The Colors Of Life

Mother Nature's greatest gift to us are the flowers of spring. After the seemingly endless dark, gray days of winter, springs flowers burst forth in brilliant, colorful splendor. One day it is only the pointy, green tops of the leaves poking through the soil. The next, the tender cups of daffodils raise their bright, yellow heads to the sun. Along about the same time come the hyacinth in their purples and whites, and then the tulips in a variety of colors (I happen to favor the red ones myself). Finally the forsythia go from green buds to vibrant yellows. It seems as if everywhere I turn someone has a bush or a row of bushes waving their hello as I pass by.

I have always thought that the colors of spring are the most beautiful of all. Sadly, they last for such a short time before dying back until next spring to make way for Nature's summer pallet. After only two or so months they are gone. Thinking about this gave me pause to see a connection between the short lived colors of springs and our own lives.

In the context of time as we know it, our lives are but an instant. Before we know it we wake up one morning to find we are thinking about things like retirement and grandchildren when only yesterday we were playing with our own little ones in the sun. The brilliant colors of our springtime have slipped away, or so it seems. But there is so much yet before us to experience, all the wonderful colors of summer roses and ripe, red tomatoes, and the burning beauty of autumn leaves. We are only leaving one season behind us so we can move on to the next season of our lives. Each one has their own beauty, their own discoveries and their own treasures to discover.

Today I potted some beautiful dianthus that were given to me by a friend. They are sitting on my porch soaking up the sun. By summer's end I suspect they will have filled in enough that I will have to split them up into two pots. For now they are resting on a table two stories above the daffodils and hyacinths that are sitting in neat little rows like soldiers beneath my windows. When they have spent their last bit of yellows and whites, they will slip back into sleep and the deep, dark pinks of the dianthus will hold my attention over the summer, along with pots of dark green herbs and purple tipped lavender. So much to look forward to. So many wonders yet to unfold, in life as well as in the garden.

And so it is.

To The Seventh Generation

"I wish for a world that deserves my children ..." Someone sent me a clip of an interview with the late Dr. David Simon, co-founder with Deepak Chopra of the Chopra Center for Wellness in California, filmed shortly before his death not too long ago. When I heard him speak these words, I was reminded of something I was told a long time ago by a very wise medicine woman. She told me Native American children are taught that, before you speak a word or perform an action, remember that the consequences of those words or that action will be felt by the next seven generations. In other words, by our children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and so on.

That is a very powerful thought. Would you want the words your are speaking, the thoughts you are thinking, or the actions you are taking, to be felt by those that will come after you? Is that how you would want your children and their children to remember you?

I am a grandmother. I think that fact made me more sensitive to what Dr. Simon said in that interview: "I wish for a world that deserves my children ..." Well, Dr. Simon, I wish for a world that deserves my grandchildren and after recent events, frankly, I'm not so sure it does. Most of the time I look around me and see more and more people becoming involved in issues  that will certainly affect our children and grandchildren, things such as renewable energy, organic foods, and sustainability. Then an event like the bombings at the Boston Marathon happens and you wonder what it's all for if my grandchildren's biggest fear will be whether they can safely go outside to play without someone wanting to kill them.

We are not a perfect society, but we are certainly better than this. We may have our differences and our problems, but there is no difference or problem so big that a compromise cannot be found, or an answer to a problem left unsolved. While we're busy fighting over who gets to have the guns, the bombers are having a field day. Might the problem not be with the means of destruction, but the reason for it? If we all want the same things - peace, prosperity, a safe home, a decent life, a purpose for our lives - is blowing each other up really going to get us those things, or is learning to live in harmony with everyone rowing the boat in the same direction a slightly better idea?

Not too long ago I heard a woman writer talking about her experience speaking to a Native American man at a book conference. He told her it was time for the women to step forward and take over because the men had been in charge for a long time and weren't doing too well! So I'm thinking maybe it's time that the mothers and grandmothers made the guys in charge step aside and let us get in there. We certainly couldn't do any worse and I suspect we could do a whole lot better.

