Gardening Paradise

It is my ambition to keep this blog going past 100 posts. In winter this becomes difficult and so, I wander afield in subject matter. See green field above. Covered with living vegetable matter, hence...well, almost on topic?

 Post 85

While we here in the Wissahickon Valley are being Articaly vortexed, there is a spot closer to the Equator that is enjoying 80ish degree days, sun broken only occasionally by quick moments of rain, trade winds, beautiful plantings and heaps of a sophisticated, hybrid culture older and more complex than ours.

I wish I were there now! It's San Juan, Puerto Rico and it's islands, where I was less than a week ago.

There was oh, so much to do. Of course there are beaches, wonderful miles of beaches.

But so much more than just beaches.  There are forts with foundations laid in the days of Shakespeare and which last saw active duty in WWII against U boats--that's 400 years of service. You can see the WWII gun bunkers in the third picture down from here, just under the flagpoles.

From this fort, the largest, you look back at the harbor and old San Juan.

Now old San Juan can be busy, such as when there is a festival,

Or quiet and European-feeling on a slow afternoon.

When people say old world charm, they are not kidding. This is a living museum of gracefully intoxicating Hispanic architecture, ranging in time from the 16th-century to 1930.

 

For shoppers there are lots of shops. What I liked was the wealth of cultural institutions. One can go to museums, the symphony, the theatre, art galleries or just walk around and take it all in.

Plus, if you want to learn more about gardening paradise, you can go to the University of Puerto Rico's Botanical Gardens. You can walk around on your own or get an English-speaking tour guide.

I did the latter and had a lovely visit.

And yes, there is still more. There is eating and drinking.  I loved everywhere we ate but am partial to two places for drinks. One is very old school Caribbean  (I'm can see Grahme Greene having drunk here,) the other is a bar that looks like it was created by daydreaming hipsters of what an old dive bar would/should/could look like. They hit it on the nose.

First, the elegant El Convento situated in, yes, an old convent.

And then, right across the street from it, this. Great jukebox.

Oh, and there is a rain forest that makes the air happy, or something like that.

If too many pics, apologies, playing with the images makes me feel like I'm back there.
I love hot places that do not get too hot because of the breezes, cool mountains that overlook warm beaches, multi-colored waters leading out to more waters and islands, good food, good architecture, good vibes.

But yes, there is also some bad news. It seems PR has overbought bonds and it's credit rating is shaky. I hope it makes it thru this crisis and can sustainably prosper in the future. I think it would be great for the United States if it became a state.

Have Yourself a Merry

Post 84

Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmastime

This has been a tough early winter, only made more intense by my mother's having shattered her hip and gotten a hip replacement. Today my husband and I, our daughter and my father celebrated Christmas in my mom's room in a rehab hospital. And we had a good time. I packed a picnic with every one's favorite foods and  there were lots pf presents. We left when my mother started nodding off.

Because of my mom's health I went up to New York (where I grew up,) during the glittery, busy week before Christmas. And this meant that when my mom did not need me, I got to wander lit-up New York.

When I was younger I used to tell people about New York's pearly night sky, how sometimes it reflected back mauve or puce, cerise or alpine green as weather and pollution dictated. No non-New Yorker ever believed me, they were sure it was just a romantic exaggeration. But I love New York and know that nothing about it needs exaggeration. I did not add colored filters to these night photographs. Reality is enough.

Forgive me thou for the above Park Ave. glitter, Picasa added the twinkle before I figured out how to turn it off.

So--time for a Christmas evening at Tiffany's.

And at the Frick

And then throughout the town.

 And of course the Nymph of the Plaza

So Merry Christmas and God bless us, everyone.  One of the beauties of Christmas is that it is as if there is current in the atmosphere that helps us to connect to what is most benevolent, generous and real within us.. It is as if there is a cosmic slip-stream to join with that can help bring out what is best within us.We join together to celebrate it, and it brings comfort and joy.

Taking Account

Post 83

What follows isn't always easy.

Winter has come quick and hard.

Which I can spin as a good corrective to the main weakness of the garden this last summer. For now, in the advent of bleak midwinter, is a good time to take account.

What did not work in the garden this year; An excess of zinnias. I was swayed by a large, cheap flat of multicolored zinnias at the farmstand. And instead of giving the extras away as I should have, I stuck small clumps of them in places they didn't belong, where they were too tall or too multicolored  to work. And then, of course, once I realized they didn't work, they were too big and full for me to have the heart to yank them out. 

