Talking to Plants

I paused over the maidenhair fern I have been nursing along in my bathroom.  My dear coworkers say I've succeeded keeping mine alive because of the humidity in the bathroom. Still--though it is attempting to put forth new shoots--I don't think it is thriving.  I would say I have consistently overwatered it, which has not harmed it, but it adversely affecting the English Ivy around the edges.  Perhaps I should fertilize it.

With a quick Google search, I confirmed that a little fertilizer wouldn't hurt (but I can wait for Spring on that) and that high humidity is good.  The bathroom is the most humid room I have; but even so, at this time of year, it's dry enough as the forced air heat combats zero-degree weather.

I haven't done a lot of successful plant-nursing in my home lately.

But the article I found reminded me of the value of a spray bottle.

Drink, sweet fern! Drink!
I sprayed it until its tiny leaves dripped, and I imagined it was dreaming of being outdoors, soaked in a drenching spring rain.  I got spray-happy, like a kid overwatering a garden she's just planted.  And then, when I had the sense to stop, I lingered like that same kid, proudly and lovingly looking at the plant I had just so blessed.  Grow, little plant, grow!  Happiness and health!  You have had a hard life and overcome less than ideal conditions (look at how you are growing!) --and now I shall take better care of you.  I will gladly send more rain soon!

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Results from searches in my mac's dashboard dictionary:

1

101 |ˈwənˌōˈwən|adjective [ postpositive ](describing education courses, real or imagined) elementary; basic : stuff that you should learn in hacking 101.

2

twenty-twenty (also 20/20)adjectivedenoting vision of normal acuity.ORIGIN the Snellen fraction for normal visual acuity (seeSnellen test ).

3

"3" could not be found.

4

four-by-four (also 4X4)noun informala vehicle with four-wheel drive.

5

"5" could not be found.

6

"6 could not be found

7

seventy-eight (usu. 78)nounan old phonograph record designed to be played at 78 rpm.

8

8vo |äkˈtävō|abbreviationoctavo.octavo |äkˈtävō| (abbr.: 8vo)noun ( pl. -vos)a size of book page that results from the folding of each printed sheet into eight leaves (sixteen pages).• a book of this size.ORIGIN late 16th cent.: from Latin in octavo ‘in an eighth,’from octavus ‘eighth.’

9

9/11 |ˈnīn iˈlevən| (also September 11th)nounSeptember 11, 2001. On this date, two hijacked commercial airliners were flown into the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan. A third hijacked airliner was crashed into the Pentagon, and a fourth went down in a field in Pennsylvania : the shroud of 9/11 will be draped over the nation's heart forever.
0007 |ˈdəbəlˌōˈsevən; ˈōˌōˈsevən|nounthe fictional British secret agent James Bond, or someone based on, inspired by, or reminiscent of him.adjectivereminiscent of or inspired by features of the James Bond films: This is not 007 territory; it can be achieved with the tools that are available already.

Sick Images, Bible Colors, Loss of Control.

I. 

Driving home from work today the tune on the radio made me think of a song by Jars of Clay on an old album, If I Left the Zoo.  All I thought of was the tones of the beginning riff, and I thought I might look it up later.  Scratching my ear thoughtfully, a memory arbitrarily popped into my head from a movie I watched years ago, a passing comment in the script that my mind had quickly turned into a visual.  It was horrifically crass, and the fact that my mind contains this "memory" makes me thoughtful about the idea that we have one life, one mind, and the effects our choices can have.

Earlier in life, we learn about renewal and clean slates.  We learn that the morning starts a new day; that after a long winter, spring starts everything over: where leaves died and fell last year, new ones grow--fresh, perfect, unaware of last autumn's decay.  We learned that no matter how awful life felt at 9pm,  so tired from a day at the park we were crying our childish little eyes out, we would wake up in the morning full of energy and ready to start a new day of discovering.

