“Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.”
― Confucius
“The lowly he sets on high and those who mourn are lifted to safety.”
Job 5:11
A walk in the woods on a damp rainy day holds a wealth of often overlooked wonders. . .
(all photos taken from a trip to the woods / Troup Co, Georgia / Julie Cook / 2015)
My father said there were two kinds of people in the world:
givers and takers.
The takers may eat better,
but the givers sleep better.
Marlo Thomas
“The greatest need of our age and of every age, the greatest need of every human heart, is to know the resources and sufficiency of God.”
― Albert Benjamin Simpson
(curious and opportunistic grackles check out the water tub / Julie Cook / 2015)
Having thrown out a bucket of corn for our resident deer, it didn’t take long for the invading passerby grackles to find the golden nuggets dispersed within the grass.
With life having been relatively dry up until the last few days, we’d put out a tub of water for our thirsty four legged friends.
As soon as the grackles approached, ready to descended onto the corn, they first hesitantly and cautiously headed toward the black tub.
A single grackle arrived in order to investigate.
Then a few more appeared hoping no doubt that the big black tub held a treasure trove of corn.
More and more grackles arrived with each new arrivee having to check out the tub for a possible plethora of food–
Obviously not satisfied by the existing kernels scattered throughout the grass.
(curious and opportunistic grackles check out the water tub / Julie Cook / 2015)
(curious and opportunistic grackles check out the water tub / Julie Cook / 2015)
(curious and opportunistic grackles check out the water tub / Julie Cook / 2015)
(curious and opportunistic grackles check out the water tub / Julie Cook / 2015)
I suppose we’re a lot like the never satisfied grackles, as we often seem to think there is going to be something bigger, better and more which must be lurking elsewhere other than that which has been graciously offered and set before us. It’s as if we are constantly hoping to find that which is easier for the taking and neatly given without our ever having to work for what we get. . .
So it is with this thought in mind that my prayer for today is that we may each stop long enough, taking time from our chaotic lives, to find the gratitude within our hearts for that which we already possess, as well as for that which has been graciously offered and lovingly placed before us. . .all without the expectation and desire of seeking anything else or anything more. . .
May we truly appreciate the effort we exert. . .which in turn,
makes each reward that more sweet. . .
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.
2 Corinthians 12:9
“Make up your mind,” Moab says. “Render a decision. Make your shadow like night – at high noon. Hide the fugitives, do not betray the refugees.”
Isaiah 16:3
(a morning glory found deep in the woods / Julie Cook / 2015)
Both Lucy Lipiner and Gerda Weissmann Klein have a tale to tell. . .
Each woman weaves a story steeped in the sweet innocence of childhood which is suddenly and unimaginably lost in the midst of unspeakable horrors. . .yet thankfully theirs is a tale of eventual survival and of small yet victorious triumphs.
There are a few differences between these two woman of which create two very individual stories. . .
Differences such as their age and the fact that they were each born in different small towns.
Yet it is to the similarities between them that inextricably binds them together for all of eternity.
I am pretty certain that these woman do not personally know one another nor have they ever met, but I somehow think that in many ways they have known one another very well for a very long time as they have both survived the unimaginable stemming from the same wicked source. . .
Each woman was born in Poland and each woman was born into a Jewish family.
Whoever would have imagined that those two seemingly insignificant factors would mark these women for the rest of their lives by placing them in the valley of the shadow of Death. Had they been born say, in America or Canada, or England, their stories would certainly have been less then memorable. Lives lived as mostly anyone else’s.
But because they were born in a country lying in the path of a very hungry and vicious animal, tragedy was to be their lot.
I have finished reading Lucy’s tale and have now begun Gerda’s equally gripping story.
As I waited in the dentist office yesterday, reading until I was called back, I had tears flooding my eyes as I read the story of an individual family, like my own family or anyone’s family, being ripped apart as they stood by helpless to prevent the rupture.
