Summertime is one of my favorite times of year here in the Northern California Bay Area. The weather is near perfect throughout the region for most of the season with daytime temperatures varying between 65-80 Fahrenheit with the occasional day or week climbing into the high 90’s or low 100’s. There is frequently a light breeze depending upon where you live, and I’m particularly fortunate to live in an area where the temperatures and breezes are consistently agreeable to my preferences, and perhaps just as importantly, to those of the plants in my garden.
I have a bit of a green thumb (some would say). My garden is mostly low water container plants that are native to this area, such as grasses and succulents. I also have a large collection of Echinopsis columnar cacti which I propagate for ornamental and traditional usage, as well as several other varieties that are too numerous to list. All of this being said - this is a story about one particular plant in my garden, my Serrano Pepper plant, and the lesson it taught me a few weeks ago.
August through September is when I usually harvest my chili peppers. The Serranos have gone from bright green to a dark, greenish-brown, turning into a deep, then bright red colored pod. They are hotter than a Jalapeno, and have a SHU rating around 30,000-50,000 (hot but not too hot). My Serrano plant is in view from my kitchen window, and this year, as in years past, I have enjoyed watching the plant flourish, and the blossoms turning throughout the season into magnificent pods of glory (too much?). Nevertheless, I inevitably have to harvest the pods and do with them whatever will suffice for my needs and the needs of my close neighbors. I often dry my pods in the sun and crush them to use as a topping for, oh umm, let’s see, EVERYTHING!
Now, as I look out my window at my pepper plant, considering how best to Over-Winter it this season, I realize something amazing for the first time; I’m connected to the plant. It’s almost as though I hear the plant saying its prayers before a long rest, confident in the answer it will receive next Spring. It’s saying to me… “My fruit is gone” and I almost shed a tear. It next inquires… “Have you appreciated me?” and I'm filled with appreciation. It asks…” Now that my fruit is gone, what do I mean to you?” and I’m startled. Right about now I’m feeling a kind of vertigo sifting through this moment. It’s as if I’m having the thoughts of the plant in my own mind, rather than me projecting my own vanities upon its expressions. It was in that moment that I caught a glimpse of myself at my best and my worst all at once.
I thought about the people I know, and how I often look at them for the fruit they bear, and how I may benefit from partaking of their goodness, and I stood face to face with my own selfishness. With people, I realized that my focus is toward the harvest, with little care for the plant (person) and my responsibility toward them. How presumptuous I have been to waltz into the lives of people (plants) I have not tended, and expect to eat their fruit. What will happen to my interest for them when their fruit is all gone, or they fail to produce altogether. I confess that I have turned my back on people because their fruit had dried up. This Serrano pepper plant seemed to be reaching inside of me, pulling to the surface what I needed to see, and showing me grace in a way I didn’t expect. Historically, when considering my foibles, I am very hard on myself, thus inhibiting the lessons to be learned in the trial. This time, I was washed in acceptance of the truth in the revelation, and I was cleansed from within as I allowed this lesson to take root within me.
It was like awakening from a dream. I snapped-out of that mist as quickly as it had apprehended me, and I began to question if the experience was real. At once I felt my heart overflow with desire - a desire to care for and nurture others, with no interest in obtaining for myself whatever fruit they may or may not produce. I know all about temperatures, soil and light conditions, watering, seasons… everything about how to grow plants, but what do I know about caring as well for my fellow Man? Not only this, but I now have a greater understanding of the need for self-care, so that I may produce an abundant crop to share with those around me. My Serrano pepper plant has a few more weeks to play in the wind and sun before I remove all of its branches and leave behind nothing but a bare stick protruding from the dry soil, and yet somehow, its Spring has already come.
I have a bit of a green thumb (some would say). My garden is mostly low water container plants that are native to this area, such as grasses and succulents. I also have a large collection of Echinopsis columnar cacti which I propagate for ornamental and traditional usage, as well as several other varieties that are too numerous to list. All of this being said - this is a story about one particular plant in my garden, my Serrano Pepper plant, and the lesson it taught me a few weeks ago.
August through September is when I usually harvest my chili peppers. The Serranos have gone from bright green to a dark, greenish-brown, turning into a deep, then bright red colored pod. They are hotter than a Jalapeno, and have a SHU rating around 30,000-50,000 (hot but not too hot). My Serrano plant is in view from my kitchen window, and this year, as in years past, I have enjoyed watching the plant flourish, and the blossoms turning throughout the season into magnificent pods of glory (too much?). Nevertheless, I inevitably have to harvest the pods and do with them whatever will suffice for my needs and the needs of my close neighbors. I often dry my pods in the sun and crush them to use as a topping for, oh umm, let’s see, EVERYTHING!
Now, as I look out my window at my pepper plant, considering how best to Over-Winter it this season, I realize something amazing for the first time; I’m connected to the plant. It’s almost as though I hear the plant saying its prayers before a long rest, confident in the answer it will receive next Spring. It’s saying to me… “My fruit is gone” and I almost shed a tear. It next inquires… “Have you appreciated me?” and I'm filled with appreciation. It asks…” Now that my fruit is gone, what do I mean to you?” and I’m startled. Right about now I’m feeling a kind of vertigo sifting through this moment. It’s as if I’m having the thoughts of the plant in my own mind, rather than me projecting my own vanities upon its expressions. It was in that moment that I caught a glimpse of myself at my best and my worst all at once.
I thought about the people I know, and how I often look at them for the fruit they bear, and how I may benefit from partaking of their goodness, and I stood face to face with my own selfishness. With people, I realized that my focus is toward the harvest, with little care for the plant (person) and my responsibility toward them. How presumptuous I have been to waltz into the lives of people (plants) I have not tended, and expect to eat their fruit. What will happen to my interest for them when their fruit is all gone, or they fail to produce altogether. I confess that I have turned my back on people because their fruit had dried up. This Serrano pepper plant seemed to be reaching inside of me, pulling to the surface what I needed to see, and showing me grace in a way I didn’t expect. Historically, when considering my foibles, I am very hard on myself, thus inhibiting the lessons to be learned in the trial. This time, I was washed in acceptance of the truth in the revelation, and I was cleansed from within as I allowed this lesson to take root within me.
It was like awakening from a dream. I snapped-out of that mist as quickly as it had apprehended me, and I began to question if the experience was real. At once I felt my heart overflow with desire - a desire to care for and nurture others, with no interest in obtaining for myself whatever fruit they may or may not produce. I know all about temperatures, soil and light conditions, watering, seasons… everything about how to grow plants, but what do I know about caring as well for my fellow Man? Not only this, but I now have a greater understanding of the need for self-care, so that I may produce an abundant crop to share with those around me. My Serrano pepper plant has a few more weeks to play in the wind and sun before I remove all of its branches and leave behind nothing but a bare stick protruding from the dry soil, and yet somehow, its Spring has already come.
