Life on the Edge

Even on an overcast day, like today, there is beauty to be found. I don't know why, but every time I stoop low to walk through this green tunnel on the way to the beach, I smile. Something about "becoming again as a child" perhaps. Or, just a smug satisfaction knowing that the shape has grown from nothing to this present form over the past twelve years due to patient pruning on my part. Comprised mainly of coastal wattle, this leafy gateway is both an entrance and an exit. Upon leaving the house, it symbolises a chance to keep behind my studio and other "work" and head freely to the cleansing surf. Upon leaving the beach and its wildness, then walking beneath the arched shadows that brush against wet skin, I enter back into the safety of home; into the warm confines of a warm refuge more intimate and close than what is on the other side of the tunnel. There is also a tiny sense of being "rebirthed"; a chance to change my mood if I choose. I carry from the house anger, sadness, joy or elation. This portal allows an opportunity to drop the emotion or carry it on. More often than not, the physical act of lowering myself has a humbling effect on my being. In such a short distance of a few feet, a sense of tolerance to the issues of the day drop onto and into me. I'm forced to see the light at the end of the tunnel. There's no denying it. Its always there. Present. Everyday. How lucky can one get?

Yesterday evening, just past sunset in fading light, I wheeled my red wheelbarrow back home and into the garden shed for the last time. This year's tree planting and repair is finished. My palms are a bit sore from having pushed into the ground 3,000 bamboo stakes (even while wearing padded bicycle gloves). The usual neck and back problems flared up from the constant kneeling and bending over to plant the 520 trees and small shrubs and repair an additional 300 other trees from previous years. But..... what a feeling of righteous goodness! Looking back up the hill one can only see a future forest emerging in thirty to fifty years. Any pain disappears beneath the overwhelming joy of having done something truly worthy. When one kneels before an altar, are there thoughts of sore knees? Surely not. And thanks to Cawley, Jill and Sophie for the days they helped. Talk about feeling blessed. While planting some blackwood trees two days ago near the circle at the top right of the photo, I stood up to have a stretch. Looking down the hill with my arms out wide (like Christ on the cross), and holding them there as in a yoga pose while all the while admiring the view, a wedge tail eagle came by my right side from behind me. The eagle did a slow circle around me about 25 feet in the air and then continued on her way. I never flinched. The suddenness of it wasn't a surprise. I just smiled, kept my arms outstretched and sang the bird's praises. And for an update on a previous blog entry (August 19), my little boat sculpture, Who's On Board?, won first place and $5,000 at the 3rd Tweed Wood Biennial. What especially heartenes me with the win, is that the award acknowledges that art and politics can be a winning combination. Just concentrating on the beauty of the form is only half the prize; the deeper content of how we as a nation treat refugees is the other, more powerful half. More money for more trees.

Captured in this morning's dawn light, three she-oaks stand glowing. The keen eye will discern that two of the she-oaks are coloured with a dusting of orange, while the one on the left is a bright green. Allocasuarina verticillata, the latin for the type of she-oak that grows around Windgrove on its nutrient poor rocky hillsides, has both a male and female tree with the male flowering in long drooping golden-orange spikes this time of year. The air borne pollen then travels over to the female tree and pollinates a tiny red flower resulting in a cone just smaller than the average walnut. It interests me that the female of this particular species gets the nuts.

Okay folks, How about increasing your vocabulary today? Endemic: only found growing naturally in the place mentioned Tomentum: (adj. tomentose) a dense covering of soft, matted hairs Stellate: studded with stars Subtending: extending under so as to embrace or enfold Phyllaries: the small bracts around the outside of a daisy head Bract: a small leaf-like structure, sometimes scale-like Scarious: thin, papery or horny, dry, non-green Pappus: the ring of hairs or scales which make up the parachute on daisy seeds Pappus bristle: one hair of such a structure Now read this: Bedfordia linearis --- Shrub or small tree, endemic to Tasmania, with slender trunk and thin spreading branches, bark grey, upper twigs covered with white tomentum. Leaves alternate, narrow-linear to 9 cm/4 inches long, margins revolute under surfaces white with stellate hairs. Flower heads clear golden yellow, white stalked, one or two in each axil of many leaves near the ends of branches making a showy mass but flowers much shorter than the subtending leaves. Daisy-type head with all florets tubular, head 6 mm/quarter inch across. Phyllaries green with white felted hairs, inner ones with shining scarious margins. Pappus bristles long white. Flowering December till January. Widespread in wet eucalypt forests and on rocky hillsides. All very well, except that it flowered in November and is in neither a wet eucalypt forest nor a rocky hillside. Instead, by itself in an open grassy area of sandy soil. Isn't it amazing what can be learned from one little shrub?

