little bird, life and death

 In my corner of the world, in the beginning moments of the day, the sun starts to sort of wake up, and rub the sleep out of its eyes. Our star then starts to stumble around in the east as if in search of a pair of clean pants to wear, then finally after about an hour of early morning struggle it then shows it face over the crest of the Rocky mountains. It is under the shadow of these mountains that I first learned what death was. 

Though the brisk early morning spring air bit my cheeks, on a spring morning in my 7th year, I departed from the stone house my family called home. Into the gray light of the early morning started down the road which my family simply called the hill.  School is at the bottom and like water I simply flow down towards the building almost as if unseen rocks or roots decided for me which way to go, and the force of gravity pulled me on. 

The first sign of life that morning came from the trill of a bird song in a very gargantuan tree above me. As I apathetically glanced towards it, a blood-red blur zoomed past me and landed on a much smaller aspen tree near me. The first bit of color I seemed to be able to see was the rouge colored feathers of the mother Robin's breast as she sang on a branch near me.

This is a sight I had seen a million times, but this morning the familiar sight was accompanied by an extraneous one. A little nest rested on the very same branch the robin was on. This isn't the first time I have seen a nest.

 Throughout my life I often recall my earliest actual memory of a bird's nest. A bird had built her nest into our cold grey cinder block wall and as a very young child I recall climbing up onto our ‘78 skyblue ford pickups hood, because it was always parked in front of this wall. And peering 

down into the gaping mouths of 6 or seven little fledglings. 

So as i watched the nest on the aspen tree, the mother suddenly departed again. I was eager for a new opportunity to see the miracle of life. So  I climbed up the tree, the anticipation was broken momentarily by the absence of cries for mother. But I was on a mission and I was determined to complete it. So I continued to climb, I was only mildly concerned about an angry mother bird clawing my eyes out to protect her nest. But my concern washed away from me as I finally climbed above the nest and saw one little blue egg. Smaller than my thumbnail and absolutely magical. 

I was captivated by this little blue egg, I had never seen a blue egg which I did not make that way. And so small. It looked like candy I would have received on easter. I understood on an unspoken level that inside that egg was a baby bird. Or at least the beginnings of one. And my arrogant human brain did not trust a wild bird who had only moments ago abandoned this miracle from heaven to care for it and raise it for its own.

So I took it, to my great eternal shame, believing that I would be a suitable mother. I scooped it into the palm of my hand and began to climb down the tree. Sometime before i reached the bottom i had unknowingly crushed the egg, ever so slightly, because when i took it out to check on it. I was distraught to discover a little bit of blood trickling out of the shell. 

Being only a few 100 yards away from the school I rushed the little egg into my teacher and pleaded with her to help me. I knew the other class had an incubator and thought if we could hatch the thing it would heal and be my eternal friend. 

I placed a burden on my teacher that day which I now appreciate. She had to explain to me for the first time in my life, what death was. I intimately understood death. I wept bitterly as she helped me inter the creature into the ground outside, and she gave me permission to run home and explain to my parents what happened. 

Four generations of bird songs were lost by my hand. And that number increases every five years. This realization has always instilled me with a sense that I have a responsibility to fill the world with greater than, or equal, goodness of a birds song, and I have strived to do so ever sense.

Two inseparable principles

when I was seven, my family went to Disney land. it was a huge surpise to me. and at first i loved it, we road tripped and had a flat tire somewhere in the Mojave desert, I remember being sleepy but concerned. my mom simply had to say that my older brothers richard and jared were working on it and we would be ok, that was enough to make me happily fall back to sleep with that cold window on the other side of my favorite pillow. 

there was real fear in all of our hearts when we finally arrived at the motel we would be sleeping in for the week. as we approached our room we saw our light was on, and through the window we saw a man sleeping on the bed. i dont remember how but we learned it was my father who was flying in to meet us after a business trip. 

