Diamond Frost

I'm taking cuttings of Diamond Frost euphorbia. This airy annual looks beautiful in a flower pot on the front step. It's lovely as a houseplant. And it's an ever-blooming edging for a flowerbed.

The cuttings root very easily. I always prefer free to paying $5.95 at the garden store for a single plant.

The Buddha offered his teachings freely because the Dharma is priceless. The Dharma is more valuable than diamonds.

Every blog i write is just a single cutting from the ever-present, abundant Dharma. I offer this sprig, and every sprig, in the hopes that the Dharma may take root and grow in your own life.

Companion Planting

 

The polka dot plants that i brought indoors in October brought some hitchhikers with them--impatiens seeds.

Outdoors, i had planted the polka dots next to impatiens on the north side of the house, since they both love the shade. After the frost touched the impatiens, i pulled them out and discovered a couple more polka dots growing underneath them. Now the next generation of impatiens is growing with their neighbors, the polka dots.

We rely on "companion planting" with our spiritual friends to steady and sustain our meditation practice. We depend on our spiritual companions to keep us on the high road, especially when that low road looks so easy and so tempting. 

We rely on our spiritual friends to bloom. That way we all look good.

Yellow Hibiscus

In the spring, i bought a yellow hibiscus and planted in among pulmonaria, forget-me-nots, and blue salvia. I forgot all about the hibiscus until just before the first frost. I dug it up and brought it indoors, where it is blooming so much better.

My sweetie can't remember its name, so he uses a mnemonic: "Hi! Biscus."

When it bloomed yesterday, i put it on top of the asparagus fern facing the living room. What a bright and happy face to look at as i walk back and forth, hithering and thithering.

The hibiscus remains still and joyful, reminding me of the possibility of un-busy-ness. "Hi! Cheryl." Remember mindfulness? Remember joy.

Farewell Alyssum

 Alyssum is still blooming, but just barely. 23 degrees this morning, and alyssum's life energy is waning.

What a pleasure alyssum is. I sow the seeds along my walkways in mid-April. Alyssum is cold tolerant, so she isn't fazed by a cold snap here and there. She starts blooming June 1, and five months later, she's still full of charm.

But now, the week before Thanksgiving, her seeds are ready to be harvested. 

I like a resilient plant, and i like resilient people. Resilience is the ability to endure the pain of a dart that someone throws, often unintentionally. Yes, that thoughtless remark hurts. Can you, I, we endure that pain with mindfulness? One second, five seconds? Maybe as long as a minute.

Then we notice we are breathing. Still breathing.

November Front Step

The mums on the front step have aged, turned brown, and been thrown onto the compost pile. The pumpkins came indoors before the first heavy frost. Now what remains is one flowering kale, a cyclamen from last year, and some cute little gourds. It's slim pickin's, but it's enough to make me smile.

Sink in to the pleasantness of any one small thing. Feel the joy. Let the positivity suffuse your body. Happiness.

It's enough.

The November Garden

It snowed a couple of days ago, followed by a killing frost. All the annuals are good and dead now. And the fall garden is beautiful in stark relief: kale, broccoli, Swiss chard, and my lone cauliflower.

Gone is the "clutter" of the summer garden. Bean plants pulled up. Squash plants melted into mush. Tomatoes in the compost.

Summer is good and dead. How can something be "good" and "dead" at the same time? Is dead good? Well, yes. Sometimes.

The fall garden is good.

The summer garden is dead. Gone. Gone. Gone.

Leaping Clear

 

Another frost warning prompted us to bring all the houseplants indoors. I also bring in the flowerpots from the front step, and those pots are heavy. I do believe i got in a day's worth of weightlifting.

Out the door. In the door. Suddenly a frog was sitting on the floor of the solarium. We tried to corral her through the exit door, but she leapt for the window.

That's when i put on my inner 10-year-old boy and acted like a hunter. Got her!

She tried to squeeze out of my clutching hands. I barely got out the door, and she won the contest. Leaping clear.

Sometimes, we truly do not know where safety lies. It seems like safety should be over there (sunlight through the window), but it's actually over here (through the door).

