Tree lessons

It is so easy to see the beauty of trees at this time of the year, when they seem to draw our attention, and make it impossible not to notice, decked as they are in their most glorious attire.

I love trees. They inspire, teach and comfort me so much. When I feel afraid or insecure, I look at a tree and how it stands there, not trying to pretend to be anything other than what it is. Not comparing itself to others; not feeling inferior or superior, just being what it is, whether young and slender, old and gnarly, split in half by lightening or whatever may be. The story of its life is sometimes plain to see, other times, not. But whatever it may look like, to me a tree is always beautiful and unique.

Also, trees teach me to relax and allow myself to be vulnerable. As my amazing teacher Bert said last night at the lodge "There's little hate in the world. But there is much fear." So true. I and we are all so afraid, and I think that fear is ultimately about being vulnerable. Yet the thing most of us want and need, whether we know it or not, the only thing that can heal us as a person as as a world, is love, and love requires us to be vulnerable. When I look at a tree, I see how vulnerable it is: to the forces of nature, and to the forces of human destruction. And yet it stands, and lives whatever its sort in life may be, dignified and beautiful.

Peace

Beauty and Pointless Destruction

" One can fight for goodness in many ways. One way of serving it is by inculcating a sense of goodness in people." Olga Berggolts

The Flower Seller Of Aleppo certainly does that. Although it is very tragic, his story also has beauty and goodness in it and that, to me, rises above everything else. I just hope that his son will also be able to feel that at some point.

Northern Italy

Flying in over the Alps I got so excited I leaned over and practically squished Aiyana who had the window seat. I think I got a few other people on the plane to be excited enough to at least look out the window...

On the ground, narrow streets typical of small villages

 Olive groves everywhere

Driving around Lago di Garda, with views so spectacular that James Bond movies were shot here.

 Crazy tunnels cut through the mountains, some of them a mile long

View of Lago di Garda from the mountains surrounding it, with small villages at the bottom and cultivated fields

 The center of the village of Brentonico, near where we stayed

 Our beautiful, spotless apartment in the hills of the little village of Cazzano di Brentonico

 Tight, very tight drive to our apartment. We were worried about scraping our (small) rental car.

 Driving to Avio castle in our rental car

Cobble stone road

 Aiyana in an olive grove

Avio castle

Views from Avio castle

Those mountains... enough to make me swoon

Stairway inside the castle.

Sena said this would be a good setting for a love scene

Village house

I absolutely loved this view from the balcony of our apartment. We were perched up on the side of a mountain, above the clouds and birds. I could've stayed there for a long, long time, just looking down over the valley and neighbouring mountains, breathing in that crisp mountain air and enjoying the silence, punctuated now and then only by bird song and dogs barking.

Little villages we could see from our balcony

Peace

About a difficult situation

Here is something I wrote a few days ago about a difficult situation that's been weighing on me:

Recently there have been some ugly developments in my extended family (not involving me directly), having to do with money. In the grand scheme, I know that this is nothing new, as it has been demonstrated many times, on small and large scales, that money and power have the power to sway people in such a way that they will betray their most fundamental values: their families, communities, and the earth that sustains them.

After doing my cow chores tonight I sat on a rock at the edge of the field with LT, the cat, and we watched the cows graze. The peaceful atmosphere brought me comfort, but I also felt sad about this situation in my family. I found it especially sad to think about people who live in relative abundance and affluence and yet are driven in such a way that they allow their family ties and other close relationship to be torn up by money.

It is easy / tempting to get bitter and self righteous with all this, but I thought that it would be more useful to pray for those who are misled, be it by money or anything else. I learned from my own experiences that it is out of confusion, fear, insecurity, anger and hurt that people end up hurting each other and themselves in the end. So I pray that they wake up and heal from whatever is driving them to act in these ways.

Today, I was still thinking about this situation as I drove in my car, while at the same time looking outside and taking in the sunny autumn day. I wrote this little poem:

Overcome
 
Overcome by the beauty of this day in autumn;
The trees hanging their branches,
Letting their colorful leaves fall,
Carelessly, on the wind, one by one.

