A Total Eclipse

The only bad part of viewing the eclipse totality in Morrilton, Arkansas was getting out of the state afterward. We left our viewing site at 3:15 PM and reached our home 11 hours later, at 2:15 AM. Interstate 40 was jammed full, and traffic moved most of the time at less than 20 MPH. We began to travel at normal speeds only after we left Interstate 40 for Interstate 49, which took us north into Missouri instead of further west into Oklahoma.

I think everyone struggles to explain the magic of an eclipse totality experience. Perhaps it's partly because we never otherwise find ourselves in the middle of an all-encompassing familiar environment, when the natural order of things suddenly goes off the rails. Yet the abnormal is itself completely natural. Words do not easily shape themselves around such realities.

Something about all that reminds us of how precious it is to serve an unchangeable God of order, who nevertheless delights in giving us special gifts and unmerited favor. And so, for me, traveling to witness a total solar eclipse, once in a lifetime, made perfect, logical sense. The fact that we could do it together with a host of friends and relatives made it a special treasure. Many of us "moteled" at my brother's house in SE Kansas, which made possible breaking the trip into two hitches of roughly equal length.

Five of us siblings were together, along with some of our children, grandchildren, and assorted nieces and nephews and their children, and a friend/relative from PA. With some typical last-minute planning, we gathered at the Methodist Missionary Baptist Church, after seeing on the internet that the church youth group was having a welcome party as a fund raiser. With restrooms, concessions, and a bouncy house close by, everyone's needs were easy to satisfy.

We lined up our lawn chairs on the sidewalks on the north side of the church and spread our quilts on the grassy level area. Our cars were nearby in the parking lot. A low curb at the edge of the grassy area separated it from a steeply sloping hill down to the parsonage below. The city of Morrilton nestled into the valley.

Besides keeping an eye on the toddlers who seemed inordinately inclined to cavort near the curb, and passing the babies from one set of welcoming arms to the next, we oohed and aahed every time we got out of our chairs and aimed our dark-glasses-clad faces toward the sun. I made sure I stood next to a sturdy flagpole while I tipped my head back and searched blindly for the only brilliance to shine out of the darkness. Between times, I also eavesdropped on the two young men who discussed philosophy next to me.

Breakfast had been served before 5:00 AM, and the mid-morning family rendezvous at my niece's friend's coffee shop en route receded gradually into the background, so a lot of snacking happened too, as well as eating sandwiches from the concession stand.

Near the moment of totality, a giant dimmer switch darkened the sky and hills to the west and the darkness overspread the area. The bird sounds turned to murmurs and then silence. Coolness touched us all. We joined in the applause that erupted from the wider area at the moment of totality. Some of us had tears. Headlights, street lights, and neon lights came on in the town below. Someone quickly threw quilts over the dark-sensing floodlights aimed at the top of the flagpole. Gentle sunset colors piled up near the horizon. The dimmer switch reversed directions and the light returned in the west while darkness faded in the east. Bird calls increased in volume.

In between, at totality (which lasted more than four minutes), we kept looking, again and again, and couldn't stop marveling. Finally, a "gem" appeared to the lower right of the circle (the diamond ring phenomenon), and the brilliance there gradually turned into a short, narrow arc. We kept checking periodically after that, noted the warming temps, and the fading of "golden hour," and eventually began to load things into our vehicles, made one more round to the bathroom, and joined many others for the trek home. *********** I had a chance to travel to Nebraska with others in my family in 2017 when the path of totality occurred there. I had to refuse the opportunity, however, since it was just before school started, and I was too snowed under with getting ready for teaching to make it work. I was a little bit bitter at this necessity, and vowed to see the next eclipse one way or another. I wasn't sure that it would happen though, until Joel's family offered to include me in their travel plans. I rode with them in comfort, but it was a bit of a tight squeeze for them because of me and my luggage. I was sorry about that.

When we left home on Sunday afternoon, high winds picking up topsoil turned the air dirty. I think all of us could begin to relax a bit as soon as we noticed blue sky overhead again, and experienced improved long-distance vision as the air cleared. This happened about halfway to Labette County in SE Kansas where my brother Ronald lives.

The next day we drank in lots of GREEN along the roadsides and in the trees. Obviously, it's been raining somewhere while we're still praying for moisture here.

We felt undeserving of the kindness shown by the folks at the church where we watched the eclipse. I hope they felt rewarded for their welcoming efforts. Traveling to see the eclipse was a very short vacation, but it packed an outsized refreshing wallop to our drought-assaulted souls.

