The rain is pouring down. Woke up to the steady thud of falling rain and realised I wouldn’t be able to get out and walk in this bleak weather. Trapped indoors, in a draughty study. All the same, after just a week back, I’ve adjusted to the deeply felt notion that rain is always welcome in Africa. The alternative is drought and thirst and dust.
So I’m glad of the downpours and to know the garden will be greener tomorrow. I have on thick blue socks patterned with orange tigers and a large woolly overcoat. A large pot of chamomile tea for soothing the frazzled nerves and raw emotions.
But I always know I am a little depressed when I find myself reading strictly vegan recipes and wondering about quinoa. There is some puritanical aspect of myself at work, a kind of ‘for your own good you should experience a little deprivation’ dynamic at work.
Embrace the brokenness already, I tell myself. There is plenty of exciting vegan stuff around — I love vegetables in season and combined in unusual ways – but I don’t have the exciting ingredients that would help me liven up red lentil dhal or quinoa with broccoli. My fresh spices are depleted and — well, you know, the magic isn’t there.
All the same I have some black beans soaking in a jug and I might do something with chilli, cumin and carrots. But it doesn’t flow right now — nothing much flows. It is all a grind, and anyone who is also going through a bad break-up or loss will know what I mean.
I want back what I had and that is not possible. I want back my hope and energy and dreams of a new life and all that tenderness and giving and belonging — and that is not going to happen. Right now my life, like my person, feels dismally unloved and the only person who is going to reconnect all those energies and reach out and do some self-nurturing is me. But not with quinoa and boiled grains or lentils. I need a little food magic around this cottage.
And it is nearly new moon and I must stay with that lunar phase, listen and trust the seasons, the moon, the landscape in which I am now embedded. Check herbs in the garden, take a long scented bath with candles burning and listen to some deep blue jazz.
I have begun planning a retreat, a chance to get away with others into the wide lonely spaces of the Karoo and spend time letting the well fill up, shared sitting practice and focused attention. Watching eagles and goshawks in those light blue skies over the Swartberg.
It is all of the same mysterious pattern, the weaving together of strength and brokenness and acceptance and rejection, abandonment and coming home. We are where we are, and that is our truth. If we fail to notice our own lives or pay loving regrd to the hurt and anger, who will notice for us?
And all this rain is doing wonders for the origanum, my two little Greek bushes, so pungently aromatic, and the new rocket, the sage on the stoep. Time for a rain dance under the olive trees…
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