The frisbee veers into the brush. Lua and I walk over. As we crouch over the planter box I look down and notice green protruding jaws cup two tablespoons of water. As I inch closer, I notice white spots, patterns and tiny teeth along the edges of the leaves.
I’m somewhat horrified, not by the threat of frozen violence, but rather by my lack of awareness about plants. I love nature. It makes me feel at home, at peace. But my near total disinterest in the specifics of botany leaves me dumbfounded. How is it possible I’ve lived among this plants for decades with such blatant disregard for the details? To what other wonders has my daily haste blinded me? I walk absently past all manner of color, leaf shape, cones, flowers. It’s somewhat horrifying that I could be so unaware.
How can I notice more of these moments?
The answer is to get present. Our perspective oscillates like a pendulum’s swing: past-future, future-past, always whizzing past now. But sometimes the outside energy dissipates and the pendulum stills.
If the first step is to stop the motion, the second step is to get calm in the stillness. Still is not the same as calm. Step 2 is much harder. I’ve come to think that remaining calm while being still is one of the hardest things to do. In the same way that a drop of water seems still, our stillness vibrates - Brownian motion of mind.
The question I find most helpful to ask myself - as a light cuts through the fog - what else is here? This helps me see the vibrations as energy; Nature observing itself.
So it is. Here and now. With plants.