For some, innocence drains away early in life.  Innate hope is battered by cruel experiences, and at far too young an age, they lose expectation.  For others, the knocks are not as hard and farther between.  But for everyone, there comes a time where the body, if not the mind, realizes the inevitable-- the cycle of renewal does not go on forever--not under the sun, or materially speaking, anyway.  Like rechargeable batteries that eventually wear out, skin doesn't renew itself as flawlessly as it once did; joints and muscles don't recover as readily from strain.  Mornings don't feel anywhere near as promising as they did to a five-year-old.

The mind continues collecting memories that don't go away.  It's not just the good ones that stick.  A terrible image is hard to erase.  You know how, on your computer, you have a trash bin?  Well, that's a good place for the bad memories--dealt with, laid to rest, not to be dwelt on any more.  But sometimes these thoughts are hiding in the attic like dusty spiders, and one day when you're chilling in your living room, suddenly this intruder is dangling in front of your face!  What then, in the realm of the mind?  A spider in front of your face. Maybe it's a wispy one, or a wolf spider.  What if it's a camel spider?  Anyhow, I digress.  In some way you're confronted by a horror.  Sometimes you're happy just to chase it back into hiding rather than squash it.  But I've known myself to just sit and stare in fascinated horror to see what webs it will spin before our eyes, proverbially speaking.

What application do these mental ramblings have to life?  Well, for me it's about consciously choosing to let ideas "stop here."  I have two or three bad images I can recall to mind in a moment.  One horrible video of a real life tragedy, one verbal description of the horrors of behavior caused by bath salts, and a really crass comment from a movie (sadly, I don't mean for a moment that's all I have on file).  The thing is, I've been in many conversations where someone shares a shocking tale, and I naturally respond with my own shockers.  ...I love shock effect...  But when someone recently shared with me a horrific reality about bath salts-induced behavior, I finally realized I am not obligated to pass it on next time someone starts an exchange of shocking news.  If I play in my mind any of those thoughts, I am sickened with the distortion of humanity.  First because it's so far from good, and second, because my fallible humanity has the very same capabilities of horrific behavior.  Thus I feel personally filthy by the very concept, and painfully compassionate to those who are full of guilt of committing such horrors.  I hope being nonspecific hasn't itself brought pointlessly negative thoughts into your head; I hope you will move on quickly while understanding what I'm saying.

There might be a social burst of joy in sharing a shocker that successfully jolts everyone in the room. My new resolution is, if it creates a visual memory that can turn my stomach any time I look at it, and there is no real life reason to inform someone of the thought, then I no longer want to 'duplicate' the corrupt 'file' by sharing it with others.  I may not be able to erase it from my 'hard drive', but by the grace of God I can relegate it into a guarded trash bin and, daily, refuse to dwell on it, and not let it replicate via my mouth.  From several sources recently I'm taking the wisdom, "The way to stop thinking about something is to move onto the next thing," whether that next thing is a better memory, a task, a prayer.  Abraham Lincoln addressed the very same idea to moments of feeling embarrassed, lol.  Move on quickly to other things.

II.

Without using any search engines besides my own recall, I was trying to think about colors in the Bible.  There's not a verse that says, "And Noah looked upon the rainbow, and behold, he saw that the band of color was a blend sequence of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple."  So I started asking myself, just what can I recall is mentioned of color in the Bible?  Not because I imagine a colorless ancient Near East, but because I am intrigued by the everyday things the contents of the Bible do include.  When I find these things, it's like a glimpse of ancient times.  It still amazes me sometimes to think that the people mentioned by name in the Bible could look up at night and see the very same constellations I look at now; somewhere on this same globe, their eyes were directed at the same arranged pinpoints of light, and they too wondered how small and insignificant they must be beneath such a vast mystery as the depths of a night sky.

Colors.  I thought about blue.  Surely a Psalm about the heavens says blue. But, off the cuff, I cannot remember such a mention (I could be wrong).

Sometimes color references in the Bible are named by precious jewels.  Sapphire is blue, and I'm pretty sure that is mentioned among many others in the book of Revelation.

