but is very dry and the creek disappears. Winter is enchanting with an occasional crystalline snow, but the trail can be very muddy.  Our forest is beautiful but there are also problems with invasive species plants that make the forest floor too crowded with non-native plants.

This time of year, the creek and the trail are very dry and we can get vehicles deep into the forest. So for the past few weekends, Hamilton, Caroline and I have gone armed to wage war on the invading plants and big snags blocking the flow of the creek. Hamilton loads the chainsaw, two different types of weed-eaters, lawn mower and chains in the bucket of the tractor, I drive the farm pick-up, and Caroline wanders over after her morning coffee.  With all the proper tools we set to work on the invasive privet and downed trees.  Hamilton mans the heavy equipment and Caroline and I wrangle the offensive brush into an enormous pile.  We had two particularly challenging areas over the creek where trees had fallen, backed up the stream and were causing erosion. The tractor and the Bobcat made quick work of the snags and the creek will be able to stay in its banks this spring.  More snags need removing in the future but this will be a big improvement for this season.

Very quickly we have cleared big areas of the creek side and our forest is shaping up to be a delightful open space, still with plenty of trees but now room to wander around and admire the flowers.  This summer we added a picnic table near the footbridge and it has become our favorite place to sit and listen to the creek, read a book or chat with friends. The forest is our beautiful outdoor home, and of course I like to make it tidy and inviting. We take pride in maintaining our land and love sharing it with our deer and turkey families. I also like knowing the I can get in and do some hard work and drive the big truck off road. Maybe next year I will learn to drive the tractor. The forest needs me, and I in turn need the forest.

As I was sorting through the last remaining books from my parents, I came across a real gem, The Singing Wilderness by Sigurd Olson (1899-1982), a Swedish-American nature writer. His beautiful writing is a gentle exploration of nature and our amazing wilderness.  “These are days of quietly falling needles when after each breath of wind the air is smoky with their drift.” If you love nature writing like I do, Sigurd’s writing is perfection.  A final quote that really reflects my love of forest and land: “Wilderness to the people of America is a spiritual necessity, an antidote to the high pressure of modern life, a means of regaining serenity and equilibrium.”

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Friends

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There was a time in my teens and 20’s when I was very lonely and days seemed to stretch forever.  I always had my precious cat Charlotte and a shelf of favorite books to keep me company but, otherwise, I was often isolated.  Something in me was determined never to feel this way again and I set out to find friends and community. In those pre-internet days, friendships were a bit harder to come by.  I was a young mother in search of community and I found it in the local Episcopal church and a play group.  I am still close to those friends I made all those years ago.  As I was thinking of my life now and what I wanted to say in this month’s blog, friendship and my many dear friends came to mind. It is spring and as my world turns green, I plant the flowers and trees I want to grown in my garden. I’ve also planted a living garden of friends in my life.  Shall we have a stroll around the beautiful colors and variety that grow in my friendship garden.

The most long-lasting variety of friends are also family.  Husband, daughters, sister, aunts and cousins are the biggest blessing in my life right now.  I love to nurture these ties that bind us through generations and DNA. Time together is the best and family reunions big and small are highlights of the year, I also love those little sibling/cousin/aunt text chains that link me quickly and easily to my family.  There will be multiple dings on my phone as stories, pictures, hearts and emoji’s come through in a flurry of activity.   There will be silence again and then a few weeks later the fun and connections will begin again.  This summer my family is gathering in northern Minnesota to bury my mother’s ashes, celebrate my cousin’s marriage, see our Swedish cousins and play with the newest member, two-year-old Nora.  Those friendships are bound by heritage but nurtured over the decades in a place that holds the echoes of our ancestors.

Childhood friends remember you as you were before—when I had glasses and braces and ugly 1970’s clothes.  Childhood friends remember your family and school and all the formative events of life.  I still have a childhood friend I keep in touch with regularly.  Mel and I met in 4th grade and have been BFF’s ever since.  Sometimes we would go long periods of time without seeing each other but when we get together it is like no time has passed and we are girls again.  We tell the old stories and play our favorite piano duet that is so deep in our memories that we will never forget it.  Our lives and interests may be different now but our past carries us forward together into the future in a special sisterhood.  A few years ago, I went to visit Mel in Taiwan where she teaches English and works on her PhD in communications.  I couldn’t be prouder of her adventurous life.

My motherhood friends and I are entwined with the lives of our children. Playgroups and school groups brought us together through circumstance and shared place and time.  We share the joys and frustrations of our growing children and the happy events along the way which for me were music and dance recitals, beach trips and play dates.  I still have one very close friend from that era, Judy.  We have so many more things in common which has bonded our friendship past the child rearing days. Now we talk about our grown children and her grandchildren with the easy of a long history already lived together.

