The hidden presence!

The spiders normally present in the flowers and buds seemed to have moved away to safe places, during the incessant rain of the last three days. I looked for them in the flowers after a heavy down pour. 

There was a spider each,  in the last two flowers above. Both of them were hidden beneath the flowers. They found their hiding place. 

There is a way of being present and yet hidden!

I felt this way of presence as something unusual. 

Anna and I visited a friend yesterday, whose husband had a traumatic brain injury in a road side accident and is now quadriplegic. The last two years have been a harrowing time for her. Listening to her we got a faint sense of the daily demands on her in taking care of her husband and adjusting to the special situations each day. In her conversation, in spite of the trying experiences, sometimes more than what she could endure, she was forthcoming with her fortitude and endurance. As a family before her husband's accident, they were in public life offering leadership in their professional roles. Now they live hidden, alone and confined to their home. 

The spirit of resilience, hope and openness to adapt to the difficult situation seemed evident in her attitude. I felt that she was a witness to the reality of receiving multiplied grace while in multiplied distress. 

It was raining heavily while driving back home in the dark, with no street lights. 

Sometimes we encounter the experience of having to stay hidden under disturbing circumstances. That is difficult and demanding. 

The spiders can look forward to sunny days and dry season for them to return to their normal habitat. They do not have to be live hidden and sheltered all the time. 

But there are those who live lonely and hidden because of stressful and enforced situations. 

How much I am aware of such people in my neighbourhood! This is what dawned upon me at the end of the day! 

A common feature ever since the nuclear family system has evolved is that a family with special needs often lives alone in isolation. They live hidden and remain hidden to rest of us because we live our preoccupied with ourselves!

The spiders and a family,  having to remain hidden in difficult circumstances, sent me a message of awareness about living more mindfully ! 

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

visitors on a rainy day !

The monsoon rain has become intense in the last three days. I did not expect any bird movements in the garden. I was surprised by the flight movements of these six birds during the drizzle. 

Excepting the Arora, none of them engaged in  bird calls. Even the Arora had subdued bird calls. Its pair was with it hiding in the foliage (second photo in out of focus). That gave it a reason to be singing. 

The Magpie robins looked soaked in the rain, whereas, the other three birds, Arora, Tailor bird, and Sunbird  had a relatively dry appearance with the plumage in good shine. 

I wondered how the smaller birds manage with heavy downpour and strong winds !

The more they are vulnerable to the unfavourable weather, the more the birds pay attention to their body with more diligent grooming and oiling. They can fly normally only when the feathers are dry. 

Living, instead of becoming an effort, becomes an art on such occasions for these avians. 

I found the rain bringing wetness into our cottage and the outhouses. The 80 years old constructions were built without the usual technological weather protective measures! It is the book room and the study which take the brunt of humidity and wetness.    

I noticed that wet season calls for vigilance. 

The visits of the birds in the garden brought some cheer, as they moved about with ease and pleasure.  

I remember a senior citizen telling me a few weeks back, that he gets up each morning wondering what uncertainty is at the door step! He seems to have had number of unforeseen hiccups in the house, which needed mending or replacement!  His anxiety level was explicit in his conversation. 

Seeing the Arora with its pair, engaged in bird calls brought another optic to carry within me for the day! Be present to the situation, neither return to be preoccupied about the past or be anxious about tomorrow!

The avians bring timely message!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

Becoming open!

It was while visiting the rose flowers in our garden yesterday, I noticed seven different stages of flowers in their opening phase.  This caught my attention. 

A bud turns into a flower by becoming open.

A person becomes himself or herself by becoming open. 

A bud does not stay in that stage. It evolves into different stages of openness till it is a flower with its colour, texture and fragrance. 

I spent a week end with a group of people recently. It was during that time, I became even more familiar with the inhibitions that some feel about being open- to be known as we are inwardly.

It was during that experience, I took time to get in touch with my own inhibitions that restrain me from being fully open. 

The openness of a rose flower is a natural progressive process, regulated by its own biological rhythm. 

How can this process of self disclosure grow within me!

Our biography has a personal and relational dimension. The relational dimension is where most of us feel inhibited to be open, for fear of breaking the creed of confidentiality. It is in that relational dimension, the inhibitions can restrain us from being fully open. 

However, there is a need to walk through that terrain to feel free of the knots that make us prisoners of our past. I took time yesterday to revisit some seasons in life, when some difficult experiences left memories,  which act as restraining influences to be fully open. In relational engagements, it is one's own personal part which one can embrace as an act of omission or commission and offer self forgiveness. When possible and at an appropriate time, it is good to get ready for making a personal confession to people who are ready to receive it. 

