September Gardening Was Awful

I want to return to yesterday's post and Pam Baxter's real question: What about gardening when conditions are hot, humid, and full of mosquitoes?

First of all, notice the unpleasantness. Hot--unpleasant. Humid-unpleasant. Sweltering--unpleasant. Mosquito bites--unpleasant.

The mind has a difficult time just leaving the raw data of experience alone. Unpleasant. Unpleasant.

So the mind compares this unpleasant moment to another pleasant moment, and feels dissatisfied with what this present moment is offering. Notice this comparing mind--the one that compares this very seeing-hearing-feeling vivid reality moment with some dream idea, some virtual reality. Feel the dissonance. Feel the dissatisfaction. Feel the unpleasantness of the dissatisfaction. (Oh-oh. Is there an feedback loop of unpleasantness going here?)

The mind might go so far as making up a story. After all, the mind likes stories. Sometimes the mind wants a story, so that we don't have to feel our unpleasant emotions. Stories such as "This hot humidity is the result of climate change. I know it," spark more unpleasantness. Even if that story is true (and maybe it's not quite true), what can we small gardeners do about it? We are already doing our best. We do our best, and allow Life to take care of itself.

Rest in your caring compassion for the Earth and your caring compassion for yourself. Go ahead, have a good cry about it, then drink some water, and go sit in your beautiful just-as-it-is garden.

Houseplants Come Indoors

The houseplants have come indoors after a 5-month summer vacation. Wow! That is the longest summer vacation they've ever had.

For years, i brought my houseplants in on Labor Day weekend. Then... Shall we call it global warming? This is the first year the plants have stayed outdoors until October, and still there's no forecast of frost.

We can put our minds on vacation, any time we want. Simply pause the story you are telling yourself. The mind-vacation may not be long. Maybe half-a-second. Maybe a whole second. Notice it. Breathe into it. Before the mind launches into its next "and then...." Pause. Take a break from that stressful story. Notice you are breathing.

The houseplants are breathing indoors now. Ahhh. Fresh air!

Melting, Melting

My garden still has not had a frost, though the forecast calls for freezing temperatures at night later this week.

These warm (for October) temperatures make me think that, somewhere, glaciers and icecaps are melting. A Bermuda-sized iceberg just broke off of the Greenland ice-sheet.

These icebergs won't raise sea level, like melting ice cubes in your drink don't raise the water level in your glass. The inland melting of glaciers into rivers and into oceans raises the water level. Bangkok is flooded with more water than it has ever seen. Even the houses on stilts have had to be evacuated.

Change--climate change--is happening relatively fast. Our children will live in a warmer climate zone than we do, and their children in a warmer one still.

Notice this day's warmth and coolness. There'll never be another day just like it.