Mysteries of Cross-pollination Between Vine Crops

This will deal only with plants that produce crops that may be commonly called one of the following:  squash, pumpkins, or gourds.  None of them are known to cross-pollinate with melons or cucumbers.  My interest was piqued when Paul Dickens gave me some saved seeds for storage squashes/pumpkins and I planned to grow all of them, believing that none of them would cross-pollinate with the others because they were of different species.  I also bought one packet of Green-striped Cushaw squash seeds from Pinetree Garden Seeds to plant because they were a different species from the ones Paul gave me, and I remembered my mother growing them.  The seed packet had the Latin species name wrong IMHO, and I wrote customer service to ask about it

My plans took on major complications when I got a reply from a customer service person at Pinetree Seeds who referred me to the website linked below. The packet was indeed mislabeled.  It's the only familiar squash in that group, and the group used to be called mixta and is now called argyrosperma--never pepo.  But the other part of the reply opened a can of worms on which I've just now slammed a lid.  The contact person also told me that ALL the squash-pumpkins-gourds cross-pollinate. Woah!  She should have added [with something else], because it's not quite correct to say that everything cross-pollinates with everything else.  Sorting it out took me way too long, and I'm posting it here so that I'll never need to do it again, and so that others might benefit. 

********** 

 Cross-pollination of Cucurbitae

https://www.morningagclips.com/the-complicated-world-of-cross-pollination/

I had hoped to plant all of these storage squashes together without fear of cross-pollination (because they belonged to different species of the Cucurbitae genus), but realize now that I need to do some regrouping:  

1.  Maxima  (Queensland Blue--stored till May for Paul)

2.  Argyrosperma (formerly Mixta, Green Striped Cushaw)

3.  Moschata  (Neck Pumpkin, AKA known as Dutch Long Neck, like a giant butternut)

4.  Pepo  (Tarahumara--Southwest Indian Winter Squash--drought tolerant, and the best one of all for Kansas, according to Paul Dickens' experimentation last year, pick at 90% green stage, stores for 6-12 months)

From the website:

"Focusing on the Cucurbita genus, there are 4 groups of primary interest:

1.  The maxima species, which contains winter squash, buttercup squash, banana squash, and some pumpkins*
2.  The argyrosperma species (formerly known as mixta), which contains the cushaw pumpkin [please note that no other member of this species is commonly grown].
3.  The moschato [sic] species, which is the butternut squash group
4.  The pepo species is a large group containing summer squash, acorn squash, most of the pumpkins, zucchini and spaghetti squash."  

*I'm adding North Georgia Candy Roaster to this list since it was highly recommended by Barbara Pleasant, one of my favorite garden writers.  It is a banana type.  I have not delved at all into which categories that individual pumpkin varieties belong to.  

Main takeaway from website:  " . . . [P]epo can cross with argyrosperma and moschato [sic], and moschato [sic] will cross with maxima."

Personal Notes on Main Takeaway:  

All of this information is relevant only if you want to save seeds from what you grow, and if you want the crops grown from saved seeds to be like last year's crop (the one from which you saved seeds).  

First Group which will cross-pollinate: (Pepo, Argyrosperma, Moschata)

--Zucchini and most summer squash (yellow crookneck, scallop/pattypan) are pepo. Some winter squash are also pepo (acorn squash, most pumpkins, and spaghetti squash).  1.  Seed saving is not recommended when any two of the pepo are grown close together.  To summarize, don't grow any summer squash, spaghetti squash, acorn squash, or most pumpkins in the same vicinity if you want to save seeds.  This is not new information to most of us--especially as it relates to summer squash.  

2.  What is new for some of us is that we shouldn't grow anything in this pepo group with Cushaw (Argyrosperma).

--Cushaw with the Butternut  squash group would be a problem too.   Green-striped Cushaw and Neck Pumpkin, for example.

Second Group which will cross-pollinate: (Moschata and Maxima)
A parallel to thinking of Moschata as the butternut squash group is that Maxima may be thought of as the ButterCUP squash group--which contains many pumpkin-shaped fruits, but also some banana-shaped ones.

1.  Don't plant together any two from the same group if you hope to save seeds.  This is not new to most of us.

--Avoid planting butternut squash and neck pumpkin (both Moschata) together.
--Avoid planting North Georgia Candy Roaster, Banana Squash and Queensland Blue Squash together (all Maxima).

