At some point the layers of my gardening life, vocation & avocation, became my-life. Collateral layers included. For at least 2 decades I've known the joy of birthdays almost daily. Akebia comes into bloom, its fragrance wafting? My dear friend Akebia coming into bloom again, letting me know in the best dramatic performance ever, I've survived another year, happy birthday. Oakleaf hydrangea blowing into full bloom as if snow has fallen in early summer, another birthday, Azalea 'George Tabor' opening his large pink gramophone horn shaped flowers, birthday greetings. Trees dropping their leaves in fall, ahead of brutal winter, yet growing stronger from the humus of those leaves, what-they-let-go-of, a birthday epiphany each fall. You get the idea. Oddly, the date of my arrival on Earth? Feels insignificant compared to all the other birthdays given.
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Books. How many books have taught me more than 2 college degrees, and been kind/nurturing in the lessons? The learning & kindnesses alone, mark them as family.
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My dogs & cats. Sure too many are already gone, but their loving memory still nurtures as family along with those still here. Those in memory? Sure, my grandma has been gone since early 1983, yet daily she's apart of my life.
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Nature, the one I work with, play with, even earn my living from. Another member of my family.
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Finally, getting to my inner circle of friends. Family.
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Unable to have children, tried-tried-tried, do I feel like I'm missing out on life, or even a full life? No. A well meaning 'friend' recently told me his children were his legacy. My reaction was to feel sorry for him, yet he went on to say he felt sorry for me. Seeing Mother Teresa's quote, gave me the spiritual science behind why I felt sorry for my friend. His family circle is too small.
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Smiled seeing picture, below. Nature wins, always. Designing landscapes, I know who I am truly designing for, and where my 'work' will eventually be, with Nature.
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“If I know a song of Africa, of the giraffe and the African new moon lying on her back, of the plows in the fields and the sweaty faces of the coffee pickers, does Africa know a song of me? Will the air over the plain quiver with a color that I have had on, or the children invent a game in which my name is, or the full moon throw a shadow over the gravel of the drive that was like me, or will the eagles of the Ngong Hills look out for me?”
― Karen Blixen
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Karen Blixen's quote, above, beautiful. Yet for so long, a beautiful enigma. Now, answer to her question, obvious. Africa was Karen Blixen's family. She went further, drawing an even larger circle, writing a book about her family, sharing with anyone willing to accept her gift.
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"Science in its beginnings was due to men who were in love with the world. They perceived the beauty of the stars and the sea, of the winds and the mountains. Because they loved them their thoughts dwelt upon them, and they wished to understand them more intimately than a mere outward contemplation made possible. “The world,” said Heraclitus, “is an ever living fire, with measures kindling and measures going out.” Heraclitus and the other Ionian philosophers, from whom came the first impulse to scientific knowledge, felt the strange beauty of the world almost like a madness in the blood. They were men of Titanic passionate intellect, and from the intensity of their intellectual passion the whole movement of the modern world has sprung. But step by step, as science has developed, the impulse of love which gave it birth has been increasingly thwarted, while the impulse of power, which was at first a mere camp-follower, has gradually usurped command in virtue of its unforeseen success. The lover of nature has been baffled, the tyrant over nature has been rewarded." Bertrand Russell
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"In the conscious desires of the man who seeks power for its own sake there is something dusty: when he has it he wants only more power, and does not find rest in contemplation of what he has. The lover, the poet and the mystic find a fuller satisfaction than the seeker after power can ever know, since they can rest in the object of their love, whereas the seeker after power must be perpetually engaged in some fresh manipulation if he is not to suffer from a sense of emptiness. I think therefore that the satisfactions of the lover, using the word in its broadest sense, exceed the satisfactions of the tyrant, and deserve a higher place among the ends of life." Bertrand Russell
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Pic, above, here.
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Gardening, gardening historically, understanding the myriad birthdays my garden gives, led to an epiphany about time. It's all I have. Time.
