For the record: Seafield: debunking stereotypes in the rose garden.

It has been worrying at the edges of my mind all day that I might, inadvertently, have reinforced stereotypical notions of an African childhood, when I mentioned my thatched hut sleeping quarters in a blog post earlier this morning.

To set the record straight for my US readers, I dug out some images of the farmhouse where I spent all my childhood years (when not in boarding school of course) on Seafield farm in Richmond district of the KwaZuluNatal midlands, South Africa.One of the rondavels in question is seen above, and hiding behind the main house, on the extreme right of the front view image which leads this blog entry. This rondavel was originally used as the farm office and a sewing room. Later it metamorphosed into a bedroom, when it became advisable to give the multitude of sisters more space.

Below is a gratuitous family group in the rose garden, minus the sisters, but including six Welsh corgi dogs (Seafield was, amongst other things, a cattle farm), the maternal grandmother, a very young dreaming nomad and showing a piece of the other rondavel which also served as a bedroom. Now that we have that straight, please don't start asking about the son who lived in a tree in the Chyulu hills, Kenya, for years.

Shakespearian dawn: fulminology

Recently I have had the mutters about the neighbours' late night lawn mowing sessions and the (dinky toy) city's 5:30 am sweeping and watering of the downtown streets rumbling army tanks through my meditations.

Well, no peace. This morning I woke just before 4 to magnificent earth trembling rumbles and an eerie orange light punctuated with bright flares. Fire! the town's on fire! I thought - last night's news story of the raging wild fires in Wenatchee/Leavenworth area obviously fresh in my mind.

Creeping over to the window, however, I find energetic lightening snakes ripping the sky apart. An awesome dawn thunderstorm come to bless this day!

The first rain we have had in more than a month comes pouring down in a metallic, earthy smelling gush. I lower some windows a little and sniff sniff sniff, hunkering down to experience the gift, breathing deeply, inhaling all that lovely wild energy. Oh! how I do love the smell of thunderstorms in the morning, even as remnants of childhood astraphobia tingle through me at cellular level.

There was ironstone in the soil of Seafield Farm way back there and then in the Old Country. The summer rainfall in that region of sub-tropical KwaZuluNatal was convectional. As a child, I frequently witnessed lightening strikes tossing the metal 50 gallon cream cans around in the milk shed and even taking Kopane, our oldest horse, the one who had patiently taught us all to ride.

Perhaps the most dramatic experience was when I was about four years old, and the only one present when lightening struck the telephone, throwing my father clean across the diningroom. A strong sulphur smell, a dislocated shoulder and a pretty good approximation of divine intervention in what was becoming a heated neighbourhood dispute over our warthogs' cavalier disregard for boundary fences were the major outcomes that evening.

In summer, the thunderstorms would build up late afternoon or during the early part of the night, often breaking around midnight. I remember countless times of running in terror through the red earth and pouring rain, dodging thunderbolts (or so I thought) to find shelter in the main house when being alone in my rondavel bedroom - a little thatched hut set outside of the main farmhouse - grew too scary to bear. The main house was protected from lightening strikes: regularly refreshed sprigs of strangely aromatic lantana umbels hung above the doors, adding its magical powers to the science of the lightening conductor on the roof. There were none of these amulets on my rondavel.

This morning's show was a meteorological intertribal dance contest. The sunrise brought on dramatic diffused orange light, the lightening demonstrated both sheet and bolt variations in bursting blue-white flares.

Curiously, I do not resent this noisy natural awakening the way I do the machinery of men.

What could my mother be
to yours? What kin is my father
to yours anyway? And how
Did you and I meet ever?
But in love
our hearts have mingled
as red earth and pouring rain
Kuruntokai - Sembula Peyaneerar

Green porno

Forget Isabella Rossellini and her Green Porno movies, she has nothing on my breakfast smoothie made fresh this morning, directly from the backyard lockup garden to the blender. Here's how:

A handful of strawberries stolen from the birds, about half a cup of blueberries, 5 gooseberries, a bunch of sugar snap peas, kale, chard and parsley. Yes! parsley: I have parsley for Africa growing crazy wild. Add a banana and a peach (not from my garden), a teaspoon of cinnamon and cup of filtered water. Blend.

Even if the final product looks like pond sludge, it is delicious and filling: kinda sweet savory. Mmmmmmmmmmostly home grown.

For the birds: an homage

Birds surround me in this life, here.

My garden, the apparent wasteland of weeds and grasses gone to seeds, subject of such neighbourly disapproval, is a wild twitter, rustle and quiver of avian busy-ness. Mornings and evenings this rises to a crescendo.

Mostly it is small brown numbers, the lbj's of birdwatcher fame, the maka'aina'na, the humble domestic eyes-to-the-earth working class of birds, who bring vibrant life and movement to the backyard lockup, feasting on the seeds and weeds growing there, making merry in the birdbath and helping to keep a balance in the insect population. I have abundant healthy vegetables for my plate these days, thanks in part to the birds.

