DOUBLE BLOOM
This weekend, after we had our garden prepped for the coming monsoons, our landlord requested to borrow the water hose for one of her other properties. We didn’t have an issue, the garden really doesn’t require to be watered now that it’s raining more often. Except though, the lily pond, which we had grown used to watering using the hose.
“But that’s a small thing. We can always use a bucket instead.”, we rationalised.
Early this morning, I set out to do just the same. As I waited for the bucket to fill up, I remembered why we had stopped filling the pond this way and chose to use the hose instead - The hose allows for a regulated slow flow, thus keeping the mud from getting unsettled every time the pond is filled. After filling up the bucket, with a smile on my face for having remembered this tiny detail just in time, I propped it’s edge to the edge of the planter and began to slowly let the water flow in.
What the hose would do with such ease, the bucket demands your undivided attention. A little off balance and the water will just splash on to the planter disturbing the entire ecosystem, making it swirl in a muddy mess. So I pour it, ever so slowly, not taking my eyes off the flow, conscious breathing helping me to stay in the moment and not drift off into listing out the sequence of tasks I had to complete today or worse, unprocessed emotion from some latest conflict that always seems to surround everything these days.
Being completely mindful of the moment, my vision narrows to focus on just what’s in front of me - and I realise, if I push the bucket just a little bit more, I may be able to direct the flow to land on top of the leaf, thus breaking it’s fall into the planter and allowing the water to flow in more smoothly, with lesser effort. Lily leaves float and have a waxy coat on them, so my theory just might work. I nudge the bucket a little and test it, and lo and behold! The water is now flowing from the bucket on to the leaf, spreading all over the leaf and gently easing into the planter, filling it up evenly and silently. I still have to be mindful and not let my excitement ruin the show, so I continue my breathing. It’s takes about a couple of minutes, I cannot be sure, it felt as though time stood still, so I wouldn’t be able to say for sure. When it was done, it felt like all the dopamine and serotonin I needed this morning was rushing to my head. With it dawned many realisations, some of which I will list below :
Hey lily, if we could communicate, I would tell you, yay! Thanks for the helping hand; or in this case, leaf (lol) It’s so much more fun doing it together!
When we are mindful, even a small, seemingly insignificant activity is a creative endeavour.
No matter the weight I may have been carrying on my shoulders, all it took was taking out time to wholly give myself to watering a plant gently.
This is not the first time I’ve been here, in this position. I’ve been training myself to be mindful through my photography, especially my work with newborns, most of them as young as 3 or 4 days old for a very very long time (This is a story for another time)
Oh my, look at how many insights I’m getting, I must write them all before I forget.
Wow! What a great day this feels like it’s going to be, I say to myself. But then of course, there’s Murphy’s Law. And in an instant, another thought comes into my head, “Why does it matter so much that the water not get murky when you fill it?” Of course, one must not be callous and dislodge the plant, but what’s this need to fill the pond so to not allow for any murkiness to appear?
A frown begins to appear on my brow and it felt like the weather gods were listening in to my private thoughts, for suddenly, a thick gray cloud beings to pass over head, bringing a light shower. As I look up, trying to figure if it’s here to stay, I think about how I bog myself down expecting nothing but perfection (more so by my own standards, not anyone else’s) when completing even the simplest task.
The water must not be murky. It must be clear. Always. Says who? Conditioning probably, that equates clarity to be better than murkiness. In reality, the murkiness settles down soon enough to allow for clarity to show up. It is me who lacks the patience to wait till that happens on it’s own.
Not intending to further enable the over thinker in me this early, I look down at the lily pond and watch as the drops of rain that are falling on it start to become bigger, upsetting the clarity of the water and allowing for the murkiness to engulf it. The lily stands proud, and tall, having not noticed a thing.
Suddenly, it dawns on me. Yet another realisation.
‘Ah, a cheeky little one you are, I see.”, I tell the lily. You allowed me think that we were connected in our little interaction, but really, I don’t matter to you. I never did. You don’t care if I’m there or not, for clarity and murkiness have no meaning to you. You’ve got the clouds that shower you from the sky. That’s alright, I’m not offended. A little hurt, maybe. Feeling insignificant, even. But that’s ok. Wait till summer comes, I know you’ll want me to water you again. I hope I’m still here by then. Life can be so strange sometimes.”
In the image above, you see a rare double bloom that happened a couple of months ago - the first and only time I have witnessed it from this lily.
Sam enjoys looking for wonder in the synchronised dance between inward and outward experiences of life. She weaves stories about how that which is termed as ‘the other’ or the ‘outward experience’ seamlessly comes to merge with that which is termed as ‘the self” or the ‘inward experience’