Therapy amongst the mint

“All of earth is crammed with heaven
And every bush aflame with God
But only those who see take off their shoes.”
Elizabeth Barrett Browning

“The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God. Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be and that God wishes to see people happy, amidst the simple beauty of nature. As long as this exists, and it certainly always will, I know that then there will always be comfort for every sorrow, whatever the circumstances may be. And I firmly believe that nature brings solace in all troubles.”
Anne Frank

(a clump of freshly pulled mint mixed in a pile of roots / Julie Cook / 2015)

The air was punctuated with the pungent aroma of mint and basil mingled with a heavy dose of loamy moist dirt.
I had taken pruning shears with me, but put them aside in favor of my two gloved hands.
My intent was to simply cut it all back but instead I opted to hopefully rid my yard and life of the invasive mayhem.

The growing green mass had covered the whole front corner of the bed by the garage and was set to cover up Mimi’s ancient cement bench if something wasn’t done and done soon to stop this almost giddy encroachment.

My heart has felt much the same in recent days, overrun and over burdened with and by the onslaught of the grim global headlines.

The now burgeoning sickly yellowish green patch is usually the first thing in the yard to show its tender new verdant foliage during those sleepy hopeful wee days between winter and spring. It’s what gives me hope that life, rebirth, regrowth and Spring will indeed vanquish Old Man Winter while ushering in welcoming warmer days.

As I wondered about how best to tackle the latest infestation of overgrowth in the shrub bed, my thoughts wandered a world away to what or whom would or could now vanquish the sweeping global sorrows that were entangling both my heart and soul.

Come late Summer. . .when life is dried out and burned out, just as the seasons prepare to knock on the door of Autumn, the leggy gangly masses have become a truly unsightly tangled mess of tired and spent. As in I’m just ready to cut it all away, rid my life of the jumbled mess and happily welcome in some cool crisp colorful order.

I wish I could easily do the same for our hurting planet.

I’ve always found solace in working with my hands.
The more manual the labor the more productive and alive I feel.
There is a cleansing honesty in working with one’s hands.
Never mind that my back has been giving me fits, never mind the heat index is still in the triple digits, I will gladly get down and dirty, as the sun continues to bake the world, for working hard in the yard is good for the soul, the mind and often literally the heart.

Oh that it could be so easy with this greatly burdened world of ours.

As a true Southerner I’ve grown up with mint sprouting from every yard I’ve ever called home. What better accompaniment to one’s tea or julep, depending on your preference, than a sprig of fresh mint? Anyone will tell you mint is easy, as in it grows itself. In fact it’s just a little too easy, as in too eager and way too invasive. It’s more like a weed gone wild then a treasured herb. Plus everyone who does any work in a garden will tell you, any novice can grow mint— it offers instant gratification to the more hesitant would-be gardeners among us.

But my mint patch has been on the run and I had to stop it before things got anymore out of hand. Rather than cut it back, just for it to sprout right back to this same spreading madness within a few days, I took to pulling it up, by the long lanky root full. Even poor ol St Francis had to be laid on his side just so I could get to what was running under my favorite saint’s feet. I don’t think he was much bothered by the intrusion.

As I yanked and pulled, buried just under the top layer of straw and soil, was a criss crossing network of an eerily bone white root system stretching for what seemed to be miles. With each tugged, pulled and unearthed jumble of lanky roots and dirt, earwigs and beetles alike scurried helter skelter, madly seeking a dark cloak of safety in the damp compost soil.

The more my thoughts drifted over the latest mounding national and global turmoils, I pulled harder and deeper. Sweat trickled down my face, pooling at the tip of my nose before dripping and disappearing into the blackened soil. The sweat seemed to reach across the globe mingling with the tears of those thousands of people now walking hundreds of miles in search of asylum and safety.

As the morning turned to afternoon, I had finally pulled up the last of the mint. The piles were now all raked up, the walkway swept and the pine straw smoothed as the shrub bed now had a delightfully clean and fresh look.

I still had no grand revelations as to how to help the ever growing global crises sweeping across our lives nor how to ease the lingering tensions within our own Nation. I was hot, tired and weary of body, but there was oddly a refreshing clarity of thought.
No longer did I feel totally overwhelmed or at a loss.
Still not knowing where to even begin to help, I gratefully no longer felt as defeated as I had.
There’s just something about physical labor, with it’s overwhelming beginning and productive ending, that gives hope to the overwhelming obstacles of life. . . hope that we can indeed tackle and eventually overcome the litany of misery facing our current global family.

I trust we will be able to do so. . .
for only in God, comes hope to the hopeless, and strength to the weak. . .

