on launching into summer

This morning I pulled the last of the garlic from the rows. It grew, mostly kind of small and crooked, tenacious. Like me reaching into a new place, learning the dirt season by season, getting undone and growing.

Some kind of fungus spread from the compost into dirt and left long beautiful white trails of spores spread throughout.

They clung on to the bulbs and as I clean them I wipe each one off and whisper a silent prayer that next year the fungus doesn’t spread.

It is kind of like this year because I remembered in my body to pull each one as the days were the longest, the calendar inside me is alive with the movement of time. Nettles, Peas, Roses, Garlic, and on through out the season. My hands know what to do and I listen to audiobooks as they move quickly through the cleaning.

My studio is full of plants in various stages of drying. The lizard who comes in and out the door ran helter skelter away from the pile of spicy garlic stalks.

I let my hands do the thinking, the moving, the sorting onto the next thing. I let it happen because this is the place that ideas start, this is place that I return, this is the place one stalk at a time that I learn and re-learn in a never-ending loop how to be part of this world at this time.

I don’t ever do it alone, the water touches me back as I wash dish after dish. The phone chirps along with their silly songs as messages come and go and tiny scraps of information float by. And each screech of the baby owls reminds me of the ear splitting sounds my children make so I feel at home when they demand more snacks.

This moment is that kind of creativity. The quick weave of braided pigtails. The scrape of dried herbs labeled for making medicine. The gentle way that I haul my tired body to bed…watching the blue turn to stars.

It was a  beautiful class last week and I invite you to join as paid subscriber to let it seep into your own making. This summer, I’ll be making some of these things as the sun and honey seep in:

-a body sized splash everyday in the cold waters of Puget Sound

-all the combinations of strawberries and roses June allows

-deep blue photographs of the changing light of summer for warmth

-poems and their parties to share wonder