Hamilton and I are both introverts and making friends outside of the family doesn’t come naturally but fortunately we have some wonderful community friends that get us out and around town.  Over the years we have grown a special group of friends that, like us, doesn’t have many local relatives or extended family.  These precious friends have become chosen family for birthdays and holidays.  I can count on them to bring something delicious to a potluck meal and be ready for a party of any kind.  We sit around the campfire by the river in the summer, have lavish Thanksgiving feasts, trade gifts and cards for birthdays and Christmas and are there when life passages with elderly parents gets overwhelming.  I adore my chosen community family.

It is never too late to make friends.  As you grow older, it can be harder to make friends as so many people are already busy with established relationships and family.  But I have been fortunate to make a new group of friends in my small town.  Proximity to friends makes life easier and since I live out in the country having friends close by has been such a gift.  My walks in a nearby neighborhood grew into meeting people who have just moved to the area and are open to making friends.  So, thankfully, I was invited to a local book club and a hiking group formed and now I have friends that are as thrilled with books, birds and flowers as I am and are willing to hike up a mountain every Wednesday.  We are already planning more adventures further afield.  I also know that I can call on them anytime and someone is close by to lend a hand.

My final category of friends is my spiritual soul mates.  These are the dear friends I share my deepest heart with. We speak a special language developed through books and experiences. I miss my dear spiritual mentors Page and Rachael; no one can ever replace them.  But now I have my graduate-school classmates who speak my deepest inner language and my friend Val who loves a good spiritual pilgrimage/adventure to parts unknown.

There are also the people that I do business with that have become friends, acquaintances, friends in the local church and people come into my life for a time and a specific reason.  All of them are a blessing to my little corner of the world and I hope in turn I am a blessing to them.  Friends are a richness to life that smooths the hard edges and brings comfort and joy to each day.  I’m so glad that I have been able to cultivate so many friendships over the years and leave that loneliness behind.

Small Things

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photo. @madsnature_

To see a World in a Grain of Sand

And a Heaven in a Wild Flower

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand

And Eternity in an hour

Auguries of Innocence—William Blake

Although it really is hard to choose, I think spring is my favorite season.  April is my birth month and I associate new life with the next year of my life.  I love Easter and Easter candy and everything about this celebration of new and everlasting life. Spring is not a grand season like the heat of summer, the intense joy of Christmas or the flaming colors of autumn. Spring is a celebration of the small and the subtle, tiny wildflowers, light breezes, little blue bird’s eggs, and soft new grass underfoot.

At the beginning of March, the first wildflowers make an appearance here on our farm in Tennessee.  The very first flowers are Harbingers of Spring, tiny pink flowers on delicate stems. It is still chilly in March and we will probably have one more snow and a few cold snaps but the promise that winter won’t last much longer warms my heart. The next flowers to emerge in the forest are the sweet white Anemones.  They are larger with pointed petals and cover the forest floor as a backdrop to the showier flowers to come.  

We have a special place in our woods down near the fair-weather creek that we call “the pretty bottoms”.  According to the dictionary, bottomland is low-lying land along a watercourse and is usually protected by hills on all sides and has rich topsoil.  It is on this land that the wildflowers really thrive. During the early spring, I take a daily pilgrimage to take in the sight and breath in the smell of delicate flowers and warming earth.  The crunch underfoot of fallen leaves gives way to the delicate green of the forest floor.  Two years ago, we built a footbridge to make the creek easier to cross and this year we added a picnic table by the creek to have a place to display collections of bark, moss and flowers.  But usually, I just sit there happy to be in my little paradise.  Deeper in the woods we have a hammock for forest bathing—the Japanese form of forest therapy.  I’m never happier than when I’m just gently swinging in that hammock with the warm breeze on my face and my eyes closed in reverie.

This year we were treated to a bumper crop of thousands of yellow Trout Lilies. The name comes from their mottled leaves that look like the mottled bodies of brook trout.  They are shy flowers that live in colonies and stick together in a large carpet of small green leaves that are close to the ground. These colonies spread slowly and we estimate our acres of lily colony to be over 100 years old.  Their heads are bowed and only display their full glory when the sun shines.  But I make sure that I enjoy their beautiful delicate faces as I tilt the petals up to get a closer look.

