Field Guide

I would say that there exist a thousand unbreakable links between each of us and everything else, and that our dignity and our chances are one. The farthest star and the mud at our feet are a family; and there is no decency or sense in honoring one thing, or a few things, and then closing the list. The pine tree, the leopard, the Platte River, and ourselves--we are at risk together, or we are on our way to a sustainable world together. We are each other's destiny.

I could not be a poet without the natural world. Someone else could. But not me. For me the door to the woods is the door to the temple. (154) ~ Upstream by Mary Oliver

I have been thinking about my core values, the principles upon which my moral code rests. In part, this is in response to the highly charged world we are currently living in which seems to call for each of us to reorient our compass to be sure we are pointing to our personal true north. Or, to return to our field guide to be sure we are identifying accurately and differentiating the natural from the artificial, the real from the ersatz. 

Here are the principles I listed to guide my actions and orient my decisions:

• First and foremost, cultivate, love and nurture your small circle of immediate family members and closest friends -- these are the people who will carry you through the toughest times and share life's joys in full measure.
• Apologize, forgive, and speak up -- never assume to be understood or irrelevant.
• Recall you are privileged by the simple virtue of where and when you were born.
• Strive to leave the world a better place: grow something, build something, create something, teach something, share something.
• Give generously and when you think you have given enough, give a bit more.
• Remember that everyone has a story and deserves basic respect.
• Work to build relationships with people, ideas, experiences, nature, and the intangible as all things are connected and share a common destiny.
• See humanity's commonalities, the desire to have one's basic needs met.
• Focus on humility as the only correct response to the universe and the infinite.
• Know the world is complex and messy -- you see only one small sliver of its reality.
• Be brave for fear is the most insidious of emotions.
• Be curious and a lifelong learner.
• Strive to live in the present as time is the most precious of gifts.

I am relieved that I could list the parameters of my field guide rather quickly and confidently -- a baker's dozen of ingredients in the recipe of my life. I will bookmark this page and return to it often. It is just the reminder I need now and again to check myself and see the beauty of this existence in full flower.

Field Guide

Tony Hoagland

Once, in the cool blue middle of a lake,

up to my neck in that most precious element of all,

I found a pale-gray, curled-upwards pigeon feather
floating on the tension of the water

at the very instant when a dragonfly,
like a blue-green iridescent bobby pin,

hovered over it, then lit, and rested.
That's all.

I mention this in the same way
that I fold the corner of a page

in certain library books,
so that the next reader will know

where to look for the good parts.

Seeding

In late February or early March, when the snow has melted but the ground is still frozen, I’m going to scatter a mix of red clover and bird’s-foot trefoil seed over the pasture. This is called frost seeding.
               
It sounds like a way to sow ice crystals, or a version of the biblical proverb about seed falling on stony ground. But as the frost relents, the ground expands and contracts and expands again, and the seeds will work their way down into the soil, where they germinate. It’s an old idea, as old as the weeds along the tree line. Even now the snow is flecked with hundreds of thousands – perhaps millions – of weed seeds, all waiting for that slow melting ride down to the ground. (205) 

~ Verlyn Klinkenborg The Rural Life

Somehow, the notion of frost seeding resonates with me. In fact, I have strewn seeds to the hands of fate once or twice myself, wildflowers and packets too old to plant with confidence, an act of random kindness done as prayer or repentance with hopeful abandon. You too might find inspiration in one of my children's favorite picture books, Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney. And, who doesn't love lupines?

Today is the vernal equinox, and spring has arrived gently to fully seed the senses. Seeding time is well at hand. The year's seed catalogs perused, the orders placed, and the preparations well underway. I will need to wait until we've made our final move to our new home in late spring, but I will get my hands dirty. I am giddy with anticipation and chomping at the bit, but I will be patient. All in good time and better late than never as they say. 

In the meantime, I have been rejoicing in images from the deserts of California, experiencing a super bloom after years of drought ended in the long, soaking rains throughout the winter. The seeds were lying dormant, waiting decades even centuries, and now bloom to blanket the landscape in color. The event is so rare, beautiful and unexpected that visitors are coming from all over the world to see what for many will be a once in a lifetime event. 

The seed's ability to survive deprivation and still bloom in all its glory may be just the lesson I need this first Monday of spring as I ask myself about the seeds still dormant and waiting to bloom in me. We plant seeds all the time in the people we encounter, in relationship with other from the most intimate to the most brief and tangential. 50 years has given others plenty of time for seeding in me, and I am feeling the urgency to do so more in others as well.

What seeds do I still hope to see bloom in my life? What seeds do I most desire to plant in others? What seeds can I collect and sort and package to pass onto my girls? What seeds can we scatter in the field and in the world at large, randomly or with plan and purpose, to insure the welfare of the greater good from the most concrete and proximal to those far and wide and deep and distant? Do I recognize a seed when I see it? Do I recognize seed containers and vessels and packets and acknowledge that something exceptional rests inside?

Today, I am seeding in action and thought, pondering the possibility of new growth and the power contained beneath a tiny shell in hopes that my senses awaken and efforts flower and bear fruit. If you join me, think of the garden we will plant and all we can feed. Just a suggestion. Just planting a seed.