My other senses are fed too. Doves make the mornings musical and Mexican. Finches in ornamental flares of red and yellow come to the feeder. Swallows swoop and dive overhead, the wind from their swift wings fanning momentary cool across my brow in the still summer evening air. The tiniest of hummingbirds whirr at blossoms.

One morning recently, a crow arrived on the fence all raucous and full of story. Fluffing and puffing and telling me everything. It was the day the canoes launched from the Suquamish shores en route to Neah Bay on this year's Tribal Journey. A coincidence or a messenger sent from The Flock Of Crows to keep me informed?

Pappa Quail, having, during my earliest weeks here, courted and consummated his marriage in this backyard, now brings his half grown brood, originally thirteen, reduced to six or seven at last count. Whilst the little ones forage and sand bathe below, Pappa Quail sits above them keeping watch, murmuring all the while to let the younguns know where the limits of safety and security lie.When I venture out, however, on the road, it is the birds of prey who show me the way: hawks and eagles.

It comes as no surprise, therefore, that this week's aromatherapy oil of choice was the mysterious, subtle, slightly musky Owl Spirit: Night Eagle come to help me let go of that which I no longer need in this life.

Go ahead: make my day!

It's not what you say but how you say it that makes my day. Found on the community notice board in my local Post Office yesterday.

Grounded: Zen and the art of truck maintenance

Those horses continue to evade me.

I had plans, today, to return to the Julyamsh pow wow to see the final horse parade. Didn't happen. I was packed and ready for the road bright and early but the truck wasn't going anywhere. It has gone mad. Roars and bucks when I try to start the engine. Wants to rush off with a life of its own, jerking and kicking agains restraints yet responds to no normal actions on clutch or gear lever.

My long distance truck diagnostics expert says clutch disc gone. Ah well, that's me hunkered down for an expensive intervention on my metal horse. Luckily I have a 253 pace commute from Skunk House to work, huh?

Coincidence would also have it that last week I booked the truck in for a service first thing Monday morning. Now how lucky is it that that the truck breaks right in the driveway of Skunk House and I already have the mechanics lined up, ready to work on it. Seems like I have some help around here in the planning dept.

Don't even ask about the rest of the day today though. I spent it unmemorably: catching up with work and sleep in no particular order of priority. Oh I did bake an enormous rhubarb pie.

In the jingle jangle morning I'll come following you...

Julyamsh is the Coeur D'alene tribe's annual pow wow. It is held in Post Falls, Idaho and is reputed to be the biggest outdoor pow wow in the Northwest. [More here]

For various reasons, beyond my control, I once more arrived too late for the horse parade, but did catch the tail end of the grand entry or the beginning of the first dance. Actually, just after I arrived, all proceedings were halted for some protocol, which meant that all photography and scheduled activities ceased for a while. No problem. One day, when the time is right, I will see a horse parade.

Uxholo - halala Madiba and Isis!

Yesterday was the birthday of Isis, the great feminine principle of the ancient north African culture in what is today known as Egypt. This is the time, according to the ancient seasonal and lunar calendar, of inundation: the celebration of the annual flooding of the Nile, which brought fertility to the land.

Of course the Nile doesn't flood any more. Well not like that. Just like the local rivers in the area where I am now living: so much is controlled these days by walls and dams and locks. Ingenious engineers!

Not to be a grouch or anything but sometimes I find myself thinking: ah! if only we didn't, in our hubris, meddle with nature and spend our creativity building dams which prevent the natural flow of our waters and all life that follows upon that. Yes, just imagine not being driven by fears of scarcity and the urge to control. Imagine not being blocked by fear!

In spite of modernity, I do celebrate a small abundance here today with a huge harvest of sugar snap peas. The earth is still fertile! I guess I am also putting aside some time to make curried sugar snap peas today.

Isis, being a goddess, had a lot on her plate. Besides being the great mother and nature fertility symbol, she was also a friend of slaves, sinners, artisans and the downtrodden.

Which latter duties were not unlike Madiba's lot. Today is Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela's 92nd birthday. Halala Madiba! Your fragile mortality makes you all the greater.

With these two beaming lighthouse icons on my mind: fertility and visionary leadership, it seemed a good time to stare down some fears, shake the dust off the prayer flags and set the wind horses loose upon the world once more, throwing down a gauntlet of prayer, as it were.

A healthy serving of peace, blessings and abundance all around. Uxholo! Celebrate the abundant life of the flood season.

More about prayer flags here

Airport with a view: blackbird singing in the dead of night

This one's for Lionheart of my heart.