Lydia, the seller of purple who was glad to learn that the God she worshipped had sent His Son with good news of salvation.  I once learned about the incredibly time costly process of making purple cloth.

Red: scarlet, the cord Rahab the harlot hung out her window which marked her house as the one that wouldn't fall with Jericho.  Blood and snow are also both used as descriptive color terms.

Gold.  Gold things, or things that appeared like gold.  Brass.

Green.  Green pastures in which the Good Shepherd "makes me lie down" from Psalm 23.  Green, verdancy; lush.  Shades of green surrounding your desk can refresh the spirits in a most pepto-bismol pink of rooms.  I learned this at my last job! :)

Though I talked earlier about not wanting to shock people with horrifying stories, I am still someone who likes the jolt created by contrasts, and bits of reality that put a splash of color back in a grayscale picture.  For the world I see on a day to day basis loses vividness of color, like retinal fatigue.  As I stare at something green, the retinal burn of purple dulls the green.  But look at another color after staring at green, and the purple retinal burn will mingle with those colors in a new way.  I apply this to mingling of ideas, too.  Stare at one very hard, and then change angles.  

III.

Driving home from work today, my shoulders both ached from work yesterday. I wondered at the entitlement I've felt to a healthy body.  While everything works well, I somehow imagine it's because I'm doing things right.  Hardly!  True, much disease can be blamed on poor choices, but only in hindsight are those choices proven to be poor ones.  Other folks make those same choices with no consequences, and thus--in a sense--those choices were neither poor nor good, but just choices.  But escaping consequences does not necessarily neutralize the poorness of a decision.  Lifting heavy weights wrong can work fine, ....until you injure something.  Smoking is fine, ....until you have lung cancer.  Do many people get away with smoking and never get lung cancer?  Sure thing.  But not smoking is probably a most excellent way to avoid ever getting it.  How many smokers, however, feel entitled to be one of those who never gets cancer, and if diagnosed, respond with as much innocent injury as a nonsmoker rightfully would if diagnosed?

My life thus far was teaching me that I intuitively know my limits--that if I can lift something, then my body can handle that strain.  I try not to lift with my back, but I've never studied body mechanics enough to realize how vulnerable my shoulders might be to wrong lifting.  Well, twice this year now I've been reminded, that I can misuse my muscles in a way that hurts other parts of my musculoskeletal system.  Oh, sure I knew it happened to other people, but injury never confronted me.  Oh, how unrewarding prevention feels as long as we suspect it's much ado about nothing!...But how we wish we could rewind time, when consequences arise which we could have prevented.

Someone who is put on blood thinners, learning her normal behavior is now unhealthy because she bruises so easily, can continue doing what "she knew she could do." Or she can admit that her body has changed, and adapt her behavior to take care of her body.

It's so easy to take a healthy body for granted, to feel entitled to its right functioning, and to believe it's functioning rightly 'because I want it to'.  With that mindset, an onset of a chronic disease can only be utterly demoralizing, for the body that obeyed certain commands before now refuses.  Did it ever obey because of my authority?  I suspect not, but rather because it has been commissioned to obedience.  I don't think the life coursing through my veins can be credited to the life of my sense of self; rather, it's a vehicle made and held together by a gerunding miracle.  This vehicle allows me to experience physical humanness.  I can treat my body like an old jalopy or like a rolls royce; I hope it will continue getting me from point A to point B, but where a first beater car is often 'driven til it drops,' we only get one car.  Sure, we'll drive it til it stops, but that doesn't justify abusing it.  Sure, things can go wrong that aren't our fault.  But appropriate fuel and routine maintenance are a little more important when you realize insurance can only repair so much.

So what if you find your maturing body takes a turn for the worse?  As you're forced to accept that the cd player has started skipping, the radiator is leaking, do you start wondering about existence Aftercar?


