Large Yellow Lady Slipper
(Cypripedium parviflorum var pubescens)
I sometimes sign on here in the morning, survey my efforts, utter a silent "meh" and decide to say (or write) as little as possible. That seems to be happening more often than it used to. When I plunk myself down in front of the computer and skim the early news, I cringe. How can we be doing this to each other? I can't find words for what is going on, or at least not the right words. Lately, I can go several days at a clip without surfing digital newspapers.
This week, I thought of my wild orchids. In the eastern Ontario highlands, lady slippers are blooming as they have for time out of mind. In their flickering, sunlit alcoves, they sway and sing a capella, a testament to wildness and belonging and community. Whole hillsides of wild golden grace express the indwelling incandescent spirit of the living earth without any help at all from This Old Thing. Wild orchids are a balm to this world weary spirit.
My departed soulmate and I watched over our wild orchid colony for many years, protecting them from being eaten by deer and trampled by bears. Every year, I stretched out in the grass nearby and marveled at their perfection, had long conversations with them and captured them with my lens every chance I got. In the midst of global disease and rampant human brutality, here they are again in all their golden perfection.
Events on the world stage are breaking us wide open, and they compel us to confront aspects of our humanity that we would rather not acknowledge, let alone address. The orchids are a powerful reminder of what it means to be a sentient being on this dear little planet, and I am grateful for their counsel. Time for us to get to work.
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