Mother Nature is amazing!!! The Asparagus is coming up. Had it for supper on Tuesday. The Walking Onions are up adequately to cut greens to add to a sauté. Garlic greens are almost five inches tall. And Mountain Spinach (local and only at altitude), which is called Orache by the Original People here, is coming. Mountain Spinach grows tall; up to 6 ft. You eat the leaves as they come. It is the best spinach ever! It freezes whole leaf and comes out of the freezer the same. All of these plants are coming a good two weeks early. Mother Nature knows how to work with climate disruption.
Indoor boxes of lettuces have produced beautifully and salads are back on the menu. My orientation is to eat what I grow when it is available. No store tomatoes, rarely anything bought in plastic containers also. But, I do collect these containers from friends for when the produce is coming in from the garden. The indoor boxes are plastic but they are now five years old, were purchased for $1.12 each, and will last the rest of my life and, unfortunately longer. Yet, if the purchase of these several years ago and used year-round for food production and flowers means that other plastic containers aren’t purchased with produce in them, that’s better for the environment and world, and for me. Fresh picked cannot be beat!
Two ground beds are planted out with cold weather crops: Kyoto 3 Cabbage (like Napa), Broccoli, Chard, Kale, Brussels Sprouts, Collards, Yukina greens, and Hon Tsai Tai greens. The last two are experiments but, in Japan they are grown at altitude, so they should do well here.
The last kick-at-the-can of nights around 30 is expected this weekend and through Tuesday. The cold crops should be fine – but, Nature gives and receives back as She will. Cling to nothing is the motto
Using the western astrological calendar, the full moon of May is held in remembrance of the birth, enlightenment, and death of the Buddha. We contemplate that together with another reason why training in shamatha is of value.
Spaciousness is natural within us. A modern life is one of constantly filling space: in our homes, minds, time, and pantries. What if we didn’t? What if the natural spacious quality within was recognized and one attempted to abide?
There is great wisdom in using the natural tendency toward activity before meditating. Physical activity such a yoga or exercise, a chore, hike or bike ride release excess physical energy and focus the mind. Mental activities also can support and prepare one for a meditation session such as noticing, softening and opening into what one has noticed, then contemplating on what was freshly perceived.
Saying a prayer for others or all beings, setting one’s intention for the session aloud, saying mantra or such, calling in the Directions, Smudging, or making an offering are examples used by people and various traditions since the dawn of humanity, all of which set the tone, the energy, and set the mind-emotion complex to align, open, be reverent and quiet. Doing so is great wisdom.