So what was that Jars of Clay song, anyway?
"Goodbye, Goodnight."
A flower for your vanity, a penny for your thoughts
about the world's insanity and how we've gotten lost
Strike up the band to play a song as we go waltzing by
And fake a smile as we all say goodbye
Goodbye, oh goodbye

Say a prayer for recognition, kiss the ones you love
Gather up the ammunition, sigh for all the lost
Strike up the band to play a song as we go waltzing by
And fake a smile as we all say goodbye

Raise a glass for ignorance, drink a toast to fear
The beginning of the end has come that's why we all are here
Strike up the band to play a song and try hard not to cry
And fake a smile as we all say goodbye
Goodbye

dereliction

My room is the opposite of fengshui.  A window cut in half.  There is truly no flow to the arrangement.

Sometimes I think my state of mind is a result of the way my room is arranged.  Because my room is inconvenient, uncomfortable, and messy, then my mind feels the same.

Because in my room I continue to live with disorder, I make passive life choices.

If I would only organize my room, I would make choices I feel better about.

On the other hand, I think my living space is an expression from my subconscious to my conscious--a work of art, if you would; a visual aid that declares my spiritual state.  Aside from practical benefits to getting my act together and organizing, I can still see how the awkward, Picasso-esque disorder reflects the cognitive dissonance I've tolerated in my mind for a long time.

It's like I look around and feel trapped, unable to see the big pictures, unable to see options that could bring serenity to my environment.

But where there is vision, where there is hope, my sight grows more clear.  The insurmountable becomes logically solvent.  I'm no longer trapped by conundrums of my own making.  If I believe in sense I don't have to blur my eyes at the sight of nonsense.

Sense.  Sweet belief.  Audible voices, not shrill cries.
Let the dust storm, the cobwebs, the buzzing of flies, abate.  Aesthetic is a real thing.

Sleeptalk

I think I'm becoming more accustomed to talking in my sleep.  Whereas I've typically caught myself in the act, and been rather embarrassed that the words I just couldn't get out in the dream came out a little easier in this world, I've made a transition sometime in the last few months.

It started in a dream where I needed to explain something to an acquaintance.  It seemed very important, which pulled upon an earnestness of expression that, from what I can tell, encouraged a crossing of wires from dream world to real world.  As I opened my mouth to explain, the words channeled themselves not into the dream, but out the mouth of my sleeping body.  But, being a veteran of catching myself in the act of starting to talk in my sleep, I clamped my mouth shut.  Also being a veteran of sustaining dreams through half-wakeful Saturday brunch-hours, it was not surprising that the dream continued uninterrupted by so lucid a thought process.

The friend in the dream awaited my explanation, and he began to misinterpret my silence.  But how could I explain to him that the only significance of my silence was that my voice, my audio line-out, was not plugged into the dream but into my empty bedroom?  (As long as I didn't lose the dream, he could hear me in either case, but I wanted him to understand just what indignity he was asking of me!!) So I very carefully and succinctly whispered what I had wanted to say, drawing sparingly on an imagined reserve of good graces from the Pragma of real life (a muse who preaches circumspection at all times, frowning and casting judgment upon the levity of all half-soaked partygoers, and also having time to point the finger at those who smile easily, and those Hannahs who don't quite succeed in refraining from sleep-talk).

This willingness to talk in my sleep was the conquering of a great dilemma.  You see, the world of dreams can be like a vacation spot where nobody there knows anybody at home and nobody at home knows where you are.  I mean, my dreams tend to be populated by versions of real-life people, but I have the overarching complacency that "what happens in dream, stays in dream."  This makes a haven of uninhibited honesty, expression, and confidence.  It's not that I never wake up feeling delighted or ashamed by what I dreamt, but nobody will come knocking on my door to arrest me for what I dreamed.  (What if they did?  It might be worth writing a novel about).  But really, there is grace in the privacy of thoughts.

So I sometimes turn cartwheels, scale cliffs, or fly; I also might rescue an orphan, speak truth without fear, and confront evil, wearing the armor of God.  On the other hand, I might swear in rage at someone I thought merely annoyed me in real life, or crawl into bed with somebody I oughtn't, or commit some terrible deed that will haunt even my waking self with the sober reminder of inherent depravity.   And I can't always distinguish between noble and naughty while dreaming the dream.

