Lavender Harvest

Today was the day. Today in spite of the "To Do" list longer than my arm, I harvested the Lavender. I have 3 glorious big bushy explosions of this sweet smelling intoxication in my front garden.

It is so simple: Take the herb cutting scissors from the jar in the kitchen with the pencils, pens and spare screwdriver, open the front door to sun sprayed pond area, and proceed to cut in small bunches these delightful tall slender flowers to dry and enjoy for the months to come.

I took my time to make a cup of fresh delicious coffee to accompany my task and savored the mixture of "java" smell and pungent oily sweetness. I lay them all together with such simple joy. Flower heads on top, thinner stems at the bottom. I love this harvest. I relish in these simple small pleasures in my year. I, more than anything, am glad I was there for it. Really present with the process.

The Lavender Harvest today marked a great peace for me and I am grateful.

Collage Artist in her Studio

I have come to see that at my core I am a collage artist. I collage together images and cuttings, sketches and paint, objects on a fireplace and vases in a grouping "just so" on a windowsill. And I also collage groups together. I take great joy in finding people who match and go together. I have even been "yenta" to more successful couples than I would like to admit.

And, it is a gift that I have and am exploring further in my studio practice. To that end, I would like to share here a little taste of a day in the studio working on a collage book.

Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Omu_FFneLF8

The Secret to a sustainable life of Bees and humans

I have always been fascinated by bees and their community behavior. I am touched by the simplicity of  daily acts with clear purpose, ease and focus.  What bliss.  I would like to spend my day as a bee this day.  One flower at a time offering and gathering.  This strikes me as true sustainability on the deepest level.

“You do not need to leave your room… Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait. Do not even wait, be quite still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked. It has no choice. It will roll in ecstasy at your feet.”

–Frank Kafka (1883-1924)

 

 

Unmasking the Mask-maker

Unmasked, the she creates our many faces.  She spins archetypes from golden threaded fingers deeply rooted into her beating heart. She sculpts in clay and paper, tissue and wire. Reds splatter, gold radiates hot heart heat, and copper instigates a turn of the jowl.  Pinks, deep greens, lush blues and turquoise highlight the moods and foods on which our souls feast.

Splits and sculpts, twists and turns, shapes and sands, paints and glazes until the media shape shift. She births hundreds of visages – yours and mine.  She squeezes them out just as her own son from between her thighs for us.  

Darkness and mulch, tortured and mute, constricted and free falling, held back, bewildered and bemused, revolving, unsolving, involving, unwinding, resigning, perplexing, non-plussing, shocking, slapping, loaded and loved. Hidden silent faces…until now.  Concealed…then revealed. Burning through until all that is left underneath - layer after layer after layer, is light and fire and shine and burned willing already-ness. Space.  Raw. Real. Openness.

The Queen of Nothingness

By Katheryn Monica April 19, 2009

 

I open the back door of my end of terrace home, as I do most mornings, and traipse up bleary eyed to feed the 5 toffee coloured chickens at the back of the garden.

There are five hens and they never fail to delight in my approach. They literally trip over each other, leaping and flapping into the air, making those cute clucky chicken sounds that chickens make.  Their interest in me shifts to the grain I scoop out and spread over the spacious muddy run and they compete for mixed grains and layers pellets.  “The girls” then simply get on with their chicken life, doing their simple satisfied chickens dance.

 

This simple daily act, like so many, can be full of mystery and wonder. So can unlocking the door, breathing in the first fresh burst of air from the misty spring morning, walking across the grass barefoot up the steps and around the bike shed to the chicken run. Then, on the way, if I am awake and aware, I have the opportunity to be touched by the beauty of luscious grape hyacinths, creamy delicate primroses, sunny daffodils and divine smelling miniature pinkish-red tulips I planted just last year.  They all dance in artistically balanced arrangements.  They seem to delight in their own existence.  They certainly do not seem to be worried if they “look ok in this outfit.” 

 

And who is to say that what’s more, they do not revel and find wonder also in my presentation before them?  Who am I to be any less radiant and alive than the thousands of humble primroses dotted throughout this ¾ acre garden that I steward? How can I possibly be less beautiful than this shiny golden orb of the “dent de lion” – exquisite and perfectly formed.  I even wonder about making dandelion wine this year.  The elderflower wine was a huge success.  What the heck?

 

In these clear moments of feeling awake and alive here in this space and place, I am aware that my Queen-dom is vast and full – and completely empty.

 

It is only in knowing this space and emptiness that is the foundation of everything that I am free and whole.  From this deep foundation, I am the Queen of Nothing, and it delights me.

 

There is only this.  I cultivate the longing for this moment.  For what is happening now. Here.  For what is real.

 

This is enough.  On a good day, the chickens and the primroses and the cool grass under the souls of my feet nourish and enliven me for days.  THIS is enough. When I let go of attachments to any of this being mine, the world becomes a queen-dom – vast beyond measure and unending.  As soon as things become mine again in my mind (pains, accomplishments, failures, relationships) my world seems to shrink back and suffering is the norm, at least half of the time when the pendulum swings that direction.

 

When I cultivate longing for this moment, this tender and vulnerable tenacious dandelion swaying against the azure sky is all that there is.  Empty and full.  If I can also let this moment die, I can breathe in the next.

 

When emptiness is my foundation, source can flow freely and fiercely through that space and out through me.

 

Empty Wisdom takes on a whole wonderful new meaning!

 

I am the Queen of Nothing.  I open the back door to the morning garden and the dandelion waves it’s good day to me with a toothy grin.  I am filled with awe for this gentle servant. I bow down and carry on with my morning ablutions.

 

“Now I am light. 

Now I fly.

Now I see myself under me.

Now God dances through me.”

 

- Friedrich Nietzsche