.....friends

Yogis,
I love this time of year in the garden! The combination of the rains, abundant heat and long hours of sunshine, have plants bursting from the ground. I grow mostly perennials, and where a few weeks ago I could stand on the edge and see everything in its place, now it appears as a sea of green.

“Hello mugwort!” as I snip off a leafy top to place in my pillowcase, ensuring deep vivid dreaming. She is a plant that loves to gather real estate, so I spend some time pulling out the already running roots. I know her well. “There you are blue spice basil! I would recognize those leaves anywhere.” She will soon be standing upright along the edges of the garden, releasing her sweet sensual scent each time my leg brushes against her. Mmmmmm…….

For me this is a time of welcoming back old friends…..not unlike our collective lives as we begin to once again gather. Some will seem as if nothing has changed, while in others we will feel the differences carved by the unique experience we have all traveled.

“My my Motherwort, you are awfully tall this year!” similar to my friend’s teenage son who appears to have gained more than a foot in the year since I last saw him. Tall and lanky. Black Eyed Susan on the other hand is steady and dependable. As always, growing to about a foot and then getting a stark overnight haircut from the grazing deer. But now that I have known her for years, I realize she likes that, as each cut stem grows two shoots for two flowers. She is unafraid of obstacles, knowing they are the root of transformation. I can learn from her.

Mint is one of those friends who is always there for whatever you need. A cup of uplifting tea on a dreary morning, iced herb water after a sweaty afternoon of gardening, or simply making me smile with her gentle scent as I rub her between by fingers. And this spring the rhododendrons and hydrangeas are unusually abundant. The year has treated them well and like some friends, caused them to now want to give…and give…and give.

St Johns Wort showed up right on time, spreading low on the ground in the east quadrant of my medicine wheel. But then she began to brown. Unable to help her, one by one the stems of leaves shriveled, leaving a hole in the garden. An empty space. I have friends who too have lost loves of their lives in these past months, coming back to the fold with their own empty spaces. Then there are those plants who simply don’t come back.

Yet each morning I religiously water the ground where I delicately placed my pea seeds one inch deep. Nurturing. Knowing new life is silently forming, hidden from view, and like my women friends who too are carrying a germinating seed within their own fertile soil, new life will emerge when the time is right.

Friends. There are those that are colorful (zinnia), those that quietly do their sacred work (lavender), and those that love to cling (wisteria). Each one unique. Would we have it any other way?

Hanging out with my hippy friend Mullein,
SARAH