I realise that the rose flowers become fully open naturally. To become progressively open is a natural journey that I too can make in my life!

Mrs Priyanka Gandhi made public disclosure recently of how angry she was towards the assassins of her father for years. It took her a decade or so to process that anger and feel free of the ache in her heart arising out of anger, loss and grief. One of the last steps she took was to meet some who were imprisoned for plotting for the assassination of her father. She hated to be in public life as a politician. She and her brother were weary of her mother being in active in politics. Now all three of them are in active politics, making a difference, by being  ardent advocates of democracy and secularism, in a turbulent political scene in India. I feel touched by the inner journey of freedom and openness Mrs Priyanka convey, following years of opus of alchemy in her personal life, a spirit of thoughtfulness, consideration and courageous engagement with people who need healing in their lives. 

Becoming open is a personal inner journey worth pursuing!

M.C.Mathew (text and photo)

A Butterfly on its mission !

In between the short spell of sunshine on a rainy day, few birds and butterflies  appeared in the garden yesterday. 

This jet black butterfly, was around for a few minutes on this flower. What surprised me was its intent on gathering nectar. The sunshine time was its window of opportunity for this butterfly.

A thought that passed through my mind while watching this sight was the stressful situations that a butterfly encounters during an incessant rainy season.  

I remember going to a natural herbal garden, where there is a conservatory for Butterflies. There were plants with flowers, which the butterflies used to breed. This was covered with transparent roofing to expose the plants to sunlight. It was open on the sides. I could see the different stages of the life cycle in the foliage. 

This lepidopterarium, was a gift from a family in memory of their son, who died in a road side accident on the way back from school.  This conservatory was a place that their son used to come on holidays. One of his hobbies was sketching and drawing butterflies. They made an album of his drawings of butterfly and paid for the construction of this conservatory. 

Their son became fond of butterfly and its life cycle, ever since he heard from his mother that the flowers when pollinated would become fruits and seeds. That stimulated him to keep observing the life cycle of butterflies. 

There are some plants in our garden where butterflies breed. We avoid using insecticides although the plants become bereft of all leaves during a breeding season. These plants recover during the monsoon season and spring forth shoots and flowers, only to return to be hosts for the butterflies in the winer months. 

I felt enthused by the sighting of a butterfly today because, it is a symbol of thriving in difficult circumstances. It used the short window of the dry spell for its outing to find nectar. 

In every adverse situation, there can be a way out of the difficulties. I experienced this recently. 

This fragile Butterfly reminded me of opportunities amidst difficulties to stay well!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

 

A story of rose flowers !

I returned home yesterday, after having been away for three days. They were rainy days. I noticed before I left, several buds in our rose bushes, which  I knew would open while I was away. I came back to see some flowers with their petals damaged and some drooping, while others remained dull or looking well in the rain.  

 

I turned this observation into a study with frequency distribution of the types of damages caused to the rose flowers in the rain. There were two rose bushes which had the flowers damaged by predators. There were five rose bushes which had no flowers, but only buds.  

Excluding them there were twenty nine rose bushes with flowers. Eighteen (62.07%) of the bushes had normally looking flowers and 11(37.93%) had flowers in unhealthy conditions. 

Out of the 11 unhealthy looking flowers, two (18.18%) had damaged petals  (photos 1,2); three (27.27%) had drooping flowers (photos 3,4,5) and six (54.55%) were dull looking flowers (photos 6,7,8,9,10,11).  

The last flower above represented a normal looking rose flower. This flower was thought to be normal because the petals looked sharp, crisp, unfolded at the edges, with normal appearance of shape and firmly standing upright. 

The first two photographs are of those rose flowers looking soaked and damaged in the rain. The next three are of those who were drooping in rain. The last six photos are of flowers which looked dull. 

I did not want to go on to make it into a statical exercise to find the probability of rose flowers getting damaged in rain in three days, as there were many variables and confounders I cannot stratify. Also, I alone was involved in this observation study.  There would be bias in my definition and grading of the damage. 

I felt good that 62.07 % of rose flowers withstood the three days of rains, which according to Anna was about four hours each day. The  rose bushes varied in their species. May be a certain variety of rose bush would withstand rain better. Our collection is of three species. I am not sure if I found any difference between species in the outcome following rain. 

At the end of this exercise I find three indications for actions. Protect the rose bushes during rain by sheltering them;  move the rose bushes in pots to the green house during heavy rain; and displace the water from the petals  by an air dryer with cool air. Too much to do! It would be what commercial gardens would practice. 

What amazes me is that the garden looks colourful and hospitable whether rose flowers are water soaked or drooping or looking dull. The flowers bring cheer and colour to give us a romantic experience. If only I had a poetic sense to turn my feelings to poetry the thoughts that passed through my mind while watching the rose flowers dance in the wind and rain ! It had an enticing appeal on me to stay beholding life, living in adversity!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

 

Growing up towards being oneself!