Unlike telling a dream to someone after waking, I would liken talking in one's sleep to butt-dialing your housemates while you are on a trip.  It's the variety of possibilities that makes butt-dialing your dream into reality so unnerving.  Thus, a lifetime of clenching my jaw at night might be an ethical construct from taking myself too seriously.

Because really, if I got home from a road trip and learned my wristwatch had been bugged, streaming audio to an attentive audience, it's possible I would have some regrets.  But sleep talking isn't even similar.  And at the unlikely conjuction of: 1) my sleep-talking clearly enough to be understood 2) someone hearing me 3) that person understanding what I was talking about, 5) saying something so terrible it will be unforgivable even as sleep talk 4) the listener being personally offended, what am I really afraid of?  Oh, maybe in romance novels John awakes to hear Jane crying in her sleep, "Oh, James!"  And John's heart goes cold.  Or people give away important real life secrets by sleep-talking.  Whether this ever really happens or not, it's hardly grounds for paranoia.

That night, choosing to sleep talk as a grand sacrifice of personal inhibition, may have been a turning point.  In this last night or too, I think I came to one of those moments of decision, where I strongly suspected I was about to talk in my sleep, and I barely deliberated.  Hang it, I had something to say to an imaginary person, and so what if someone in the waking realm heard me?  Maybe I'll even go into public speaking!  (Does that seem to be a non-sequiter?  But I am sure it follows logically.)

But if my newfound, cavalier attitude toward sleep-talking continues, why--I shall probably become a sleeping bard.  Only, I'm guessing everybody else would rather be asleep, wandering their own dreamlands.  Perhaps I would like to go creeping, find a room full of outspoken dreamers, and then awaken them with mocking laughter.  And I'm sure they would be terribly amused, and we could all chock it up to one of those great moments of history.

A Review of Starflower by Anne Elisabeth Stengl

Recently, I was delighted to read Anne Elisabeth Stengl’s most recent fantasy novel, Starflower. As each of her books hits the shelves of stores, I’m delighted to hold a copy and contemplate hours of pleasure to come. I don’t usually read it right away. It sits somewhere in sight, and I go about business as usual for a week or so. It would not do to open it and only be able to read a few sentences. I must wait for an evening when I have no other obligations, laundry has run, the house is quiet. Then I can snuggle down in a chair with a cup of coffee and slowly begin turning pages.

Since college, losing myself in books has been a challenge. First I was burned out from all the required reading. Second, I no longer had long lazy summers during which I could read stacks of mysteries, romances, and adventures. Yet somehow I continue making time to read paragraphs, pages, chapters. And every once in a while, I still find a book that takes hold of my attention such that, instead of reading a customary bedtime chapter, I turn another page, and another, more intentely, as the clock ticks and the lamp burns into the wee hours of the morning. And when that happens, I know I’ve found a book worth writing about.

buy this book at Bethany House Publishers

Fairy tales take us far away from our present cares, to a place where our steps are not so heavy nor our consciences so seared; and in this medium of deeper colors, lighter laughter, and wilder weeping, we find our wounds gently tended and truth filtered into our heart like ambient light to shine upon our worth and our weakness. Stengl writes adventurously and deliberately, delicately and boldly. And so, when her fourth book Starflower made its way into my hands, I was more than eager for the adventures in store.

Earlier books from the Tales of Goldstone Wood referred frequently to the ancient times Starflower would explore. I was most haunted by a passing scene in the previous book, Moonblood, when a ghostly apparition appeared in the Wood Between, speaking in an ancient accent and asking Lionheart to send word to Starflower. His brief presence—an unanswerable pathos, feeble tenacity—moved me deeply with a sorrow for dreams forever lost but never quite erased. Thus, as I literarily climbed the foothills of scene-setting in Starflower, gathering momentum for a late night a finis read, that mournful scene surfaced in my memory and heightened the alertness of my imagination.