There are yellow Trillium, May Apples, Twin Leaf and droopy Bellwort, but they all are the beautiful backdrop to my favorite Purple Phlox. This is what I’ve waited for all winter—the purple phlox.  As I arrive at the Pretty Bottoms, I’m greeted by their delicate smell and showy purple flowers.  They don’t need sunshine to open, they are just happy all the time and in turn make my heart sing with absolute joy.  I can’t wait to share these beauties with anyone I can convince to hike up the hill that then leads to the long winding hill down to the flowers.   But I do love it best when I have the flowers, birds and trees to myself in my own private paradise.  I often think of all the years these flowers bloomed without my knowing.  Now every time I see them, I let them know how happy I am they waited for me.

photo @madsnature_

I’ve gone on and on without mentioning the exciting new small thing that has arrived on the farm—honeybees.  Now I have thousands of tiny flying friends to also enjoy the spring display.  I had been thinking about getting bees for a couple of years and was going to start a hive this spring when my obsession with Facebook Marketplace finally paid off.   Joseph had placed a listing looking for land for his hives in exchange for honey.  I couldn’t message him fast enough!  A few weeks ago, he brought out 16 hives on four pallets—all the fun of bees and none of the work for me.  Toward the end of the trail around the farm I get to see those bees swarming, busy doing their important bee jobs. Biscuits and cornbread will soon be the preferred method for honey consumption.

I hope my enthusiasm for small things inspires you to go notice the little things in your world. It is easy to notice the big and boisterous and overlook the delicate, fragile and quiet but that would be missing the corners of our heart and mind waiting to be filled with beauty to soften the hard edges of life.  

Noticing

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A couple of weeks ago, Alexandra was ready to have a trip to town.  Since she was working from home she had not been anywhere in a couple of weeks and was hungry for a Dairy Queen vanilla cone. I needed some plumbing parts from Home Depot to fix a leaky faucet.  The ice cream was just what she wanted and we headed home through the countryside to our small rural town.  About halfway home she saw some cows in a field, including several calves. I promise, she has seen baby cows before, but even though she is closing in on 30, any baby animal brings a delight usually reserved for toddlers.  She made me turn around so she could admire the babies. We found a driveway to pull in to and had a perfect view of a mama giving her baby a bath.  The little one stood patiently as mama’s rough tongue cleaned under its chin, each lick making the baby lift up a bit, yet the bath happily continued for several minutes.  It was a mini-magical moment for Alexandra and me.  In the background, were the purple silhouettes of the Great Smokey Mountains. The rolling spring-green field contrasted with the dark angular bodies of the Black Angus cows. It was a simple, bucolic moment but yet one of perfect contentment for the mama and baby and me and my sweet girl.  At that moment, all was right with the world because Alexandra had noticed.  She noticed the simple beauty of babies in a field and wanted to savor that moment.

Noticing. This is how we pilgrimage to the present. This isn’t remembering the past or anticipating the future but finding those little moments of everyday life as special and beautiful. Currently our physical worlds are reduced in size as we tend to the business of life and health. But our internal world is infinite when we take time to notice the beauty of life. It is in connecting with nature and the amazingly creative human mind and spirit that we find those timeless moments that feed our soul.  It is so easy to get caught in the negative and the difficult and forget to see, to notice the abundance all around, the opportunities to enrich our minds and souls.  I’ve enjoyed the operas, ballets, gardens and museums that are online for us to enjoy in a way I haven’t before.  I’ve had time to read and tend my house, cook and take a daily walk to enjoy the spring flowers and budding trees.

My sweet friend Becky was reading a passage in my book about pilgrimages to your own back yard. She took that idea to heart and noticed that her own backyard needed some tending and decided to build a “pretty little garden” where she could put her hands in the dirt and find refuge from her busy “on-line” life. Every day she would pilgrimage a few short steps to her little place on earth and found healing and peace.  She shared her special space on Instagram.  It is up to each of us to find and nurture that space of time and place to pilgrimage; we just have to stop and notice.

 

Noticing, observing– brings gratitude for the details of your surroundings, the little things that are often ignored but actually hold the essence of life.  Notice the taste of simple food, the earthy smell of a cat, the softness of worn sheets, the heaviness of a hardbound book, the tattered edges of a warm rug, the brilliant purple of the tiny violets in the grass. Notice the bird songs in the early morning, the whipporwill’s call at dusk, the croaking frogs after a rain.  Each of these things and an infinite amount of other little things in our world become a moment of pilgrimage to our life as we live right here, right now.

My dear cosmic mother Rachael passed away last month. She was in very poor health, the perfect target for Covid-19.  As I mourn her loss, I think about something she would often say, “we are in the glory now”.   By noticing, we experience Now in each glorious moment.

Rachael Salley   1942-2020

Pilgrimage to the Past

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Trout Lily, Spring 2020

Historically, pilgrimages were taken by people in all social, economic and cultural levels since sacred travel was about the call of the spirit to seek soul in the world. In our modern times, pilgrimages can seem to be for the privileged few that can afford the time, money of an exotic pilgrimage. Many have physical limitations that make a long pilgrimage impossible. I’ve always worried that my blog and book on pilgrimage have over emphasized international pilgrimages at the expense of the true nature of a spiritual journey.  As my tag line indicates—pilgrimage is about making every step of life sacred, a journey of the soul. Yes, pilgrimage is about physically going out into the world, discovering your inner world as you discover the world around you. But I also see pilgrimage as a perspective, a way of viewing life as a sacred journey.