Not far from the Sullivan Lake campsites, in pristine forests and fringed by white Shasta daisies, I found a little airport, complete with one light aircraft, windsocks, good fencing (to keep the mule deer and bighorn sheep off the runway?), fresh mown runway and the most magnificent view of the glacial groove of Lake Sullivan.

...take these broken wings and learn to fly
all your life
you were just waiting for this moment
to be free....

Light on water

Thinking to be near water for the new moon solar eclipse and searching for a good camp and kayak spot, I manage to fill up a Sunday scouting north and east of Chewelah.

About 70 miles away on beautiful winding, almost deserted roads I find Lake Sullivan. In the process I visit Crystal waterfall on the side of HWY 20 East and another whole handfull of lakes: Gilette, Fletcher, Nile, Leo (where two eagles in their mid air passionate dance entranced me), Thomas... oh, there were many more. I forget their names now. Apparently there is a seven mile long interconnected system making up the Little Pond Orielle Lakes. If one had a canoe and a partner it would be possible to paddle, portage, paddle, portage....no possible for lobo solo.

Colville National Forest Service supports, and collects fees for, three fairly primitive campsites (sophisticated longdrop toilets, no showers, fresh water in taps dotted around): West, East and Noisy Creek, on the shores of the three and a half mile long Lake Sullivan which floods the river valley scoured out by glacier a while ago when ice was having its way with this geography.

The natural lake has been enlarged by a dam wall of some antiquity. The water has the aquamarine blue green luminosity characteristic of the glacial silt mineral deposits, and a crystal clarity rare outside of advertisements in glossy mags. I kept having to blink, reach out and touch the purity, to reassure myself that I hadn't stumbled onto a huge studio set created to promote some wildly expensive vodka, aftershave or air freshener.The road runs along one side of the lake. Hall Mountain rises steeply on the other side. Apparently the famous bighorn sheep hang out on the mountain and are fed with hay by the forestry service in winter. Unfortunately they eluded me on this visit. So did Bear. I did, however, see plentiful mule deer, chipmunks, marmots and am satisfied there is the full compliment of furred, clawed and flying creatures appropriate to these parts.
I also did not see Sasquatch, although the BFRO has some Class A recorded sightings at this place. By a woman kayaking the lake, nogal. Whoo hoo! and I am thinking of camping in this remote place, going kayaking at dawn? Alone. Yup. Is this as wild an idea as sleeping on Papohaku beach on Molokai? Yup. Will I be brave enough to do it? Watch this space.

When I walked down the path (picture above) to the water, the scent filling my nostrils was distinctly the empowering Sacred Mountain - the particular blend of therapeutic natural oils, amongst which are ylang ylang, spruce, fir, pine and cedar, which Shelley of the Healing Hands had used in her work on my crippled shoulder in my most recent session with her. Another name for this aromatherapy blend is Heart of the Forest. The time was 12:30 pm, Pacific Time. Somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, visible from the piko (omphalos) of Easter Island, a total eclipse of the sun was underway. Sniff, sniff, sniff. Sasquatch, you got nothing on the mystery of my life when heavenly bodies align.

Mostly it was a wordless, looking deep into light on water kind of day.

Good morning deer: making hay while the sun shines

On my Saturday morning walk, in the cool before sunrise, in Stingy lane I meet a deer beneath beautiful skies. She stamps her foot and snorts impatience at me as if to ask what I am doing disturbing her morning browsing.Everyone is making hay now, while the sun urges growth and the uncut grass going to seed reaches almost over my head.Every possible piece of field has been mowed in beautiful graphic stripes which later are rolled into curious, regular bales scattered across the undulating landscape like giant alien insect droppings.It seems haystacks are no more. I remember hours of play climbing up and sliding down the haystacks on The Farm way back then, in the old country, on another continent. On the other side of this mechanical adulthood: childhood hay play and memories of burrowing deep, seeking the transforming heat in the smouldering dark heart of the old hay stacks.

Moonshine at dawn

It seems my hour of power is the still twilight time just before dawn. It has moved to 3:30-4 am, now that the sun is at its fartherest reach. The air is cool and fresh and the bird chorus joyous, while the light comes up soft and scented. Briefly I feel complete, each day, in this little breathing space, this pause between dark and light, between rest and action.

A few days ago the eastern sky was decorated by the thin new crescent faintly holding the old moon in her arms. Yup, I was too lazy to get tripod so there's hand shake blur, but this is who was looking in my kitchen window when I padded down to make tea.Interestingly, though, on this particular pristine morning, peace was not to be mine for long. The city maintenance crew, in their wisdom, decided to use noisy equipment to sweep and dampen streets at 4:30 am. Rumbling through my dawn meditations while I was playing in the dew they really did sully the silence rudely. I guess it was preparations for the upcoming Chataqua parade. That's what I get for choosing to live in the heart of downtown and in the precinct of the parade route.