some time after magic mountain, but before the indiana jones ride and the Mainstreet Electrical parade.  i got home sick. my mom said it was the first case of homesickness for the actual place. i missed the familiar bed, and i missed the big oak trees in my back yard, or the even bigger oak trees that line mainstreet in my hometown of farmington to this day. i missed the warm fragrant early summer air in my back yard. 

now, as an adult looking back on this memory. i regret not cherishing my last family vacation with my beautiful sister Amber. I will never be able to revisit the opportunity i lost to get to know my brother richard before his mission.

my place is Farmington, this is the city my Great Great grandfather helped build when he was stranded here nearly 200 years ago. this is the city my grandfather brought his youngest children too when his house was lost to eminent domain. this is the city i where i bought my first house, which is the house my mother met my father in. 

my place is as a son of Joseph and debera Kennard. a brother to 6 of the best humans i have ever known. i belong in the love of my mother in law Annette davis, and i am in a new home that is all my own, and held together by my unbreakable bond to Cassi Kennard. 

I wont always be standing infront of magic mountain with my brothers and sisters, or walking down Mainstreet in farmington with my mom learning about my families connection to my city. i cant always be sitting at The davis family kitchen table or even spending every evening with my best friend and wife. it has only taken me 30 years to realize it, but i finally realize what it means when they say, home is where the heart is. 

my home is in the farmington cemetery, and its also on mainstreet of disneyland in 1997 and it is at my grandparents house that i remodeled with my wife. my home is in the vacation house in Hurricane utah. my home is in oregon with richard. and it is defenently in the home my parents have lived at for the last 27 years. no matter where life takes all the beautiful people i love, it is with them that my home will be. it is there that i will belong.

"Residence as well as family members are two inseparable principles that supply significant experiences that aid form and also create an individual. The home is typically construed as the resultant connection of individuals that have special sense of belongingness dwelling in a house."

"He picked up the lemons that fate sent him, and started a lemonade stand."

its been a minute.

I have been gone for way too long. I started my third sememster of school. the world literally caught on fire. and i am just tired folks. I could feel myself sinking into an incredibly dark place. I found myself feeling so helpless about so many things that i wished i could influence and change for the better, or at least what i think would be better, and then the following idea came to me. 

When life gives you lemons. 

Everyone has heard this phrase. It originated when the Writer Elbert Hubbard wrote an obituary for a comedian and Actor Marshall Pinckney Wilder who was a little person, and an incredible person. Seriously, follow this link and read about him, then come back and read the rest of this. I dont know if there is someone more fitting to have this phrase written about. Anyways, here is the real quote “he picked up the lemons that fate sent him, and started a lemonade stand”

So here is the idea. Life or fate or God has given the whole world a barrel full of lemons. So i want to start a club, if you will that hopes to give 2020 and all of its problems, and any other problems the bird! it is incredibly over used, but there is a famous quote that says we should be the change we want to see in the world. starting with a food and money drive for the utah food bank on 10/12/2020. lets make a difference!

Lets make the best damn lemonade the world has ever seen!

Most of us have barrels full of fates bitter lemons. Lets make them work for us. How many world shattering inventions could come from the lemonade initiative? How many people can we lift out of despair? How much money can we raise for charities across the world? What possibilities await a group of humans with limitless potential and each other? Rise up! Lets work together to be the change we want to see in the world, no more thoughts and prayers. Just change!

if you could meet one person from history, who would it be?

The Lemon Tree

The Lemon tree is experiencing a ton of new growth, it blossomed while I was at bear lake but ants started to collect pollen from the blossoms. So I sprayed those suckers away. The growth really is amazing, the tree is just constantly growing new shoots and new buds, some of the buds have started to develop into what look like tiny lemons, at least to me. So we will see, i may have my own lemons by my birthday in september. 

While it grows remarkably fast for a plant, it is still a plant and its growth isn't too remarkable, so after sharing a few updated pictures, i will move on to the next section.

Me.

So, in december of 2016 Cassi and I bought my grandparents home, the one they essentially raised my mom in. We have never regretted it, but with all older homes comes a great deal of work. So i have spent my time since my last update doing some of that work. 