Even as we are still early in 2020, our entire planet has been turned upside down as we pause life to tend to health and safety. Daily, even hourly, life is shifting with plans and routines which have disintegrated into the unknown. We are all on an untried path for a while before a new normal arrives. Although most of my family already work from home, Alexandra is here in Tennessee, a refugee from her micro-apartment in California.  My elderly mother is in quarantine in her retirement home–all appointments cancelled and no lunches out for the foreseeable future.  Our introvert natures are happy to be home with the cats and a stocked pantry.

Travel is going to be interrupted for quite awhile and maybe even make us rethink some of our far-flung vacations. It is unnerving when a much-anticipated trip is interrupted by the unexpected but that is part of a pilgrimage. Nine years ago, I was caught in the Egyptian Revolution and sequestered in a hotel before British Air sent an empty plane to rescue travelers. We expect our plans to go well—and most of the time they do—but part of the nature of a pilgrimage is a test of inner strength in the light of outer events.

Pilgrimage can always be part of our life no matter what the circumstances of the physical world. Thanks to the remarkable nature of our consciousness with the help of our five senses we can pilgrimage anytime and anyplace: past, present or future. Let’s start with pilgrimages to the past.

Our past experiences remain available to us through our memories.  Although memories are not usually perfect recordings of the event, our own imagination and the perspective of time can remake an experience in the past into a meaningful experience in the present.  For example, I bet you could walk around your childhood home in your mind or visit your grandparents house with a full sensory experience.

I can feel myself walk up my grandparent’s sidewalk on to their back porch and see the details of my grandfather’s shaving kit on the porch sink and hear the door slam shut behind me.  Now I can go into the tiny kitchen and smell the fried chicken and open the cupboard where my grandmother kept Juicy Fruit gum. I continue on into the living room where my grandmother sits in her pink velveteen chair and I sit down by her feet and watch the nightly news as my grandfather sleeps on his green couch beside us.  These memories are so vivid forty-five years later.  I can remember those ordinary moments of my childhood and re-imagine them as the cherished experiences of my personal story.  What childhood experience joyful or difficult are part of your personal history?  Can you pilgrimage to these sentinel moments and greet them, thank them for participating in your life?

Our senses make these memories come alive.  Our bodies remember our lives through the senses and we can use these memories to travel to the past and remember our lives in detail. Last year, I was at a concert listening to Beethoven’s 9th Symphony and I was unexpectedly back in my childhood home with my family by the fire listening to this monumental music on a scratchy record.  I was surprised by the vividness of the memory and realized how this calm family experience was so important to my introverted soul.  In the summer, the smell of warm pine trees takes me back to a summer vacation in Estes Park Colorado. The taste of raspberries are the reminder happy moments of summertime in Minnesota.

As well as cherished memories of our childhood, think about pilgrimages you have taken in the past.  Think about how they have affected your life now many years later for we need a lifetime to process these profound moments.  During a conversation with a fellow plane passenger, I asked her if she had a special trip that she could now see was a pilgrimage.  She recounted going to Brazil with a friend, and as part the tour, the group held a ceremony by the ocean to honor her ancestors that had crossed the ocean on slave ships. She teared up thinking about how meaningful that moment was for her.  She now remembers that trip as a powerful and life-changing pilgrimage, not just a casual trip with a friend.  Sometimes our most powerful experiences come not from intention but from the unexpected.  Often, we can’t see this until many years or decades later.  Go back through your photos and find a trip that was meaningful and take the time to remember. Maybe make a photo album of that trip or get out mementos and build a little shrine to that experience that changed you.  While we experience this moment of “global time-out” we gain the space to experience time differently and meld past and present together.

 

 

Basho

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Breaking the silence

of an ancient pond,

A frog jumped in to water —

A deep resonance.

This haiku by the poet Matsuo Basho (1644-1694) is one of the most recognizable poems in Japan. Haiku is a short traditional form of Japanese poetry consisting of seventeen syllables divided into three sections of five-seven-five. It was Basho who perfected the haiku form, but he also wrote beautiful prose in the form of a travel log with the haiku inspired by his experiences. The Narrow Road to the Deep North is his best-known work and read by almost every Japanese high school student and translated more than any other work of Japanese literature.