To pull off the wild garden, it can't be too wild.  Next year no tempting flats of zinnias for me. I'm going to start my own instead, and just one variety, my favorite.: Queen Red Lime. That way they will unify the garden . A garden flourishes thanks to, not only the gardener's creativity, but also their self-criticism. 

Is it really so icky out or am I just grouchy from a cold that wouldn't go away?  I'm feeling the low-energy imposture blues. Time to stop writing before the self-criticism devolves in to mawk.

Thou I will wonder, does the water in a fire hydrent freeze like all the water around it, or is there some means to keep it liquid?  As you may guess, I never had physics in High School, just chemistry and lots of biology. And I often feel the want of it. My husband says it has to do with pressure.

Empathy, Or The Second Annual Beauty of Decay Post

Post 81

For a gardener, Fall can feel traumatic. What one has loved is passing away.

It is hard not to identify with the garden if one has subcreated and tended it with love.

 

Recently, at my day job, I got a reference call. The question? What is empathy?

 

The dictionary definition was too technical for the caller; she asked me if I could explain it. I said, approximately," It's like when you watch the evening news and you see a woman crying cause someone or something has died. Part of you hurts just seeing her go through it. And you'd like to make it better for her, just like you would like things to be made better for you when you're hurting."

        

This time of year we see a lot of stuff dying around us. Even though we've been told that plants do not feel pain, their seeming demise projects a somber quality, even though the colors of the turning foliage are the essence of liveliness. It's a suggestive paradox.

A long time ago I worked at a company that was loosing money and where it felt like everyone was fighting. At lunch a co-worker and I would go and sit in a quiet corner of St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York, trying to get some peace. I remember feeling as if all the world's misery was on my shoulders. I did not know it then, but I was heading into a depression. My friend said she felt it too. There was so much constant  disruption around us, it was as if we could feel peoples' pain bleeding into the air. And all we could do was breathe it in.

 

 Like I said, long time ago. But empathy can sometimes be almost a double-edge sword. People who are sensitive to others' pain sometimes get taken advantage of because of it. They breathe in others' pain and let it become their own. And frankly, I do not know of a human being on this earth who does not have enough pain. Nobody needs more.

 

For me, this season is useful for thinking about such things. As I get older, I feel I get freer, strong enough to feel empathy but also to keep better boundaries so as not to breathe in others' pain. And I've learned to mistrust people who expect or even ask me to do so. 

                                                                               

Most of us want most of the good stuff in life, much of which most of us never get all at once. I have found I need certain things, like privacy and freedom. I feel self-conscious easily. I dislike being guided by anything but my own small portion of intelligence, my conscience and the Holy Spirit. I hate control, and I consider underhanded attempts at control mean and ugly. I like to cooperate. I like to know what is going on and the more I know what is going on, the easier it is for me to cooperate. Nevertheless, I also know that at the center of life is Mystery, one that should not be too easily defined or confined.  I believe the laborer is worthy of her or his hire. And I know that love makes things thrive and if there is no thriving, then there is no love. And that I, like most of us, need to be loved and to love. And all this, of course, is nowhere near the definition of what I need. Like everyone, I am too complex for any such shorthand. But with age, I have at least learned a few basics.

Walking through this autumn world is a chance to rehearse what's been learned during all one's  cycles of growth and decay. To feel empathy without losing boundaries. To morn with the dead and exalt with the living. To be more circumspect and subtle than innate bluntness may normally allow. To affirm, while in time, that the outworn sometimes needs to go so that the new can be given space.

To bless the beauty of decay and hopefully, but wisely, await what follows.

Dogs, Autumn Leaves and other Intimations of Immortality

Post 82

Falls coming on.

Leafy duff in piles of fluff
Beguiles my dog

Who jacknives in,
Snorts and spins.

A purple leaf
Breaths on his nose,
He smells the cloves
Warming in the wine,

As we homeward trek;

Through flecks of life once lived
Trampled rainbow signs
Of all we hoped to bid
And all we knew must die.

Any dog can smell a coming meal;

Like the brightness of dead leaves
Bringing out this brighter feel
-- To what indeed may come
When all we know is done.