Mindfulness is the door. Open the sense doors of mindfulness--seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, tasting. Freedom lies in this very moment.

First Frost Finally Falls

When i woke up at 5:30 and the temperature was 33 degrees, i had a faint flicker of hope. But after an hour of meditation, the verdict was in. Frost. Frost after all. Yes, i expected frost, but denial is strong. Delusion hopes not really. Not yet. But yes. Yet. Now.

Only for an hour or two. But that hour is sufficient to kill the impatiens, the zinnias, the basil.

No use imagining excuses. If only.... But i could have.... If i'd only known.

Frost is. This is the is-ness of this morning. Frost.

No excuses.

Still No Frost

Still no frost.

Global warming is happening right here in my garden, in my yard. I used to bring houseplants indoors on Labor Day. Last year, the first frost came in mid-October. This year, it will be November.

Oh, there have been some close calls. It was 33 degrees when i woke up one morning last week. By 7 a.m., the thermometer said 32 degrees. The rain on the outdoor table had turned to ice. But the dahlias were still blooming.

My neighbor's garden, downhill and about 100 feet lower in elevation than mine, was frosted in mid-October.

Aging is like being on a battlefield. People (or plants) are dying all around you, and you are still standing. You don't know why.

Gratitude for the life--and death--that is all around me.

More Beans

My pole beans kept producing beans into October, right up to the first frost. I was astounded.

My sweetie groaned. "Not more beans!"

I felt delighted. "Yes! More beans."

Our freezer is already full of green beans.

"But look at those big beans," he said.

"Yes!" I said. "Just look."

I grew up on overcooked green beans. My sister calls them hundred-hour beans. With shreds of ham from a ham hock, and a lot of onions, the beans are more like a stew than a fresh vegetable. Tasty (according to me).

This little civil war in the kitchen continues. Yes. No. I want. I don't want.

Fortunately, we remain civil and kind to each other.

Sugar maples stand out now with their beautiful yellow foliage, especially this late in the season. Peak foliage, about a month ago, was rather muted. But now that there have been some frosts, the yellow maple leaves against the blue sky look spectacular.

Sometimes, it's not until the "first frost" falls on us that we take this ending of the season seriously. A friend who had a heart valve replacement earlier this year is selling her house and moving into a retirement community. She was out of commission for six months after surgery and realized that house upkeep is not how she wants to spend her remaining life energy. She is loving downsizing.

The yellow maple leaves are beautiful. And short-lived.

Ornamental Sweet Potatoes

My brother asks whether he can eat the sweet potatoes he found in his hanging pot with a sweet potato vine. The tubers are radish red, but shaped like a potato.

Yes, they are edible--if you haven't fertilized your hanging plant with chemicals. These "ornamental" sweet potatoes aren't as tasty as regular sweet potatoes that are bred for sweetness. But i daresay, that wouldn't matter much in a side dish of roasted roots, for example.

Harvesting vegetables from your flower pots feels like a 2-for-1 deal--beautiful vines in the hanging flower pot all summer, and, after frost, a harvest of vegetables.

This reminds me of Pascal's Wager. The seventeenth century philosopher, mathematician, and physicist, Blaise Pascal, says that a rational person should live as though God exists. If God does not actually exist, such a person will have only a finite loss (some worldly pleasures), whereas she stands to receive infinite gains (represented by eternity in heaven) and avoid infinite losses (eternity in hell).

We could fine-tune Pascal's Wager by recognizing that unwholesome, unskillful conduct leads to stress in the here and now. Yes, unskillful conduct can feel like fun, but our conscience knows. We don't even need to believe (or not believe) in God. The proof of Pascal's Wager lies in our very own emotional bodies.

If we act with wholesome intentions, we can harvest the flowers and the vegetables of a life well-lived.

Bedraggled Mums

The mums on the front step are beginning to look bedraggled due to frost, rain, and age. Ah, yes. Mums deteriorate, just as we ourselves do.

A British friend describes her mother's aging process as a sort of pool-and-drop river. Her mum's health remains steady for a while, then there's a small or big emergency. Her mother recovers, but loses some functioning, and never returns to her previous state of health. We could call this aging process "weathering the storms of the body"--frost, rain, and age.