Stengl never fails to bring classic literature to life in her newly imagined fairy tales. For those not familiar with George MacDonald or C.S. Lewis (not to mention some more antique treasures of fantasy, poetry, and allegory), the Tales of Goldstone Wood present anew some of the most insightful imagery wielded by old masters of literature. I hesitate to give away much of the content of the story.  In fact, I would hardly alter the blurb on the back cover, but to hint about a few of my favorite scenes. 

There is a comical ruler of an obscure demesne who has a plethora of frogs residing in royal swampiness. There is a burning city in which a famished mortal struggles onward with an endless reserve of determination. Then one's guts twist in compassion when a loveless child falls asleep in loving arms. There is joyful wonder when connections are made to other books in the series, and a increasing anticipation of approaching confrontations. And it wouldn’t be fair to forget entirely about a little songbird in a cage, who doesn't know fear and is thoroughly vain.  She resides in such a spot as to vex the tale’s resident tormented soul and to provide a directional force for the heroic journeys detailed.

Finally, I happily invite you to discover the other Tales of Goldstone Wood, but remind you that Stengl has generously written in such a manner that there is freedom to read the books in any order. So for now I am speaking for Starflower, and recommending it as a delightful page-turner that will tickle your funny bone and touch your heart.

"The Chase" analogy

I dearly enjoy analogies.

They provide a canvas on which you can surprise yourself with new understanding about life.

"If the fork in the road actually represents a decision, then the trees beside it could represent reassuring authority figures in our lives who watch but do not micromanage our lives."

Eh?  Anyway, moving on...

I reflected on the subject of traditional courtship, emphasizing a male pursuing a female.

It is definitely not unheard of for relationship-educators to compare such a pursuit to a hunter chasing after a deer:  earnest prose about a man as hunter, pursuing a woman with attentive patience and determination and passion, and she might, well, "rustle the leaves" a bit so he knows where she is, though she plays (or is actually) hard to get.  And of course, if he gets her, how proud he is of his "prize"!  How consummate shall be their love when at last she is his and how well they shall understand each other for having played the appropriate parts in romantic comedy.

Dear, deer!
image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I won't say the imagery is ALL wrong.  It may even have hints of biblical basis.
However, there may be some tests of analogies by which caring individuals can gauge some outer limits of analogy.

First, there's what I would call a "back translation".
Think through the story in the inverse, but with the same details-- for, why not?  If an analogy is ardently used, let it not be a one-way street.

So, a hunter chases a deer because he wants it as his bride.  And so on.  This quickly turns sour.  Why? Why can't the analogy be a two-way street?
Because it's a buck that pursues a doe with 'romantic' intentions, not a hunter with a gun. Whether animal relationships should be a model analogy for human relationships is a different question I won't comment on here.  Anyway, the simple back translation doesn't work.

Second, a double inversion:  "back translate" an image of hunting as it is.  Say you have hunters rallying together and pep talking each other about the hunt for a deer.  Suppose a veteran hunter wants to educate the new guys about the patience and skill it takes to get the kill.  The men chuckle and lick their lips as they think of an upcoming venison steak.

The back translation then takes what is true of hunting and imposes it on courtship.  If you ask the question, "What is true of courtship? Well, look at a hunter...."  you have a man who will cunningly pursue a prey until it cannot escape anymore.  He has no meaningful communication with the prey.  The prey has nothing to offer him but a satisfied belly and a trophy to brag about, and increased cunning. What does he have to offer the prey?  Maybe in some situation a life in captivity, but realistically, the end of life.    Anyway, I hardly need go on.  The analogy is just weak and casts a pallor on the intentions of men who insist strongly on their role as pursuer.  To espouse strongly a view that man's role is to be the hunter, it makes woman the hunted, and when the two have been united, there really is no future in their relationship but for him to digest her and be done with her.

In taking the analogy to its extreme, I in no way suggest that earnest Christian men treat their wives that way.  What is known is that there are men out there, claiming or not claiming Christianity, who do have exactly so low an attitude toward their future wives.  And my question is, if the analogy falls apart so miserably in back translation, should it be used?