Thoughts about eating well to feed your body and spirit.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
I’ve been eating young tender beans a few at a time when working in the garden, but now comes the week or two when they are abundant.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
To understand anything fully, we must know both the why and the how, to explore the meaning and the experience. Though I was taught this in connection with meditation, it applies to most anything wants both to feel fully and to be able to repeat and to communicate.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
The grapes are not nearly as bountiful as last year. The first 90F week was too early and sudden, which blasted dozens of newly formed grapes. And then it was too wet and cool. The few figs dried before ripening. But it was a great spring for kale and chard, and the cherry tomatoes are pretty happy. That the weather makes some things happier and some less happy is a tangible reminder why mono-cultures are so risky a venture. One of the greatest gifts I get from the “failures” in my edible garden is gratitude. I am reminded of how fortunate I am that the only repercussions of something not growing or producing well is that I have to buy more produce at the farm market or the grocery store.
The rains and now the heat are wondrous lovely for the mosquitoes. Here’s me dressing for a morning’s work in the garden. You might laugh, but I only got two bites in over three hours in the garden, which included watering. It likely would have been at least a dozen in loose trousers or shorts and a t-shirt. This is also the outfit of choice when hiking in the woods filled with deer and mice and lyme-disease bearing ticks.
I picked the marigolds yesterday to put on the altar. The puja card of the day was “balance” or “samtulana.” It was a perfect concept to meditate on for the day because little brings me back into balance better than spending a few hours gardening, and I’ve been feeling off-kilter.
Uma, of course, was there to lend moral support.
The “before” picture gives some idea of how simultaneously overgrown from the rains and heat-blasted from the past week everything was.
The “after” picture doesn’t reflect as much as I would like how much of a difference three and a half hours of weeding, deadheading, clipping, rearranging, harvesting, feeding, and watering made. When I got hungry, I just picked sun-warmed, just ripened grapes and then got back to work. Lunch, of course, emphasized contributions from the garden.
I went out into the garden right after I sat for meditation this morning. Even at 7 a.m., the air was hot summer thick. I harvested cherry tomatoes, a handful of green beans, a cucumber, a red onion, and some garlic greens, basil, and a jalapeno pepper. Then I went back inside and practiced some asana and cleaned house in anticipation of a guest arriving for lunch. I weeded a little, but did not fully plunge into all that could be done.
I have lots of epazote. Anybody need some for planting or for cooking? I let only a little go to seed many years ago, and it comes back in force every year. I let it grow wild between the bricks of my patio, but keep it out of beds and containers. It could be a real challenge in a more open garden, but in my constricted, urban setting, inviting the useful, invasive plants to grow where nothing else will grow is a good use of space.
Last week’s DOL elevator poster.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
And just about any other endeavor or creation in life.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
It may be true that power that gives power over corrupts, but being empowered is liberating. The yoga, when practiced as part of an ethical life, is empowering. But beware those who claim that “enlightenment” frees one from behaving with integrity.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
By all means, wish. But then contemplate, evaluate, explore, and act. For as we know, merely wishing won’t make it so and many of our wishes are not what we really want when we think about the work to effectuate and the consequences of realizing them.
What do you truly wish for? For what are you truly willing to focus your energy and attention?
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
Tonight in the moist tropical air of Andrea and her wake, the garden is outrageously blowsy. It will be a marvel when the sun heats it up again.