2.  Seed saving is not recommended when Moschata and Maxima are grown together.  What follows may be new to some of us:

--Avoid planting butternut squash or neck pumpkin (both Moschata) with North Georgia Candy Roaster, Banana Squash or Queensland Blue Squash or any Buttercup squash and many pumpkins (all Maxima).

GREEN LIGHT ON THESE COMBINATIONS:

1.  Pepo (big family!) and Maxima (Buttercup and banana types, and some pumpkins) CAN be combined because they will NOT cross-pollinate.  Examples:  

A.  Tarahumara (pepo) and Queensland Blue (maxima)

B.  Tarahumara (pepo) and North Georgia Candy Roaster.(maxima). 

2.  Argyrosperma (Green-striped Cushaw) and Maxima can be combined.

A.  Cushaw (argyrosperma) and North Georgia Candy Roaster or banana squash (Maxima) can be combined.

B.. Cushaw (argyrosperma) and Queensland Blue (maxima) can be combined.

Final simplification for my purposes:

Of my original selected storage varieties, It WILL work to plant one of these combinations if I plant none of the others nearby:*

A.  Tarahumara (pepo) and Queensland Blue (maxima)

                      or

B.  Tarahumara (pepo) and North Georgia Candy Roaster (maxima)

                       or

C. Cushaw (pepo) and North Georgia Candy Roaster (maxima)

                       or

D. Cushaw (Argyrosperma) and Queensland Blue (maxima)

*It would also work to plant any summer squash (pepo) with a maxima (like Queensland Blue).  

*****************                                          

It will NOT work to plant Neck Pumpkin with any of the other storage squash because it is a Moschata, which will cross-pollinate with pepo (Tarahumara), argyrosperma (Green-striped Cushaw), and maxima (Queensland Blue).  

It also will not work to plant neck pumpkin (moschato) with any of the summer squash (pepo) because those two groups will cross-pollinate.

***********

All this make the price of new seeds look really reasonable.  

What we might consider is recruiting a small group of gardeners to each plant one of the combinations that will work, and then to share fruits and seeds with all the others.  

News Roundup on February 10, 2024

 Here is something that I posted on Facebook several days ago.  One person who commented said that I should start a blog. She is not part of my religious/cultural tribe, but finds much common ground with me in matters of faith applied to current issues.  I didn't tell her that I already have a blog, but I did heed the memory prompt to post here some of what I also post on Facebook.  

I'm sure that there is quite a lot of overlap in the reading audiences for the blog and Facebook, and I apologize for what probably seems like bombardment--especially if you are on a different wave length than I am.  

********

Miriam Iwashige

  · 

Shared with Public

I'm writing this primarily for people from my "tribe" who may have limited exposure to current realities on the national scene. What is happening right now with the bill about the border/aid to Ukraine-Israel-and-others is deeply distressing to me.

As background, you should know that everyone agrees that things have been chaotic at the southern border and something needs to change. This has been a reality under every administration for the past few decades at least. Also, you should know that a large majority of Americans are in favor of giving aid to Ukraine in their resistance to a Russian invasion. I'm not sure on how things stand in public perception with regard to aiding Israel, but such aid has "always" been assumed to be forthcoming from the US when Israel has been under attack.

One more crucial element of the current situation is that a number of months ago, Republican extremists in Congress (HOR) loudly insisted that no more aid should be given to Ukraine and Israel until the southern border problem has been solved. Under President Biden's initiative, a group of three people promptly came together to come up with a bipartisan proposal. The group included one Democrat, one Republican, and one Independent. The Republican was Senator Lankford from OK, whose Conservative credentials have never been in question. Kyrsten Sinema (I) from AZ was another member of the group.

After four months of work, the committee rolled out a proposal that included almost everything the Republicans wanted and addressed much of what the Democrats wanted (although it omitted giving "Dreamers" a path to citizenship), but a short while before the content of the bill was even public, Trump began to contact Republican congresspersons to ask they they not vote in favor of the bill because he needed to be able to highlight the chaos at the border to bolster his appeal during his presidential campaign. Right now it looks as though the bill is dead, since the Republican Speaker of the House says that he will not allow the bill to reach the floor for a vote.

Voices from major conservative media outlets applaud the bill. They reiterate that Republicans made a demand, the demand was met, and now they say, in effect, "Just kidding." People who study such things say that the bill before them is almost certainly the best immigration bill that Republicans will ever see.

