The eye of the zinnia

The eye of the zinnia stares at me and captures my attention. "Slow down," it shrieks at me; for it knows it is hard to get my attention as I rush to get the gardening tasks completed. The first zinnia bud spoke to me several years ago where I garden with my students. Now I anticipate seeing them every summer, however, what other buds have I missed?





I am still reading Here and Now by Henri Nouwen and this morning he spoke of being in a hurry:

"I am constantly puzzled by my eagerness to get something done, to see someone, to finish some job, while I am fully aware that within a month or even a week I will have completely forgotten what it was that seemed so urgent. It seems that I share this restlessness with many others."

When I am trying to get all the over-the hill blooms deadheaded, what do I miss in the process? My eyes are so focused on the dead and dying that I know I miss what is becoming. When I explain deadheading, I joke with my students that it is a good thing we don't treat old people the way I treat old flowers. "Get rid of them so we get more blooms." But if I spend all my time searching out the dead and dying, what use is getting more blooms? In the flower garden it is blooms that we want, but first come the buds.


Here are two more I discovered by slowing down with camera in hand:



This is leadwort. I have become a lover of plants that end in wort.










This is a vuurvogel which could sound even better than wort, but I don't know how to pronounce it. Maybe somewhere dahlias are known as a wort.



When one slows down one can experience the moment, the beauty of becoming.