My very handy and thrifty grandpa had two sheds, one which it looked like he constructed and another that looks like either a prefabricated one or one that he bought at lowes or home depot. I don't know what he actually used either one for in life, because every opportunity I had to learn as a kid I spent playing games or chasing cousins instead of learning about my grandpa. Perhaps I shouldn't feel guilty about that, but i do. 

But since the ownership of these sheds passed to me, they have been used for storing garbage, wood scraps and cardboard cutouts of gunsmoke characters, and rusty chainsaws, and perfectly good paint brush extenders and one billion screws and just as many nails countless other things of varying value and usefulness. So I rented a dumpster and disposed of almost all of it. It was a monumental feat, but now I know what is in my shed, and I can finally put cars in my garage. 

My thoughts. 

As a child, a certain thought experiment regularly emerged. It has many variations, but it always essentially comes out as this question. “If you could meet any person from history, who would it be?”

This question has been haunting me this week. As an adult i know now that almost every historical figure had parts of his past which were questionable at least, and outright wicked often enough. This isn't going to be about the current political climate. It may drift into that topic, but  I don't want to justify anything that has happened in the past. I definitely don't want to negate a victim's experiences by trying to make some injustice, “ok.”

As the student of history I have always been, I would want to possibly meet George Washington. Inevitably however I would have met one of his slaves first. This would have led me to his quarters where I could ask him anything. I could ask him anything about his life. Perhaps he and I could discuss the precedent he would set as the first president. I could get a first hand account of how he felt about the naysayers and the ne'er do wells in his army. All the time his house slaves would be lurking in the background. I would wonder from which one his dentures hd come from. this and other facts I don't think my modern sensibilities could abide. 

Sally Hemings

I could also meet Thomas Jefferson and him and I could discuss the writings of John Locke and David hume. He would perhaps take heart in knowing that students of the future would be versed in the wisdom of these men. However; i don't feel he would appreciate my eagerness to meet Sally Hemings. Or perhaps he would think nothing of it. If given the chance I would ask her if she was willing to bear his children. 

This post would be 400 pages long if i cataloged every historical figure that is not the exact mythical figure i grew up thinking they were. So I have found myself asking the question. If these men were not who i thought they were? Who were they? The conclusion I came to was that they were just men. Each one, and countless others from history managed to accomplish incredible things. World shattering discoveries have been attributed to adulterers. And civil rights won by men who literally owned other men. They are not composed by their miraculous accomplishments, just as their identity is not made up of the putrid ingredients that are their failings. 

the story of Washington and the Cherry try was a complete fiction

Washington's journey across the Potomac can't be erased from history because he failed to truly see the great moral error of owning another man, his victories at Yorktown are not cheapened if the words of Charles Lee can be held in esteem. “T’was indecision in our military councils which cost us the garrison of Fort Washington, the consequence of which must be fatal, unless remedied in time by a contrary spirit . . . There are times when we must commit treason against the laws of the State for the salvation of the state. The present crisis demands this brave, virtuous kind of treason.”

And of course, should you find yourself filled with love for Mr. Jefferson, so be it, but let it be because of his taking advantage of an enslaved person, and do not forget that although he may not have truly believed it, he shared the idea with the american psyche that “all men are created equal. 

So all men and women in the history books are in some measure worthy of our hate, some more than others. It must then stand to reason that most, if not all men and women are worthy in some respect of some small measure of adoration and love, possibly even our gratitude. No one act should erase or diminish the other, good or bad. It's so incredibly hard to say what i am trying to say without being reductive, but that is just it, no person should be reduced to one aspect of their past, their personality, their environment or their upbringing. People are intense and emotional and figuratively (and sometimes literally) messy creatures. 

