Loving Lupins

The first things that caught my eye at the accommodation in Kinloss were the lupins. Majestical and noble, they were standing guard at the entrance of the path up to the house. Although their spines looked very straight, they were far from stiff, with their delicate, pea-like flowers growing in dense whorls around a tall spike in a soft apricot abundance. ‘Welcome!’ they waved to me as I entered further, and was pleasantly distracted by a group of bright red Papaver orientalis surrounded by at least five different colours of aquilegias. “This looks good!” I exclaimed. “I like this little garden.” 

The owner of this temporary home, at the moment in Canada until mid July, immediately recognised the herbaceous perennial plant on the photo I sent. Last year his woman friend had taken some of its seeds — which come in a pod as fruit— to sow in her own Canadian garden. Two gardens, two people on different sides of the earth, connected by lupins and love. Most likely they grow very well there.

There are many species of the Lupinus albus and perennis, and they grow everywhere in Europe. For thousands of years they have been found around the Mediterranean, as well as in North and South America, where, it has been discovered, especially in the Andes, the legume seeds or beans have been grown for food for 6000 years. From my agricultural years in the Netherlands, I remember that farmers grow them as green manure, to nourish the soil. A meadow full of these yellowish flowers looks astonishing. Nowadays the lupin bean is increasingly popular as food again, as a healthier alternative to soya beans. Full of protein. An antioxidant and a prebiotic. And gluten free!

I would start to grow them in my veggie patch right away. Lupins. And more lupins. Partly to nourish and heal the body, partly as an ornamental flower to heal my heart and to brighten my days.

Now bring me that garden! As that is still missing. With a house, my long-term home to be. Yes, please!

© Blog 46, photo and text  9th June 2016, Kinloss.  © Adriana Bijman    

This is a shortened version, the whole version will be in the upcoming book!

Gardening again

Now we write May again and although snow was forecasted for this coming weekend, the sun is out. The chalet, where I am temporarily staying in The Park has a south-facing terrace and herb bed, both yelling to be tended. The gardener in me can’t wait to respond. Weeding is the first thing that needs to be done. With the physical condition I have at the moment — amongst which vertigo with constant dizziness and distorted eyesight— it seems an overwhelming and Herculean task. I do not know how to begin gardening again! Kneeling to do the job? No! Squatting? No way. OK… sitting and moving on the ground then? That might work….  Oh my goodness! Is this something all less-able people have to go through? I never knew!

I am painfully clumsy, like a drunken sailor. For one and a half hour I try to ‘keep calm and keep on weeding’, puffing and sighing while every move of my head causes everything to swirl around. Until I have to stop from nauseousness. It is the most disappointing and frustrating experience I have had in this last half year here in The Park.

But OK, I pruned the sage. I weeded three meters of terrace tiles. I tackled a big long rooted nettle family. They’ll end up in tonight’s soup. With quite some effort I did fill more than half a brown compost wheelie bin with weeds and old branches. I did it! Now I’m proud to have gardened again.

Blog 44, text & photo © Adriana Sjan Bijman, May 2016

The joy of flowers and herbs

It has been and it always is a great joy to photograph plants, which I’ve been doing for many years. With an interest in, and love for wild and cultivated flowers since I was a young girl in the Dutch countryside, I now have a large photo-archive full of flowers and plants, made in the areas I lived in or on my travels around the world.

“The wonders of nature are like new every year” author Wendel Berry* writes.   I love gardening and see the daily changes in plants, from seed to bud to blossoming to the releasing of seed again at the end of the cycle. Such a great example of life! The flowers in our gardens are grown in a natural way, without chemicals, just organic compost, manure, love and lots of appreciation. I loved living with them in my own garden at home, at the studio, and in other gardens.

With every herbal greeting card, with every little bag of herbs or seed in it we give you:

The promise of life enfolding

The joy of growing and releasing, all in perfect timing

The blessings of good health

The abundance of colour, form and fragrance

The encouragement to express your love for the Earth

The miracle of Life

—   You are also all that!

Herbal cards:  greeting cards with a herbal gift: seeds or herbs for tea or bath.

The new herbal greeting card series with inside a present from the Findhorn Gardens: Six different herbal greeting cards, (15x15cm/6x6” with coloured envelop) with a cute bag of seed and herbs to grow in your garden or in pot (like nasturtium, calendula and papaver), to make yourself a tea (fennel, lady’s mantle) or to use in the bath (lavender). Wonderfully illustrated with photos and explaining story about the herb. Hand harvested in the Findhorn Gardens. With instructions.  For sale in my online shop http://www.findhornimages.webs.com

·       Life is a miracle, Wendel Berry  (2000)

© text and photo Adriana Sjan Bijman, 2015  blog 41

Beauty and ugliness

Hello everybody

Here some thoughts about health, both in the garden and in my body, and the congruence I see happening between these two. Although my houseplants are thriving, healthy and growing fabulously, so I‘d like to take them as my example.

‘Fear of the unknown is an essential part of the human program', Joseph Dispenza,The Way of the Traveller,(2002)

Beauty and ugliness in the garden

More than 50 strawberry plants, there are black-and redcurrant shrubs, abundant roses, lettuces, calendula, lemon balm for my tea, and many kind of herbs for the picking. I defend my food and plants against the pests who are looking for their next meal. In essence we are all doing the same thing, looking for food to live on. The snails and slugs are enjoying an abundant wet summer in my garden.  They’ve eaten all my zucchini plants (including the yellow flowers); half my beautiful lettuces; they’ve totally destroyed an immense green striped hosta plant, and all of the dahlias; they’re doing their best with my cabbages and broccoli and now the snails are heading for my strawberries.

“No!” I told them. ”You can have the cabbages, but not the strawberries. That’s my limit.” We’re not on speaking terms anymore. So I tried to stop them, using crumbled eggshells, prickly comfrey leaves, with copper anti-slug tape and I even bought them beer. (As a coeliac, I don’t drink beer). I think they’re ugly. I wouldn’t mind seeing them drown themselves drunk in the cans with beer I placed at several strategic places. 

I still have quite some processing to do before I can be at peace with them, before I can see their beauty.

Challenges of beauty and ugliness in the human body

Like my garden, my beautiful, slim, 51 kg, flexible, strong body has its own ugly side to face, invisible to others. For years I’ve been struggling with the untreated consequences of coeliac disease. I now have it quite well under control and am at peace with it, but two months ago the right side of my body went numb. Although it still functioned normally, it is as if it was only partly present. At the same time red spots started to appear on my chest. Neither I, the doctors and nor the hospitals have any idea what is going on. I’m a guinea pig, receiving one cream and test after the other, even antibiotics, all without result; a biopsy, a lumbar puncture, an MRI brain scan; bioresonance sessions, homeopathic and Bach remedies, a thorough clean of my new house after the discovery of the fungus Aspergillus. After two month my illness is still a mystery, as both the spots and the numbness are not only not improving, but getting worse, with severe dizziness, causing me to faint in the street last week.

During good moments I am in peace with it. During other moments, the worry and the fear set in. Then I start imagining, like Don Quixote, my own dragons where there might only just be windmills. Time to face the dragons and maintain the windmills. 

No beauty without learning about ugliness, no love without getting to tackle fear.

Blog 39, July 2015, © text and photos: Adriana Sjan Bijman

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