I first learned of Basho while researching pilgrimage. I was already familiar with the haiku form and its popularity in both Japan and the West but going deeper into Basho’s life and work expands my understanding of the form, but more importantly informs my own pilgrimages and soul journey. Although Basho spent a great deal of time traveling, it is this pilgrimage to the Deep North that called his soul. To wander in nature and discover the world was not a luxury for Basho but a necessity for his poetry and the calling of his soul.  On this journey, Basho developed a new form a writing called haibun, which alternates prose and haiku to describe his journey. The prose, equally as beautiful as the poems, explains the physical aspects of the journey where the haiku illuminates the internal images and experiences. He walked 1200 miles over five months with his disciple Sora and planned part of the route to include places described by other writers. Basho’s call to a pilgrimage was not a specific place but to experience whatever unfolded before him. “I myself have been tempted for a long time by the cloud-moving wind–filled with a strong desire to wander”.

Basho’s words are beautiful in their simplicity and grace. He uses a lightness and gentleness to describe nature and life itself. Beauty becomes an essential element in the soul’s journey. Basho found beauty on his journey: in the change of seasons, fleeting moments of sun on dew, a hazy moon, the arch of the Milky Way. He found beauty in the smallest details of cherry blossoms, pine trees, wind and water. Life is fleeting and these details captured the ephemeral moment when life is perfect beauty. Basho took great delight and wonder in these moments that fed his soul’s path. It is in these brief moments that Basho experienced eternity and left a trace in his haiku.

Walking pilgrimages are inherently simple. Life is reduced to what you can carry on your back. Basho’s haiku perfectly alludes to the essentialness of his journey. Pleasure is found in the simple moment of a flower, the soft breeze, or sound of a cricket. Basho left behind the comforts of home and community to see the world in the simplest moments where the sacred is found. Basho doesn’t analyze or offer opinion on what he sees, rather he relates pure experiences as they happen in the moment and in his heart. Haiku becomes the way he expresses his journey. Although haiku is simple in form it is not simplistic for the subtly expressed by the image associations and verbal play enter in the depths of the human heart.

In the essence of his work, Basho is above all a nature poet. All his senses were tuned to the natural world and Basho misses none of the subtleties of the wind, seasons, smell and sound, often bringing him to tears in the moments of pure wonder and grace. His poetry and prose are words of praise and thanksgiving for life in all of its forms. The sea, rocks, stars, mountain, trees, flowers, all participated in Basho’s poems to the ineffable mystery of our world.

Although written almost 400 years ago, Basho’s story and poetry are timeless. His experiences and observations reflect his deep understanding of nature and his own interior life. Pilgrimage, as a time of solitude in nature, becomes a catalyst that opens an important soul space.  Basho heard the call of this soul space and left a beautiful account of what that interior pilgrimage looks like. His words are those of the mystic that sees the sacred in all things and in all places.

The title of Basho’s story, The Narrow Road to the Deep North, reflects the physical road and is a metaphor for the quality of the interior journey for the sacred does not come with broad highways and neon signs. The sacred is found with effort on a narrow path that takes time and sacrifice, suffering and joy. There is no easy and quick way to a lasting relationship with nature and the soul. Hard work and dedication are needed to find these numinous moments when the world becomes alive with wonder as we step out of time into the timeless.

Later this year I am going to Japan to see for myself what inspired Basho. I will be walking part of the 88 Temple trail on Shikoku island, a 1000-year-old spiritual pilgrimage and a sister pilgrimage to the Camino. Basho did not walk this particular trail, he walked north of what is today Tokyo, but the landscape and culture as well as the search for the heart and soul of nature aligns me with the spirit of Basho.  Basho wrote on many subjects that moved him to live in relationship with his soul and thus offers me language to seek the same beauty.

 

 

Amid mountains of high summer,

I bowed respectfully before

The tall clogs of a statue

Asking a blessing on my journey

 

To talk casually

About an iris flower

Is one of the pleasures

Of the wandering journey.

 

In the utter silence

Of a temple,

A cicada’s voice alone

Penetrates the rocks.

 

 

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Gifts

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As we enter the traditional season for giving, I am reminded that gifts are always a part of the journey, on a pilgrimage and in daily life.   All you have to do is become aware the abundance of life and open your heart to receiving these gifts so freely given.  I offer these three gifts for this holiday season.  Gifts to give yourself and then in turn give to others.
Joy:   The poet Leon Bloy says, “Joy is the most infallible sign of the presence of God”.   Finding joy, living joy, sustained joy are the moments the pilgrim has put down their burdens, worries, sorrow and let the light of the Divine show through to your life.   This is a moment of transformation where just being alive and open hearted is all there needs to be.   On the Camino I had the experience of sustained joy where just walking and being in nature made every breath a thank-you.

Silence:  In our noisy world we don’t find much silence and if you do happen to encounter it most people find it uncomfortable and immediately fill the void with more talking or scrolling.   Silence is where you take time from our frenetic world.   You can’t hear the voice of your heart and the Divine if you are talking or distracted.   Practice sacred silence as you move into sacred space.   Take time to sit in silent wonder and just be with the experience.   You need time to be without distraction to connect your being to your special place on earth.   Before and after visiting a special place give yourself the gift of coming into silence so you can prepare, receive and then integrate this experience.

