Endings and beginnings

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Genesis 1:1)

"See, I will create a new heaven and a new earth" (Isaiah 65:10)

"Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and earth had passed away" (Revelation 21:1)

"In the year 8510, God's gonna shake his mighty head. He'll either say I'm pleased where man has been, or tear it down and start again" (In the Year 2525, Zager and Evans)

My "lilies of the field" garden (seen earlier this spring here, here and here) has been looking rather sad lately as the nasturtiums, bachelor's buttons, and larkspur have completed their short circle of life. I took advantage of the early morning shade in this area to clear it out, again throwing the spent flower carcasses in a heap to decompose and hopefully reseed. I also cleared out some London rocket, bermuda grasss, and other weeds that had managed to sneak in somehow. Surprisingly, I found some healthy strawberry plants that had been hidden by the showier and taller flowers. 

There's a lot of God-as-gardener imagery in the Bible, and sometimes I think that when God made humans in his own image, he might have been thinking along those lines. At least, that's what I thought of today when I was weeding and pulling up spent flowers! Part of gardening is continually tearing down and redoing, either in an effort to correct mistakes, make improvements, or like I was doing today, just removing what has finished its life cycle in order to make way for new growth.

Now, I need to deadhead some marigolds and zinnias and sprinkle their seeds in the area I cleaned out, so that later this summer I will have a new accidental garden!

The snake in the garden

Here's another picture of our "lilies of the field" garden under the key lime tree. In addition to the nasturtiums, bachelor's button and larkspur are beginning to bloom.

All the citrus trees are in bloom now, and the smell is delightful. Unfortunately this week I have learned that for every gardening Eden, there is a snake determined to spoil the pleasure one can enjoy in it. The snake that is rearing its ugly head for me right now is seasonal allergies, something I'd previously thought myself immune to suffering. Ha!

Actually, allergies are not usually caused by citrus, or the other kind of things in my garden. Flowering plants like citrus and these nasturtiums are insect-pollinated rather than wind-pollinated, and usually the pollen grains produced by insect-pollinated plants are too large to be inhaled and cause trouble. It's more likely that my symptoms result from the neighbors' ash and mulberry trees, or from the current crop of spring weeds infesting every patch of ground in the Valley area.

Morning meditations

For the beauty of the earth

For the glory of the skies

For the love which from our birth over and around us lies

Christ our God, to Thee we raise this our hymn of grateful praise.

During the last year, I've begun to practice (albeit sporadically) what some call meditation and some call centering prayer. It involves quieting my mind, concentrating only on breathing, and listening for the voice of God. This time of year I find it especially nice to do this outdoors, although I really must keep my eyes closed or I will see something I need to do, like pulling weeds or thinning peaches. Today it was the words of this old hymn which came to my mind. I think we often tend to get so bogged down in "doing" rather than "being" that we forget to appreciate the simple things in life, and to be grateful.

I think of this spot under the key lime tree as my "lilies-of-the-field garden". Last spring and summer, as annuals succumbed to the heat, I threw their corpses in a pile under this tree and left them alone until the spent flowers, seedheads, and leaves dropped off. I didn't do anything else here, other than add the revamped grid drip system we've been installing all over the yard, and try to stay ahead of the weeds by pulling them out as I saw them arise. And right now, this spot is the most colorful one in the yard, with very little effort on my part.

And now it's time to go and thin the peaches, pull out a few weeds, and pick some asparagus for tonight's dinner.

Considering the lilies of the field

Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

The closest thing we have here to "lilies of the field" is Mexican primrose, one of the plants at the top of my "things I wish I hadn't planted" list. It reproduces by both seeds and runners, and if I'm not very aggressive about weeding it out, it could take over the planet....or at least our backyard piece of it. As you can see from the photo above, I haven't been sufficiently aggressive lately. Two weeks of vacation followed closely by forced inactivity due to lower back issues = the invasion of the Mexican primroses. But they are beautiful.
My chiropractor has temporarily forbidden me from "lifting and bending over" which precludes a lot of garden activity. But walking is supposed to be good for me, so I can still enjoy my neglected garden by walking in it, which I do several times a day. I find that, because I can't do the things I think need to be done, I perhaps notice things I might not otherwise have seen. The peaches I had so carefully thinned are rather small, and I wonder why. Did I not thin them enough, or give them enough water and fertilizer? We experimented with several new plantings this year, and potatoes are going gangbusters in three different locations, but the raspberries I planted in a carefully-chosen sheltered location look terrible. There are tiny figs on the fig tree, and the Don Juan and Iceberg climbing roses may not be trellised properly, but they smell heavenly.
My Mexican primroses, and the "lilies of the field" passage remind me that life goes on just fine with or without our intervention. I'd be embarrassed if the RGFRP selection committee came to visit right now, because I don't think it would be what they are looking for. Yet it is beautiful in its own way, and I enjoy walking through it and noticing what has sprung up, all on their own, without any help from me. I realize that I'm a controller....I think that by thought and planning and making good choices, I can control life. But that's not true. I can increase the odds in a particular direction, but I am not in charge. And yet, there is still surprising beauty, and resilience. Life will find a way.