LIFE IN ARIZONA -Christmas

The holiday is just around the corner and am going and coming in a feverish rush of cleaning and baking; you see, all my children will be here this Christmas season and also my very first grandchild.

The whole house exudes aromas of cinnamon, cloves and vanilla; two make-ahead casseroles are already out of the oven, and I still need to get into the Christmas ornament boxes to select only the best ones for this season. We’ll trim the tree once they are all here.

      We haven’t been able to string the lights or set out the luminarias yet as the wind in this part of the desert may blow them all out before the actual holiday arrives.

Some of the kids are arriving tonight, some tomorrow, late.  They all come for some Sonoran sun, and perfect winter hikes, on perfect winter days.  They all come to Arizona for a sun tan, already fed-up with one of the crudest US winters in recent times.

     Our Scotch pine, only recently cut, proclaims its fresh scent throughout our spacious abode of Mexican tile bordered on the outside by prickly cacti and the Ocotillo, Cholla and Joshua trees, seemingly taken out of a Dr. Seuss children’s story.

      We are heating the pool so that the kids may go for a quick swim and truly voice the fact that they spent the holidays in a place where winter is hardly acknowledged.

      When our eldest daughter’s flight was cancelled because of heavy snow and ice in Seattle, we tried everything to reroute her through other means. She finally made it to Tucson two days before Christmas.  All the others found their way without mishap.

In spite of a warm swimming pool, it was too cold to swim so we sat in the loungers facing the sun, lit the fire pits and hiked.

      On Christmas Eve, on our way back from the caroling service, the night appeared starry and clear; cold, there was no quilt of clouds to keep in any of the afternoon warmth.  By 3 AM however, the first snowflakes began to fall.  By morning, our house, which sits at the base of the Santa Catalinas was covered by snow, much like the snowfalls etched in our memories from our previous life in Colorado. The mountains looked regal, majestic in their holiday blanket.

      With first light we saw a family of javalinas leaving their hoof prints on the sheathed  street; weak sunshine made the effort to filter through massive dark clouds. 

      A red fox ran up our front Chilean Mesquite, surely inspecting the happy faces on the other side of the French windows; our little granddaughter: captivated in this second Christmas that she may perhaps keep in her subconscious all her life.  

      We had a white Christmas in Arizona after all.  My family gathered round me; steaming coffee or hot cider in hand, a roaring fire and a twinkling holiday fir.  What else would we need?

The peace and love of the season gratifies me year after year as I recount the blessings I’ve been so fortunate to receive.

      The saguaros and barrel cacti are surrounded by snow, some even caught up in their thorns, and on top of the Santa Claus hats I place on their heads when a cold wave is announced. Birds fly from branch to branch sending thin plumes of snow onto the gravel below. 

      By noon that Christmas Day, the weather was partly cloudy and cold.  My children and I decided on a long walk up Golf Course Drive, mug of spicy tea along; posing for countless pictures; enjoying each other’s company and the neighbors’ lovely decorations. 

An Arizona Christmas to remember. ESW

    

LIFE IN ARIZONA -It's Autumn Once more

With this new season come colorful changing leaves, warm cozy sweaters, ciders and harvesting of the land. I wish we had more organic farms nearby, I wish all food sources were GMO free and organically grown. In spite of these feelings… low-chill olives, almonds, walnuts and other nut trees as well as apples have fallen from their umbilical cords. There's nothing quite like the just-harvested wealth of nuts, veggies and fruits of autumn! 
Olives go to the press, nuts to the roaster, abundant colorful produce arrive at markets inspiring us to cook warm and healthy foods.

In autumn we move back the clocks, emerging longer nights and first frosts: this is a busy time of year—fields are being plowed while winter wheat is sown. Kids are back in school anticipating their Halloween costumes and seasonal treats. Parents balancing a lighter load, their jobs back in focus. Seasonal changes occur in the mind as well. we rearrange schedules, bring out afghans and blankets from their summer storage...
Life seems to resume its customary pace, another season has slipped away -but another one, full of expectation has arrived.

As a mid-sized school child I loved stumping through crunchy fallen leaves with my dark blue lace-up shoes,unaware one day I’d be among the colors of these peaks, mesas, buttes and hills with an unimpeded view of heaven… my life was different then: urban streets, the riot of city life, and school mornings in my uniform -a living memory- charmingly tucked in the confines within me. I will never let it go in spite of the twists and turns of my life; neither will I ever forget the tiny vision of me in French braids in the starchy white smock and royal blue bow of my early elementary school days: collecting velvety green moss from the walls and sidewalks of yesteryear.

There was nothing more seductive to me than the smell of crisp new notebooks and freshly sharpened #2 pencils on those first days of the new school year when the memory of sandy beaches and summer fun faded at gigantic steps. 
Once I was in high school, during weekends and after school hours, I knew the joy of wearing red or caramel suede moccasins or knee-length boots; the magic of wrapping myself in a matching soft mohair sweater and scarf, my hair, pixie short, as I strolled with friends down the street inhaling the healing aroma of eucalyptus trees, on our way to a steamy cappuccino. And truly, autumn is for girlfriends, for young couples holding hands on quiet streets, strolling hand in hand along the crimson foliage, delighting in a tête-à-tête over text-books and coffee, happy as another season was in motion. 

