(Above: last Sunday the wind briefly stopped and the sun came out and so I dressed the picnic table outside for an ‘al fresco’ meal. It was lovely for about an hour and then the chilly spring weather returned. I’m glad I grabbed the moment, though.)

Hey! How was your week?

Sometimes when I am describing to a friend the futility of resisting what is happening in life, I say: ‘Anyway, there’s no point resisting it. It’d be like trying to punch the wind.’

This week, though, I really did feel like trying to punch the wind!

The spring winds here are chilly, mercurial, and strong. Despite my continued attempts to reframe them: they’re ‘cleansing’; they’re ‘blowing out our cobwebs’; ‘they herald the advent of summer’… I landed on Thursday feeling fed up and cranky about the weather. (So pointless.)

There’s just so much I want to do in the garden but I don’t last long out there in these strong spring winds…maybe twenty minutes?

However, I have potted up my first tomatoes. And I bought some leek seedlings which will be ready for next autumn/winter if I plant them in September. I used to plant leeks in January to be ready for winter…but the last few years I’ve been planting them earlier and earlier. This may be the earliest, however.

Have you managed to start some spring planting yet?

Here’s some things I’ve been enjoying lately:

Dramatic (and philosophical) fire cooking with a charismatic Argentinian chef

This documentary about Argentinian chef contains multitudes. He’s famous for cooking with open fire and there’s plenty of inspiration for that in the film (he cooks a lot of meat…so if you’re vegetarian, take care) but there’s also slow-living philosophy, visible mending and nature appreciation.

He’s quite the charismatic, zen dude and I enjoyed this immersion into his life.

Song for the Week: ‘Under the Sun’ by Mia Doi Todd

Mia’s voice is high and sweet. The lyrics are dreamy. Discovering this song this week was a great antidote to being cranky about things I can’t change, like weather, politics and certain life circumstances. The song has a healing flowing feeling.

A tomato poem: ‘In My Next Life Let Me Be a Tomato’ by Natasha Rao

Because I’m dreaming into summer produce, especially tomatoes, I went looking for a tomato poem. There’s lots to love in this poem but I particularly love this line:

‘I want to be unabashed, audacious, to gobble

space, to blush deeper each day in the sun, knowing

I’ll end up in an eager mouth.’

In my next life let me be a Tomato

lusting and unafraid. In this bipedal incarnation

I have always been scared of my own ripening,

mother standing outside the fitting room door.

I only become bright after Bloody Mary’s, only whole

in New Jersey summers where beefsteaks, like baubles,

sag in the yard, where we pass down heirlooms

in thin paper envelopes and I tend barefoot to a garden

that snakes with desire, unashamed to coil and spread.

Cherry Falls, Brandywine, Sweet Aperitif, I kneel

with a spool, staking and tying, checking each morning

after last night’s thunderstorm only to find more

sprawl, the tomatoes have no fear of wind and water,

they gain power from the lightning, while I, in this version

of life, retreat in bed to wither. In this life, rabbits

are afraid of my clumsy gait. In the next, let them come

willingly to nibble my lowest limbs, my outstretched

arm always offering something sweet. I want to return

from reincarnation’s spin covered in dirt and

buds. I want to be unabashed, audacious, to gobble

space, to blush deeper each day in the sun, knowing

I’ll end up in an eager mouth. An overly ripe tomato

will begin sprouting, so excited it is for more life,

so intent to be part of this world, trellising wildly.

For every time in this life I have thought of dying, let me

yield that much fruit in my next, skeleton drooping

under the weight of my own vivacity as I spread to take

more of this air, this fencepost, this forgiving light.

Affordable Art: Kereru @ Whanganui River

I’ve broken my self-imposed budget for affordable art this week. This beautiful print by Rob Barrington is $95 so almost twice the affordable art budget of $50. Forgive me. I love it so much I had to share it with you.

I live an hour’s drive from Whanganui, know the landscape well and love this depiction of the river, coast and ‘my’ mountain, Taranaki in the background. It has a vintage NZ school journal feel about it that I love, too. My folks gave me a little money for my birthday and I’m pondering this print as a contender for what I spend it on.

(Above: Kereru @ Whanganui River by Rob Barrington. Image borrowed from Kina.)

A meditation I wrote for processing and integrating ‘recent events’

Back in 2020, I wrote and recorded a meditation to offer solace for how unsettling and scary the pandemic was.

I didn’t specifically mention the pandemic in the meditation. I just referred to it as ‘recent events’. This good decision to be a bit vague has meant this meditation is perennial …because there are continual ‘recent events’ for us to cope with. My hope was that a listener might feel a little more calm, less scattered and ‘put back together’ after listening.

You can listen to it here.

(And for my northern hemisphere readers…you can hear the short flat vowels of my very NZ accent!)

Recipe: Twenty Minute Tahini Biscuits

I made these biscuits this week. They are good for if you have someone coming over and you need something to serve quickly. I served some to my friend Kushla and she said they tasted like chewy halva.

They are quick to make (twenty minutes from go to woah) They have just three ingredients and are gluten-free.

Twenty Minute Tahini Biscuits

Mix:

one cup unhulled tahini

one cup powdered jaggery (Indian unrefined sugar)

one egg

It will make a stiff paste.

Roll into small balls. (Approximate a teaspoon full.) Put on a greased biscuit sheet.

Bake at 190 C for 9 minutes. (Keep an eye on them. They cook quickly and burn easily.)

Put on a cooling rack. Enjoy!

*

It’s my birthday this weekend and Fraser and I are going off-grid for two nights to a hut in the bush with outdoor cooking (hence watching the aforementioned fire-cooking documentary!) and an outdoor bath.

The description of the place says there are eels to feed, glowworms to visit and the bridge across the nearby stream is a giant log. I feel confident we’ll have a great time.

Until next week, try to stay out of the wind!

x Helen