A Plant

From the crowded rows of a greenhouse shelving unit

to your sunny window ledge.

10 beautiful, shiny leaves.

Water it, once every two weeks. Fertilize it twice a year.

10 beautiful, shiny leaves

Water it, once a week, fertilize it monthly through the summer. Shield it under thin plastic in the spring.

10 beautiful, shiny leaves

Water it twice a week, fertilize it monthly. mist it lightly with a repurposed spray bottle, move it round the house to follow the sun.

10 beautiful, shiny leaves

Water it daily, fertilize it on demand, set it on the linoleum floor of your bathroom while you shower, place it near the humidifier and wipe the leaves with a warm wet towel, move it outside when the sun is shining, and back indoors when night falls.

10 leaves.

Only, it’s not a plant.

It’s a person.

When do you stop tending, what will not grow?

Art in the Time of Pain

Everything. Everything about you can be healed.

You must have the courage and resilience to sit with the process of healing. And therein lies the rub. The ipso facto that causes people to side step healing. To attempt to slink past before the roar of pain wakes up and catches you in its bloody paws. Vainly.

To vainly try an avoid that which provides the most beautiful of all. Truth.

I was pretty young when I learned truth could hurt. In fact it was that very realization which led me to my very first lie— and pretty much all the lies that would follow. Truth could land me in trouble, a spanking, a grounding, a week with no music, no books, no friends. Truth caused me to get yelled at, and for days on end treated with a stony angry silence.

I don’t blame parents. Especially not mine. It’s got to be hard raising Hellraiser and little rebels. But parents often inadvertently teach their children that lies get you in trouble, but truth will get you in trouble too– the only safe bet is to lie so well— the truth is never discovered.

That is a small digression from the original point. Truth can be painful. But it is in wading through, admitting and accepting truth– that we can really be free.

The truth about ourselves is often the most painful to face and takes the longest to heal. Often, it’s not even our direct fault the toxic traits we adopted to survive. But it is our responsibility to face and heal them. If we don’t, we become the monster-in-waiting that sends hurt and pain spiraling back into the wild.

Truth bleeds through in my art. My art is borne from wounds, mine and my ancestors. Bubbling up through layers of dead earth, it pours through my veins. Sometimes I think it couldn’t’ wait any longer. That the fount of pain, like a volcano, had such enormous pressure it erupted into my being. Sprang forth out of my mom’s womb with me. Breathed free air for the first time when I screamed my anguish in announcement to the world. The pain I face, heal, and carry is not all mine.

I know that

I feel that deeply.

Ancestral pain is somethin’ else. And when I say it like that– somethin’ else– I hope you know what I mean. I hope you know how I say that. I could give it back. I could send it away, because we all have enough to carry without also carrying the burdens of centuries. And some I do send away. I send it to the earth, it can carry loads more than me. The earth has a symbiotic system waiting to metabolize the pain it receives. Something in me, my ancestors maybe, tells me that the earth can take the pain that I send it with grace.

But some of the pain I retain, and will attempt to heal. With truth and art.

The Stillness Begets

A beautiful secluded lake sits off the beaten path, nestled in the Chuckanut Mountains. It’s a local favorite, a moderate 6-mile round trip trail marked by switchbacks and enormous stumps of long dead trees covered in moss. The surrounding area of the lake is a geologist’s dream, with steep multifaceted cliff faces, and an unpredictable terrain; the lake itself is an angler’s oasis where trout lurk just beneath the waters calm surface.

On a semi-cloudy, unremarkable Sunday, we decided to hike up to Fragrance Lake. A liminal journey that mirrored my own current grapple with my spirituality. We weren’t seeking anything deeply, or in pursuit of any goal beyond arrival to the lake.

We started off simply knowing that we couldn’t spend another dreary Sunday watching life stand still.

Over the COVID 19 pandemic and subsequent quarantine. I’ve taken the ample down time at home to really hone in on my personal spiritual practice through developed rituals, divination, and awareness. I’ve long since eschewed my religious Christian spirituality, it was a tight vice that never fit or felt real to me. But as a vestige of my upbringing and family relationships, I’ve found it challenging to release. Though, I am entirely conscious of the notion that I need to let go completely before I can grasp my fledgling eco-based spiritualism.

I ran my hands over the smooth under bark of a birch tree, a few steps from the trail. It had been peeled of its outer layer from the ground up, about 15 feet. What remained was a pale, striated interior, like polished marble. I took a breath and sent gratitude to the tree, for existing, for being in this space where I could pass by and see it.  The 2 mile climb had exhausted me and seeing this tree gave me a natural pause and breath.

We continued on, and finally arrived.

The lake was glassy and unbroken, save a happy Labrador wading in to fetch his stick, taking his time to paddle through the water calmly.  His owner was unseen in the treelined edge of the lake. The lushness offered invisibility and anonymity, and we perched on ancient rocks, levelled out by decades of gentle nudging by the water. This perfect resting place had taken an eon to be. Why did I expect my own evolution to materialize quickly?

We sipped some lemon water, nibbled at a tart green apple and walked on.

A 75 foot tree had recently fallen and taken out a small brook bridge, so we waded through the mud along side it to continue along the trail. I stopped and ran my hands along the thick deep green moss covering the bark, entwining my hands into its jade tangles. It felt cool, wet and alive. Further up, where the tree had weakened and splintered, were bright orange rings of outer layers, protecting the white rings that belied the trees old age.

I knelt by the tree, sharing its energy. This pandemic has weakened and splintered me in areas too. I’ve been laid low by the lack of connection and outside inspiration, unable to write, to produce anything substantive. And in the time/space I’ve had to build my own practice, I’ve also succumbed to the vacuum of movement- forgetting my yoga, forgetting at times, to drop my shoulders and breathe.  

This is the stillness that begets more stillness. In front of me the tree lay on the ground, uprooted and fallen, yet still alive and providing sustenance for its co-organisms. I thanked the tree for its life and we rejoined our hike, looping back towards the car. I was no closer to my destination, but more replete in the journey.