Despite the fact that these two lady’s stories took place over 70 years ago, I have been struck by the similarities of the worldwide current plights now littering our news.
Each was a young girl when The War broke out–when Germany marched forth seizing Poland as its own.
Each girl came from a prominent family within their respective towns. They were loved, nurtured and happy living their lives as innocent children.
I think it is Lucy’s story that I have found to be most relevant to any story I might read in today’s paper—that of any number of families fleeing Syria or Egypt or Turkey or Somalia or Tunisia, or Eritrea, etc.— each seeking refuge from the unspeakable horrors of the upheaval of what was an average life.
Lucy’s family was on the run for almost 10 years. Starting when she was 6 years old when the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939– they became just another statistic of families in the throng of the displaced as they sought refuge in the Soviet Union and later Tajikistan then briefly back to Poland and ironically to Germany and eventually to the US.
There was death, violence, sexual abuse, grave hunger, incapacitating illness, loss, sorrow, separation and near madness.
They had been a family like any other family–they had a nice home, nice clothes, nice jewelry. They went to Temple. They enjoyed their extended family. They attended school. They had jobs. They played music as they lived, loved and laughed—-
Suddenly life took a turn beyond their control and they lost everything–they became hunted, like animals. They were reduced to wearing clothes turned to rags as there was no longer choice. They lost weight. They were hungry. They were infested with bugs, inside and out. They ate rotten trash and drank fetid water to quell an endless hunger. They were dirty, they smelled. They were sick both physically, spiritually and mentally.
They were shells of human beings.
Miraculously the family remained intact but it came at a tremendous cost to each member of the family. They survived in part due the kindness of those strangers and individuals encountered along the long and arduous journey who were willing to offer aid, shelter and comfort, as meager as it was. . .to dirty and seemingly unsavory subhuman individuals who were considered enemies of every state simply for being Jewish.
Yesterday’s news ran a story about the discovery of a lorry, or tractor trailer, abandoned on a road in Austria containing at least 70 dead bodies of migrants, or refugees, who were on what they thought to be a journey to freedom.
Today there was the story of another capsized ship losing possibly 500 individuals–men, women and children drowning while on their way to freedom.
There have been the stories of the Chunnel being overrun and shut down, day after day, by the thousands of migrants in Calais seeking asylum and freedom.
There was the story of an arson attack on a migrant shelter in Germany, as Angela Merkel was booed by those Germans not wanting to see Germany overrun by the hundreds of thousands of refugees seeking safe haven.
It is said that the current influx of migrants from both Africa and the Middle East is the largest exodus of people since World War II.
A humanitarian crisis of epic proportion.
The worry– how will the small European Nations absorb the millions of people running away from tyranny, abuse and horror. . .how will they be able to provide for all of these “other” people as they continue providing for their own. . .?
These refugees are different–culturally, religiously and ethnically.
Later I read a story about the marking the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.
The story told the tale of how one group of New Orleans citizens did not want the “other” New Orleans citizens, those who were the evacuees coming from the more disadvantaged areas, to cross the bridge bringing them into the more affluent neighborhoods.
These citizens were afraid of being overrun with what was thought to be unsavory individuals bringing with them drugs, crime and violence—those citizens coming from the areas which were known to be rife with such—
And I suppose some of those feelings may have been justified after we heard the stories of the rapes and murders taking place within the Superdome when it was opened to those evacuating the lower 9th ward.
Is it fear that keeps us weary, holding our arms outward not as arms offering a welcoming embrace but rather as arms pushing away and repelling those who come seeking aid and assistance?
How can we take on an endless sea of people in need–economically absorbing the astronomical costs for healthcare, housing, education, employment and assimilation?
What of the hidden terrorists among the masses?
Are we not told to be hospitable and welcoming–offering sustenance and aid to our fellow human beings who are in desperate need?
Would we not want someone to do the same for us?