Besides, I've got an even bigger reason to want to see our world return to peace ... I recently found out that I will be a great-grandmother for the first time in September (a very young and vivacious great-grandmother, mind you - emphasis on the "great")! My investment in this old world just got a whole lot bigger - we're on generation #5! I don't want to have to explain to my great-grandchild why Grammy didn't save the world for him, do you?

And so it is.

Embracing Change

If there is one word to describe the legacy of the Boomer Generation, it is Change. We have seen music go from vinyl records to getting our music from "the cloud." Computers have shrunk from the once mammoth machines that filled entire rooms to the size of a small notebook that slips easily into your purse. We have put a man on the moon, an African American in the White House, and women in jobs they only once dreamed of. We have also, sadly, seen our soil attacked in the most brutal way imaginable for the first time since The War of 1812 and once happy trips home to see Grandma now involve taking off our shoes to look for explosives and full body scans. Is it any wonder that as we get older we look for things to cling to, for the unchangeable, to provide some sense of being grounded, to "Be Here Now" as Ram Dass taught us.

For me, that idea, that thing to cling to, was gardening. There was a sense that regardless of what was going on in the world, be it technology or politics, I knew that night followed day, sunrise followed sunset, and the seasons came and went in a normal, natural progression that I could count on. I put the seeds in the ground, I watered and fed, I raked and weeded (and even talked to them), and I got the results I expected except for the occasional drought or hail storm. As long as I was planted in my garden along with the flowers, veggies and neighborhood wild life, all was well in my world.

The one thing I didn't have any control over was the economy. I still had to work to support myself and jobs in my area of upstate New York were disappearing as fast as my sunflowers after a particularly hardy invasion of woodchucks. Alas, after 8 blissful years, I had to give up my lovely country town and my little piece of heaven outside to move closer to where the jobs were ... and ended up in a small apartment with a screened in porch.

I moved in August, at almost the end of the growing season. I dug up a few plants that I felt would travel well and put them in pots in the back of the car to take them almost 30 miles south of where I had been living. All winter I sat and stared at that porch, mourning over my garden and wondering how I would ever survive with all the traffic and concrete. By spring I had created in my mind an outrageously ambitious plan for the porch. I built a small metal arch with flower boxes at each end up which I imagined morning glories and moon flowers climbing. I surrounded the arch with a small plastic fence enclosing huge patio pots of flowers. From the hanging planters on the walls I grew herbs and begonias. There wasn't much room to sit and enjoy the view but I didn't care. I had my garden.

A few tips about porch gardening: if you live on the top floor of a building that faces west, you can expect to the take the brunt of any summer storms. By brunt I mean like tornado force winds that toppled the arch and tore out the morning glories. The flowers in the floor planters were so heavy that I was unable to move them indoors and some of them never came back from the drowning they took in that first storm of the season ... and one of the cats ate all the chives.

 So what was the lesson I learned from this experience? Maybe the word "adapt" is a word we can exchange for the word "change." Maybe instead of digging in and saying, "no, no more changes," we can use the wisdom we've gained from all of the other changes in our lives and say instead, "how can I make this work?" So I stopped watching HGTV shows on yard gardening and landscaping and started researching container gardening. I talked to people in my new neighborhood about what worked here and what didn't. Now I have an soft, inviting garden room in the summer with vertical boxes on the wall and plant hangers I can easily lift and move when a storm rolls in. I added charming elements like wind chimes and small garden sculptures (like Mr Toad from Wind In The Willows and a stone lighthouse), and hung a colorful flag on the wall. I swear that if it was not for the screen, the neighborhood birds would be in there with me, so many hang out on the railing outside.

Change doesn't have to always be painful. Sometimes it can be an opportunity to see how much we've grown and what new wonders there are to discover. Boomers never really get old - we just keep reinventing ourselves. Rock on!

