Friday Ramble - Earth/Earthy

Earth is a good word for pondering in this shaggy season as we work in our gardens and tend the sweet beginnings of the harvest to come. All things, or at least most things, arise from the earth and return to it in time, us included.

Our word dates from before 950 CE, and it comes to us through the good offices of the Middle English erthe, the Old English eorthe; German erde, Old Norse jǫrth, and Gothic airtha, thence the Ancient Saxon eard meaning soil or dwelling place. Then there is the Latin aro, meaning to plough or turn over. In the beginning is the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) form *h₁er- meaning ground, soil, land or place.

When we say "earth", we are usually thinking of the ground under our feet. We may also be thinking of the many millions of roots doing their thing way down deep, of the bones of our little blue planet and the fiery heart beating in its molten core. We almost never think of ourselves as elements in the same story, but blood and bones, root and branch, rivers and rocks, we are all tiny thoughtless players in a vast elemental process. Endlessly befuddled strands in the web, we are always getting distracted and forgetting that we are part of anything at all. 

Once in a while, the simple fact that we are NOT separate shows up and insists we pay attention. It can happen while dangling on a rock face or seated in a pool of sunlight under a tree in the woods, on a hill somewhere under the summer stars, or on the shore of a favorite lake at dusk. Dazzling sunsets and starry nights do it for me every time, and occasionally it even happens while I am parked in the waiting room of my local cancer clinic. Such moments cannot be predicted, and nor should they, but I have noticed that they often show up right when I need them.

There I was this week, feet planted in the garden and head in the clouds, but not a lofty thought in sight. My soulmate and I gardened together fifty years, and I was missing him more than words can say that morning. Out of the blue, there came a fey scrap of elemental knowing, and I remembered (probably for the millionth time in this long and tatterdemalion life) that I was right where I was supposed to be and doing just what I was meant to be doing. I needed that.

We belong here, roots, branches, star stuff and every dancing particle - we belong here as much as rivers, mountains, acorns, wild salmon and sandpipers do. Dirt, clouds, sky and stardust, it's all good.