One country closes its borders.
Is that fair to the other surrounding countries?
How do we feed them all?
Where will they stay?
What of those who are criminals?
What of the illness and disease they bring with them?
What of the myriad of language barriers?
What will happen to our own way of life when it yields to the incoming masses?
Do we lose ourselves, our identity, while giving of ourselves to the “other?”
I don’t know the answers to these hard questions and I don’t think the rest of the world knows the answers either–
yet I simply keep hearing these words. . .
For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’
“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
Matthew 25: 35-40
Lusia’s Long Journey Home
A young Girls’ Memoir of Surviving the Holocaust
by Lucy Lipiner
A Memoir
All But My Life
by Gerda Weissmann Klein
I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen:
not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.
C. S. Lewis
(a camouflaged praying mantis on the rubber plant / Julie Cook / 2015)
Marginalized,
lambasted,
ridiculed,
disrespected,
and ignored.
Considered. . .
foolish,
out of touch,
ignorant,
and old fashioned.
Silenced and hushed.
Mocked and scorned.
Altered and changed.
Disproven. . .or so they say. . .
I am supposedly alone in my thinking,
cast aside as one who is mad for believing.
I am told that I cannot believe nor proclaim.
There is no room for such nonsense in our culture.
It has now been cut from every corner of what ever was.
Never mind that our laws and our very government is rooted in Its Word.
The spoken Word of Law and Order
Of right and wrong. . .
Of consequence and cost. . .
It has been stricken from walls and books,
from playing fields, events and meetings.
It has been ripped from ceremonies and pledges.
Mere mention brings an assault of legalism, reprimand and anger. . .
You are correct, I have never seen nor heard nor touched. . .
And yet I continue to believe. . .
Despite your objections to the contrary,
or your attempts to call my hand. . .
or your incessant pursuits to silence my thoughts.
I believe because I have seen It all too clearly. . .
In the stars and in the moon. . .
I have heard it in the coyote’s cry and in the whippoorwill’s sad song.
I have found It in the sun that has warmed my face–
As I have found It in the mighty winds and tumultuous seas of any given storm. . .
And I have found It in the silence of loneliness and despair. . .
It is found in the face of every new born child
And It is in the bird which takes flight on the winds.
It rests in the gentle touch of the elderly.
And it sits upon the shoulders of the innocent. . .
So despite your objections and your vehement desire to erase It from my life,
as well as every other’s life. . .
I will continue to believe,
to proclaim,
to worship,
to pray,
to observe,
and to witness
You may think you can make It all go away by simply taking it all away and
pretending It just isn’t there. . .
yet His Wonders never cease. . .
May your wonders never cease
may your spirit never leave
may we ever long to see your face
and when we turn from you again
oh how quickly we forget
may we be reminded of your grace
May Your Wonders Never Cease
Lyrics by Third Day
May Your Wonders Never Cease
Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
1 Peter 1:8-9
“. . .All it takes is tuppence from you
Feed the birds, tuppence a bag
Tuppence, tuppence, tuppence a bag
Feed the birds,” that’s what she cries
While overhead, her birds fill the skies. . .”
Lyrics from Feed the Birds / Mary Poppins
(no this is not a bird / Julie Cook / 2015)
Tuppence, two pence, pennies on the dollar—that’s what it once cost to feed the birds.
A handful of bread or grain sold by a simple street vendor to be tossed out to the pigeons, who would descend en masse, happily and greedily gobbling up nary last crumb.
Today’s birds seem to have more expensive taste.
Kind of like everyone and everything else these days—some sort of bird inflation I suppose.
I paid $12.99 at Target for a sack of black oiled sunflower seeds this week, that being the sale price. A sack which fills dad’s entire feeder.
I buy my birds the nut and fruit seeds which are even more expensive.
