Winter Berries

All summer i've been looking at a non-descript shrub outside my kitchen window. That shrub is spreading. What the heck is it? What was i thinking when i put it there?

Now that it's covered with red berries, i see that it is a holly called winterberry. The red berries are a pleasure to look at while i'm doing the dishes, and the berries will last 5 months, until the end of winter.

The shrub has teeny-weeny flowers in the spring, and the plain deciduous leaves have no fall color, but now winterberry is the star of the winter garden.

Meditation practice may look boring and dull in the summer of our lives, but it really bears fruit when we are reduced to the bare bones of life. 

The Joy of Holly Berries

Winterberry is a form of native holly (Ilex verticillata), but without the pointy leaves. It loves to grow in full sun in marshy areas. I don't have enough full sun for it, and my marshy area is in the shade. So i have to be content with seeing it along the way in my daily travels.

When i saw these ice-encrusted winterberries alongside the food coop parking lot, i stopped to take a few pictures. Stopping and looking is one way to savor the moment. Savoring several small moments every day rewires our neural networks.

One garden friend took on the challenge of taking one photo a day for a year. It was her way of stopping and savoring a moment--or several--every day. At the end of the year, she gave a beautiful slide show to the garden club, and her moments of joy transmitted themselves directly to the rest of us.

Stop and savor the moment. This one, for instance.