Archive for Taking care of yourself
Urban Foraging
Posted by: | CommentsUrban foraging may sound like an oxymoron to you – how can you find food in the city, much less find enough to consider it foraging? Actually there is a lot of food to be found without going too far from your doorstep. Now I want to note that I live in Denver, Colorado so I am not talking about New York City, although the neighborhood fresh foods programs and vacant lot or roof top gardens there are becoming far more common than you might think!
I am actually meaning something more basic than growing veggies and fruits in the city. I am teaching people about the plants that are already growing and ready for the picking. The greens are in full swing right now, and you can find enough to eat to make a salad for your family almost anywhere. You just need to adjust your sight to the cracks and crevices, alleys and yards, road cuts and ‘wild’ areas of neighborhood yards and parks.
In a short time, I can have enough of these nutritious plants for a pot of greens or a fine salad. Gone are the days when iceberg lettuce was the mainstay of a tossed salad! Now we are regularly using baby spring greens, arugula, sprouts, red and green leaf lettuces, and (believe it or not) weeds! Dandelions have come back into favor to the point where I can find a large bunch at the natural grocery for an unfortunate price, or go pick my own!
A short story of the lowly dandelion: these plants were so well thought of by our Founding Fathers and Mothers that they were brought over on the Mayflower as an essential food and medicinal plant. It was known as an indispensable addition to the yard/garden, table and medicine cabinet. All of it is edible and nourishing. The flowers can be dipped in batter and fried like squash blossoms, the young leaves are delicious in salad, and the old leaves make a good pot herb like kale or collards. The roots can be boiled, diced up in soup or stew, as well as roasted and ground for a hot drink. The uses go on and on!
There are some caveats to foraging that I want to make very clear before I mention the next lovely foods for the table. First of all, know where you are picking and whether the plants have been exposed to pesticides or herbicides, car exhaust or old dumping sites for toxic materials. Second, never gather wild foods unless you know what you are picking. There are very few poisonous wild plants however the few that are poisonous are really deadly. Third, stop using chemicals on your lawn and try to get your whole neighborhood to stop as well. The last item is to use 50% of your regular greens with the wild ones since this is not yet a common table item for you. Always start slowly or you will really clean out your system! Not such a bad thing…if you expect it!
I will only mention a few more very common wild plants here today. They will go very well with the dandelions in a salad. Find a good book or a knowledgeable person to show you the first time. My current favorites are: lambsquarter, sorrel, clover flowers, especially red clover, chickweed, and purslane. Each is a good foil for the more bitter dandelions, all can be eaten raw, and each has an abundance of nutritious qualities. As an example, purslane, a low growing tasty succulent, is good raw or sauteed, and has more Omega 3 fatty acids than most fish!
This is local, organic, sustainable, nutritious, and tasty at it’s finest! Eat your weeds, Friends, and enjoy!
Becoming Myself
Posted by: | CommentsI ran across a brief note to myself today, a sentence from a seminar I took awhile ago. “We are here to flourish and bloom!” What an interesting lens to look at my current life through and to look at what I want to create. January is a month for focusing on the theme for the rest of my year, and this little sentence may be a key to a change in emphasis for me.
As is true of many women, my family has been a primary focus in my life. First it was as a sister and daughter, then as a Mother and wife, and most recently as a Grandmother. These are roles though, not who I am. Sometimes these roles have created a time of blooming and flourishing; sometimes there has been strife and angst. After all of that though, they are still roles I play and have played, not the truth of who I am.
Speaking with a very dear friend today brought some of this into sharper focus for me. What if we cannot become as powerful and useful as we are supposed to be unless we are able to leave behind all those roles and push off into the unknown terrain of Wise Woman/Crone? Maybe the ties that bind me to a definite place in my family of birth and origin actually keep me from becoming myself? Can I step into my own wisdom and power as an elder if I do not loosen the tethers I have to the roles of the younger me?
Another statement from this same slip of paper is equally intriguing. “The extent that the world is working is the extent we are stepping into our power.” Applied to the previous ideas, this speaks to me of allowing my deeper, wiser self to emerge and be as powerful as I can sense her to be. I have gifts and talents that can be of use in the world and they have remained under the proverbial bushel for fear it would make someone else seem ‘less’ or take the spotlight off of one of my own.
The ‘everyone else comes first’ idea is from a time when we didn’t live this long with as much health as we have now. In many ways we are on the very edge of the known Universe looking into an unknown future. It occurs to me that we are the elders that have the life skills, the time, the health, and the wisdom to step fearlessly (or not so fearlessly) into what CAN be instead of what has already been.
Dream your dream of how the world can look and feel! Allow the juiciness and passion of the best Earth has to offer us fill your thoughts, and picture a future we can all prosper in. What have you learned by living that allows you to see into a future of beauty? What didn’t work and what brought you gifts beyond expectation? Where is love found and how do you and I cultivate our lives so that each one of us flourishes and blooms? Create a vision of healthy foods, clear, clean water, and vibrant communities that care for the Earth we live in. Dare to breathe in these possibilities above all others, and we can go there together.
We each know the qualities and attributes that are present inside us that give our lives deep meaning, joy, and beauty. We also know that these are the very things that create a peaceful and prosperous world for us – regardless of possessions, position, and cold hard cash. Now, finally, this is what is important in my life. I have lived long enough and lived through enough situations that I do not fear being ‘thrown out into the cold’ so to speak. Been there; done that and I’m here to tell you it’s just another curve in the road. Wait a minute and this too will change.
My true power is within, and I have been funding it all of my life – with all of my life! Now I am ready to claim what I am, and use all the power that I have, to help create a world flourishing and flowering with the best that we have to give. Walk in beauty, my friends, flourish and bloom.