It wouldn’t be any big deal I suppose but it’s a lot more than just birds eating the feed and that sack of Dad’s won’t last 3 days. There will be days that my birds will have to go without as they like to eat me out of house and home. And it wouldn’t be that bad had the grackles not moved in and the raccoons hadn’t figured out how to open all the feeders in the middle of the night cleaning me out of house and home.
But Dad is a different story, his birds may not go without.
I filled his feeder up last Thursday.
The feeder was empty as of Tuesday.
The phone rings and I see it’s dad calling.
I break out in a cold sweat as I fear the worst. . .one of them is down for the count and can’t get up and I need to call an ambulance and come quick.
But yesterday’s call, thankfully, was not that sort of call.
“Julie, when you come up tomorrow, how ’bout picking me up some bird feed, we’re all out”
I bought it yesterday Dad.
“Oh, you’ve got some already?”
Yes Dad, that’s what I said.
“Will you bring it with you?”
Yes Dad, it’s already in the car.
“So you’re bringing it with you?”
YES DAD!
“When are you coming?
TOMORROW. . .
This conversation lasts a while. . .
There are the cute little chipmunks at his house who scurry about on the back porch, below the feeder, scrounging for dropped seed. . . so cute. . .
Or that’s what I thought until I watched the chipmunk scamper scale up the brick, dashing tearing its way up the screen and precariously
jumping onto the feeder. . .Hummmm. . .
What a cleaver little sweet creature. . .hummmmm
“Dad, the chipmunks are climbing the house to get to the bird food. . .
“Oh I know I just love watching them, aren’t they cute. . .
Hummmmm. . .
(the chipmunk birdseed stealer as seen from Dad’s kitchen window / Julie Cook / 2015)
And yet there are other, more sinister varmints feasting on my hard bought feed.
I was sitting in the den with dad watching one of his never ending 1930 black and white movies when suddenly a loud bamming and booming hits the roof.
KAPOW
Followed by a sound of someone or something ripping the screens off the sunroom porch window frames.
DAD!!??? WHAT IN THE WORLD???!!!”
“Oh, that’s the squirrel.
He just loves the bird food”
Racing out to the porch to see what has attempted to tear part of the house off its foundation, I spy a giant grey squirrel hanging upside down from the gutter reaching his body out, stiff as a board, away from the house and grasping the feeder. I believe they call that sort of stunt planking.
The birds are now noisily perched in the trees expressing their great disdain for this usurper.
I proceed to watch this greedy grey acrobat race from the bush, to the gutter, to the screen, to the feeder over and over for the remainder of the afternoon.
Never allowing a single bird to gather near.
You should know that this squirrel is as big as a very large house cat. With the fullest prettiest tail I’ve ever seen on a squirrel. Not so for neighboring squirrels who are scrawny and lean.
Dad’s squirrel is super squirrel and he loves this squirrel.
Actually my dad loves all animals.
Not that I don’t, I certainly do but I do not give money to every organization on television who uses those sad big brown eyes staring back at me while Sarah McLachlan is sadly singing “In the arms of the angel”
This is a man who unknowingly, or knowingly as it depends on who you ask, has been giving money to what some have deemed a terrorist organization— PETA.
Not that giving money to animal rights activists is a bad thing, but the whole activist wording leaves me a bit nervous. People who kill other people because of animal violations scare me just a bit. Not that I haven’t wanted to beat people senseless who abuse animals, but to act in an organized vigilante sort of kill or be killed mentality just makes me, like I say, nervous.
I didn’t know about his funneling giving generously of money until I took over paying his bills. He had letter upon letter from PETA sitting in the black hole of an office, aka my old bedroom, when he was at his worst–just getting the mail and putting it away, never to look at it again—hence why I finally had to take over—it was either that or the IRS was going to put him in jail. Plus I feared PETA may send strong-armed big men out to get their annual, hush money, donation.
So now, we are no longer funneling giving away money except to the power company, the phone company, the gas company, the insurance company, the care service as well as to the Government. . .
