lavender

This weekend was a 4 day holiday weekend in New Zealand to celebrate Easter. If your not Christian too bad :) We're celebrating that nailing up and resurrection sequence, got it?
I drove over to the West Coast (number 5 on the Lonely Planet places to visit in the world.....yep) to visit my sister and spend a couple of days in remote bushland. I can handle being a hippie for short stretches of time. I turn off my cellphone (becuase there is no reception anyway), barely watch tv, no radio (no reception again) and eat food mostly grown in the area. I dress a lot less consciously and I read alot when I am there. I change gears mentally and spiritually, stress less and quieten down. Its good for me.
I drove over on Friday, it was a public holiday and all the shops were closed so I made it there in 3.5 hours. The roads were busy and I spent alot of time looking at the scenery waiting for a passing lane to come into view. I have a Nissan Cefiro and it can gun it pretty fast :) I could be a boyracer if I wasn't already a 41 y old female.
My stereo was bust, so that was the only bummer of the trip. I want to drive across the US one day. I've already travelled from Alburquque to Mexico via Texas on Route 66 and loved it. I will have to have a cool car and a really good stereo when I make that trip, no halves thanks.
Anyway, my sister lives in a rural area, surrounded by native bush, not alot of telecommunications, no coverage, limited tv and some of the most beautiful landscape in New Zealand. We went to "town" on Saturday, like any small town, one street of shops and no mall. There was a market with alot of crap :) I resisted. We headed back to her place at lunchtime and decided to cut some lavender shake before the rain started.
Lavender shake is the remnants of the lavender season. The last stalks that still have lavender buds but not enough to get a run of oil from.
The hill is covered with lavender and bees bob from one plant to the next. I sat down amongst the plants and cut the tops of an entire row. Very slow, contemplative work. It was warm but overcast, with just the sound of bees, clippers and cicadas. A sea of purple mist. Its back breaking work but really meditative.
I trimmed the tops off enough plants to make a pillowcase of lavender. Of course this would be too much for one pillow and instead of relaxing you it would probably make you puke, so I'm making it in to smaller satchets for friends to insert in their pillows.
This morning I am back from my wee trip and I've spent the morning stripping and removing the stalks, sitting the seeds in the sun to dry before I make the pillows tomorrow.
Plants and planting have a healing place in my life. I like the quietness of planting, just me and the dirt. I like to see things grow. I like to see what happens when things are tendered to, just like humans.
carpe diem

h2