• About
  • Seeding Our Future

Communing

~ with Nature

Communing

Tag Archives: Cycles

Witch Hazel

26 Thursday Oct 2017

Posted by Lesley Irene Shore in Aging, Elderhood, Fox Hill Village, Growing, Land, Nature, Spiritual

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

Bloom, Blossoming, Cycles, Fall, Flower, Flowering, Fox Hill Village, Green World, Halloween, Harmony Farm, Rambles, Rhythm, Seasons, Spiritual Growth, Spring, Winter, Witch Hazel, Woods

Upon moving to Harmony Farm, I bought guides for identifying the land’s wild vegetation. During rambles over fields and through woods, I became familiar with the green world living there. I learned the names of many species and, over time, their medicinal uses.

When I first met Witch Hazel (Hamamelis virginiana), I was struck by her beauty and the timing of her flowering. During October her leaves turned vibrant yellow and the woods grew awash with her brilliant color. Then, as fall progressed, she dropped her leaves to display delicate yellow flowers along her boughs.

As time moved on, I learned the rhythms of Harmony Farm’s year and lived the cycles of her seasons. I looked forward to Witch Hazel’s burst of glory occurring while the land prepared to enter winter’s hibernation. This happened around Halloween in Medfield, MA.

Witch Hazel’s tendency to flower during late fall, even into early winter, endeared her to me. By bursting into flower at the end of a cycle, I felt reassured that my elder years could be a time of blossoming and spiritual growth.

Our move to Fox Hill Village took place during early January. Looking out the window one late February morning, a brilliantly flowering shrub caught my eye. Due to its yellow blossoms, I assumed the shrub to be forsythia and bemoaned the effects of global warming, for forsythia usually blooms in early spring. A fellow resident corrected my misconception, identifying the flowers as belonging to Witch Hazel. At first I refused to believe him, but further investigation revealed this Witch Hazel to be an oriental variety that blooms in the midst of winter.

Having moved into our new home, I began acquainting myself with Fox Hill’s woods. As I rambled around this new territory, I discovered native Witch Hazel growing here too. Recognizing an old friend, I watched as she sprouted leaves in spring and when summer moved into fall, I eagerly anticipated her time of blossoming.

Her leaves turned yellow and still cling to her limbs. As I take my walk each day, I now study her closely, searching for signs of flowers yet to come.

Halloween nears and this will be my first time participating in Fox Hill’s yearly celebration, a costume party. I decided to adorn myself in Witch Hazel garb – her leaves and, hopefully, flowers too.

As I celebrate beginning the last phase of life, I look forward to my own blossoming. I eagerly anticipate a season of spiritual growth and flowering.

Summer Soul-stice

20 Wednesday Jun 2012

Posted by Lesley Irene Shore in Spiritual

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Cycles, Gratitude, Heart, Interconnection, Nature, Seasons, Soul, Summer

Today, the summer solstice, is the longest day and shortest night of the year.  Summer blossoms forth from this day forward.  After today, daylight will shorten and night-time will lengthen until the winter solstice, when daylight will lengthen once again.

Thinking about celebrating the day, I wander over to Harmony Center. Sunlight filters through trees and dances along the ground, guiding me down the path. 

When I reach my destination, I stop … in awe of the sight before my eyes.

A sea of foxglove beckons me on.  Waves of white and hot pink spread before me, and envelop me.  Majestic spires of delight reach up and draw in. 

My heart expands – filled with wonder, full of love.

One spire calls me closer.  Pulled into her embrace, I reach out to touch.  My fingers explore her silky soft skin.

Enthralled, I move in for more.  A wide open blossom invites me to enter.  My eyes follow the dotted pathway, travel into her mouth and down her throat.  I enter her center, the core of her being. 

Her place of inner stillness resonates deep inside me.  For a timeless moment, we share this space, the inner sanctum of soul. 

Nature and Culture

10 Tuesday Jan 2012

Posted by Lesley Irene Shore in Whole

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Culture, Cycles, Food, Gardening Organically, Interconnecting, Nature

I live on Harmony Farm where we’ve been gardening organically, raising chickens and sheep, and connecting with nature for over 30 years.  In my early years of living on this land, I became enamored with living a natural life-style.

We aimed to grow as much of our food as possible.  Our chickens produced eggs.  The gardens blessed us with garlic, greens, herbs, strawberries, tomatoes, squash, and many other gifts.  I learned to freeze vegetables and make jams without using sugar.  During winter months, we also ate potatoes and carrots from our cold storage room in the cellar. 

Gardening organically and living in tune with the seasons became my personal mantra.  During the heat of summer months we ate more cooling raw foods (salads and fruit), and in winter turned to heavier stews and soups.  I also listened to my body as it cycled through the seasons, sleeping more during winter and less during summer. 

While our dream of living in harmony with nature was becoming a reality, we were also part of another world, society – living in it, working in it, enjoying it.  In some ways we kept our two worlds separate, leaving one to enter the other, but they also overlapped, and I felt torn between them. 

As much as I loved nature, I felt unfaithful and disloyal, for I also appreciated the comforts and conveniences of modern life.  My food processor was a blessing in the kitchen, along with the blender, grain mill and juicer.  And while I savored taking peaceful walks, I also fancied the feel of driving a high performance car, one that enabled me to feel my way along the road, sensing each turn.  As much as I enjoyed gardening, it hadn’t replaced going to movies, plays, symphonies, and eating out.

I felt torn, fragmented, pulled in two directions.  One of my feet was firmly planted in the earth, feeling her cycles and rhythms.  My other foot was speeding along America’s highways, which favored the straight, narrow path of logical, mechanistic thinking.  I wasn’t comfortable with these disparities and kept thinking that I had to choose between different worlds – that truly valuing nature meant renouncing culture and its technological advances. 

I was suffering from our society’s disease of either / or thinking.  Though nature had been showing me how she weaves parts into wholes, I’d been seeing the parts and overlooking the whole.  Either / or thinking was the culprit to banish from my life, not the machines that made it easier, enriched it. 

After coming to this realization 25 years ago, my learning from nature intensified.  I began looking toward living a whole life, not subtracting from it, and experiencing how interconnecting creates wholeness. 

Winter Solstice

22 Thursday Dec 2011

Posted by Lesley Irene Shore in Nature

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Cycles, Seasons

The seasons change, life moves on, cycling from dark to light and light to dark.  Today, the Winter Solstice, marks the longest, and thereby the darkest, night of the year.  It invites us to appreciate the dark, to explore the mystery of darkness.

Living in our light-loving culture, we’re raised to fear the dark, to shy away from potential evil lurking inside the dark.  I too love the light of summer, yet know that darkness brings gifts of its own.  It beckons us to turn inward, to move into that still place deep inside.  It encourages us to explore mystery, to dream, to meditate, and to appreciate both sides of polarity — the dark as well as the light.

Winter Solstice marks the beginning of our winter — a time to embrace the dark, to wrap a blanket around our bodies and curl up inside the “cave.”  During winter our energies slow down.  We hibernate and rest, allowing our energy to replenish in readiness for the rebirth of spring.

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Recent Posts

  • We Must Never Forget
  • Survivor Tree
  • Witch Hazel
  • Nature’s Fury
  • Community

Categories

  • Aging
  • Elderhood
  • Fox Hill Village
  • Growing
  • Healing
  • Land
  • Nature
  • Spiritual
  • Whole

Archives

  • November 2018
  • January 2018
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • November 2014
  • November 2013
  • May 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.com

Blog at WordPress.com.

Cancel