And of course to big fat grey squirrels as I’m now off to buy yet another bag of feed to take up later this week.
At 26 bucks a week, I just may need to take out a tuppence loan in order to feed the birds. . .
(a small mess remains from the birds and squirrel / Julie Cook / 2015)
(the never ending feeder / Julie Cook / 2015)
There is only one day left, always starting over:
it is given to us at dawn and taken away from us at dusk.
Jean-Paul Sartre
(a southern dogface butterfly visits a freshly planted petunia / Julie Cook / 2015)
Don’t panic. . .
It’s Summer, I’m talking about Summer. . .
As in I’m done with it. . .
I’m over it. . .
As in kaput, fini, over and out!!
Actually. . .I’m talking about heat, hot, drying and dying—the tiresome end of all that was once lush, plump and thriving.
In late August, here in this deep South of mine, there is no thriving and there is barely any surviving.
Everything is leggy, yellow and very near death.
And mind you, there is many a day, during this particular time of year, that I feel very much the same.
The little flower bed, just out from our front door, had been full of snapdragons and petunias that were planted back in early Spring when the yard was overhauled.
Had any one asked me, I would not have chosen petunias—I’m just not a fan, but nobody asked me and my husband thought they looked nice. I had to go back in later, as the late frosts of Spring did a number on the petunias, so I threw in some snapdragons in order to fill the gaps. I wasn’t keen on the snapdragons either but I knew they were pretty darn hardy—
Pink snapdragons and crimson petunias.
Not my idea of color choices but again, nobody asked me.
The tiny plants did begin to thrive. . .
Filling out and covering nicely the little flower bed the landscape guys had decided to create for me.
Had I had my druthers, I would have moved the bed, enlarged it and done it a bit differently—
but again, nobody asked me.
The landscape guys had put out some very pretty pine straw all over the yard in the newly formed beds and then for some reason they added bark to the little flower bed.
We had bark once.
It washed like nobody’s business whenever it rained.
I would have a river of bark racing down the front walk requiring scooping and sweeping up after every down pour.
I was done with bark.
However the landscapers were into contrast when they were laying out the yard and again, nobody asked me.
So bark it was and bark it is.
As the Summer has worn on, like a tired old moth-eaten wool overcoat, the petunias and snapdragons have been rapidly approaching their limit. Long, tall, leggy, yellowing, more vine than leaf, shriveled and grossly unsightly. . .I could no longer stand to look at the flower bed without feeling a great sense of anxiety. . .with a touch of disgust added in.
For weeks I’ve been telling myself “not much longer. . .September is almost here. . .then you’ll be able to pull up all that crap and replant it all with some fresh wonderful crisp fall magic.”
Yes, I’ve told myself that for many weeks now.
A tiny cold front passed through the state last night–and please note I use the words cold and front with much rolling of the eyes. . .
I will admit that it did actually drop our temps to the mid 60’s this morning.
Never mind that the high was still 90ish–I’m taking that smidge of crisp and I’m running with it. . .all the way to the local the garden center.
This entire week will see me at dads, doctors, dentists so if I was going to act, it had to be today.
The only problem was that the garden center really doesn’t have in crisp fall magic yet.
They still have in hot summer same ol same ol. . .
No matter–I would make do.
I got home with my assortment of trays.
When I thought I was grabbing some pansies, I was actually grabbing trays of petunias as well as a couple of trays of snapdragons—as in been there done that, it’s too early for violas and pansies so AGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh well, no matter, they’re purple and white and they’ll do until the garden center gets in its fall crisp magic.
I chose white because I like white.
I wear a lot of black, as I like to say it hides a wealth of woe, so I suppose I like it’s opposite as in I think white looks elegant. Never mind when the white elegant blooms die, turning a sickly shade of brown and falling off–I’m sticking with elegant—
And purple because the butterflies like the purple butterfly bushes I recently put out.