This of course extends to you and i. If you fail a test in school, you aren't a failure. If a murderer saves a child from a burning building, it doesn't bring back the lives they took. I am a product of my upbringing to some extent. My Lds pioneer heritage doesn't define me completely. The experiences I had almost 25 years ago in what is now my back yard don't define me completely. My memories combined with my choices define me. When my final day comes, some of those choices will be shown to be wrong ones. Many of the memories will have faded away, but some of those choices will be right ones, and some of those memories will linger. As time goes on the static facts of my choices will change and shape the memory of me according to the morality of those recalling the facts. Let it be, i won't be there to worry about it. So why worry about how history will remember me while I have life to live? All that's left is to just do what you think is right, and let the world interpret those actions the way they will. 

One last thought, I want it in writing that I think that no amount of freedom given to the world will ever excuse the enslavement of people who were stolen from their homes. Writing the declaration of independence does not magically make impregnating an enslaved woman a consensual act. That act will always be rape. But words can not express the gratitude I feel for George Washington who spent many nights away from his family and slaves at Mount Vernon to help the effort to liberate the colonies from english reign. Thomas Jefferson is a mind that I have always admired. At the start of this post, I would have liked to share some uncomfortable questions with these men. But now I am ok keeping my distance from them, a distance that history has so graciously provided, because I want society to progress towards equality of opportunity for all people.

side reading about 5 Myths About George Washington, Debunked

this weeks post in three sections.

I'm going to start doing what i have done here, and break the blog into sections so you can easily visit my updates and find what you came for. 

The Lemon Tree

The tree has seen a lot of growth this last week. It kind of skipped blossoms, or maybe the blossoms happened when I wasn't looking, but skipped straight to buds. While I am definitely not able to make lemonade from my own tree, I celebrated by getting a few lemons and trying a new lemonade recipe. I won't make you read the rest of the blog to get the recipe, because if i do i know you will just scroll to the bottom for the recipe anyway, so here it is, 

Ingredients. 

6-7 Meyer lemons (however many you need to yield 8oz of Juice)

1 cup of Sugar, or honey for a unique flavor.

4 cups of water.

1 cup of peach syrup if you'd like, i like fyi

Instructions

1. Set the cup of Sugar, or in my case honey, and one cup of water to simmer on the stove, your goal is to reduce this mixture to a simple syrup which is easier with powdered sugar. 
2. While the sugar is simmering, juice your lemons, as i have already said, you want 8 oz of juice for these portions which is a cup. 
3. When the syrup is ready, mix it with the lemon juice, then mix the remaining 3 cups or water in a serving pitcher and serve as desired, \
4. Peach syrup makes a nice twist to the lemonade, but only if you feel like it. 

So I made the lemonade in tribute to future lemonade. I will try a variety of recipes which I will surely share with you all. I also added some grass clippings to the pot and one of those tomato wires with the three rings that you stick around the plant. I wanted to help the tree grow a foot or two before it really starts to spread its shoots.

Me.

I spent from sunday july 5 to thursday 9 with my family at Bear Lake Country Cabins in St Charles Idaho. Which is on the North Shore of Bear Lake. My family consists of me and 5 siblings each with families of our own, so my dad bought the Bear Lake Country Cabins some time ago to make sure each smaller family could have private sleeping space, while all sharing space together. This is made possible by the ten single room cabins that all surround the main lodge. All of this helped us social distance. My sister in law had access to a semi private beach because of her family. Even though we are a group of 15 adults and 15 kids, we did a pretty good job social distancing. 

It was nice to reconnect with family in a place that is mostly removed from a cell signal and the excessive noise of the world today. My oldest brother moved with his career to Oregon earlier this year, and his family has the newest addition to our family with a two year old. Who was truly nothing but a delight. 

My thoughts. 

This week I am thinking alot about the truth. I was raised to believe in truth as an objective fact. 2+2=4 and the Freezing point of water is 32 degrees fahrenheit and other things like that. The question on my mind is, is truth an objective fact? Is it a particle of reality?

There is something much smarter men than me call the correspondence theory, which as best I understand it is the theory that “a Judgement is said to be true when it corresponds to an external reality.” or in layman's terms truth is a statement that can be proven by the state of affairs in the world. 

