Amma has been leading a beautiful meditation this summer, one that has us visualize white flowers of peace falling from the skies and covering everything in the world. The meditation inspired me to make a collage of white flowers.
For some time, I have been thinking about writing a post about a small lemon tree I purchased during the summer of 2013. My plan was to call the article “A Tale of Endurance.”
Then on Thursday, Sreejit posted his Dungeon Prompt for the week. He asked us to address:
How do you measure up to your eight-year-old-self’s plans for the future? We all had childhood dreams, or fantasies. How did you imagine the world as a kid? When you were eight years old, what did you plan on being when you grew up? What would that version of yourself think about who you are now?
Responding to this prompt posed a problem as I have almost no memories of my childhood. My mind went blank when I thought of my eight-year-old self. As I reflected on my childhood as a whole, it occurred to me that that my growing up years could also be seen as “A Tale of Endurance.” I wondered if I had that attitude about life by the time I was eight.
I decided to include both endurance tales in one post!
A Tale of Endurance #1
What did my eight-year-old dream of? I have no idea. My only clue is that I know my primary past-time during my childhood was reading. I do remember loving the Bobbsey Twin series. I think those were books an eight-year-old might read. I have no doubt that when I immersed myself in my books I was transported to other lands. It is likely that most of my childhood dreams came from the books I read.
Since I couldn’t answer the prompt by talking about my dreams, I decided to see if I could learn more about my eight-year-old self. I searched for some pictures and found two. I believe I was eight in the first one and nine in the second.
Me at 8?
On our way to Germany
I grew up as an army brat. I was born at Sandia Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico and lived there for the first years of my life. At some point during the Korean War my father went to Korea and my mother, brother and I moved to West Palm Beach, Florida, the city where my mother’s family lived.
I thought I had attended three different schools in the third grade but as I looked through old belongings yesterday, I discovered I had gone to two schools during the second grade and two in the third. When my father returned from Korea, we moved to Fayetteville, North Carolina; I would have been seven at that time. After two quarters of school in Fayetteville, we moved to Ft. Bragg, which is also in North Carolina. I finished the second grade there. I attended third grade at Ft. Brag for half a year and then moved to Pirmasens, Germany for the last half of third grade.
I can imagine the difficulty that switching schools so often would cause a child who was a strong introvert. In an army brat’s life, friendships were usually short; either we moved, or our friends did. I have no memory of any childhood friend, other than the cousins we visited on vacations.
I remember my mother saying that my pattern was to have one friend and then if they moved on to another best friend I would be devastated. I can imagine myself developing a “why bother” attitude when it came to friendship.
Yesterday, I also looked through all my elementary school report cards. I probably had read them sometime in the past, but it would have been decades ago. I paid particular attention to the report cards from the years I was eight and nine.
At that time, my teachers described me as earnest, pleasant, a hard worker, cooperative, and a good student who was creative, read well, learned quickly and had a wholesome attitude. In the second half of second grade and the first half of third grade, I received “Excellent” and “Good” for grades. When we moved to Germany and they used A, B, C, etc. as the grading system, I received A’s and B’s. The area where I consistently received the lowest marks and negative comments were in Writing. One teacher wrote “Carol (my name at that time) writes large enough but her letters are poorly formed.” Those comments continued throughout my elementary school years. I have no memory of my writing being an issue, although I’m not surprised considering how poorly I write now!
After writing positive comments on my report card, one teacher added- “I’m afraid she doesn’t receive much challenge.” I wonder what she meant?
Other comments that interested me were:
“She is slow to express herself.” That seemed reasonable for an introvert.
“Carol has improved some in writing but seems tense and not able to relax when writing and other times also. Have you noticed this?” My mother, who was also a teacher, responded “I have never noticed any tension in her writing at home but then she has an eraser at home (which she uses far too often) and I think her not having one at school may cause the tension. I’m not sure. She is a sensitive child and may be trying too hard to succeed in a subject she knows she’s having trouble with.”