Let that soak in. Ukraine doesn't get help. Israel doesn't get help. Taiwan doesn't get help. All of these countries are under threat from Communist governments or terrorist organizations. The border chaos continues. This is the case despite the fact that this is not what a majority of Americans want, inside Congress or outside of it--but it's what Trump wants for his own selfish purposes. That this is how public policy in national and international affairs is being made is mind boggling, but it's not as mind boggling as what I see in the unquestioning loyalty that is being offered to Trump.

Meanwhile, Tucker Carlson jets off to Moscow to meet with Putin--who has so far refused to meet with almost all foreign journalists. Several American journalists are imprisoned in Russia. Trump also would be welcome in Putin's presence, it seems, based on what we know of Putin and Trump's cozy relationship in the past.

On other fronts--

An appeals court ruled yesterday that Trump does not have presidential immunity from criminal charges.

An (HOR) impeachment vote yesterday targeting the Secretary of Homeland Security (Mayorkas) narrowly failed. It was initiated by Republicans who pinned the blame for "border problems" on him. Never mind that what he asked for and needed to enforce existing laws was routinely denied him by the same political machinery that became galvanized in the impeachment effort and now in the opposition to address border problems.

One more thing--which I find especially preposterous. Background: The Kansas City Chiefs are headed to the Super Bowl. One of their star players, Travis Kelce, recently began a romantic relationship with Taylor Swift, the singer/entertainer who is arguably at the top of the pile in that world. The "preposterous thing" associated with these well-known celebrities is a conspiracy theory that posits that the Chiefs' and Swift's ascendancy has been orchestrated by "the deep state" for purposes designed to promote the election of Democrats. If you've never heard this, I'm sorry for inserting it into your consciousness. I'm doing it for the sake of disabusing those who have heard it and believed it. End of Facebook quote. One person said in a comment that Biden didn't need a new law--if only he had enforced the already-existing laws. This was my response:

"______________which laws, specifically, has Biden not enforced? Are you certain that enforcing these laws would solve the border problem?

Why did the Republicans insist on tying new border legislation to aid for other countries? It appears to me that they saw a need for a new law--until they didn't.

I'm troubled about framing this as being what "Biden" needed or did not need. Seeing the issue through the lens of political gain or loss for anyone seems to me to be a fundamentally flawed approach.

Please also become informed about how the current amnesty process is broken, how much-needed migrant labor (as well as highly-skilled labor--think foreign students) is often unavailable under current law, how a lack of funding to hire personnel hampers processing and enforcement, how overly-onerous legal pathways to immigration have become, and how much our country actually stands to benefit economically (and otherwise) from immigrant contributions. In each of these areas, effective existing law seems to me to be lacking or insufficient for addressing the problems. Anyone who values Christian compassion, or even humanitarian impulses should also consider how present laws are working by these measures."

In yet another comment, in response to someone else who marveled at the hold that Trump seems to have on people, I wrote this:

_________ "I still marvel at the hold he has on people." Do you think there might be more than "normal" factors involved--as in supernatural, demonic influences? To me, normal factors include thinking--rational vs. irrational, past experience--learning vs. failing to learn, listening--to THIS voice vs. THAT voice, attitudes toward others--open-heartedness vs. animosity, approach to life--courage vs. fearfulness, Jesus--commitment to Him vs. having no commitment, perspective on "common virtue"--loyalty to widely-held values over a long period of time vs. sudden and thorough abandonment of such values . . . . Generally, I think people who make it into leadership positions are there because they tend toward the "good" side of the good vs. bad continuum. I don't see much that seems "normal" in the Trump loyalty phenomenon though. Is there a better explanation than "supernatural, demonic influence" for this abnormality? I wish there were, and would welcome help in reaching a more hopeful understanding.

********* Since then I have posted this:

"Ageism: prejudice or discrimination on the grounds of a person's age." (Google search page). Perhaps this is as good a time as any to open the can of worms in relation to this issue. I'm not ready at this point to do much more than to acknowledge that we often struggle to get "ageing" exactly right for ourselves and others. Also, I'm sure that ageism is a bad thing.

What do you think? Have you ever seen ageism? Do young people inevitably see ageing differently than older people? What are the social/cultural factors that influence people's ideas about ageing? What do we learn from scientific inquiry and what do we observe personally? Why are discussions about ageing often conflictive? End of FB quote.

