Milt Greek's Blog: The River of Life - Posts Tagged "gratitude"

I have heard that Thanksgiving is a day of mourning for Native People. This seems likely, since any honest recognition of the lasting injustice and institutional racism in the inheritance of land and wealth in the United States speaks volume of the extent of suffering over 500 years of European invasions have caused. For years, my wife and I gave money to support Native Americans and their traditional culture through an organization created by sensitive-seeker activists. Likewise, we have bought sculptures from a Cherokee artist and have learned the heart-wrenching stories of their survival through centuries of European invasions and ethnic cleansing.

Sensitive people and activists often reach out and make sacrifices to promote peace and justice. Recently my wife saw a concert pianist who is an international human rights activist; a couple of months earlier we attended an art reception for a ceramic and glass artist who was donating 30% of income from her art to Doctors Without Borders and other international aid charities. In another instance, I worked with a former violent man who reacted into becoming a Christian Pacifist who fasted for 42 days in 1992 during the period that Columbus’s ships sailed to begin the invasion of this land as a commemoration of 500 years of struggle and resistance by Native People.

In our personal circles, sensitive people and artists who have had romantic relationships, marriages, children or adopted children from other ethnic groups, including Native Americans, Africans, Arabs, African-Americans, Latin Americans and others. These choices change our lives, giving us a life history and personal knowledge that is more empathetic and concerned about peace, harmony and justice with other ethnic and religious groups. Our communities and families cross the lines of traditional hatreds and we see our own ethnic origins and privilege through that much more complex lens.

This contrasts with some white money-chasers I’ve known who were slumlords and/or racists and white violent men who encounter people of color mainly through their work as policemen. I’ve known white puritans who travel to other countries to proselytize people of color whose history has been marked by invasion and exploitation by Europeans and puritan white women who used the Bible to justify not dating men of color. Through these actions, white people who have these traditional aspects perpetuate traditional hatreds with a triple punch of violence, economic power-over-others and religious proselytizing, benefiting from injustices that prior generations of Europeans brought about.

I recently attended an art discussion by an international Arab woman artist who said that as politicians in the United States had grown more hostile to others that she was receiving more requests for shows and discussions in the United States by artists here. As the traditional and politically conservative alliance of white money-chasers, violent men and puritans perpetuate traditional hatreds and gain power-over-others, wealth and followers from the current situation, sensitive people, artists, activists, thinkers, and others reach across ethnic, religious, national and other traditional boundaries to work for peace and justice. Likewise, the gender gap showing women—who tend to be more sensitive—voting much more than men for policies and politicians who are seeking to improve relationships between traditionally conflicting groups.

Supporting sensitive people and the more liberal allies of thinkers, activists and others is a way to support the movement towards peace and justice. As sensitive people support ourselves and seek, by our own natures, to reach out, get to know and help those who have been or are being oppressed by white money-chasers, violent men and puritans, we seek to make the world better and counteract the harm people with more exploitive aspects do.

I am deeply thankful this year for the bounty my family and community receives, but this gratitude combines with a consideration the importance of compassion and good works toward those who suffer. This is especially important towards those who my ancestors took land and wealth from, directly and indirectly, using the traditional triple assault of violence, economic power-over-others and proselytizing. I am also thankful that I can work and have enough time and abundance that I can do good works and receive the blessings of the Covenant of Good Works through my acts. I remain a deeply fortunate person; my good fortune is a responsibility as well as profound luck in this tragically hard and wonderful world.

The Dogwoods and Redbuds continue to bloom, with more and more trees budding out to create velvety lime green backgrounds to their white, pink and purple flowers. With a warm April ending in heavy rains needed to bring forth the early spring garden, we are at the very start of the “salad days” of May and June. On May Day, I took a vacation day to harvest some of the profuse outpouring of young greens from our garden. I harvested heirloom Arugula, Red Romaine and Grandpa Admire’s lettuces, grown from our own seed, and Beet greens, leaving Spinach, young Kale, Mustard and Turnip greens for the weekend.

For our May Day local meal, we opened a Honey Golden brewed in January, formed a salad of the day’s harvest with local Spinach and microgreen sprouts, made an Asparagus Quiche and had local Strawberries as desert. With the influx of salad and early spring crops, our daily meals will once again be filled with delicate, fresh, local foods.

May, in our region, is the time of the fertility of the Earth bursting forth, with many later flowers of spring soon to blossom, including sweet smelling Honey Locust and Honeysuckle. The Farmer’s Market and produce auction have a flush of seasonal foods, beginning a time of abundance of local food. Amateur gardeners like myself crowd into the garden shops and begin setting out tender summer crops like tomatoes, Basil, melons, and beans. For some of us, who sow cool-weather plants in the colder months of early spring, May marks the beginning of near-constant harvests.

For me, the magic of watching young plants grow from seed is mesmerizing. As a thinker, I often get caught in the falsehood that all things must proceed from a plan fixed through study and reason. Seeing a plant pushing its way blindly through the soil towards the warm sun, to become a mature plant and form seeds to perpetuate itself for future years contains the mysterious miracle of life in its essence. How many eons of time have passed with seeds sowing themselves into future generations in the river of life on Earth without humans pausing to understand the complexity of a sustainable natural community? How can I perpetuate this sustainability while harvesting from our garden both the crops to feed us and the seeds to provide for us in future years? Simple questions like these lie at the core of the challenges facing humanity.

At the same time that we are harvesting the first greens from our garden, our lives are filled with the children borne of the young mothers in our family and community. Two of the toddlers my wife cares for are children of a dear family friend and one is a six month old in our family. In addition to these, many more babies in our circle of friends have been given to us in the past few years, including an anticipated newborn this spring.

My wife, who dearly loves children and babies, is now babysitting six days a week most weeks. May Day is no different for us. After I harvested from our garden, shopped for local food at the Farmer’s Market, and prepared our meals, my wife and I cared for the six month old in the afternoon and evening. We both enjoy caring for the baby very much, who has been growing more active and observant and greets us with big smiles that touch our hearts. Just as having a meal of local food on May Day is a celebration of the joyous fertility of the Earth, spending time caring for this new life is a celebration of the wonders of human re-creation in the Earthly river of life.

In the Catholic tradition, May is the month of Mary, mother of the Christian god incarnate. Following the research of thinkers and feminist seekers, Mary is herself a retelling of the Mother goddess of religions prior to Christianity. As patriarchy sought the diminish the role of the sacred feminine from divine to mortal, the later patriarchal religion of Christianity took this Mother goddess and made her human, subject to a male, human-like deity envisioned by patriarchal priests. As this religion merged with older traditions, the fertility ceremonies marking the reawakening of the Earth were overlain with rituals honoring Mary, Mother of god. Traditions recognizing the joyous rebirth of the Earth and the fertility of spring were submerged under the Christian traditions.

Yet, for those close to the Earth and the human community around us, May and the cycle of birth and rebirth is a time of the celebration of the fertility of the natural and human communities. The gifts of spring and new life are for us to celebrate in their abundance. The privilege of being able to have enough land to grow some of our own food and the profound privilege of having new life in our family and our circle of friends calls for tremendous gratitude. Many people would long for a small plot of land to provide them a garden to tend; many more are lonely for the gift of young lives to celebrate the passage of time. My wife and I are fortunate to have these gifts of the fertile Mother in our lives, regardless of what words we use to describe the source. Taking the time to be grateful for the profound fertility of the sacred feminine that flows in our Earthly river of life is essential for my spiritual growth.