I don’t know how soon my life began to feel like a tale of endurance. As I aged, I became more and more unhappy at home. At one point, I counted off the days until I could leave for college. I hated moving so often and wanted to create a life where I could stay put. Hmmmm. I wonder if that was a dream when I was eight. If so, it was one I created as I have lived in the same house in Seattle since 1973!
I have loved getting some insight into my eight-year-old self. Thank you Sreejit for offering this assignment and thereby prompting my exploration.
A Tale of Endurance #2
In the summer of 2013, I bought a small lemon tree. There were several lemons on it when I purchased the tree and I had visions of all of the lemons that were to come. The nursery staff told me to bring the tree into the house before the temperatures dropped, so as winter neared I put it indoors. One by one, the beautiful lemons turned black and fell off. Then most of the leaves fell off. Soon there was nothing left but the trunk (if you can call something that small a trunk) and a few leaves.
Spring came and nothing happened. The same few leaves stayed on, but there were no new ones and there were no buds. I took the plant to a nursery to see if it was possible to save it. They instructed me to use a particular kind of fertilizer. Months later there was still no new growth. It wasn’t until late August that a few flower buds formed. The plant was still alive but it seemed too late in the season for any fruit that formed to grow to maturity.
As it started to get cold, I once again brought the tree into the house. And again, the few small lemons that were on the tree turned black and fell off. This time the rest of the leaves fell off as well. I decided to leave the tree in the house even though it was just a stalk.
Sometime in late winter, I concluded that the situation was hopeless and put the tree outside on the balcony. I would compost it in the springtime. However, when springtime came and I picked up the container to take it to the compost heap, I noticed there were many tiny leave buds!
This tree seemed determined to live. Over the next weeks, the leaves grew, flower buds formed and then blossomed!
After a difficult childhood, my life blossomed and has been filled with friends, adventure and learning. It is interesting for me to see that many of the characteristics that my teachers pointed out on my eight-year-old report cards are characteristics that I am known for now. I think my eight-year-old would like the adult I have become.
It appears that this year the lemon tree is moving forward on its journey towards health. Perhaps in time it will even bear fruit that will become ripe!
I appreciate all the ways, past and present, that I am learning the value of endurance.
My friends, Yashas and Ramana, and I have been meeting occasionally to practice and sing bhajans (devotional songs). This past Friday, Yashas asked if we could sing outside in a beautiful place when we met on Sunday. What came to my mind was a public beach or in my back yard with neighbors looking on. While I liked the idea of being outside, I was not up for being in a public space, so my first reaction was not positive.
Later, I began to think about the lot behind my house. That space would be much more private but it is filled with blackberries, ivy and morning glory vines. As I pondered that possibility, I remembered there used to be a secluded area under a cedar tree in that lot. I decided to see what that space looked like now.
It turned out there were actually two cedar trees, standing side by side. Most of the area was sloped but not all of it. We would be able to play the harmonium and sing there once we cleared out the dead branches and some blackberries. In time, we could even invite others to join us. The neighbors might be able to hear us singing but they wouldn’t be able to see us. That mystery could be fun for everyone.
My hope was that we would be able to see a tree I consider majestic while we sang, (I have since discovered that it is an alder tree and rather than being one tree with four trunks, it is actually two trees, each of which has two trunks.)
The next day, Yasas helped me with the clearing. We sawed off dead branches, cut down a few blackberry vines and generally cleaned up the space. We placed some of the leaves on the ground to sit on.
Sunday afternoon, I built a small altar. Finding a level place where it wouldn’t fall over was tricky!
When Yasas and Ramana arrived, we sat in the new sanctuary and sang and talked for three hours. We had a wonderful time.
And this was our view!
When I sent some of these pictures to Sreejit (my son), he commented that we looked like pagan hippies. Hmmm. Well I still treasure the hippie part of me (A Hippie and Proud of It), and my love of Nature is ever increasing. I will accept that label!
I suspect I will spend many more hours in this new sanctuary.
Some of you may remember that towards the end of last month, a swarm of tiny black ants formed on the sidewalk in front of my garden. I, of course, didn’t know how many there were but in my shock it looked like millions! I didn’t want to kill them but I also didn’t want that many ants, and potentially more, in my garden. I also didn’t want anyone to accidentally stand in them. After pondering the dilemma for a short time, I decided to wash them away with water from a hose. That solution worked and the ants never came back.