I had told the landscapers I wanted some butterfly bushes—
Surprise, I didn’t get any.
Lest we remember that no one was asking and obviously no one was listening. . .
So I spent the remainder of my day cutting all the leggy spent petunias and snapdragons–leaving 3 clumps that still seemed to be “ok”
I then raked off the tired dry grey bark from the bed.
Next I spread a big ol heavy sack of soil—all over the red Georgia clay that makes up the bed.
I had wanted the landscapers to add topsoil to all the excavated ground but remember, no one was listening.
I put in two dwarf fountain grass—
why you ask—
because they caught my eye on the way to the checkout register–
I think we call that an impulse buy. . .however not to fear, I liked them.
I added my trays of the new petunias and snapdragons—experiencing a bit of deja vu as I did so.
I watered, re-spread the tired grey bark- – – but no matter as it now matches the once pretty red supple pine straw the landscapers had put out, which is now dull, crunchy and grey.
One good last watering and I was happy—well, happier than I was.
I’ll really be happy when it’s finally fall crisp and magical. . .
(work)
(more work)
(leggy and spent)
(better)
“Only in God is found safety
When my enemy pursues me
Only in God is found glory
When I am found meek and found lowly. . .”
Lyrics Only in God by John Michael Talbot
based on Psalm 62
(tiny toadstools / Troup Co / Julie Cook / 2015 )
(tiny toadstools / Troup Co / Julie Cook / 2015 )
How often do we as Christians, who are in this world yet not of the world, find ourselves in need of a source of strength, of a place of refuge or even a sanctuary of solace?
Most likely we have a church body, or a bible study, or a group of committed friends who are often our spiritual mainstay—the meat and potatoes of one’s faith.
Yet, for some of us, that is not the case and we may find that we are more alone than not, cast adrift as it were, floundering on the seas of the tempest of temptation and struggle.
No matter where we may find ourselves along our Christian journey, chances are we will find that there are those moments and times when we need, when we desperately long, to retreat inwards.
We yearn and need to seek a time of quiet—-a time for reflection, a time of prayer and a time of meditation.
For me it has been those stolen interludes, here and there over the years, of solitude when I could lose myself within the music of John Michael Talbot. Ever since I was a senior in high school, I have been drawn to the songs–to the lyrics of this rather unassuming musician.
A man whose soothing voice, as he is accompanied usually by only his guitar, would / could worshipfully sing the psalms.
There has always been a pinpoint accuracy to his simple songs of worship, adoration, imploring and lamentation. . .
Reverence, honor, genuineness and honesty.
Singing the psalms, as I imagine them to have been sung by a lone cloistered monk or nun in his or her cell, alone, lost in deep thought before both Savior and God.
I have written a previous post about John Michael Talbot and his music, as well as the impact it has had on my own spiritual journey.
https://cookiecrumbstoliveby.wordpress.com/2013/05/18/o-divine-master/
John Michael Talbot, who is more monk than anything else, is a Third Order Franciscan who lives, along with his wife, in a Catholic Community– The Little Portion Hermitage in Berryville, Arkansas.
An odd place to find a cloistered community of both lay and religious folk alike who live in a place named for St Francis’s original cloistered community in Assisi, Italy—yet it is a comfort knowing that there are such places that exist in this ever maddening world of ours.
Psalm 62 has always been one of my favorite psalms as it speaks so rawly to my own inner struggles with the unseen God of my Salvation.
It is truly in Him where I find my rest.
It is to Him I run when the world has had its way with me–leaving me battered and bruised.
A stronghold and anchor in which I may tether myself as I wait out the storms of life.
He is always greater, while I am reminded that I am indeed, forever smaller.
Yet even in all of His greatness, He not only sees and notices, but He actually knows. . .me.
And it is during such times that I am often reminded, rightfully so, that I am indeed less than.