We seemed to be in a hurry to grow up and get on with our lives!  


Here in Arizona, the colors of the Santa Catalina Mountains are never the same; the shifting light and arid conditions make a dramatic event of our daybreak and sunsets; a gamut of hues from shimmering purplish pinks, reds and oranges to violets and cobalt-y azures provide wavelengths of colorful light amazing the eye and the spirit.  I still think South African sunsets are the most beautiful I've seen in my life but Arizona's are strong contenders. This is autumn in the southwest.

Perhaps my senses are heightened, my awareness right under my skin. One sunrise at a time, one sunset at a time I say, and I’m trying, I’m repeating my mantras, I try to see beyond my physical being, my spirit’s adrift. esw

LIFE IN ARIZONA -Thoughts on Nothing 1

I guess I’ve reached the point when I can clearly see that the life I had planned on has alienated itself from me, it’s disappointing seeing it didn’t go as I intended.

Did I change that much from my original self? When did the shift into a different outcome occur? Have we all changed that much since our teenage years? Is humanity evolving into a careless society, consumed with materialism and technology?

I imagine as we grow in years our values get moved around and the heroic goals and ideas of the past, even though still there, seem submerged under a lagoon of old and new concepts and thoughts.

The universe has been moving along and at increased speed, I’m thinking.

New developments in science, medicine, lifestyles and technology have changed the way today's teens plan out their lives. Marriage and children are not the main goals of young girls anymore, but if that is the case, they can now wait longer to achieve them.

Birth control, newly accepted morals and behaviors and flexible parenting skills have all pooled to bring forth children like mine, more open, picking careers they feel comfortable in.

I find that if I don't evolve I'm placed within an ‘older age’ category.  It may be a word I used years back, or the way I wear my hair, or a fear to fully adopt technology.  Wouldn’t it have been unimaginable back in the 1920’s and 40’s that popular behaviors such as smoking would be currently banned from all public places! Heck, even unthinkable in the 1970’s!

So evolution, really, arrives through ideas and discoveries; we learn from our children, and we change with our children, I know I do with mine. My original plans shifted somewhat to reflect the life that was happening around me. 

Moving forward and knowing that the universe isn’t perfect have helped me come to terms, and to love and accept the way my life has turned out to be.

LIFE IN ARIZONA -My Meditation Saguaro

At the foot of the Santa Catalina Mountains our desert is dressed in extraordinary and splendorous color.

When people consider the deserts of the American Southwest they may imagine dried-up river beds and widespread parched lands; this is partly true; however, when monsoon rains soften the landscape, the desert is reborn in a riot of amazing wild flowers; the wind whispering alongside canyons as eagles soar above the mesas.

The end of winter and the onset of spring bring forth the glory of various cacti species. And even though this past winter we had only one month with snow plus some hard freezes, we did have several weeks without rain.

Nonetheless, the desert is in bloom!

Not as proliferate as in past years, but I have found delicate yellow and orange pea flowers and tiny daisies with yellow rays and centers along stream beds or in the shadowy floors near ravines and bluffs. Hot pink flowers make their appearance on low-growing prickly pears and close to the giant Saguaros.

The Sonoran Desert sports distinctive Saguaros which populate the land with their archetypal silhouettes resembling an army of standing soldiers waiting to battle.

Saguaros are the icons of Arizona, their giant and spiny columnar stems rise upwards of 20 feet in many cases. Saguaros take a long time to reach maturity but I have heard they may live up to 200 hundred years! I can only imagine the changes they've seen!

I often sit by the shade of a very old saguaro on my daily hikes along the mountains near my house; I know it’s very old because it has about five arms and those begin growing at around age 50 they say; by the time saguaros reach their 40^th birthday, they begin producing flowers but no arms yet.

‘My’ saguaro has milky-white flowers with yellow centers; blooming started only a few days ago. Its blossoms open during the night and close again with the heat of midday.

From my seated position on a nearby rock, I have an unhindered view of the high peaks; the militia of saguaros of varying heights and number of arms standing guard; and innumerable breath-taking wildflowers and blossoming cacti flirting with raucous pollinating bees humming around in a frenzied fête.

This is my meditation spot … a place where I rejoice within myself and my thoughts … the place that allows me to decipher and resolve the queries and doubts that collect in my consciousness and physical being.

From that spot in the mountains I am able to heal and soothe my soul; nothing can beat the cool mountain breeze, and the experience of coherence with the universe; I close my eyes, I hear the wind pirouetting with butterflies in the flowers and I forget the troubles of a pressing world. I can say that my culture schock has passed and I have bonded with this land.