World, throw what you will at me
Tempt me with anger, envy, greed or jealousy,
Cheap trinkets all, by comparison...

This peace in my heart,
The lessons that I've learned,
The infinite gift of another day, here, to be a part and contemplate all this,
These you cannot take away from me,
Nor will I trade them for any of your ways.

Visiting Nicu in Hunedoara, Romania

I wrote about Nicu in an earlier post. Going to visit him in Hunedoara, Romania, was an important impetus for our trip. We spent 3 days with him, and he treated us like only a parent would. He must've prepared for weeks before we came, because at every meal he served at least 3 courses, all home-made, delicious food. Also, he either grew the food himself, or ordered it from farmers he knew, especially for us. It was really touching to be treated this way.

This is Tutu, Nicu's best friend and companion. Among Nicu's many virtues is that he's very good with animals. He loves animals, and when he leaves the house he always has a bag of bones and other left overs with him, which he uses to feed the many stray dogs that are on the streets everywhere in Romania. Dogs just come up to him, many of them in very rough shape, knowing that they'll get some food and kindness.

Nicu's amazing skills include foraging and food preservation. He roams the woods at all times of year, foraging all kinds of berries, mushrooms and nuts. This is in addition to growing his own garden. He can tell you about all kind of plants, what they're useful for, how to prepare them as food, or medicine, or how to use them in construction materials. These skills, which some people of Nicu's generation still have, will be gone with him, and the world will lose so much. The youth in Romania is mostly not interested in learning about them, just like they're not over here, they're into technology and more modern things, but hopefully there are still a few out there that these skills can be passed on to so we don't completely lose them.
Even though Nicu lives in a communist era apartment building, he has a root cellar full of preserves. These are some of the pickles he makes, and in the left corner are wild nuts he foraged and saved for the winter

And these are some of the grapes he grew, which he harvested for us. He also made grape juice out of them. It was all delicious. The bottles in the background have all kinds of alcoholic beverages made with fruits Nicu forages in the forest.

More preserves put away for the winter. Most of this food he actually gives away, to relatives and friends. He gave us a whole bunch too, and would've given even more if we didn't stop him out of fear of weighing down our luggage too much.

Making wine and another berry alcohol

Nicu's dining room and his whole apartment is small and very neat.

At the start of the meal

The first course for breakfast one morning: potato salad with home made mayonnaise, vegetable fritters and roasted vegetables spread (zacusca). Then followed hand-made crepes filled with home-made cheese and jams; then fruits. There was also hot cocoa, coffee and tea.

Nicu took us to Deva, a town near where he lives to visit a Dacian fortress, dating back to before the Roman conquest.

The sign says: Be careful! Vipers!
Nicu said that there are many vipers in the stone walls of the fortress. They are mostly active in warm weather and are very poisonous.

View of Deva from the fortress.

We took this crazy electric cabin to get up to the fortress. It was riding on a rail inclined at a super steep angle. The mother in me did not like that ride at all. I was relieved it only lasted about 2 minutes.

He also brought us to Cincis, a beautiful place near his town, where his son is building a house, and where Nicu spends time foraging.

This is Nicu's apartment building. He's been living in it for over 30 years. Hunedoara, the town he's in is not very beautiful - it used to be big industry during communist times, most of which has been abandoned since, so it looks kind of sad now. But it does have some nice historical parts, and even better for Nicu, it's very easy to get out of town and into the woods or countryside where he can pursue his activities.

Here Nicu's demonstrating how he makes cheese from raw milk he buys from a farmer. In the background are some stuffed peppers he just made for us.

Sena watching intently as Nicu pours the curds.

Cheese curds draining

And hanging the curds to drain until next day. This cheese then becomes Nicu's daily breakfast, or stuffing for crepes, and other things.

Thank you Nicu for everything (I say this knowing that he does not use computers, but I feel that I must put it out there anyway).
Peace