Back to the garden!

Two Acres

For six months of the year, I forget that we have land. I hurry down the front walk, sometimes trying to avoid ice patches, sometimes shuffling though oak leaves making a bee line for my car.

Everything changes in May. We are outside all day moving plants, shoveling composted manure, weeding and forever digging holes for planting on this glacial moraine where we live. Every time you put a shovel in the ground you hit a rock. Without fail. Or you find a treasure or simply a memory. I have lived here for thirty-three years, David for five more. These two acres hold stories. Every inch.

Yesterday we were digging a new bed by the edge of the courtyard in front of the barn. It is the very place we had a pig roast and party one year ago this weekend on the eve of Carrie and Tim's wedding.  This is where we celebrated the publication of John's book,  Loon.

Digging away in a glow of memory, the shovel hit what we thought was a rock but looking closer we realized was a large piece of concrete. We puzzled over that. Was this the old shed foundation, the original garage that we moved twice and finally a third time down our driveway to give to a neighbor?  No, not in the right place. Why would there be concrete here? Then David's face lit up with the answer. THE BASKETBALL HOOP!  When the girls were on teams and wanting to shoot hoops, David poured a foundation and erected a wooden pole with a red basketball hoop and net at the top. Did we actually use that thing he wondered. The deflated basketball in the barn is proof that we did. At least for awhile. Then one day when basketball teams in middle school were a thing of the past, we took it down, leaving the memories lodged in a piece of concrete just under the soil.

Yesterday I went on a rampage in the woods along Weston Road pulling up vines of poison ivy and buckthorn. Once you start pulling,  the underground root can take you a long way exposing the earth under the layers of oak leaves and weeds. Looking down something yellow appeared under layers of rotting leaves. It was the circular disk that was propelled by one of our favorite toys (see above photo). I loved the whirl a gig, no batteries needed, pull the string on the handle and the discs went flying into the air and into trees and out of sight. Many a birthday party was saved by the arrival of this wonderful toy. Many flying discs were lost or stayed high in trees until hurricane force winds brought them down. Here under the mulch lay the memory of this toy and all the children who shrieked with joy as the disc took flight and ran after it, reaching up to grab it out of the air.

A deep memory is lodged under a solid rock behind the Hemlock tree behind the house. Here lies our beloved dog, Niki, buried there on a cold January day six years ago. She knew this land better than we do, she ran around these two acres for fourteen years, catching balls, burying bones, leaping to lap water out of a garden hose and forever trying to steal the ball when we played "monkey in the middle." David and I greet her every time we pass the rock marker of her grave, often bending down to pat it. "What a good dog..."

 Who knew that a shovel in the ground could unleash so many memories. I am just beginning to understand the joy of tending a place, working hard and getting up early the next day just to see how the transplanted andromeda are doing. The past becomes present, it's a big world out there on this small place.

Insight Meditation Society Barre, Mass.

The Thai buddha is flanked by roses in celebration of the ten year anniversary of The Forest Refuge, the meditation retreat which is part of IMS designed by David and his office ten years ago.

Buddhist monks ("the Venerable") blessed those who were gathered and the building by chanting, anointing all with water. We circled the building, chanting.  How many architects have had this kind of celebration of their work?  Many who have sat meditation here say it is unlike any place they have been. Very serene. Monks and teachers from all over the world come to stay for up to a year. It was very moving to be there and see how warmly everyone greeted David, the architect. They are so grateful for his work. This project was the brain child of Joseph Goldstein who is a leader in the field of Insight Meditation in this country. He and David worked very closely on this project. Seeing them together was like seeing old friends. The project had been very collaborative, with all the ups and downs that go with that! 

Below is the final part of the project. It is a dorm for the Insight Meditation Society where retreats last a few days or a few weeks but are separate from the Forest Refuge above. David had a chance to see the design he had done years ago taking shape. The challenge of this project was joining a new building with an existing building. 

Above, David with the builder (who does great work!)  I must admit I miss crawling around construction sites. This is the last project that has worked its way through David's former office that he had a hand in designing.

Check out this wonderful place. The Forest Refuge.

Mothers for Peace

Chestnut Street Garden planted and painted by my mother, 

Martha Lamb McLean

 Mother's Day as we know it — where we celebrate our own mothers, with flowers, gifts, and cards — is relatively new, but annual celebrations to celebrate motherhood are an ancient practice.

The motherhood festivities have historically been in spring, the season of fertility. In ancient Egypt, there were celebrations to honor Isis, the loving mother-goddess, who is often shown in Egyptian art with the baby Horus at her breast, much like Mary and Jesus in later Christian iconography. The cult of the great mother-goddess Cybele began in Turkey and soon moved to Greece and Rome, and she was worshipped in some form for more than a thousand years. Her priestesses led wild celebrations, full of drinking, dancing, music, and all kinds of debauchery.
In the 1600s, England declared an official Mothering Day for that fourth Sunday of Lent. It was a time when families were encouraged to get together, and servants or workers were allowed one day off work to go see their mothers, since many working-class families in England worked as servants on separate estates and rarely got to see each other.

When the pilgrims came to America, they stopped celebrating Mothering Day,  just as they stopped celebrating most holidays that they thought had become too secular.

Mother's Day was reintroduced to America in 1870 by Julia Ward Howe, who wanted to set aside a day of protest after the Civil War, in which mothers could come together and protest their sons killing other mothers' sons.

But the woman who really created Mother's Day as we know it was Anna Jarvis. Her mother had held Mother's Friendship Days to reunite families and neighbors separated during the war, and when she died, her daughter, Anna Jarvis, worked to proclaim an official Mother's Day to honor her mother and celebrate peace.

And so on May 10, 1908, the first official Mother's Day celebrations took place in Grafton, West Virginia, and at a church in Philadelphia. In 1914, Woodrow Wilson designated the second Sunday of May as Mother's Day.

(the above copied from today's edition of The Writer's Almanac by Garrison Keillor on NPR Radio)

eating outside

A smoothie in the glass I bought at Townsend Tea on Alberta Street in Portland, Oregon sitting in the courtyard by the barn under newly budding trees. A good breakfast.

Breakfast

Another breakfast

Okay, so by Colorado standards 5,050 feet of elevation doesn't sound like much (Mt Elbert, 14,444 ft), but in New England, you are practically on the top of Mt.Washington (6288 ft.)! Almost all the elevation is made on foot.

A breakfast I loved was eaten at Lakes of the Clouds Hut, one mile from the summit of Mt. Washington,  in 2008 when Eliza worked there.  Eliza was one of the crew who carried the food up the mountain in a pack and prepared it for the hungry guests. For me, it was a pretty challenging climb to get there but the rewards were great. Now I wonder if I would be as  motivated to get there without my daughter as a lure at the top of the mountain. But the view, the sense of accomplishment, the quiet and the breakfast are making me wonder if I might go there again.