Correspondence theory is good for observable truths. Until you consider descarte. But it really doesn't easily embrace the many different kinds of truth. 

I'm going to ask some questions and i would love your answers

Is truth a metaphysical thing that just exists which all physical things need to conform too?

If an amputee feels pain in their missing foot. If they say “i feel pain in my missing foot” are they lying?

These are my feelings this week. I would love to hear back from anyone reading this to see your feelings on truth, or anything else i have written about.

bit of a bibliography

David, Marian. “The Correspondence Theory of Truth.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Stanford University, 28 May 2015, plato.stanford.edu/entries/truth-correspondence/#1.1.

Relman, Eliza. “The 25 Women Who Have Accused Trump of Sexual Misconduct.” Business Insider, Business Insider, 1 May 2020, www.businessinsider.com/women-accused-trump-sexual-misconduct-list-2017-12.

the psychology of a dragon, a lemon tree, and the meaning of life.

The lemon tree progresses slowly, it is an organism of low demand. Most experts say that if you are watering it twice a week that might be too much. On hot days I mist its leaves, so they don’t get scorched.

So, as I thought about this tree throughout my week, i indulged myself in a moment of self-reflection, why am I concerned with this lemon tree? When we picked it up from the store I had this vague and unreasoned idea that I would have a lemonade stand

and make lemon cakes and the neighbors would come knocking on the door asking me “Robert, do you have a few lemons I could use for a recipe?”

While I do find the idea appealing of being self-sufficient for all possible lemon needs, I realize that I don’t use that many lemons now as it is, so I then thought at length about the benefits to me psychologically as I have discussed to some degree in my other updates. Then while considering the tree and realizing that it doesn’t require my constant care, I have been at a bit of a loss for how to find regular psychological nourishment in caring for a tree that requires minimal care.

so, while considering these things, I found myself listening to Malcom Gladwell’s Podcast, Revisionist history. (linked here) Mr. Gladwell has just recently released season 5 of this podcast, and in the first episode I found the concept discussed incredibly engaging. That concept was “the Psychology of a Dragon”

It awoke something in me that I haven't been able to shake. as the podcast starts, it immediately delves deeply into a unique issue to which I was previously unaware, that is that the art museums of the world do not estimate the value of the art which is in their care. I don’t want to spoil to podcast for anyone who may be interested, so suffice it to say here, this podcast got me thinking first about ownership and what value truly means.

The title of the episode comes from a poem by J.R.R. Tolkien called “The Hord” here it is.

THE HOARD

'When the moon was new and the sun young

of silver and gold the gods sung:

in the green grass they silver spilled,

and the white waters they with gold filled.

Ere the pit was dug or Hell yawned,

ere dwarf was bred or dragon spawned,

there were Elves of old, and strong spells

under green hills in hollow dells

they sang as they wrought many fair things,

and the bright crowns of the Elf-kings.

But their doom fell, and their song waned,

by iron hewn and by steel chained.

Greed that sang not, nor with mouth smiled,

in dark holes their wealth piled,

graven silver and carven gold:

over Elvenhome the shadow rolled.

There was an old dwarf in a dark cave,

to silver and gold his fingers clave;

with hammer and tongs and anvil-stone

he worked his hands to the hard bone.

and coins he made, and strings of rings,

and thought to buy the power of kings.

But his eyes grew dim and his ears dull

and the skin yellow on his old skull;

through his bony claw with a pale sheen

the stony jewels slipped unseen.

No feet he heard, though the earth quaked.

when the young dragon his thirst slaked.

and the stream smoked at his dark door.

The flames hissed on the dank floor,

and he died alone in the red fire;

his bones were ashes in the hot mire.

There was an old dragon under grey stone;

his red eyes blinked as he lay alone.

His joy was dead and his youth spent,

he was knobbed and wrinkled, and his limbs bent

in the long years to his gold chained;

in his heart's furnace the fire waned.