When I wrote about that event in Discrimination Opportunity, a blogging friend responded that he understood black ants to be harmless. In pondering his words, I realized that I had moved to action very quickly. I had been stung by red ants in the past after I unwittingly stood on or near their hills. Even one bite from a red ant can be very painful, and being bit by a large number of them is something I will never forget. Did that memory cause me to act too fast?
As I continued to reflect on my action, I realized that a child would be terrified if that many ants were crawling on them, even if they weren’t being stung. I concluded that my washing the ants away was a reasonable response, but I wasn’t sure that I was right.
Prior to that event, I had seen a few big black ants in my living room. After the incident with the tiny ants in the garden, more of those big ants showed up, both inside and outside of the house. Two ant events in a short period of time made me wonder what was going on.
When I become conscious of an animal, bird or other living being repetitively showing up in my life, I sometimes look to see what that creature symbolizes in Native American traditions. I googled “native american medicine ant” and found Dr. Loretta Standley’s website. She says this about ant medicine:
When Ant Medicine grabs your attention it is asking you to cooperate with your tribe (co-workers, family, projects, etc.,) in unity and patience. Ants are resolute and unwearied little creatures. Although they are tiny, they are indeed mighty. They have a strong skeleton on the “outside” of their body (exoskeleton) with specialized muscles that give them their strength. Ants can carry 30 times their weight, which would be equal to a 150 lb. person carrying a bulldozer on their back at 19,500 lbs.
The typical way to stop ant medicine is to literally stomp on it or fumigate it. If an ant is stomped on, it will emit pheromones that will draw more ants to the area. In short, ant medicine is unstoppable, tireless, patient and unified.
Ant’s message is about working non-stop toward your goals and forging ahead for the Good of the whole. Are you working on a project that benefits a larger audience? Have you been ignoring your tribe? Ant medicine cooperates with the tribe in harmony and wisdom toward a common goal, knowing that patience will be rewarded. Have you been cooperating with yourself on your own personal projects?
I was intrigued. Just the day before, I had met with two colleagues to clear up some long standing issues between us and was going to do the same with another friend the next day. I thought the “ant medicine” perspective was valuable and would ponder the questions Dr. Standley put forth. Now that I had this information would the ants go away?
Nope! If anything, the number of ants increased. I did more research and discovered the ants were carpenter ants. Everything I read indicated that I would probably have to call a professional pest control company to keep them from damaging my house. While there were still not that many ants, over the next few days their numbers continued to increase. Their favorite location seemed to be on my front porch.
I decided to take the time to observe them and see where they came from, where they were going and what they were doing. As I watched, I noticed that there were some small holes, or perhaps just indentations, in the caulking near the front door. The ants went to those holes over and over again. Even though the ants never went inside of them, it seemed like the holes were getting bigger. Maybe the ants were breaking down the caulking. They also went to a place next to the bottom corners of the door where some wires, probably old wires from broadband television hook ups, were located.
The following day there were even more ants on the porch. Anytime I left the door open even for a minute, the ants tried to get into the house. I decided I couldn’t continue doing this so called pest control. I made an appointment for them to do an assessment the following week.
I remembered hearing that spreading cinnamon powder could repel ants. It hadn’t worked very well in India when I tried it there, but I didn’t want to kill these ants unless it was absolutely necessary, so I spread some cinnamon in front of the door and in the areas where the wires were located. The number of ants decreased immediately but some still made their way through the cinnamon.
The next morning, I looked outside to see what was happening. There were three dead ants on the porch. Two were by themselves; the third was being pulled away by a live ant. The dead ant had a little different coloring than the rest of the ants. When I had looked up carpenter ants on the internet, I had noticed that the queen ant had different coloring than the workers so I wondered if the one being pulled away was a queen. I questioned whether a queen would be on the porch with a worker, but it seemed like a possible explanation as to why the black ant was trying to carry her away.