The few pictures above of a mother hen and her chicks in a garden, drew my attention, to become familiar with a hen's way of getting her chicks ready to find feed on their own. 

The mother hen would scratch the surface to dig into the subsoil to find seeds and insects and move further away from the chicks. The chicks would then pick food from the subsoil. 

I noticed some chicks scratching the surface on their own and moving away in different directions. That was the time when the mother hen moved out of their sight at a short distance away. When the chicks were getting scattered, the hen gathered them around her to comfort them with the security of her proximity. 

This cycle of the hen assisting the chicks to find food, leaving the chicks to fend food themselves, and regathering them to herself, was a cycle of behaviour I noticed as I watched this moving sight  for about 20 minutes.  

In the Biblical narration, there is a reference by Jesus of Nazareth about His desire to gather people to Himself,  like a hen gathering her chicks to herself (Matt23:37). Jesus said,  'you were unwilling'!

I noticed similar behaviour with the chicks in the above flock. The chicks sometimes drifted and made loud bird calls to get mother hen's attention to get them back to the fold. 

Their is a relational story in the behaviour of the hen and chicks. The hen readies the chicks and the chicks respond. The hen seeks after them when they drift. That is similar to the parable of the Good shepherd Jesus of Nazareth spoke about. The shepherd leaving the ninety nine went out to look for the one that was lost (Luke 15:1-7). 

I felt refreshed by the sight of a mother hen and her chicks growing up together, the mother hen letting go and the chicks finding the freedom to be themselves and yet feeling secure in the shelter the mother hen offered to them. What a lesson in nurturing to grow up!

I discovered some sound foundations for child development. A mother in her role as the enabler!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

Buds and Leaves !

The two Black headed Orioles were moving between trees in the evening, while calling out in a sonorous tone to reach otter, which is what took me to the garden at dusk. Their colourful  plumage and immaculately groomed body, although hidden in the foliage, caught my attention. The bright colours were in contrast to the green foliage around. Their voice tones and body behaviour indicated that they were in courtship. 

Just below one of the trees, was a rose bush with a single flower, showing signs of having endured the rainfall of the last couple of days with its fading colour.  That alerted me to look for the flowering stages of other rose bushes in the garden. 

All the buds and partially open flowers in the above pictures told me two stories. 

The first was the vibrant life in each of them. They were soaked in incessant rain for two days, which do not favour the buds. Yet, the buds were preserved. 

The second part of the story is the partially eaten leaves in the stem. Insects have found their way. The leaves are food for the caterpillars. 

The buds and leaves are most vulnerable to weather and pests. They grow in a threatening environment. 

I was going through a difficult experience of recollecting a stressful phase in my life. It was an experience which consumed my wellness and taxed my discerning skill. I had not known the extent to which that experience intruded into my wellness! 

Seeing the buds and leaves survive the adverse situation brought to me an optic to view that experience differently. Although they bear the marks of what they endured, the leaves and bud thrive resiliently. 

Watching the Orioles sing to each other and the buds and leaves share their resilient spirit brought a refreshing awareness about life, which is unfolding in spite of all circumstances. 

I noticed this croton plant in the corner of the garden with its foliage of different colours. The leaves different in colour represent different formative seasons in the life of a plant. 

Life that I live is an expression of different formative experiences in life. To receive life,  with the diversity that it represents,  is a calling! To view the diverse experiences as integral to becoming our true self, is a transition process. In the seventh decade in my life, it is an integrating experience, where life events bring a confluence to give coherent view to life. It brings comfort and peace. 

I returned form the garden with a sense of wonder! What we see and hear can resonate within to bring deeper meaning and consolation! We shall be formed and renewed when we are open to receive what we see and hear! 

Life's inherent instinct is to be on a journey into transformation to live with a new consciousness that 'it is in God we live, move and have our being'!

The stanzas of a hymn by Hugh T. Kerr came to my mind:

God of our life, through all the encircling years,

We trust in Thee,

In all the past, through all our hopes and fears,

Thy hand we see,

With each new day, when morning lifts the veil,

We own Thy mercies, Lord, which never fail.

God of our past, our times are in Thy hands,

With us abide

Lead us by faith to hope's true promised land,

Be Thou our guide,

With Thee to bless, the darkness shines as light,

And faith's fair vision changes into sight.

God of the coming years, through paths unknown,

We follow Thee,

When we are strong, Lord, leave us not alone,

Our refuge be,

Be Thou for us in life our Daily Bread,

Our heart's true home when all our years have sped.

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)