That I can separate myself from the world—a world that so often puffs up its inhabitants steeping them in arrogance and self-centeredness.
It is difficult, if not impossible, for those who feel their worldly importance to ever humble
themselves to the Creator of all of Creation.
John Michael Talbot’s simple yet powerful rendition of Psalm 62 has always helped to recenter me—as it has always had a way of bringing me back to the beautifully complicated relationship I have with the Creator of all of Creation. . .
Truly my soul finds rest in God;
my salvation comes from him.
Truly he is my rock and my salvation;
he is my fortress, I will never be shaken.
How long will you assault me?
Would all of you throw me down—
this leaning wall, this tottering fence?
Surely they intend to topple me
from my lofty place;
they take delight in lies.
With their mouths they bless,
but in their hearts they curse.
Yes, my soul, find rest in God;
my hope comes from him.
Truly he is my rock and my salvation;
he is my fortress, I will not be shaken.
My salvation and my honor depend on God;
he is my mighty rock, my refuge.
Trust in him at all times, you people;
pour out your hearts to him,
for God is our refuge.
Surely the lowborn are but a breath,
the highborn are but a lie.
If weighed on a balance, they are nothing;
together they are only a breath.
Do not trust in extortion
or put vain hope in stolen goods;
though your riches increase,
do not set your heart on them.
One thing God has spoken,
two things I have heard:
“Power belongs to you, God,
and with you, Lord, is unfailing love”;
and, “You reward everyone
according to what they have done.”
Psalm 62
“We are homesick most for the places we have never known.”
― Carson McCullers
“The winter will be short, the summer long,
The autumn amber-hued, sunny and hot,
Tasting of cider and of scuppernong.”
Elinor Wylie
(wild growing scuppernongs after a morning rain / Troup Co, Ga / Julie Cook / 2015)
(wild scuppernongs hang high in the trees / Troup Co, Ga / Julie Cook / 2015)
What is your trigger—that certain thing, person or place. . .
when seen, heard or tasted. . .transports you to a different time, a different place?
That single something that magically erases the years and lightens your step?
Is it a smell, a perfume, a scent. . .
Perhaps the sound of bells ringing, children laughing or birds singing. . .
Maybe it’s the sight of a balloon, a leaf gently blowing in the breeze. . .
or maybe, just maybe. . .
it’s the sight of the scuppernongs hanging heavy on the vine. . .
Pour, Bacchus! the remembering wine;
Retrieve the loss of me and mine!
Vine for vine be antidote,
And the grape requite the lote!
Haste to cure the old despair,—
Reason in Nature’s lotus drenched,
The memory of ages quenched;
Give them again to shine;
Let wine repair what this undid;
And where the infection slid,
A dazzling memory revive;
Refresh the faded tints,
Recut the aged prints,
And write my old adventures with the pen
Which on the first day drew,
Upon the tablets blue,
The dancing Pleiads and eternal men.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Bacchus
line 50-65
(wild scuppernongs / Troup Co, Ga / Julie Cook / 2015)
(wild scuppernongs / Troup Co, Ga / Julie Cook / 2015)
Praying, we usually ask too much. I know I do. Sometimes we even demand. I think I am learning to ask enough for the moment–not for the whole year, utterly veiled in mystery; not even for the week, the month ahead; but just for today.
Jesus said it all when He told us to pray: ‘Give us this day our daily bread.’
That bread is not only material, it is spiritual; in asking for it, we ask for a sufficiency of strength, courage, hope and light. Enough courage for the step ahead–not for the further miles. Enough strength for the immediate task or ordeal. Enough material gain to enable us to meet our daily obligations. Enough light to see the path–right before our feet.”
― Faith Baldwin
(tiger swallowtail feasting on the butterfly bush / Julie Cook / 2015)
Both of my grandmothers always had a good response when any of the grandkids began rambling off a list of wants—to what must have seemed like a never ending and ever growing list of wants.