To his belly's slime gems stuck thick,

silver and gold he would snuff and lick:

he knew the place of the least ring

beneath the shadow of his black wing.

Of thieves he thought on his hard bed,

and dreamed that on their flesh he fed,

their bones crushed, and their blood drank:

his ears drooped and his breath sank.

Mail-rings rang. He heard them not.

A voice echoed in his deep grot:

a young warrior with a bright sword

called him forth to defend his hoard.

His teeth were knives, and of horn his hide,

but iron tore him, and his flame died.

There was an old king on a high throne:

his white beard lay on knees of bone;

Credit to Nimonilshttps://www.deviantart.com/nilmonils/art/Old-King-435421597

his mouth savoured neither meat nor drink,

nor his ears song; he could only think

of his huge chest with carven lid

where pale gems and gold lay hid

in secret treasury in the dark ground;

its strong doors were iron-bound.

The swords of his thanes were dull with rust,

his glory fallen, his rule unjust,

his halls hollow, and his bowers cold,

but king he was of elvish gold.

He heard not the horns in the mountain-pass,

he smelt not the blood on the trodden grass,

but his halls were burned, his kingdom lost;

in a cold pit his bones were tossed.

There is an old hoard in a dark rock,

forgotten behind doors none can unlock;

that grim gate no man can pass.

On the mound grows the green grass;

there sheep feed and the larks soar,

and the wind blows from the sea-shore.

The old hoard the Night shall keep,

while earth waits and the Elves sleep.'

This left me thinking, what is the value of an object? i find value in an object when it helps me live, when it sparks a feeling or a memory, or when it helps me live an experience i would otherwise not have lived. When I force myself to consider it, I know that I can’t take my riches with me. That is clearly the moral object of this poem. “it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.”Luke 18:25 But then Gladwell discussed Hoarders in his podcast. The discussion was about how Obsessive-Compulsive disorder is a reaction to an intrusive and negative thought.  But the Compulsion to collect things is not this. Hoarders so often find themselves feeling like a part of themselves would be lost if the object were lost, and this can be an object as simple as an old and used envelope.

an object only has the value i give it,  I purchased my grandparents’ house, my grandparents are not in the house, they are not the house. They are Dead and are of course not literally in this house. Grandpa isn't found in his Korean war enlistment papers, Grandma isn't here left behind scripts and other dramatic writings. Their headstones are left in the cemetery,  they aren't the headstones, they aren't there. All these things will pass. Even if the home stays standing for a thousand years, it will change and grow, it may get damaged and repaired. all the family history documents will eventually be lost, and if not lost then unread, and ignored for disinterest. At that point they might as well not even exist. With care the rose bushes could go on growing and blooming for some time, they would eventually get diseased or wild or torn out for a vegetable garden or a patch of grass. Even my lemon tree will die.

But if entropy is a law that effects all things, eventually the energy runs out, the animals die and the plants wither and the stars collapse, why make an effort at all? Bear with me, I am going to a happy place. Some religiously minded people might say the purpose is to make it to heaven and live with god, then why build monuments? Why build houses, again to quote Jesus “the son of man hath not a place to lay his head.” He lived only to share his message and move on, but we all build temples to worship him.

So, everything dies, and if heaven is our goal I briefly wondered why I should even bother with all the extras on earth. The answer might feel obvious to you all, but I realized it was to make a choice. You can strive to make your mark on this world, and maybe you will be the one who finds a way to make that mark last forever, but entropy is universal. Everything in this universe deteriorates into nothing, or rather something else. If you choose this path, you will do so much good. Or possibly bad. You will shape the lives of other creatures on this world.

There is another choice. This Choice doesn’t depend on your belief of the afterlife, or the fore life, this choice is to recognize that life is special. Life is only known to exist on one planet. This one. So, your other choice is to realize that you are a miracle and should be treated as such. At the same time this choice requires you to realize that all life is a miracle and should be treated with the dignity that is required of a miracle. If a moment is forgotten, it is forgotten so that another memory can be more vibrant. I’m not saying you should try to forget, or be forgotten, but live in the present.