LIFE IN ARIZONA -Energy Fills my Space

When I am being creative or in solitude; I simply flow. I feel it when I’m writing or when I’m sitting among my cacti, birds chirping in space. It is simply me, my words, and the music within. Not much in a material sense is needed to create simplicity. My writing and the inner sounds manifest themselves from within my body, my senses, my surroundings, and the air about me. Air is simple. It is always here and it is predictable.

I feel a connection to earth and the spirits when I write and when I sit alone in the quietness of my garden, vibrational energy moves through me. I love to think that my energy reaches others, others of my choosing or others I don’t know, others who may be sick.  It’s just the air and me, the slight breeze caressing the wind chimes that hang from the SW corner of the house; the putt-putt of a faraway golf-ball.

There is a certain ritual every time I sit to write. Most times I use my little tablet because it can go anywhere so long as it’s charged. I may be outdoors, or at a side-walk café, in bed or at the doctor’s office. Rituals help me feel the simplicity of my ordered Feng Shui settings. Something inside me is able to take over and I’m able to just BE. Neither worry nor stress. 
I prepare by taking deep breaths, feeling warm air circulating within me. I imagine any stale energy around me becoming fluid and cheery again. It is all about what flows around me, my breathing and my feelings of oneness.

Creativity allows flow, and flow is where I begin to understand that oneness. Learning what that feels like enters other areas of my life: my thoughts, my relationships, and my internal existence.  I can stop and smell the roses. I have arrived at that point I was not many years back. I can now reconnect with my concept of simplicity -- mind, body, and extra-sensory perception -- I can rejoice in this formidable change. I do embrace the flow, the movement, my own understanding of what simplicity means. At times when I revert to old ways, I shift my breathing to regain the spiritual balance I have achieved.ESWApril82013

LIFE IN ARIZONA -Thoughts on Nothing 2

I am remarkable, I know I hold much spiritual potential. As I am today, a non-working (in the commercial sense – non- wage earner) individual, with no paying job to make me an outstanding whatever, nor a titled job bearer to proclaim my self-confidence, 

I now totally try my hand at becoming whole again, focusing on the importance of nourishing and honoring my body, soul and spirit through organic nutrition, essential oils, supplements, meditation and healing unconventional treatments. I am trying to feed the depths of the person that I am. 
The person I am, was only moderately connected to what I did in my jobs and/or my social life.

Only once I was a ‘nine- to- fiver', most of my other jobs have been unceremonious, I made my own hours as I went along, working around my children’s schedules when they were young. These were jobs I loved, mostly. But I definitely knew that what I did was NOT who I was. My own personal life always took precedence over whatever I did in a paying job. 

I can always develop a quiet and secret life of my own if I allow my imagination to reign, I am happy with ME as the only visitor. I feel in harmony by just being with myself, and appreciating the remarkable human that I am.
I never defined myself by what I did at work, even though I did enjoy the social aspects and routines of a more disciplined life.
‘Retirement’ and free-lancing from home can definitely be chaotic. When there’s order within myself, however, I go through my day in a controlled and systematic way, accomplishing the tasks that seem to pile up during daily living.

People think that I am sager now, that I possess wisdom, prudence and good judgment. I suppose I am more so than I was fifty years ago but in essence my spirit remains unchanged.

LIFE IN ARIZONA -Missing the Sea

It seems ironic to me, maybe even ardently wrong the way nature plays with us. I hear the coyotes’ merriment drifting over the jagged peaks of the Catalinas; I see the sleepy saguaros that rim the mesas as I listen to the wind performing in the freshly born leaves of the Arizona ash tree I planted in our yard. We’ve had a warmish January -- we even imagined spring just around the corner -- but as February approached, the weather turned into a mean winter blizzard outside.  The countryside took on a rather colorless sepia hue as a steel sky set in and a cold wet snow began falling, wilting new shrubbery and foliage from warmwr days.

The seasons will do - come and go - as they please, with no determined schedule in this part of the southwest; we simply inhabit the rugged areas that have now gone urbane. The native chollas, palo verdes, barrel cacti, yuccas and saguaros of bygone days have been dug out and re-planted elsewhere to make room for housing, roads and cars.

Nature is strong, omnipotent, and omnipresent.  I live in this desert with which I feel no rapport. The dry land profits from me. It takes my moisture, my softness, and my abundant reveries and indulgent memories of beaches past. Remaining in this desert, I will dry-up like an apple left out on the kitchen counter for a while.   

I cannot deny desert’s beauty; she’s a unique crystal, a balanced ecosystem of full sun, ragged mountains and sandy landscapes; pastel painted sunsets, vastly starry nights …

As I gaze into the future - down the road of my life – I fail to see new undertakings coming this way. The path ahead does not appear to be too long or easy anymore. I miss the sea.

The sea indulges my musings … it voices my truth.

Transplants from other parts tell me it may take up to five years to break through the culture schock and feel a bodage, a connection to the desert.