And so it is.

It's Much Easier Being Green

I'll bet you read that title and thought, "oh, it's another conversation about going "green" and shrinking our carbon footprint. Nope, not at all. This post is about the handsome gentleman below:

Yes, that debonair, multi-talented, award winning frog we've all come to know and love. I saw this poster hanging on a window at my local library and it got me to thinking about self acceptance and age.

Did you know that our beloved friend here is 55 years old? That would make his girlfriend, Miss Piggy, about the same age (I'm not going to be the one to tell here, are you? I don't believe age has helped her deal with her anger issues). As I stood looking at this poster I started hearing his voice singing in my mind: "It"s not easy being green." I looked up the lyrics when I got home and revisited the feeling that Kermit was trying to get across. He talked about being ordinary and blending in with the rest of world - nothing special. Then he realizes what a wonderful color green is ("green is the color of spring"), how there are so many wonderful things that green reminds us of, and how unique and special he really is.

So now our Kermit is into middle age and is proof positive that we can go forth and boldly live our dreams no matter what our color, age, food habits or lifestyle (plus you have to admire his courage for dating that pig).

Each one of us is unique and special in our own way. Sure, we may think we're nothing special, or that we have nothing out of the ordinary to offer the world, but we are much more than we know, braver than we believe, and gifted beyond our imagination. How we appear to the world has nothing to do with it, especially when it comes to age. Although we cannot see them, I'm sure Kermit is hiding a few grey hairs underneath all of that green (do frogs have hair?). We can still move forward on the path to our dreams even if they've been hiding under a lily pad for 50 years. Just climb out onto that log and start singing (but watch out for pigs who know karate).

And so it is.

No Expiration Date

During my novice years learning to garden, and grow myself in the process along with the flowers and veggies, I became obsessed with learning everything there was to learn on the subject. Let's face it, I came to gardening later in life and felt I had a great deal of catching up to do. So I became an ardent fan of Victory Garden and HGTV, and read every book and magazine I could find. However, some of the best education and advice I got came from the gracious women I got to know in my adopted home town. It would come in casual conversation and news shared with the neighbor next door, the ladies picking up their mail at the post office and striking up a conversation about the weather and their gardens, visits to the meetings of the historical society and garden clubs, or whoever might be hanging out in Riley's Diner over a cup of coffee. There is nothing to compare with learning about gardening from those who have it in their blood passed down from generation to generation.

One of the things I learned that surprised me the most was that seeds packets have an expiration date. Really? Who would have thought? After all, to my inexperienced eye they already looked old and dried up. How did you tell if they had "gone bad?" Did they start to smell like old milk? Grow mold like forgotten leftovers in the back of the frig? "You'll know," they told me, and indeed, I did ... when you plant them, nothing grows! Nothing like the obvious, right?

Thankfully, the same premise does not hold true for dreams: There is  no expiration date on dreams! It doesn't matter how long you've had them. True, you may have to take them down off the dark shelf of your mind where you've been hiding them all of these years and dust them off. You may even have to update them given today's technology or changing ideas. It doesn't matter if you are a novice, an old hand, or somewhere in-between. Dreams never lose their capacity to grow into something wonderful.

I think this is a perfect time to reflect on this idea as we get ready to celebrate resurrection, new birth and new beginnings. The robins are back and busy building new nests. Tiny buds are sprouting on the trees with the promise of something more to come. Gardeners everywhere are raking out the debris of the past and preparing the ground for the garden they've been dreaming about all winter.

Winter is over, my friends. Break out the gardening equipment. Dust off those dreams. Get busy.

And so it is.

Learning To Fly

As winter continues its seemingly endless temper tantrum here in the Northeast, signs of spring, although rare, are starting to show themselves. The one I look for with the most anticipation, or I should say "listen for," is the return of the birds that flew off for warmer climates before the first snow flake hit the ground. There is nothing more beautiful to wake up to in the morning than a robin's song outside of your window.