Comments on this are still coming in. One of the interesting ideas I've heard for the first time is that healthy ageing involves developmental maturity (I suppose this means as opposed to arrested development at an "immature" stage). I want to explore this further. *********

And this (from a journalist who first caught my eye while I was researching the economic downturn in 2008 to create an all-school study of the then-current economic situation):

Fareed Zakaria, an immigrant and a political centrist, writes about the USA's problematic amnesty policy:

"Despite what some Republicans claim, Fareed writes, the problem with US immigration is the law itself. Currently, migrants cross the border, make contact with US law enforcement, and claim asylum. They can then remain in the US while their cases are adjudicated by a severely backlogged court system. The Senate compromise included provisions to raise the bar for claiming asylum and to allow the president to deny entry, if a certain number of daily irregular border crossings was met.

"Former President Donald Trump opposed the bill and lobbied GOP lawmakers against it. Fareed argues that their criticism was disingenuous, writing: “The most obvious proof that Trump realizes that this bill would give the administration powerful tools to address this crisis is that he is so dead set that it should not pass. Were it to pass, it might well solve large parts of the border problem—which would not serve him politically. He wrote on social media, ‘This Bill is a great gift to the Democrats.’ The rest of the West is facing a similar challenge and is grappling with how to adjust immigration and asylum laws. Many countries have taken significant steps. Yet in America, one of its major political parties is determined to inflame the crisis rather than douse it, fiddling while the country burns, hoping that at least they can inherit the smoldering ruins.”

******** And this:

The grandsons who were here today reported that the bees living inside the Kentucky coffee tree are out. The maple tree is buzzing with the activity of the bees among the tiny flowers. I love it! ********

I'd be very happy to see these things discussed further here, with this more limited (and presumably, safer) audience.

News Roundup

 This is a copy of something I posted on Facebook today.  It's a news/current events roundup, mostly written off the top of my head.

Documentation about current events will not be provided here, but I believe that what I’m summarizing is easily verifiable with rudimentary research. 

1.  The US economy is in good shape, both when compared to the record of the recent past and when compared to global economies. 

2.  A major earthquake hit Japan on Monday.  However, the death toll and the resulting tsunamis were far less devastating than the one in 2011.  The epicenter of this one was in the Japan Sea.  In 2011, the epicenter was in the Pacific Ocean.  Hiromi does not know of any personal connections that he has with any of the people in the most affected area.

3.  Court decisions in two states (Colorado and Maine) have ruled that former president Trump is ineligible for the presidential election ballot, based on the fourteenth amendment to the constitution, which prohibits anyone (broadly speaking) from holding office if they have engaged in rebellion or insurrection. Challenges are pending in nine other states.  A number of the remaining states have either ruled differently from Colorado and Maine, or cases have been filed and then voluntarily dropped by plaintiffs.  Kansas is one of the “dropped cases” number.  This matter will almost certainly end up in the US Supreme Court.  Three members of the court were appointed by President Trump, and the court has an overall Conservative majority.  A Christian lawyer and journalist whom I trust writes that he believes that a very strong case exists for applying the 14th Amendment to Trump.  He states further that no fear of “consequences” should keep anyone from embracing or pursuing faithful application of clear constitutional principles. 

4.  Former president Trump received millions of dollars from foreign governments (at least 20 of them) while he was in office.  This is expressly forbidden in the first article of the US Constitution.  No money received by President Biden has been documented to have come from foreign governments, although his son has received such money.  The investigations that show both of these outcomes were conducted by a committee in the House of Representatives.  The investigation into Trump’s foreign money sources was abruptly halted when Republicans gained a slim majority there–when the investigating committee had only a fraction of the records they sought..  Nevertheless, those few records show a damning picture.  Soon after an investigation into President Biden was opened, impeachment proceedings against President Biden began.

5.  Presidential candidate Trump’s rhetoric has become increasingly extremist.  From my perspective, it seems maniacal and incredibly repugnant and dangerous–not to mention indecent and ignorant.  Many in the populace seem to have stopped listening (I do have sympathy with those who are too exhausted to keep on listening).  Nevertheless, many Republicans appear to be poised to vote for Trump if he becomes the Republican Party's candidate for president.  

6.  Widespread agreement seems to exist that a second Trump presidency would be almost nothing like the first, the main reasons being that he would fill all appointed positions with extremists (often those with almost no experience or qualifications other than their fealty to Trump), pardon all who have been convicted in the courts so far (in relation to January 6 and other Trump-related cases especially), destroy the institutions and traditions that have provided a check on authoritarian rule, disregard laws that apply restraints to him, and actively seek to punish or destroy his enemies.  He states many of these things himself, clearly and publicly. This kind of rule could not accurately be described as Democratic.  Authoritarianism would fit, and other more shocking labels might fit too.