Music:   Music is part of spiritual practice in all traditions, hymns, chants, toning and other types of music that enhances your personal experience.   As always these should not affect the experience of others near you or the nature of the site.   Sing a song in your mind, quietly chanting, listening to a song on an iPod can greatly enhance your experience.   I like to link a specific song with a specific place or experience.    Sometimes I have chosen that song ahead of time, sometimes I let the shuffle setting choose the song, sometimes I like to have a song spontaneously come into my mind.      When a song is sung or listened to at a site the song is then imprinted on your energy at that site.   In the future when you hear that song then you can be instantly transported back to that place and time.   It is a way of being part of that place forever.   In the cathedral in Burgos, Spain during a Mass in English the congregation sang a hymn I learned as a child.   I sang the words that I knew but hadn’t thought of for decades.   Now my voice is forever in the stones of that chapel.

The Getty Villa

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November found me back in Southern California to visit Alexandra and attend my quarterly class at Pacifica.  I always have a couple of days between my weekend with Alexandra and my classes giving me opportunity to search for beauty in an abundant part of the world.   On this trip I visited The Getty Villa in Malibu just a few miles up the road from Alexandra’s apartment.  Since it was a weekday and off-season, I found the place mostly empty expect for some rambunctious school groups loading back into their buses.   Soon the Villa was peaceful and after a lovely pesto and cheese sandwich at the café, I was ready to explore.

The Getty Villa is J. Paul Getty’s first art museum built when he realized that his art collection was much larger than his home.   With billions at his disposal, Getty spent his later years collecting some of the finest art work around the world and left a large endowment for their display and care.  The Getty Villa houses his classical art from Greece and Rome and the rest of his collection is a few miles away at the Getty Center.  But he didn’t want just any old building for this magnificent art, he wanted to recreate Italy itself on his property overlooking the Malibu coast and out onto the endless Pacific.   The plan for the new villa was based on an excavation in the 1750’s of Villa Dei Papiri, that had been buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD.  Not only is the new villa the same scale and plan but also includes some materials from the 2000-year-old villa.

After watching the short introductory film, I took a guided tour of the gardens.   The docent detailed the four main gardens starting with the fragrant kitchen and herb garden.   I was encouraged to take small samples to smell and after placed the samples in my pocket—I had plans for those herbs.   The formal water garden had a magnificent view of the ocean way below.  There was a sculpture garden with pomegranate trees and a walled garden with acanthus plants and laurel trees.  I wandered around the galleries enjoying the detailed Greek urns, perfect sculptures and mosaics.  It was hard to believe that this art was so old and yet still had such a current influence in our world.    The gods and goddesses portrayed in the art remain part of my everyday life as I study myth and archetypes as part of my classes.

Two days later I again drove past the Getty Villa and up the beautiful Malibu coast to school near Santa Barbara.  It is my favorite route to take and the ocean, cliffs and music on the radio together make a beautiful experience.    The next day I started to get texts to see if I was alright—were the fires near me?   I was far enough from the fires but couldn’t believe the peaceful drive just a few hours before was now an inferno.   I took those herbs I gathered just a few days before and walked them to the center of the labyrinth on campus.  I had physical gifts from those peaceful gardens to offer prayers for the people suffering from the destruction.

The Getty Villa had to shut down during the fires but remains unharmed and has now reopened.  Two thousand years ago the first Villa was destroyed in a sudden rain of fire and ash and now the new Villa had the potential to meet the same fate.  How fleeting life can be, peaceful one day and gone the next as we witness every day the natural disasters that happen on our planet.  I try to savor every day, not in a fatalistic way, but so that life doesn’t just pass unnoticed until it is too late.

 

 

Secrets of a Healing Garden

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Guest post by valarie budayr

Nothing shows the journey of life better than a garden with its seasonal cycles of blooming and rebirth. For children who are victims of physical and sexual abuse and trauma the healing/therapy garden at New Hope is a welcome retreat as a place of healing and renewal.

New Hope Healing Garden is a private garden retreat for children, care givers, first responders, staff and therapists

The New Hope Therapy Garden is a private outdoor garden space that has been specifically designed to meet the physical, psychological, social and emotional needs of the children using New Hope and its resources as well as their caregivers, family members, friends, and staff as a place to re-connect with their well being and heal the invisible wounds of current and post-traumatic stress.

The design is to inspire play through nature exploration, nature and gardening care, and imagination. Throughout the whole garden we engage the child through various textures, sounds, imagination and interaction. It instills awe and wonder, and invites anyone to come in, look, listen, and see what grabs your curiosity.