Part of the anticipation of the birds coming back is the eventual debut of the newest members of the family. I have a front row seat at my window as the moms with their new offspring come to the feeder and enjoy whatever bounty I have put out for them. The little ones sit on the railing with their tiny beaks open, crying away while mom flies to the feeder, gets some seed, and flies back to put it in their mouths. No sooner has she given them some then they are crying for more and she is off again to the feeder. They hop and flutter up and down in excitement as she continues her back and forth delivery system. I notice that even the smallest of them can execute some pretty remarkable feats of aviation although they are not steady enough for a steep climb or or deep dive. They are learning, day by day, from the time they break out of their shells until they take their first tentative step out of the nest and onto a nearby branch. One step at a time, one flutter at a time.

We are like those little birds. Something new and exciting is calling to us, especially for those of us who have put off our dreams and passions to "be an adult," and follow all the rules. Now the scent of spring is in the air and we feel that pull, that intoxicating aroma of newness and possibility. We want to dive off that branch before we've learned how to flutter our wings. All it takes is one unfortunate plunge and we're left saying to ourselves, "see, they were right. It was silly to think I could do this at my age." Nonsense! First you learn to hover. Then you fly a few steps. Then you fly to the end of the branch, then to the next branch, then to the next tree. Before you can sing, "Rockin' Robin" you are in the air, and isn't the view well worth the wait?

These can be the most exciting, the most rewarding years of our lives. We are old enough to know better, and young enough to try. So unpack those Florida suitcases and pull out your wings. It's time for flight practice! And so it is.

Mud Season

The snow and ice are melting. The ground is starting to thaw - you can actually see brown underneath. Wait! The temperature dipped below freezing overnight and there is a thin dusting of snow this morning - which changed to rain in the afternoon - which refroze overnight again. Welcome to the Ides of March or, as we call it here in the Northeast, Mud Season. Only the foolhardy do not keep a pair of boots beside the door and give up all hope of shampooing the rugs for at least another few weeks.

This is a very hard time for the gardener in us. There is really not much you can do in the garden right now. You can do a little bit of clean-up from winter like picking up pieces of downed branches and raking up the leftover brown leaves and foliage from autumn. With the chance of below freezing temperatures overnight and ground that turns to mush during the afternoons all you can do is look out of the window and plan ... or is it?

What you can do is start your seedlings indoors. A few packets of seeds, a seed tray, some potting soil and a window that gets good light, or a grow light, and you can start nurturing the garden that you see in your mind's eye, the one you have been dreaming of all winter. Over the next 6-8 weeks as you keep them warm, moist and well-lit, just the smell of the soil and the feel of it on your hands brings a sigh of contentment to your lips. If you are still in need of a shot of spring, visit your local garden supply shop which has been tempting gardeners since right after Valentine's Day with garden equipment, green houses and the heady aromas of hyacinth and daffodil bulbs that have been forced for the Easter season.

If winter was the time of planning and dreaming, mud season is the time to start taking baby steps in the direction of your dreams. Take those ideas and visions out of your head and put them on paper. Make a sketch. Do some research online. Start your seedlings. Want to write a book? Start with an outline, a plot line, or even just a working title. Visit an art store and look at the rainbow of paint colors. Go to a craft shop or yarn store and sink your hands into the luscious bins of soft, inviting fibers and textures.  Choose the "seeds" that will grow into what you desire and then nurture them, keep them warm and well-lit (meaning, keep your attention on them). Little by little you'll begin to see little sprouts come up: a word, a phrase, a chapter; the first brush strokes; the first row of stitches. Before you know it, the time will come to take the tiny plants out of their seed trays and put them out into the world to grow into beautiful things.

So what are you waiting for? Put on your boots and get out there!
And so it is.