That said, there does seem to be a lack of respect for silent hours in this strange little town. One morning last week, I was disturbed during my sunrise yoga session by the neighbour (on the south side, not the mortuary which is on the northern side of Skunk House) mowing his lawn with a noisy electric lawn mower at 5 in the morning. The garbage trucks in my neighbourhood start their squeaky clanging, banging rounds at 6 am on a Monday morning.....Ah I grow cranky in my old age and selfish about the morning hours. Give me more of that moonshine morning dew!

That all might have life and have it more abundantly: summer

Yay hot! Temperatures in the mid-thirties, or nineties, depending on your measure. I come alive in the vertiginous swoop and dive to nighttime chill of an inland range, the sudden lushness of blooming landscape galloping breakneck to seed in summer's brief window.

The vegetable garden needs mediation services to calm the quick wild scrimmage. Sugar snap peas tangle with yarrow, smother the calendula and somewhere in there I am sure was another blueberry bush.

Whilst strawberries reach for the stars, opening white petalled blossoms flagrant to the sun, blueberries ripen slowly. Chives stand stalwart guard, spinach bolts to unrepentant flower and kale and chard swell and heave abundance. Gooseberries chime in from their corner with a dangle of plump globes. How do I tell if they are ripe? Raspberries climb the walls with a joy of productivity. Bring on the birds! Berry season is immanent.

Aaaaah! summer: squelching barefoot on new watered soil at dawn, mud-between-the-toes summer! At last.

Rainbow Fourth

My first Fourth of July as a US citizen: a few little squeaks and pops around town, nothing at all compared to the gunpowder I was accustomed to on the rez.

The best was a sudden rain squall which created a double rainbow spanning Quartzite Mountain just at sunset. Radiance outshining anything any made-in-China fireworks could ever achieve.

Rez roadtripping, dancing bears and wildflowers

Went for a looooooong drive yesterday looking for the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation's famed 4th July pow wow. Of course I took the long way around too via Spokane NDN rez just to see the bustle around fireworks (for old times sake) and to take the little Columbian Princess ferry boat from Gifford to Inchelium across Lake Roosevelt .

En route to Inchelium, at the one horse town of Fruitland, where I bought some elderberry and serviceberry jam in exchange for using the toilet facilities at the multipurpose store, post office, petrol and vehicle service station, I found the remains of a ghost town on the side of the road. Even though it looks as though it has been around for more than a hundred years, I swear it wasn't there last time I passed that way. The changing season really does change the landscape, but you would have thought that I would notice a whole ghost town, wouldn't you?
For the first time ever, I saw the little Gifford-Inchelium ferry filled to capacity. I don't think they could have fitted even a baby buggy more on that midday sailing yesterday. It was a masterful piece of arrangement. Two huge rusted trucks towing huge rusted caravans were positioned down the centre, surrounded by the usual assortment of carts, trucks and things that go in front, behind and at the sides.

When eventually I found the Colville Indian Agency pow wow grounds it turned out (thanks to my meandering ways) that I was a couple of hours late for the horse parade and the dancing will be next weekend. All that remained was a few families cooking food on portable braai (uh that will be barbeque to some of you) equipment, and slapping lazily at flies in the afternoon sun, or sheltering in lawn chairs in the shade of their enormous houses on wheels (aka recreational vehicles aka RVs) parked alongside the tipis which are part of the pow wow grounds.

I found an alternate route home via another circuitous route where, just after the little town of Keller, I met a dancing bear in the middle of the road. I got some really bad shots through a windscreen hazily whilst the bear gambolled off through the wildflowers and into the woods. I was tempted to follow but there really wasn't anywhere to pull the truck off the road at that point. Look hard and you can see a bear peering through the yellow flowers just a little to right below centre of the picture.The landscapes and wildflowers made the whole trip worth it. Even though I didn't once find red, white and blue colours to photograph together, I did spend a good part of the journey pondering the choice of flag and thinking how beautiful it was to drive through forests and valleys carpeted with blue, white, yellow and pink, yarrow, lupins, fireweed, brown eyed susans in full magnificent bloom....with just a hint of orange-red at times in the Indian Paintbrush. It was way better by far as a Fourth of July Parade, than urban areas hung with patriotic bunting. Sometimes it works out that way. You find that what you have in front of you is just so much more perfect than that illusive idea you thought you sought.

Now on the morning of my first 4th July as an American citizen, I am baking a loaf of my famous vegan banana bread. It is overcast and cold and there is a howling wind wrecking havoc with everything. Some friends from the west side of the mountains are coming to visit with their big golden retriever dog, refugees from the gunpowder mayhem so prevalent that side this time of year. They are camping near some lake or another. There are a million and one campsites by lakes in these parts. Which isn't a bad thing, giving me many possibilities for future road trips with truck and kayak. I am betting summer weekends run out long before the unexplored lakes with campsites do.