Welcome to our Garden ~

The Singing Hopscotch Path


We enter the garden via the numbered circled path. There are two ways to use the path. The first is by hopping as in playing hopscotch. The next way of using the path is to sing. Each colored marker on the path makes us stop and sing a first line of a song such as Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Both hopping and singing are ways to enter the present moment, the here and now. We have to concentrate really hard to hop on one foot and then the other. It’s a relief to be able to stop with both feet on two numbers. It doesn’t leave a lot of room for outside thoughts to run inside our minds. Singing also achieves the same thing. We can only sing one note at a time. It takes full concentration and our full breath. We need to sing the correct pitch, have enough air in our lungs and move to the next note in the song as well as sing the correct words. The pathway is an indicator that we are transitioning from the world out there, that at times isn’t so nice, to the safety of the garden where we will explore, experience, and embrace nature through play. Everything that happens in the garden, happens only in the present moment, the now. The experience of the garden opens up new possibilities and new ways of seeing things.

Flower Planters


Just in front of the parking lot are four moveable garden planters. These have been planted with a variety of flowers which once cut come back again. Such flowers are zinnias, calendula, marigolds, nasturtiums etc., as well as, herbs. All of the flowers and herbs in the planters will be used for nature play in the Nature House and in the Fairy Forest.
The flower planters are also away for the children to take the watering cans, and trowels and personally help care for the garden by watering and weeding. Both child and therapist while weeding, watering, or picking flowers can have those very important conversations that foster healing.

Sunflower House
Each Spring a 6 x 9 house will be created completely out of several sunflower varieties.
Children love hideaways to play in and view the outside world without being seen. The sunflower house is such a place to sit and create flower and nature mandalas, rake a zen garden, or sit an enjoy the world around them as birds fly in and out and squirrels scamper up and down the trees. It’s a place to feel protected, ponder and create.

Fairy Forest

Using only natural materials such as sticks, shells, stones, leaves, pinecones, acorns etc, we create fairy houses. There is no right or wrong way, only natural materials can be used. No nails, glues, twine or string. Building a natural fairy houses instills the idea of being able to fix things that one doesn’t like. We can create something enchanting by using our imaginations and by creating with what nature gives us.

The Fairy Forest instills the idea of impermanence that something may not be there forever but we can rebuild with what is left over and what new things we can pick up from around the fairy forest to build with.

Therapists also share the idea that they can create a safe house in the Fairy Forest and build what that looks like.

House by house, the forest fills until one day we come upon an entire village. There are two old trees in the garden and the stretch of land between the left hand tree, the bird bath/water play area and the tree on the right hand side will encompass the Fairy Forest.

Field of Flowers Bird Baths


Sitting in a field of seasonal flowers is our water play area. Local artist Linda Edmunds created bird baths using large squash and rhubarb leaves. Each one is hand painted and sealed to bring a fun and playful feel to the garden. The bird baths instill water play. Just to the right of the field of flowers is a big concrete bowl which when filled will have floating balls in it. Both the bird baths and bowl invite the child to play by simply pouring water into them as well as placing various nature items there to interact with. Many specific therapy modalities also use water as a tool for healing. This allows free play and imagination in a structured setting.

The Labyrinth


Welcome to the meandering path. Labyrinths are used as a centering tool to quiet the mind. The labyrinth at New Hope is a 7 circuit Chartre labyrinth.
The path winds its way back and forth, in and out. The mind becomes disoriented because it’s not sure which way the path will turn next. This confusion actually calms the mind in a still and gentle way. The wandering path also in only the width of one foot which means you can only walk with one foot, one pace at a time. Another tool which silences the mind.

A labyrinth isn’t a maze. The same path we use to walk to the center of the labyrinth is the same one we use to walk out.

A labyrinth is a tool of transformation. We are never the same person who walked into the labyrinth as the person who walks out. There are three stages of a labyrinth walk. The first is the intention to walk the labyrinth, quiet the mind and leave the outside world behind. The second is the actual walk. As we get closer to the center we are moving into our own interior space. Once in the center we take a moment to reflect, whether that’s a simple moment of gratitude, to take a few deep breaths or to even meditate. We are in the center of ourselves as well as being in the center of the labyrinth. Those few moments we took in our walk and reflective thoughts have us walking out a more centered person than when we walked in. The very design of the labyrinth instills this whether we choose to reflect in the center or not.
The labyrinth was designed for little legs and so the adults who walk it comment that the turns happen quickly, yes for long legged people but for our children visitors it’s just the right of walking paces between turns. Since the labyrinth has been installed, both staff and children have enjoyed walking the wandering path.