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At a meeting Lois started, a 12-step meeting, I remember well these sharings, "Yesterday is as old as the pyramids.", "Keep your head where your butt is.", and "What I say and do reflects on me, what another says/does reflects on them." Of course, "Do the next right thing." stays at the top of the list.
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Much goes thru the funnel, and we are merely left with time, and how we wish to fill it. Time, a day at a time. It's obvious where I go for joy, love, meaning, answers.
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"The supply of time is truly a daily miracle. You wake up in the morning and lo! your purse is magically filled with 24 hours of the unmanufactured tissue of the universe of your life! It is yours.
Karen Blixen's quote, above, beautiful. Yet for so long, a beautiful enigma. Now, answer to her question, obvious. Africa was Karen Blixen's family. She went further, drawing an even larger circle, writing a book about her family, sharing with anyone willing to accept her gift.
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"Science in its beginnings was due to men who were in love with the world. They perceived the beauty of the stars and the sea, of the winds and the mountains. Because they loved them their thoughts dwelt upon them, and they wished to understand them more intimately than a mere outward contemplation made possible. “The world,” said Heraclitus, “is an ever living fire, with measures kindling and measures going out.” Heraclitus and the other Ionian philosophers, from whom came the first impulse to scientific knowledge, felt the strange beauty of the world almost like a madness in the blood. They were men of Titanic passionate intellect, and from the intensity of their intellectual passion the whole movement of the modern world has sprung. But step by step, as science has developed, the impulse of love which gave it birth has been increasingly thwarted, while the impulse of power, which was at first a mere camp-follower, has gradually usurped command in virtue of its unforeseen success. The lover of nature has been baffled, the tyrant over nature has been rewarded." Bertrand Russell
.
"In the conscious desires of the man who seeks power for its own sake there is something dusty: when he has it he wants only more power, and does not find rest in contemplation of what he has. The lover, the poet and the mystic find a fuller satisfaction than the seeker after power can ever know, since they can rest in the object of their love, whereas the seeker after power must be perpetually engaged in some fresh manipulation if he is not to suffer from a sense of emptiness. I think therefore that the satisfactions of the lover, using the word in its broadest sense, exceed the satisfactions of the tyrant, and deserve a higher place among the ends of life." Bertrand Russell
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Pic, above, here.
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Gardening, gardening historically, understanding the myriad birthdays my garden gives, led to an epiphany about time. It's all I have. Time.
.
At a meeting Lois started, a 12-step meeting, I remember well these sharings, "Yesterday is as old as the pyramids.", "Keep your head where your butt is.", and "What I say and do reflects on me, what another says/does reflects on them." Of course, "Do the next right thing." stays at the top of the list.
.
Much goes thru the funnel, and we are merely left with time, and how we wish to fill it. Time, a day at a time. It's obvious where I go for joy, love, meaning, answers.
.
"The supply of time is truly a daily miracle. You wake up in the morning and lo! your purse is magically filled with 24 hours of the unmanufactured tissue of the universe of your life! It is yours.
....You cannot draw on the future. Impossible to get into debt! You can only waste the passing moment. You cannot waste tomorrow, it is kept from you.
....You have to live on this 24 hours of time. Out of it you have to spin health, pleasure, money, content, respect and the evolution of your immortal soul. Its right use…is a matter of the highest urgency.
....We shall never have more time. We have, and have always had, all the time there is." Arnold Bennett, 1867-1931, How To Live On 24 Hours A Day.
Seeing the pic, above, now you know a few of the reasons it makes me smile. And some of the types of fuel used in my work/life. Almost daily, acquiring new fuel, just as Mother Teresa's quote was in a note arriving this morning. Fuel.
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Gardening, personally/professionally, never intuited as a few plants here/there.
Garden & Be Well, XOT
2 comments:
I've hiked through the jungles of the Yucatan and come across ficus trees with aerated roots, each as big around as a large man. Like the photo of the ruin in your blog, it's easy to see how powerful and disruptive nature can be when left to its own devices. The roots seep into Mayan ruins and break them into unrecognizable pieces. Thanks for the memory, Tara! xoxox, Brenda
Brilliant!!
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