The live ant spent the whole day trying to drag the dead one from the porch. He seemed disoriented so I believed that he was probably also under the influence of the cinnamon.
I had thought the cinnamon would repel the ants, not kill them. My heart felt heavy as I watched his efforts. As I felt my feelings, I was struck by how much I have changed. I was raised in an era when we killed bugs, flies, spiders, and beetles, with swatters and insect spray, and here I was mourning the death of three ants and feeling compassion for the one who was taking such care to move the dead one.
I watched that process throughout the day, and noticed that no other ants ever came onto the porch. It has been almost two weeks since all of this happened and I have only seen two or three carpenter ants in or outside of my house during that time. They appear to be gone.
But my story doesn’t end there. There are two more related events!
During one of the psychotherapy groups I led the first week in June, an ant walked through the room. One of my clients immediately smashed it. As I thought about his action during the following week, I realized it was a good teaching opportunity. In the next group, I asked him if I could do a regression piece with him (a role play where he acted as if he was an eight year old and I was a healthy parent). He said yes so I talked to his eight year old about ants and what he thought should happen to them if they were in the house. We also talked about spiders. After we discussed his belief that they should be killed, I asked if he wanted to try something different. He was interested. I offered him the opportunity to be in charge of catching and releasing all bugs, spiders, and ants that might wander into the group room. He liked that idea and accepted the challenge. This past week an ant came into the room and he had his first experience of catching an ant and taking it outside!
The second incident occurred yesterday, the day I started writing this post. That morning, a friend phoned and said she wanted to talk to me about the morality of killing carpenter ants! Her situation was very different than mine in that there were a huge number of ants involved, but the timing amazed me. How interconnected we all are as we learn what we need to learn on our life journeys.
Am I done with the ant lesson? I don’t know; only time will tell. What I do know is that I have gained much from these occurrences. I see that I had an opportunity to:
Be thoughtful before taking an action that effects one of Mother Nature’s creatures.
Feel compassion for a creature as small as an ant.
Consider ways of thinking that are outside my normal experience, e.g. the Native American perspective.
Hear feedback and reflect on it.
Not criticize myself when I took action not knowing for sure what was right.
Learn from a previous experience, e.g. the ant swarm event prepared me for the carpenter ants
Share my experience with others, e.g. talking with my friend and to those who read this post.
Teach a new way to respect nature to a regressed 8 year old.
Be reminded that if I take my time, the answers will come.
See how all beings are interconnected.
Reflect on how much my attitudes towards live creatures have changed throughout my lifetime.
I feel very grateful for all I have experienced and learned as the result of this ant “lesson.”
As I have walked my psychological and spiritual life journeys, I have been taught much about desire. This week I have been reflecting on what I have learned.
From Amma I learned:
Peace of mind comes when the mind is free of desire. Amma uses the example of chocolate in teaching that concept. If I have been desiring chocolate, the moment the chocolate touches my tongue I may have the experience of bliss. If the bliss came from the chocolate then I could eat more and more chocolate and I would experience more and more bliss. Instead, if I continue eating chocolate, I will make myself sick. The bliss comes because my mind becomes silent the instant the chocolate touches my tongue. Moments later, another desire emerges and my mind gets caught up in wanting again.
My desires are most likely to be realized if I let go of them. If I hold on and try to force the issue they are less likely to materialize. It is also important for me to “Put in the effort and let go of the results.” If I have done the best I can in a given situation and let go of the results, I am more likely to have peace of mind. Staying attached to them is one way I make myself miserable.
From Church of God in Christ ministers I learned:
When the praises go up, the blessings come down!
God isn’t deaf. There is no need to ask for the same thing over and over. If I don’t receive that for which I ask, the answer may be “No.”
On Thursday, I was asked what I would like to learn in the future. That was an interesting question. At first, what came to mind were skills I already have, but haven’t done for years, e.g. knitting, crocheting, and quilting. And I’m a beginning gardener so I definitely have much to learn in that arena! While those answers would have been true, they didn’t seem like the one I was looking for. Continue reading “I’d Still Like to Learn…”→
“The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.” “Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.” “Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.”-William Shakespeare
Living, Learning and Letting Go 
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