Bear one another’s burdens, and thereby fulfill the law of Christ.
Galatians 6:10

“Let me arise and open the gate, to breathe
the wild warm air of the heath,
And to let in Love, and to let out Hate,
And anger at living and scorn of Fate,
To let in Life, and to let out Death.”
Violet Fane

Tenacious

“Real courage is when you know you’re licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what.”
― Harper Lee

(a couple of volunteer pansies popping up / Julie Cook / 2014)

The garden of Winter stands empty and bare.
Lush rich canopies, once towering overhead, are now all but forgotten
Only gnarly sticks and branches, jutting precariously helter skelter,
stand as the lonely sentinels of the yard.
Once an oasis of cool green grass offered a refreshing respite for hot tired toes,
now all that was, stands garishly transformed, stunted and brown
As a blanket of grey wraps its cold arms around everything in sight.

Yet just under the veil of freshly fallen snow
or perhaps it was just after the latest hard freeze,
a demure, yet tenacious wonder, appears.
Short and stocky, yet perky and hardy
joyful little face-like blooms emerge one by one.

No other color or tender blossom dares tread this time of year
as the frosty winter air is not for timid or faint of heart.
Nevertheless take courage you who are cold and weary–
as you who suffer, laying waste under the wiles of Old Man Winter’s wicked spite,
for there is one who stands valiantly at the ready to offer both
color and hope to your worn and bleary senses. . .
for behold the lowly pansy readies for a fight.

Hurry, get ready, it’s coming

If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant: if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.”
Anne Bradstreet

(image taken using a trail camera / Troup, Co. Georgia / Julie Cook / 2014)

Pausing briefly, this Sunday morning in order to welcome a new month to the calendar, this the first wee days of March, I cannot help but feel a great deal of anticipation.
Anticipation because I know that with March comes more warm days than cold.
Longer days than short.
More growth than death.
More sun than cloud. . .
or so we hope.

Old Man Winter is not dead and gone by any stretch of the imagination but He is in the death throws as the ending of another winter grasps for its final breath—for which, I am thankful.

I say all of this as I also find myself filled with a bit of foreboding trepidation on this beautiful brand new morning to a brand new month.
With the arrival of Spring, and all of its splendid glory, an epic climatic battle of the seasons is destained to ensue, relegating us mere mortals to that of spectator and victim.

The ferocity of the clash between a dying winter and a blooming Spring comes at a tremendous cost to Earth’s inhabitants. Such encounters seem only to be more fierce in recent memory. Looming somewhere in the atmosphere, as days warm and winter continues to fuel the strong north winds, the inevitable meeting of these two bodies of energy, warm and cold, spawns a fury that sends chills down the spine the most seasoned farmer, metrologist and emergency responder.

It is the phenomena known as the Tornado.

So whereas I am more than ready to welcome in a more temperate climate, sans winter’s cold winds and gray skies, I do so with one eye turned ever skyward, silently offering a small prayer, not today Lord, please not today.

Will you still be here tomorrow?

I have you fast in my fortress,
And will not let you depart,
But put you down into the dungeon
In the round-tower of my heart.

And there will I keep you forever,
Yes, forever and a day,
Till the walls shall crumble to ruin,
And moulder in dust away.”
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

(images of the ornamental quince bushes trying in vain to bloom / Julie Cook / 2014)

With warming sun and temperate rains, the tiny calling cards of a desperate Spring, fighting to make its presence known, eagerly appear.
Ever so stealthy and secret, an army of blooms rise upward as if magically appearing from barren wood, all preparing to do battle against the unseen enemy.

We have naively relaxed our guard as we’ve shed coats and gloves, noting how marvelous a warming sun feels against our now pasty dry white and ashy brown skin. We forget the calendar reads February as thoughts of spring wardrobes dance around our heads.
Are those sandals suddenly appearing on those blindingly white feet of yours?

63 degrees feels like heaven to skin that has hunkered down inside of sweaters and coats for almost 4 long frigid months.
Pull out the plants which have been hibernating in sheds and basements!
Till the garden!
Prune the scraggly shrubbery!
The seed packets have arrived ready for planting.
There’s talk of Easter in the air. . .

But wait.
We have not yet survived our 40 days of fasting and reflection for a Lenten season.
We have not yet had to beware the Ides of March.
Were we not just recalling our loves on Valentine’s Day?
Did not the groundhog just sound the ominous warning of 6 more weeks?
Oh get behind me you specter of falsehood and empty promises.

For tomorrow the cold northwest winds will return with rumors of snow flakes dancing through the grey clouds.
The battle wages on.
Freezing air will blow across a changing landscape with a vengeful glee, gaily sucking those waning warming images from our vision.
The coats, the gloves, the scarves, so hastily banished to the recesses of closets, must be summoned to duty once more.
For Old Man Winter has not moved on but has merely been napping.

So rest well this last night my tiny splashes of color.
For tomorrow you will sadly wither, giving up the ghost in a losing battle
You will turn from today’s deep mauves and bright chartreuse back to the sickeningly shades of browns and grey we had grown wearily accustomed to. . .oh but for another day dear Spring.

A show of hands please, who’s ready for Spring?