And as the children, as in me, my brother and cousins grew, the “wants” exponentially became grander and more expensive–
The response from my mother’s mother was her dry “your wants never hurt you” with the response from my dad’s mother being her famous and very flippant singsongy “too bad, too bad”.
Now it’s not as if these two ladies were not doting grandmothers—they certainly were as they lavished their grandkids with a great deal–it’s just that some of those lavished items were indeed wanted and giddily accepted while some things were certainly not wanted nor had they even been a thought on the list.
New clothes and affording an education to a private school, if and when the need arose, was gracious and welcomed no doubt in the eyes of parents, but in the mind of a growing grandchild, the more pressing issues were for more fadish items or candy, ice-cream, the circus, concert tickets, bikes, horses, etc. . .these were the real items to the list of wants just waiting to be filled.
Both of these ladies were born at the onset of a new century–one in rural middle Georgia the other in rural Texas. They each lived through two world wars, a great depression and a myriad of other wars, police actions and the ebbing and flowing of the security of the world. They each knew difficulties and suffered loss while growing up. They each worked hard for what they had albeit in very different fashions.
To this day, I can hear my grandmother’s “too bad, too bad” ringing in my head every time I hear myself lamenting “I wish I had a [new] _________________________.
Filling in the blank with anything that is not necessarily essential to survival.
So it is on this once again hot and overtly humid day, which is just another day in a long and never ending string of hot and humid days, that I am heard to lament. . .
“I wish it was cooler.
I wish it was Fall.
I wish the weather would change.
I wish it wasn’t so hot.
I wish it wasn’t so humid. . .”
on and on ad infinitum
And somewhere in the back of my brain, I can now hear one of those two ladies amusingly replying, “be careful what you wish for missy, you might just get it. . .”
“We need the tonic of wildness, to wade sometimes in marshes where the bittern and the meadow-hen lurk, and hear the booming of the snipe; to smell the whispering sedge where only some wilder and more solitary fowl builds her nest, and the mink crawls with its belly close to the ground.”
Henry David Thoreau
(cattails / Troup Co Ga / Julie Cook / 2015)
(cattails / Troup Co Ga / Julie Cook / 2015)
Nothing says lazy, tranquil and idyllic like a swaying patch of Typha latifolia, otherwise known as the common cattail. Nestled along the edge of any pond, creek or swampy culvert, cattails are the telltale sign of any sort of shallow standing water. Cattails stand erect, as if at attention like an army of brown little torches, they can be found growing all around the globe in or near any swampy or marshy environment.
The greek word for marsh is typha–which is most fitting for the cattail as it is truly a prolific marsh plant, that to some, is perceived as an invasive noxious weed. It is also from the word typha that we get the word typhoid—a disease spawned from fetid waters.
The cattail, often referred to as the corn dog plant, is a fast spreading tall massing plant whose leaves can grow upwards of 10 feet.
The brown “cat tail” which sits atop a long slender stalk is the “flower” of the plant.
The plant spreads either by the myriad of seeds released along the autumn winds as the brown cattail begins to breakdown or throughout the deceptively fast spreading rhizome root system. A cattail only needs shallow waters, keeping its feet wet, in order to thrive.
According to Green Deane, a naturalist and forager, cattails are edible and were even being considered by the US Army as a chief source of starch for American soldiers by the end of World War II. Cattails contain more starch than rice, potatoes or taro root. A flour made from the roots can be used in recipes just as one would use wheat flour.
Deane is the author of several books, as well as an online website and newsletter, educating readers as to the fine art of foraging for those edible wonders found in fields, glens and deep within the woods.
Deanne notes that anyone finding themselves lost and in need, who comes upon a patch of cattails, has everything he or she may need to survive– a source of fuel, a source of food, and a source or shelter.
You can read more about the common cattail, finding recipes and much more on his website:
“Eat the Weeds and other things too”
http://www.eattheweeds.com
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