7.  US military support for both Ukraine and Israel is being held up by some in Congress (a minority of Republicans in the House) who insist that they will not vote to support it unless they first secure a promise to impose draconian immigration policies at the southern border.  Meanwhile, Russia is making gains in Ukraine.  

8.  US government funding for some of its major programs runs out on January 19, so action before that is needed if services are to continue uninterrupted.  Other programs have later “expiration” dates

Herbalism

I've had a long-standing interest in herbs.  This topic meshes with other areas of interest such as being a nature lover, a passionate gardener, and an absorber of health information.  More recently, I've come to see that knowledge in herbalism might hold answers to some of the vexing problems in the health care industry.  

Over the holidays, I had a conversation with my nephew who is ready to begin a PhD program in medicine.  He has completed a pre-med degree and done several years of work in a medical research lab.  By pursuing an advanced degree, he believes that he is preserving the flexibility to either enter a clinical practice (after completing a residency) or doing further research.  I didn't think of it while I was talking to him, but I wish that he also could apply his considerable talents and skills to learning how to fit plant-based medicine into his framework.  

I wish health were not seen as the exclusive purview of professionals.  Even if nothing else shifted, I believe that people being more proactive in relation to their health would trigger good changes.  Being proactive seems to me to acknowledge some foundational truths about the created world, about God, and about human choice.  Being proactive also involves learning more in each of these areas.  

Herbalism is where learning about foundational truths intersects with the plant world.  God created a good world, but it soon became marred through human choice, the consequence of which was pain, disease, and death.  Even plants turned rogue, developing thorns and growing where they were not wanted.  Desirable plants refused to thrive without the exertion of human effort.  But God did not abandon His people and did not leave them without recourse.  Plants with medicinal qualities and good human choices to the rescue.

Medicinal plants can often be foraged in the wild, and many can be grown in small backyards.  They are accessible to people with few financial resources, unless they are too knowledge-poor to know how to make use of them.  Many of the effective compounds can be extracted with water.  Others require alcohol or oil. Lack of ability to refine plant products to the point of creating a "single-compound substance" is no detriment to their usefulness, since various compounds often act synergistically, to good effect.  

I believe that widespread availability of plant medicines provides evidence of God's provision for the health of all people everywhere.  Even in a "spoiled" world, nutrients and remedies for health problems exist wherever plants can grow..  The challenge then is to find what grows well where you live and how these plants can be put to the best possible use.  

I'm personally leaning into learning about medicinal plants on these fronts:

1.  Plants that grow in the wild near me that may have medicinal uses.  Learning about how indigenous people used them can be helpful.  Some of them have been the subject of good research.  I love when this is the case, and am very pleased that the University of Kansas has a Native Medicinal Plants Research Program.  It was established in 2009.  

2.  Identifying good sources of medicinal wild plants.  Some of them are so weedy that I'm not sure that I want to grow them on our small property, but I don't always know of places where they can freely be wild-gathered.  Permissions (on public or private land) and pollutants (along roadways or field edges--petroleum products and chemical sprays) can both be issues with wild gathering.  Diminishing supplies in the wild is another issue.  Digging roots is a bigger ecosystem disturbance than plucking flowers or leaves and gathering seeds or stems.  Echinacea comes to mind as an example here.

Many herbal books recommend plantain and stinging nettle--both reportedly ubiquitous "everywhere."  I have no idea where I could go to gather either of these plants, but I also don't know if I really want to plant them in my yard.  Mullein, dock, dandelion, purslane, and chickweed could be added to this list.  It might make sense to simply acquire these plants from a reputable source rather than to try to grow them or wild-gather them.     

3.  Learning what it takes to grow medicinal plants.  Some that need more moisture than can be relied on to fall from the sky can be grown with irrigation in my climate.  Plants like this might be worth planting if/until I find a native or wild plant that accomplishes a similar health effect.  

4.  Learning how to make and take plant medicines.  Indications, ideal stage of harvest, parts of the plants that are useful, how to extract and preserve the useful compounds, interactions with other plant compounds, reasonable dosages, etc.