This is what bodies do: Deteriorate. How can we feel happy despite the fact that the body feels lousy?

Mindfulness can lead us, breath by breath, into our calm place, into contentment with this present moment. Not comparing this moment to any other moment. Simply happy to be alive, no matter what we look like.

Mums age and die.
Sigh.

The Winter Garden

Now that the first frost has sent annuals to their compost-grave, we can see more clearly what remains in the winter garden. Curly red kale, for instance. It's beautiful.

Here at the writing retreat, we are served kale every day--kale in the minestrone soup, kale-quinoa salad. It's delicious.

As our bodies deteriorate, and we lose this small function and then that one, we can see more clearly what remains. For my own "winter garden" i've been cultivating calm and acceptance. After all, my happiness does not depend on how I feel.

Cool weather is here. I realize i cannot see or hear as well as i used to. I need reading glasses for everything. I can no longer eavesdrop on nearby conversations.

Nevertheless, my happiness does not depend on how i feel about these situations.

The winter garden is beautiful.

First Frost

We had our first frost of the season last night. November 9. It's a shock to the system. Suddenly, it's November. It's actually November.

This is a great example of how delusion works. "What? It's November???"

We've been ignoring a fact of life. In this case, we just turned over the calendar page last week. The new calendar page said "November."

But we were having fun with the seemingly never-ending autumn. Maybe we could have winter without winter?

Ignoring the facts of life makes us ignorant. Ouch!

The frost is on the punkin on my front step.

It's Snowing

It's snowing. I kid you not.

The first killing frost last night, and winter has begun. Whaaaa....???

Wait a minute. I still have garlic to plant, lime to spread on garden beds, kayaks to store away, and a dozen other change-of-season tasks. Suddenly, it's time to put up Christmas lights? And it's not even Halloween yet!

A friend emails me that her brother who has outlived his cancer diagnosis by 2 years now has cancer metastasized to the brain. The doctors say he has maybe a month to live.

We have a day to live. This day. Don't resist it. Go jump around in the snow now.

Pumpkin Seedlings

Two pumpkins rotted before i could pick them. I was thinking, Oh, boy. Pumpkins will grow right here next year. But they are growing right now.

Pumpkin seedlings in October? This does not augur a good outcome since frost is due next week.

Our rotten old experience sometimes composts in amazing ways. Like growing something new and beautiful.

Nevertheless, nothing survives. Impermanence comes sooner or later. In this case: sooner. Much too soon.

Aging Mums

The Old and the Young

I bought mums in September from the garden club mum fundraiser. For 3 weeks, they were camouflaged by the beautiful flowerpots on the front step. They had about a week of lovely solitude on the front step before the first hard frost came, and now they look pathetic. Off to the compost pile with them.

I stopped at our local farm stand and bought 2 more pots of spectacular mums. I know from previous experience, that these late-in-the-season mums will have a short lifespan.

How much am i willing to pay to resist the frosty season of old age?

We too resist aging in various ways. Anti-aging creams (as if such a thing exists), exercise, weight loss, dying our hair, and, perhaps our favorite, new clothes to cloak the aging body and distract attention from the wrinkled body.

I have "clothed" my front step in new young mums.

Star at Dawn

A hard frost came last Sunday and killed all the annuals. Sudden death. Suddenly the slow drift of seasons has become dramatic. Leaves falling, falling. Bare trees all around. A different season is definitely here, yet i am not resisting--at least, not yet.

I take joy in the yellow leaves still clinging to trees, the copper beach leaves. I delight in the blue of the sky, gaze at the last two stars twinkling brightly in the dawn.

Take 30 seconds and drink in some beauty right around you. Been there. Done that kills our joy. Let your joy shine like a star at dawn.

Yellow Leaves

Yellow leaves are falling like rain now that we've had our first frost. Or maybe i should say "falling like snow" since it also snowed immediately after the killing frost.

Old age dallied a long time, fooling us with a too-warm and lovely September. The killing frost came late--October 18--but it did come. Suddenly the gardens look dead, but they are quickly covered with a quilt of leaves--yellow, red, and brown.

Leaves falling. In our lives as well.