Why am I smiling? Because I'm planting. Because the red wheelbarrow has she-oak seedlings in it. And not only that, it also has the plastic bags, mulch mats and bamboo stakes that are required to protect each young tree during the first three years of its growth from rabbits, wallabies, wind and competing grass. When the owner of the Puchella nursery found out that I couldn't afford what I had ordered from him, he simply said that what was more important was that the trees get into the ground; the money could be paid later. Les also took $100 off what was owed as his way of supporting the Parliament House Vigil. My friend, Jess, has also sent money over from Melbourne stating: "I'm working at the Restaurant every night this week, and what better way to spend the money I earn than on something benefiting the planet." The land thanks each of them. The baby trees thank them. And I thank them. So now, part of each day will be given over to planting out this year's 365 she-oaks and some 35 blackwood trees. Generally, I'll work in my studio in the morning and then, later in the day, take two to three hours to plant out 50 trees. However, the nicer the weather, the earlier I have to get started in order to put in the same 50 trees because the tendency is to find more excuses to sit and admire the excellent work one is doing. All I can say is that it is a good thing that I'm the boss man around this place. On a really, really nice day, especially a clear day with no wind and where I take a thermos of hot tea plus a tin of baked cookies, it might take forever to put in just 25 trees. But boy, do those trees feel looked after and prayed over. As proud as I am of my artistic endeavours and the sculptures that come out of my studio, nothing quite equals the honest satisfaction of putting into the ground several hundred life forces for the planet's and our future. Think about this. For each tree that goes into the ground, I have to kneel down to put it into the newly dug hole. Even if I didn't say a prayer for each tree (which I do), just the prayerful pose of kneeling would do something energetically to both the plant and the planter. In a few weeks, when I'll have dropped down on my knees 400 times, this will be the equivalent of eight years of Sunday only church going. And since this year will mark the four thousandth tree planted, one could almost say that I have already done a lifetime of prayerful work. No wonder I feels good.

William Stafford came to mind today as I was having some difficulty feeling up to the task of resolving a design problem concerned with plant stands for flowers and herbs in the new conservatory off the sun facing side of the house. Years ago in North Carolina while fielding questions from the audience after a poetry reading of his work, someone asked him how was it that he was able to write poem after poem everyday. Stafford's response was that, like everyone, he woke up some mornings and knew that his genius had stayed asleep. On these days, he said, he continued writing poems, but lowered his expectations. I simply put down my tools. And allowed the sweet fragrance of this week's first lemon blossoms to ever bloom at Windgrove carry me into contentment. I then thought of Stafford's poem, "Yes". "It could happen any time, tornado, earthquake, Armageddon. It could happen. Or sunshine, love, salvation. It could, you know. That's why we wake and look out -- no guarantees in this life. But some bonuses, like morning, like right now, like noon, like evening." Like this lemon blossom.

More wonderful than even the visual delight of a native currant bush (Leucopogon purviflorus) in bloom is the delicate honey fragrance that hovers in the air when the wind abates and the sun’s warmth exults its nectar to exude. With a nickname of “Bear”, I take great delight in sticking my head straight into this bush and filling my nostrils with deep intakes of scented air. Nothing better. But I’m confused, as a lot of other animals and insects are, because the photo taken today should not have happened for another four months or until October/November. All around Windgrove more than half the currant bushes are blooming far out of season; and with masses of flowers. Sure, it is a pretty sight. But there are no bees or other insects flying in and out of these bushes. Winter has just started (June here being the equivalent of December in the northern hemisphere) and there is no one available to crawl into the tiny one eight inch flower to retrieve the pollen off the anther and spread it to the plant’s ovaries. A silent blossoming. Perhaps the wind will blow things around a bit enabling the fruit, a small, edible waxy white drupe, to emerge. But when? In the middle of winter, before its time? Will it ripen? Will the birds who normally eat the fruit in summer, be around? Or, have they migrated north for the winter? And, what will they eat upon their return if there is no more fruit? So what is this telling us? That global warming is creating havoc? That there are consequences when complex interconnected natural cycles are disrupted? I look at this currant bush and think of those many well meaning, yet potentially unwise, parents who force feed their children with so much extra schooling and lessons that the poor kids blossom into knowledge, into adulthood, too quickly before the appropriate season. And then later in life, all confused and angry over who they are, they wither early and never bear fruit of much significance. Not having had their hearts, minds and spirits pollinated in a more natural sequence, they stay stuck in adolescence and find it difficult to ripen into wise elders. Stretching a long bow on my part? Maybe. Maybe not. Why is drug and alcohol abuse and suicide occurring within socio-economic groups of higher education and wealth? What’s failing these supposely gifted people?

To casual viewers looking at the above photo, they could be forgiven for saying: “What’s the big deal? Just a few shrubs of different sizes.” The fog of one’s ignorance disappears as one takes the time to become familiar with each shrubs’ story. With understanding, even a modicum of understanding, the potential of compassion, care and love becomes more real. These “shrubs” are actually an endangered pine and have been planted to help in the longevity of their species. They also stand as sentinels around an eternal flame dedicated to world peace. Nine represent the guardians of the future and four of the them represent the past. The Peace Fire at Windgrove, initially called the “Children’s Grove”, is ringed with a single species of pine native to Tasmania: “South Esk River Pine (Callitris Oblonga), a tall shrub or small tree 3 to 4 meters (13 feet) with bluish foliage. Dense compact form. Hardy.” Or so said the plastic tag identifying this tree from all the others at the nursery. But only “hardy” if given a habitat to grow in. When I planted the first seven trees seven years ago to commemorate the births of six girls and one boy, I had actually never seen a mature specimen of South Esk pine in the wild or elsewhere. I only knew from a visiting botanist that this particular pine was one of the most endangered pines in the world because its very small native habitat in north east Tasmania was being lost to clear felling, farming and other land “improvements”. To survive, it needed to be propagated elsewhere. Hence, my choice of it for the Children’s Grove. Yesterday, I planted out four more along the circumference of the existing circle; paid for with a donation of money and a request from a woman visiting from Amsterdam who desired to have a grandmother tree planted next to her granddaughter, Isabella (one of the babies of seven years ago). The amount of money given was enough to purchase four trees, so I planted two on either side of the designated granddaughter tree thereby allowing all four of her grandparents to be with her. They might be smaller than she is at present, but I would think this particular tree is feeling rather lucky. Shall we go back to the original sentence: “So, what’s the big deal?”