Far From Home

California is full of transplants. Many of my friends live far from home. A few have moved back home to be with family. I have not. It has been 12 years since I left Connecticut and my whole family. My mother just left us after visiting for a month and as she left, it was like home left with her. My entire being wanted to collapse and cry. I was driving on the 405 so I did not, but I crumpled and withered inside instead.
It's miserable being far away from my family of origin. As much as they can drive me crazy, they are from whence I came. I love her. I love all of my family, and to be faraway from them seems, at time like the most back-asswards way of living in the world. I can justify it with the golden opportunities we have here, my husband's great job, his family and all our cousins and the short distance to the beach and the snowy mountains. Then of course, there is the weather. The almost endlessly sunny days that lull us into a California coma of "we can do anything" because we can. We can plan a birthday party out doors in January at a park and get away with it. I can justify living here for the pure adventure of it all, but nothing makes being away from your Momma right.

Moments after she left I thought about what she said she wished for me, to "smile more and relax more...to take care of yourself first." My first thought, was we are just different. I am a "doer" and she doesn't get that I just feel better when I am busy. She is more of a go with the flow, mosey along and stop and smell the roses kind of gal. But then I thought about who she was when she was with us. She was of complete service. All she did was ask what she could do for us. She had her times of making art and relaxing on the back patio chatting with her friends, but for the most part, she lives her entire life to make others happy. She helped us by cooking, sweeping, playing with the boys so my husband and I could talk or work, and she made art with our 4 year old to prevent tantrum disasters.


Meanwhile, I often plunked away on my laptop, writing email after email to plan the national Moms Across America March to Label GMOs. I dashed about, volunteering, prepping for den meetings and hopping on calls with national leaders. The urgency to "get things done" was fed by the knowledge that I had a loving and free child care helper and I had better get done what I could, while I could.
After she left, I missed her and instead of wishing she would be any other way other than how she is (like for her to stop encouraging me to slow down and relax), I realized that the difference between her and I was zero. Although she was not working regularly to better her nation or the world, like I am obsessed to do, she is of total service to her family. And that is no less important. She gives of herself more fully and generously than anyone I know.

I cried to myself and a friend that I asked to commiserate with me, because I realized that on many days, I took advantage of her being here rather than taking advantage of being with her.

My mother's visit often seems like an opportunity for me to relax just a little bit in my motherly duties...my mom will often make breakfast for my kids while I sleep in just a half hour later, or wash the dishes while I talk to my husband alone after dinner or work on the Moms March after the kids get home from school because I know my Mom will play with them. But after she leaves I am filled with regret for not taking the opportunity to relax and just be with her.

My friend acknowledged my feelings and then gave me the freedom I as looking for from the heaviness I felt. She reminded me my sorrow came from my vast love for my mother. It is a breakdown for me that I was a brat to my mother even once while she was here. It is painful for me to be away from her. That is a miracle of love. My sorrow became my access to relief. I am grateful to have that love for my mother and be present to the contribution she is to us all...even for a month or a day out of the year...far from home.

Zen Honeycutt

The Grass is Greener

The water tastes sweeter here, the rain more gentle and frequent, the dew last longer and the scent of dirt is stronger. The grass is greener with lushness and the air is filled with floral freshness that wakes you up and says "YES!". There is nothing like Connecticut country living.
The hills roll more roundly here and the country roads more curvy. There is an abundance of everything that has you breath deeply more often and sigh...more green, more rain, more song birds and more daffodils that bloom again and again. More acreage, more horses, more stone walls covered in flat minty green lichen. More geese, more morning doves, more wild herbs and more love of good hard work. Maybe it's all the beauty around us or the change of seasons that drive us, whatever it is, New Englander's have more gumption. We are do-it-yourselfer's boot strappin' folk. We don't pay nobody to do something we can do ourselves. The satisfaction is what country living is about.

Doing it all myself has gotten me in a bit of trouble here and there though...a lot of last minute scrambling and projects not quite what I wanted ...and I have been expanding my mindset after living in California for twelve years. I am still a country girl at heart, and I got a dose of fast-walking-New-York-City girl blood in me after ten years of pounding the pavement there, but as a California girl, I learned to slow down, to look people in the eye and say hi and enjoy it. I have learned to connect, create partnership, play nice and work well with others. I have learned that you get more done with a team and yes, honey does work better than vinegar, and no it doesn't always work to get mad when people are late and or do everything myself. California has taught me it's okay to chill and play, to see the abundance and roll in it. To feast my eyes on greenness and not see work, shrubs that need to be trimmed or weeds that need to be whacked, but to see the dew drops and spider webs and marvel at them so long that my knees ache. I am grateful for the shift in my perspective from having lived in New York and California. I see Connecticut as more delightful now, and my gratitude has me be at ease.

Enjoying Connecticut living has me be more quiet now too. There is no air of having to prove something like I take on in California. I can drive for an hour with my Dad and just stare at the trees hugging the roads. I can stain cedar siding with my brother and just enjoy the satisfaction of working together. I can sit by the pond with my Mom and just point to a Great Blue Heron. Everything else is said with a sigh of appreciation. We can just be in Connecticut.

There is something magical in being in nature for the boys too. They hardly fight. They run and play and catch dragon flies and leopard frogs and then fish and throw pine cones at snakes. They interact with nature. They break sticks and dig stuff up. They revel in the stink of Skunk Cabbage and marvel at the glow of a Buttercup flower under their chins. They run with bare feet and fall on gravel and get up with determination. They get dirty and crusty toed. But somehow they seem cleaner than ever. They have to be wrangled into a shower once a week. Their hair is thick and shiny and their skin is rosey and clear. Their shouts of glee when they catch something is worth more than the fee of a summer camp. Their faces of awe when their uncle builds them a tree fort is worth more than their weight in gold. Summer in Connecticut is priceless. I hope you get to experience nature like this often in your life.

Ode to California

I Live Where….

I live where the seasons sing in songs of sun,
Glowing,encouraging ,
Searing white light,
Gentle, comforting,
And soft, furtive sun.

I live where the Eucalyptus kiss the sky,
Swaying with long tendrils of sophisticated leaves,
Trunks reveal ridiculous peach and lavender
beneath layers of delicate cool grey skin.

I live where the freeways and fences are draped with gentle jasmine,
Hypnotically intoxicating.
Where walls between dense apartment complexes are topped with
Fiercely fuscia Bougainville, screaming “Fiesta!”

I live where hummingbirds bob between Bottlebrush,
Lush pink balls of nectar and flirty fun.
Where fluorescent purple Jacaranda scatter their petals like confetti
On grateful sidewalks…giving morning dogwalkers and
moms with strollers a reason to wonder…What color, What beauty!

I live where the luscious ocean goes on forever,
Licking my feet in the soft millennial sand.
Smoothing the purple, spotted and green jade rocks,
Unleashing wave after wave after wave endlessly…

I live where the rolling hills of green velvet
turn into brown and yellow fodder for fires.
Where earthquakes roll through Easter brunch and we…
Californians…
laugh and sit and sip our lemonade by the pool,
in the sublime sun and the shade of the palms.


Zen Honeycutt
www.zenspurplegarden.com