A New World, And a Bold World

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

Hello.

Hi.

Is this thing on?

I’m experiencing a bit of stage fright, sitting here staring at the screen. It’s been so long since I’ve been here. Not here as in sitting at this computer staring at the screen. I’ve been to that “here” TOO much over the last few months. No I mean here, here. To this site, here. It’s been so long since I’ve pulled my head out of the cave I’ve been living in. Pulled my nose up from against the grindstone, so to speak. Reintegration is going to take some time and patience. When I thought I might write here today my first thought was, What will I say?

So much has happened and yet nothing has happened. I haven’t done any gardening so there are no recent experiences to draw from. And yet I just finished writing roughly 75, 000 words on the act of gardening. And I just spent hours upon hours looking through the thousands of photos of gardens and gardening that I took over the last year. I am immersed in gardening to the point of collapse and yet I have nothing to say.

The brain is tapped. I need a refill.

And so first some pictures. A little Dazzle Camouflage (aka Dazzle Ships), if you will. Because when I can’t speak with words, I can often find a way to say something with a picture. Although I’ll admit I don’t know what these say. Squash is pretty?

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

And also, wow America. It took a while for it to sink in today. I think I was afraid to believe it was real. But it is real. My excitement is swelling. I have been thinking about the Nina Simone song “Blackbird.” (Sorry I couldn’t find a version online) The first line goes, “Why you wanna fly blackbird, you ain’t ever gonna fly.” I’m a big Nina Simone fan and have long turned to that song in moments of hopeless despair. She expresses so fully that sense of deep longing and wishing for the impossible. The fear that to wish and then to turn that wish into an action (hope) will lead to more despair and pain. It’s always amazing to see a concrete example of what can happen when people take a chance — even if just a small one — to put hope into action. And so I’m then reminded of this Nina Simone song.

I’m so happy for you, America. Happy for all of us.

p.s. I have zillions of unanswered emails in my inbox. I promise to get back to you soon.

Gayla Trail
Gayla is a writer, photographer, and former graphic designer with a background in the Fine Arts, cultural criticism, and ecology. She is the author, photographer, and designer of best-selling books on gardening, cooking, and preserving.

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22 thoughts on “A New World, And a Bold World

  1. A lot of us have been living here in the US for almost a decade without feeling good about our country. It’s so amazing to finally feel like we might have done something right, something to be proud instead of ashamed of. Thanks for the supportive words, and welcome back to the blogosphere!

  2. An Obama win is amazing. My joy is curtailed by the knowledge that here in CA, we voted to start treating the animals we use as food better, we joyfully confirmed an Obama presidency, but slammed shut the door on the rights of GLTG to marry the loves of their lives just like I did. I will continue the fight for my GLTG friends and I hope an Obama presidency will inspire others to stand up for social justice as it has me.

  3. What an election and a sigh of relief from this American.

    Gayla – I’m excited about your big writing project. Hope you get to take some time for yourself now.

  4. As a gardener – Hooray, Gayla, you’re back! And as an American – I’m so excited! I was beginning to think the change was never gonna get here. Thanks.

  5. Yes, it has been so nice to see people around the world waving those American flags again! And it has brought tears to my eyes many times thinking about what we have accomplished here this week. We have a lot to do now to fix things, but we are on our way! Wheeeeee!

  6. Welcome back Gayla! I will be checking out that Nina Simone song very soon :) What a great week for a Canadian like myself, living in America (Utah), to feel that finally … people are paying attention to what’s going on in the world!

  7. Yay for voting the woman-haters out of office– though unfortunately my state DID vote to alienate lovers of the same sex. A great embarrassment, since a great deal of our tourist revenue comes from our rainbow days and parades and mass ceremonies down in miami and pensacola. Sure, womens rights will finally be honored again and I am giddy that we are finally taking a chance on a man who is not anglo-saxon, who isn’t from a rich family, and shares my most of my views, no less! but my state has elected to deny the right of thousands of people to enjoy matrimony. A huge embarassment. We can earn a living off them in tourism and bars, and we base funny characters off them on tv, but we wont let them get married. Just for the record, I voted against that particular state ammendment, and I’m going to go work on building my cold box for the coming months to get my mind off the whole thing.

  8. finally a sigh of sweet relief. it’s no longer embarrassing to say I’m from the US, though I echo Victoria’s sentiment. There’s 4 years of hope ahead, Victoria!

  9. Hope. Lovely word. Lovely sentiment. It’s burgeoning, that’s for sure, in a giddy way. Finally a president who can put a full sentence together! and without making us cringe when he finally does!

    “The border relations between Canada and Mexico have never been better.”
    – George W. Bush

  10. I buried some Egyptian walking onion starter bulbs amid my usual short day onions and a few experimental onions this weekend. I’m all excited about wondering when and in which direction they’ll start walking. My experimental bulbs may be too day neutral to bulb way south here, but hopefully the walking onions will walk regardless of the day length.

  11. I’m so jazzed to hear about 75,000 words of gardening goodness but more importantly hope that you will take a much-deserved break and go somewhere fabulous. We’ll all be here when you get back xo

  12. To all of you who are “embarrassed” to call your selves an American- a lot of mistakes have been made these last years, however, your President has managed to keep you safe and he deserves credit for that. My husband is a career veteren and you have no idea the sacrifices he (and we as a family )has made to protect your freedoms. The other countries who have enjoyed security under our watch have contributed also but it cannot be denied that they have been happy to rest peacefully under our cloaks. So only time will tell how this era will be judged for who knows? Perhaps looking back our President will be credited with being the catalyst for bringing peace to parts of the world who are more that happy to destroy themselves. I believe in America and the spirit of her people-

  13. Believing in America is not the same as believing in what the president has done in her name. Not speaking out against what he’s done if you disagree is unamerican. Our forefathers fought and died so we can exercize this liberty. My father is a veteran of both the gulf war and the present “war on terror” and I am still very willing and able to speak out against the atrocities comitted, and so is he.

  14. This will get any gardener’s hackles up. Not the product (I just received the seeds in the mail. I dont know how good the tomatos actually are). I’m talking about the law part, where, “saving seeds was made illegal under the ‘Colonial Powers’ of the United States. Under the new law, Iraqi farmers must only plant seeds from ‘protected varieties’ from international corporations.” (http://rareseeds.com/seeds/Tomatoes-Red/Rouge-D-Irak) How about that for solving terrorism? I guess by planting Rouge d’Irak tomatoes in my garden, I’m planting miniterrorists.

  15. Victoria: Thanks for the link. In the last while there have been a bunch of instances of countries banning seed saving or corporations suing… A reminder of how important it is to support seed saving organizations and save seeds ourselves!

  16. I just don’t see how banning seed saving in Iraq will prevent terrorism. It seems to me that allowing farmers to plant their own seeds would be a good way to get in the farmers graces. Forcing them to plant seeds from interntl corporations seems to me a moneymaking sceme aimed at squeezing all the money we can out of the people of Iraq, and not even the people who have any money to be squeezed. At least one tomato variety is being saved. I’m still looking for other varieties to plant, in spite of the terrorists it’ll surely attract to my little garden.

  17. Another link for the seed saving horror stories– Monsanto Terminator technology! It would render saved seed sterile. (http://www.geocrisis.com/monsanto_terminator_technology.htm) Many other countries too poor for their farmers to buy new seed every year have abolished the technology already. Why haven’t we? How will new strains of flowers and melons and tomatoes be made if we never know what seeds will be sterile and not? It sounds like a bad scifi movie, with the corporation controlling what seeds we can grow every year. It’s enough to make me want to reconsider my major, were it not so much fun.

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