5.  Looking for plants with multiple uses.  Some herbs are culinary, medicinal, and pest repelling. Some cut flowers have medicinal uses as well.  Prioritize growing these, especially if they grow wild in your climate.  

6.  Figuring out logical groupings for backyard herbs.  I don't have this one mastered yet.  Categorizations that have occurred to me are these:  1.  Similar growing conditions (sun, shade/moist/dry, etc.)  2.  Similar growth habit (annual, biennial, perennial, natural re-seeder, etc.), 3.  Similar effect on the body  4.  Similar plant parts used (probably most critical when root parts are the most sought after plant part) 5.  Ornamental value/weedy appearance/invasiveness.  6.  Proximity to the house.  7.  Hardiness.  (some might survive winter on the south side of the house, but not elsewhere).  In general, I suspect that the most ornamental and those that are most useful in small amounts for cooking will get a spot in the backyard. 

7.  Seeking our Christian perspectives on herbalism, including those from my own Amish Mennonite cultural tradition.  

What I'll likely do is to prioritize No. 1, pray, and do the best I can to take all the others into account as I go. 

I have been seeking information via books, seed catalogs, and online resources.  I own a handful of books on herbs, have checked out others from the library, and am purchasing more.  I'd love to hear from my friends and readers about any aspect of herbalism.  It can be the smallest snippet if that's what you want to share--personal experience, trustworthy source of information, good practitioners--or whatever else that comes to mind for you.  

Spun Silver

Today I saw a picture on Facebook of one of my mother's cousins and agemates.  Lorraine is 94 now and has white hair just like my mother had.  Her granddaughter had noticed the first gray hair on her own head before she was 30.  She chalked it up to the stress of being a medical school student, and went to the effort of covering it up--till she tired of the arduous process, and decided to "go gray."  At a recent family reunion, she looked around at her aunts and uncles and cousins and noticed that most of her relatives had more gray/white hair than their spouse did. She was ready by now to claim the early graying tendency as a mark of distinction and connection with her relatives.  That's how I feel.   

I often think of one time when I held a clump of my mother's silver threads in my hands, and combed and formed them into braids.  I pinned the braids up into a coil "just so" and pinned her covering in place over the braids.  It happened in the handicapped bathroom stall at church.  I brought in a folding chair for my mother, and I went to work with her hair supplies spread out on the toilet lid. 

My sister Linda usually fixed Mom's hair, but on this evening, she could not leave work early enough to get home before Dad was ready to leave for church, taking Mom along.  Dad called and asked me if I could come early and do her hair at church while he attended another pre-meeting.  I agreed. 

Somehow that space and that experience ended up feeling sacred to me, and I wanted to keep alive always the memory of this part of my mother's beauty.  My own white hair connects me to my mother, and I have never wished to cover it up, especially at the cost of spending time and money to make it happen.  If I had braids now, they would be dark brown, so I haven't lived quite long enough yet to earn those spun silver braids, but maybe someday someone will hold my silver hair in their hands and aspire to owning such beauty.   

Reflections on the Day of a Funeral

https://www.elliottmortuary.com/obituary/parker-exposito

Today our family attended the funeral of this man, Parker Exposito. He had married into the Iwashige family in 1999. His wife Bev is Hiromi's niece--our children's first cousin. As is often the case, I learned details about his life that I never learned during his lifetime. Among the most surprising was that he had been on the front lines in Viet Nam for two years--drafted while attending college. He never spoke of that time, even to his spouse and to his best friend. He was only one of five from his platoon who survived. Small wonder that he had severe PTSD after he returned.

I knew him as a friendly and gentle man. At home, he cooked and watered his flowers and watched the birds from the patio. He owned Alexander's Jewelers since 1984, a Main Street business in Hutchinson, and went to work every day right up until the day he fell down the stairs at home while carrying a vacuum sweeper, and fractured bones in his spine.

That initial injury did not seem life-threatening, and was not paralyzing. The aftermath was brutal, however, involving a second surgery to correct something that had gone wrong during transport to Hutchinson from Wichita after the first surgery. The picture changed fast after that, and hopes for any kind of return to "normal life" looked dismal. He suffered a heart attack and died in the hospital in Wichita about a week after his fall.

Shane was the vocalist at the funeral. He sang the same song that he sang at my mother's funeral: "Wayfaring Stranger." I heard lots of sniffles and nose blowing behind me during his singing, and overheard many expressions of appreciation afterward. The crowd included people whom Shane had learned to know through business connections in Hutchinson. This funeral was the first clue that Shane and some of these folks had that they both had some connection with Parker.