The Nature House


Next to the labyrinth is our Nature House. It is a place to have important conversations while playing and creating with nature. While in the nature house, children can create nature mandalas, use therapy trays such as sand, stone, and landscape as well as rake into the table top zen gardens.
Nature House is also a great place to be outside in all kinds of weather. It offers some protection from rain, snow, and sleet, allowing children to experience all moments regardless of weather outside.

As the children connect with the garden they are planting seeds for the future. The garden, the connection to nature, and life after the stress of abuse, are full of hope.

New Hope is a private garden and safe haven for those that utilize New Hope and its facilities and is closed to the general public.

The therapy garden was designed by Maryville resident Valarie Budayr. Valarie has been gardening her whole life. Valarie was on the creative design team for the Secret Garden at the Knoxville Botanical Gardens which opened in October of 2016. Valarie’s area of garden design specialties are labyrinth building and design as well as secret gardens, fairy gardens and houses,paradise, and healing gardens. She also greatly loves her vegetable garden. Valarie is also known as an award winning author and publisher.
It was her great joy to create the Therapy Garden at New Hope and wishes much healing and creative nature play to take place there.

Angkor Wat, Cambodia

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Hamilton and I each had things we wanted to do and see in Thailand but we both had a deep desire to go to Cambodia and visit Angkor Wat. When we would talk about visiting Southeast Asia it was always traveling to both Thailand and Cambodia. When he was a boy living in Thailand it was not safe to visit Cambodia. Just say “largest temple complex in the world” to me and Angkor Wat goes straight to the top of my must-visit list.

Angkor Wat is in the northern part of Cambodia next to the city of Siem Reap, just a couple of hours south of the Thai border. The largest religious monument in the world, it covers over 400 acres with with dozens of individual temples. The most important and best preserved is the temple of Angkor Wat. The temples were built starting in the early 1100’s and were active until the 1700’s. During that time it changed between Hindu and Buddhist many times depending on what king was in power but is now Buddhist.

After our bus tour we had made arrangements to go to Cambodia. It seemed like a good idea at the time just to drive down to Siem Reap as we were relatively close to the border. Well, it was a bit more complicated and challenging than we expected and included dragging our suitcases through the long and congested border gray zone and surrendering our passports to a man on a motorcycle along with bribes for visas. There were moments I was pretty sure that I was going to be featured on next season’s Lock Up Abroad.  Eventually we made it to our beautiful hotel and finished the day with a sunset boat ride on a large lake with floating villages. We flew back to Thailand a few days later—a wise decision. I love a good adventure but that border crossing was almost a bit too much adventure.

The next morning started bright and early because I wanted my first glimpse of Angkor Wat to be at sunrise. Our guide picked us up in the dark and we went and purchased our tickets and walked through the night across ancient paths and bridges to a pond with a dark silhouette of the temple on the other side. The stars were bright and Venus was hanging low with the moon. We stood with quite a large crowd waiting to see this remarkable holy site be illuminated by the morning sun. Eventually the sun peaked over the tall towers and reflected on the pond in front of us. As the temple reflection mingled with the water lilies, it almost too much to bear, with the pink, blues, purples of the flowers and morning sun illuminating this glorious shrine to the gods.

 

We walked across the bridge, through doorways, up and down steps until we reached the center of that holy place. It was still early so there was a cool breeze and the larger crowds hadn’t yet arrived. It is as awe inspiring as the great cathedrals of Europe, the monumental temples of Luxor, the crystal city of Machu Picchu and the magnificent Grand Canyon. It is a humbling expression of man’s insignificance before the Divine.

On the bottom level are four pools with four more pools on the level above. Every bit of the walls inside and out were covered with fine, detailed carvings depicting the epic stories of the Hindu gods as well as celestial dancers celebrating life. We climbed the narrow and very steep steps to the upper level to see the second set of pools and look out at the deep green countryside. Along the walls were headless Buddhas in mediation. Some had gold sashes reminding visitors that this is still a very holy place. As with all of the great temples built by our ancestors, it is breathtaking in the current expression. I can’t imagine how amazing it was with ponds full of lilies, the walls painted and the Buddhas whole.

The shrine to Buddha is back on the main level. Although Angkor Wat was mostly lost in time, for 300 years the main temple was always tended by monks so the energy never left this special place. Two monks were sitting by the shrine giving blessings to those who were ready to receive. I lit incense before the golden Buddha and then knelt in front of the monk for my blessing. First he put a pink cord on my left wrist and the took a whisk dipped in holy water and shook the water on my head as he chanted prayers.

It was hard for me to leave, I had dreamed of that morning for a long time and I didn’t want my visit to be over but it was getting warmer and we hadn’t had breakfast. So I said my good-byes knowing that I would be back. Like so many of the most holy places on earth, it is so overwhelming that I can’t take it in on the first visit. As I write this I’m listening to the music that I chose for my pilgrimage and my powerful memories entwine with the notes. I will go back.

Vishnu