Cactus Flower

photos by: Chandra Brown

Cactus Flower

Bud to bloom

Brief is life;

Capture beauty

In eternities time

 Fleeting moments

Cause rapturous sublime

Pistil, Stamen, Pollinate

Wilting quickly

Death; law of nature

Seasons dictate bloom or dust

thus,

contemplate conundrum;

 from this death comes life again.

Chandra Brown



Tend Your Garden Post #5: Fruit of the Vine

Growth takes time. Be patient.
And while you're waiting, pull a weed. 
saying by Emilie Barnes

We were starting to get impatient, "When are we going to see something we can eat?" We'd grumble. Then the other day we saw these peas, so Alex picked them and I ate them. They were sweet, crisp and crunchy. I claimed to not like peas, probably because the ones I'm used to eating are frozen. Those taste soft, mushy, kind of like a bland paste. What a difference growing them yourself makes. I could just stand there and pick and eat and be satisfied.

We've had to make adjustments in our "learning" garden. I had to prune away tree limbs so the plants could get enough sun. I had to transplant a squash plant, it made it through the move and is doing well but I wonder if this will hinder its fruit. Our strawberries are trying to burst out but birds just love them too much! I need to buy a net.

This experiement has taught us many things, one lesson that currently comes to mind is patience. In due time the fruit will be there we just have to learn to wait and let nature do its thing, in the meantime just watch the process, take care of what you can and rejoice in the harvest when the time comes. Funny how this garden lesson parallels the happenings in our personal life too!

 

The Progression Of The Cone

A pictorial review of the cone's fashion statement in history.

by: petercat.harris

The Ancients: Elongated Skulls were the FAB FAD

Practiced through cultures worldwide by binding the head to a board.  Notables such as the Incans, Mayans, Egyptians, Native Americans and Siberians left evidence of this coveted high verticed look. If you wanted that 'smarter than a bookworm' look, nix Coco Chanel and sport a board.

Image 120027, from Professor Giuseppe Orefici's research at Cahuachi (Peru), courtesy BBC Horizon (1998 program).

Nefertiti: Egyptian Queen

The Modish Medieval Model: When women shaving their bangs off for that elongated look was 'wenchin' 

                                                                     Portrait by: Rogier Ven Der Weyden

AND THEN... Cone fashion revisited the Dark Ages only to resurface again in the 20th Century with a downward spiral attached to its legendary fame surrounding superior intelligence. The cone now had an uncanny semblance to a waste basket.

Circa 1960: When rotating your hips to "The Twist" and sporting a Rocket hat was Hip; the cone makes a comeback, but as comebacks usually do, it flopped. Can you spot the infamous cone in this fashion spread?

                                                                                         Yeah, Baby!

The 90's seemed like a long tunnel with no point, the cone was still recovering from the bad rap it got from the 60's but the cone just may have reached its zenith in this decade.

                                                    The Coneheads from SNL

Somewhere on the timeline of human history the cone lost its mojo, it was demoted from its association with superior intelligence only to be cast in utter fashion faux pas for the weekend entertainment seeker.

Now maybe the cone can relate to Oblio, from the land of point.

                                                                        The Cone in the Corner

The "Ergotized" Kingdom And The Farmer Who Saves The Crop

I should be attending my Monday chores of cleaning up the house after the weekend onslaught of messes but I think this is a more important matter. All weekend long I have been reflecting on the Matthew 13 parable Jesus told his disciples about the darnel and the wheat; the word Mercy kept scrolling through my mind as I thought about the story.

As the heading note in The Chronological New Testament states, "It is important to understand the term, "Kingdom of Heaven". Found only in Matthews gospel, it describes the current age in which we live." It is important to understand the wheat is the true followers of Christ and the darnel is the many deceptions that lead one astray. One can list many, many things that fall under the darnel category.

As I read the story and got to verse 29, the reason the word mercy was so prominent in my thoughts made sense. The servants of the field had found out the enemy sowed weeds in the framers field and asked the farmer if they should take care of the problem immediately. The farmer replied, "No, lest perhaps while you gathered up the darnel weeds, you root up the wheat with them."

Darnel is called false wheat, it looks just like real wheat except it has unworthy attributes. (See the amazing facts below taken from botanical.com by Mrs. M Grieve)

1)When Darnel has been given medicinally in a harmful quantity, it is recorded to have produced all the symptoms of drunkenness: a general trembling, followed by inability to walk, hindered speech and vomiting.

2)The ancients supposed it to cause blindness, hence with the Romans, lolio victitare, to live on Darnel, was a phrase applied to a dim-sighted person.

3)The alleged poisonous properties of Darnel are now generally believed to be due to a fungus.

4)It is said that the country people of Cheshire believed Darnel to be 'degenerated wheat'

5) In the East it is a more serious enemy to the farmer, and in the low-lying districts of the Lebanon and other parts of Palestine it becomes alarmingly plentiful. If inadvertently eaten it produces sickness, dizziness, and diarrhoea. It would seem that the 'malice aforethought' of sowing this wild grass deliberately (as in our Lord's parable), was a not unusual practice. The following is a quotation from an old newspaper:

'The Country of Ill-Will is the by-name of a district hard by St. Arnaud, in the north of France. There tenants, when ejected by a landlord, or when they have ended their tenancy on uncomfortable terms, have been in the habit of spoiling the crop to come by vindictively sowing tares, and other coarse strangling weeds, among the wheat, whence has been derived the sinister name of the district. The practice has been made penal, and any man proved to have tampered with any other man's harvest will be dealt with as a criminal.'