The husband of one of my Master Gardener friends shared memories and a tribute.  

Parker's best friend from high school married a Japanese woman, and they live in Denver.  In visiting with them afterward, Hiromi learned that her grandfather came to North America in the 1890s.  After landing in Mexico, he was incarcerated (I don't know why), and forced to work in the mines.  Somehow he escaped the mines and came into the USA through Texas.  He must have raised a family on the west coast because this woman's parents were rounded up along with thousands of other Japanese people from there during World War II.  Her parents were taken to an internment camp in Nebraska, and confined there for the duration of the war.  Many like them lost everything they owned, except what they could pack into a suitcase.  Although there was never a shred of evidence that the threat was real, the US government was ostensibly acting to keep Japanese Americans from communicating with "the enemy" and betraying American interests.  

I believe that "Phyllis" having grown up in Denver is significant.  A former governor of Colorado is a hero to Japanese people because of the warm welcome he extended to their people after the federal government had mistreated them.  I've visited the Japanese Cultural Center in Denver, where the governor is honored.

In another interesting twist, our daughter-in-law, Hilda, recognized Phyllis and her husband from having seen them several days ago at Carolyn's Essenhaus in Arlington. Her husband's mother,  Mrs. Baker,  worked at the Arlington bank for 40 years, and Hilda remembered his Arlington uncles from having worked at Carolyn's years ago.  When the Bakers come to Kansas, they stay in Arlington, and go to Carolyn's every day while they're in the area.  

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Current events during my high school years included the Viet Nam War.  One student several years ahead of me at Partridge High School died in Viet Nam.  I remember our government class teacher soberly reminding us of the possibility of that happening long before it actually took place.   I respect him for not glossing over the reality of war carrying a huge cost in human suffering.  

On the way home from the funeral today, Hiromi talked about how awful it must be for soldiers to regularly engage in destructive acts and inflict injury on other human beings--not because they want to, but because they have to follow orders.  "No wonder they have PTSD," he said. 

I feel really sorry for people like Parker who had so little help in dealing with PTSD after the Viet Nam War.  Anti-war sentiment ran high, and soldiers who came home were often not given a hero's welcome.  Some of them were shamed for having participated.  

I long for a reign of peace.  Surely that is just as true for those who have seen war up close as it is for me.  

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Here's a repost of something I posted on Facebook yesterday:

This is a short piece on the Mennonites of the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia during the Civil War. I especially like this story about Stonewall Jackson's encounter with Mennonite men who were forcibly conscripted. Thanks to my brother Caleb Miller for drawing it to my attention. The rest of the article details some of the costs borne by Mennonites and others during Sheridan's march to the sea. Custer (famous for his attacks on Indians in the Great Plains) was a player in these events. I hadn't known that.

"Even though the Confederacy made no provision for conscientious objection to military duty, most Mennonite young men refused to fight the civil war. To escape conscription some walked over the mountains into what is now West Virginia where military action was less intense. Others attempted to remain invisible, sometimes using the services of the Underground Railroad to hide. But on Sunday mornings, many came out of hiding to attend church. It was not beneath Stonewall Jackson to arrive at Weaver’s Mennonite Church near Harrisonburg on Sunday mornings where he knew Mennonite men of fighting age would be assembled. Forcing them to muster against their will, he soon found that even in battle, Mennonites had a way of remaining true to their pacifistic beliefs. In the oral history of one Rockingham County family, their ancestor was caught up in Jackson’s raid on the meetinghouse. After the first battle, Jackson asked the young man if he had shot? “I didn’t see anything to shoot at,” replied the lad. “Didn’t you see those Yanks over there?” asked Jackson. “Sure,” the boy replied. “But they are people. And I don’t shoot people.” Jackson is quoted later as saying, “There live a people in the valley of Virginia that are not hard to bring to the army. While there they are obedient to their officers. Nor is it difficult to have them take aim. But it is impossible to get them to take correct aim. I, therefore, think it better to leave them at their homes, that they may produce supplies for the army.”

THEMENNONITESFILM.COM

Civil War: A Test of Conscience and Will - Being Mennonite in America

The Civil War tested Mennonite’s peaceful orientation once again. Mennonites in Virginia refused to own slaves and most opposed the war. Yet they found it impossible to stay out of the contentious debate engulfing Virginia. One instance is instructive. On the rural frontier, Mennonites often helpe...