In conclusion, I realized that I can frantically grasp for meaning in every event and object in my life. I can pass on heirlooms or monuments. Or I can live my life, love those who have loved me, help those who I can help, build up other people trying to also live their lives. I can plant and care for trees, and help change lightbulbs, and stay up comforting a maltreated soul. I can feed my Cats, and go to work everyday, I can chat with my friend via xbox live. i can stay up and laugh with my wife. then when my final day comes, hopefully not for many years, give me back to the earth. Plant me in the ground and plant a tree on top of me. There is no need to leave a stone on my head, If I mean something to you, then tell my story to teach future generations, but don’t lose sleep about if I’ll be remembered. When I die, it will be time for others to live, as best they can.   

Back to Life as Usual

As I ended my weekend and with it the fantasy of being the head gardener of a lemon orchard, I set about my normal routines, with one major change on my mind. My lemon trees.

In between my families Father’s Day tribute BBQ, and a few failed rounds of pickle ball with my siblings and their kids, I learned that my tree is a Meyer improved dwarf lemon tree. According to citrus.com;

“Dwarf Meyer lemon trees are shrub-like, but they can be pruned and made to look like a tree. The beautiful blossoms of this lemon tree are white and delightfully fragrant much like blended citrus with jasmine. The fruit is sweeter, has less acidic flavor & reduced bitterness compared to Lisbon or Eureka lemons.”so I learned that my little guy would grow to be a pretty little thing.

I also learned that my trees forebearers traveled here from their native China in 1908 at the hands of a man named Frank N Meyer. But grandpa lemon tree was discovered to be a symptomless carrier of the Tristeza Virus which was deadly for other citrus trees, through it all the forefathers of my citrus friend prevailed, because while many were destroyed, the strain of Meyer Lemon trees found to be disease free avoided oblivion. And from that stem, which was carefully guarded by the University of California, my lemon tree was born.

I started to worry about pollination, who could blame me, nobody wants to talk to their one year old about the birds and the bees and the minutia of reproduction. plus the Apricot tree in the front yard is kind of a slut. I learned it was part of a family of Self Pollinating trees. so I don’t really have to have that conversation; the process of hand pollination requires me violating my trees blossoms by brushing them the stamen of one blossom and rubbing pollen on the pistol of another. Not prepared for that. 

What I learned about as I started to worry about a possible economic shutdown in my state, was that the minuscule details of plant care are soothing. While I have no intention of making this the center of my Zen garden, I would like to use the care and cultivation of this tree to take my mind off my obsessive thoughts so that as I prune the stems off the tree to help it focus on growth, I can shed my mind of the toxic thoughts that permeate my mind. And although it will be larger than any bonsai tree, it already is, it will serve the same purpose as the Bonsai, it already has.

As I transfer the sapling from its current pot into a pot full of a nutrient dense and loamy soil that will keep the root network moist without drowning it, maybe I can find a way to do what is right no matter how hard it is, while not suffocating my spirit with all the bile and hatred in the world.

 this is the pot that i decided my little lemon buddy will spend the summer in, with some treated potting soil that should help keep the root network moist, but not drowning. and some fruit and veggie fertilizer. i drilled holes in the "self watering" tray of the new pot, because everything i have read says that the tree needs to be able to drain off extra water.

When I come home weary from the physical and emotional strains of my daily life. I can find strength in caring for another living thing. And with it I can hopefully bring some beauty into this world.

as I said goodbye to siblings and nieces and nephews, I hadn’t seen in months due to “social distancing “guidelines, I made plans to find my tree a humble terracotta pot and get some citrus specific soil and fertilizer. I searched the web for guides on pruning and realized that we can worry about so much, and control so little, but in the end all we can do is take focus on making a positive impact on the part of our lives we can control.

Edit 7/5/2020 sorry I didn’t finish this thought in my original post.