6) Chemically the seeds contain an acrid fixed oil and a yellow glucoside, but as far as microscopical appearances indicate, the Darnel contains nothing that is not contained in wheat, and analysis has not yet revealed its poisonous elements.

I find it amazing that even modern science has trouble distinguishing the false from the real and in the case of darnel, a new word to describe its malice has been created in order to describe it. The word is ergotize and means to be poisoned by grain...

Can you see why the farmer said to wait until harvest? Can you see how sneaky the evil sower is trying to"ergotize" the real? (Religion, in ALL sects, forms and denomonations worldwide certainly are candidates for being placed under that "darnel" category.)

Can you see the wonderful act of grace and compassion in the decision of the farmer? He waits until the harvest where only a trained eye can distinguish the real from the fake. Isn't He the only one who knows our hearts? (Jeremiah 17:10)

The good news of the wheat and the darnel parable is this; the farmer; Jesus, came to fulfill the promises given in order to save us from being strangled out by the darnel. If we keep our eyes on Him, take up our cross and follow Him, learn to submit to what His will is through obedience made possible only through a daily relationship, we can be made ready for the harvest and "shine forth like the sun." (Matthew 13:43). The field is the world, the wheat is the real and the darnel is the false.

Jesus and all He has done and IS, is MERCY. He is the "farmer" that constantly tends to the crop, surveying the heart (substance) that seeks His truth. He makes strong those "stalks" of wheat that reject the facade of the darnel as it bides its time growing in the Kingdom of Heaven side by side.

The truth will set you free...(John 8:32) even in a world choked with weeds...

Shade of Grey: Not So "Shady" Anymore

I'm not really a Sci-Fi junkie but I admittedly watched The Twilight Zone late at night growing up in those adolescent years because frankly, the show titilatted my gray matter, especially the amygdala.

Last night was one of those nights, the kind where your brain will not shut up and keeps you barely hanging on the topics it presents like a chatty cathy. So I wanted to divert my thoughts to a different topic to help bore the issues out of my head, so I got on Youtube and searched The Twilight Zone. I thought a little jaunt down old memory lane might scare my brain into giving me some peace so I could sleep.

Then I saw this clip and all it did was make my brain more alert...

The Obsolete Man

Sounds like today doesn't it!

One word: Surreal

Rod Serling:  "Serling was active in politics, both on and off the screen and helped form television industry standards. He was known as the "angry young man" of Hollywood, clashing with television executives and sponsors over a wide range of issues including censorship, racism, and anti-war politics."

Pulp Fiction: The Bean Conspiracy

On my self directed journey to learn about nutrition I was way layed by an eye opening article uncovering the truth about that magical fruit we all attribute our bodily noise from the nether regions to; the fiberous bean.

Ahh, I might as well get it out of the way..

Everyone knows the well rhymed chant of childhood that causes uproarious giggles, finger-pointing and even proud admittance at the act of passing gas. The infamous Bean Song..the song that somehow became a legend through oral history and from generation to generation is unscathed by misinterpretation or incorrect wording only to live another day.

The Bean Song

by: Anonymous

(and probably wanted it that way)

Beans, beans the magical fruit

the more you eat, the more you toot,

the more you toot the better you feel,

so let's have beans for every meal.

(or this added line)

so lift your leg and let it squeal!

Let's break this conspiratorial message down line by line with what is truth and what is fiction..

Line 1: Beans, beans the magical fruit...TRUTH

It is common for most conspiracies to start out with a bit of truth, it makes it necessary for the targeted mind to succumb to the lie somewhere hidden or twisted into the plot. Beans really are quite magical, the way in which they grow is interesting in itself and their function in the human body is unique to the legume family. (more on this later) Of course, the well known English fairy tale Jack and The Beanstalk dictates the magical qualities in an entertaining fashion.

Line 2:  the more you eat, the more you toot...FALSE

This is where the conspiracy starts and I speculate the motivation behind this lie was fashioned by a parent to get their kid to eat their dinner which happened to involve beans. A parent will resort to humor in desperate attempts to get their kids to do what they want, my own humiliating experiences abound in my head as I write this. When a lie is outed, a fact must take its place. According to Karen Hurd Ph.D., Nutritionist and retired Army Captain, Beans Don't Cause Gas. The Bean Queen, as she is known amongst her colleagues and clients explains the reality of how gas is formed in our digestive system and how the bean actually is the regulator of this imbalance. (The entire article is worth the read, as she explains the process beautifully.)  She has had amazing results prescribing beans for health and has published a cookbook, suitably called The Bean Queen's Cookbook. 

Line 3: the more you toot the better you feel...TRUTH

I can't squabble on that one...when you gotta go, you better blow! Although, the lie is somewhat perpetrated further in this line.

Line 4: So let's have beans for every meal...TRUTH (with a condition)

If you have consistent flatulence problems beans up to six times a day is a curative method according to Karen Hurd's above mentioned article.

Maybe this post "spilled the beans" on a brilliant conspiracy to thwart and place blame on the innocent bean in order to get kids to eat their dinner. Ahh, when it comes down to it, this is one pulpy conspiracy I can live with...

The "conspiracy" lives on...