“What a severe yet master artist old Winter is….No longer the canvas and the pigments, but the marble and the chisel.”
John Burroughs

Barbed wire is not so sharp with an icy coating

Yesterday we shrugged under a heavy coating of ice—every thing inanimate and not moving fell victim to the cold touch of what the ancients would recognize as Ymir, the norse god of ice. This morning Mother Nature must have spoken kindly to Old Man Winter, as we were greeted by a covering of snow onto of the already think coating of ice, making things so much more bearable to behold.

The buds of the blueberry bushes now lie encased in a tomb of ice:

Nandina berries offer beautiful contrast to their coat of white:

The squirrels will have a difficult time gathering these acorns turned popsicles:

Are the weeds more tolerable when painted in shades of snow and ice?

**It must be noted that I took these pictures yesterday morning. By mid-morning the sun reappeared as the temperatures rose into the 40’s—this morning there is very little left as a reminder of the storm, that on Monday, the forecasters were predicting to be “Epic and Catastrophic”—amazing what a few hours of sun and warmth can do to Old Man Winter!!

A treacherous beauty has arrived

“It occurs to me now that I have never seen the ice-storm put upon canvas, and have not heard that any painter has tried to do it. I wonder why that is. Is it that paint cannot counterfeit the intense blaze of a sun-flooded jewel?”
Mark Twain

Along the moonless landscape, under the cover of darkness, crept a primordial spirit working with sinister glee–toiling throughout the long night painting a dangerously beautiful masterpiece. The innocents who slumbered, wrapped warm in the chaste dreams of ignorant bliss, would soon awaken to a new diamond encrusted twinkling world.

The ancients knew the spirit as Woden or Cailleach Bheur, today it is Old Man Winter who has come calling. With a single sweeping motion of an ice ladened brush, the world has been transformed. Gone from the fleshy fabric of Mother Nature’s genteel handiwork, with the joy of her tactile beauty, is the very essence of life’s warmth. For now, as far as the eye can see, lies a glistening cold, heartless prism.

With each gust of wind, the eery jingle of the massive wind chimes of limbs, full with ice clanging against ice, groaning under the weight of a mantle of water transformed, reminding the brave, who venture out, to be wary of all things overhead. The trees now alive with the rustling of the shimming sound of heaviness. In the distance the familiar roar of an explosion—wood shattering under the crushing weight of its tomb of frozen water.

For unto us this day, the world we know has been transformed.
Foreign yet strangely familiar.
Dangerously tempting, like the alluring siren who, beckoning to all weary travels to come gaze upon the beauty, falsely offers safety and security. Beware of those things that glitter, for not all are meant to be embraced. . .

A season of texture and tones

The true worth of a man is not to be found in man himself, but in the colours and textures that come alive in others.”
Albert Schweitzer

(Pinecones from Dad’s yard, along with a fungus covered dead branch, Julie Cook 2013)

With the rapidly approaching official arrival of winter we are, no doubt, beginning to feel as if we are spiraling into a type of color withdrawal. Gone are the beautiful scarlets, golds and burnt oranges of Autumn; gone are the golden swaying wheat fields and the intoxicatingly beautiful jasmine and honeysuckle of Summer; gone are the vibrant explosives reds, blues, greens and lavenders, of Spring. For in this deep slumbering shadow of the calendar, we are left with an empty void of nothingness, or for some, a giant blanket of white encasing every living and non-living thing as far as the eye can see.

Yet in this perceived void of lacking and emptiness, there remains a very important component to our field of vision, for suddenly open for the entire world to view, the earth lies naked before both creature and man— exposed, unprotected and vulnerable. Gone are the colorful coverings of flowers and leaves which act as accessorizing baubles and wrappings. Gone are the tall grasses and heavy ladened branches bearing fruit and flower. What remains is an intricately woven skeletal system, the undercarriage of our natural world.

Cautiously, and a bit weary, we peer out upon this barren landscape, sad and forlorn, fearing that we are doomed to grey gloomy skies, long dark nights and a lack of visual stimulation. But thankfully a slow hesitant joy begins to claim our mood, for upon closer inspection we realize that we are not the helpless victims of Loss and Void, but rather we discover that we have been granted a tiny treasured lagniappe, a treat for all of our senses, for spread out majestically before us is a different type of visual splendor—one which appears more delicate and almost fragile than what had departed–for here, in what we now find at our grasp, is beauty in its most basic simplicity.

Branches, limbs, sticks, stones, straw, bark, cones and moss—these are the bare essentials which Nature generously offers to our visually weary senses. Wonderfully we rejoice for we now know that we have not been flung out helplessly to fester in a world of monotones and dull eyed death. Here in this seemingly cold and barren world– beauty is to be had, to be seen and to be touched. The visual wonders still abound.

These visual treasures are not the garish over the top harlots of those previous seasons, but rather these beauties remain understated, subtle and quiet. They speak of structure, shape, texture and tone offering us a tactile reminder that our visual needs have not been forgotten. Old man Winter may be hard and harsh, but he is not unkind. As you fight the deep calling to venture outside to a world of cold wind, freezing rain and gloomy grays, do not be discouraged—Nature knows your need and she has provided.