#and then there’s just the inevitable conflict as their relationship constantly grows more tense and unstable

[silverspadesss]

idk if any of my d20 followers also watch arcane but deli and colin are becoming sooooo jayce and viktor coded

[mrmichaelchadler]

"You Were Expecting Someone Else?" Why a Non-White James Bond is the Franchise's Logical Next Step

On the heels of false rumors that Idris Elba was next in line to inherit James Bond's license to kill, arguments for the inclusive casting of the character and against a non-white actor playing Bond have landed like thunderballs. This makes sense. For going on 60 years, audiences have only ever seen Bond as white. Now it finally appears that, per director Antoine Fuqua, producer Barbara Broccoli has concurred that “it’s time” for a non-white Bond. A non-white Bond appears an easy choice in 2018, when a culture once dominated by straight white men has started making room for once-marginalized voices. Casting a Bond of color would indeed change the franchise. 

And if you look at how Bond and the franchise have evolved over the last two decades, you'll see that this wouldn't be an arbitrary change, but an evolutionary one. You could even say that it's what the Bond series has been building towards, as it strove to infuse stories with political details drawn from recent headlines while making Bond seem like even more of an outsider than he did already.

We should begin by enthusiastically stating that, in the character's earliest incarnations—on the page as well as in the first few decades of films—it made a world of sense for Bond to be white. Although reflexive resistance to casting Elba, or any non-white performer, tends to be rooted in racism, it's not accurate to say that it doesn't matter whether Bond is white. Bond’s race is indeed a part of the character, and a key bit of context necessary for understanding how he functions. As opposed to Bond’s race being a neutral character—or Bond’s actions not being motivated by race, as Matt Miller asserts—it seems fairer to say that Bond’s whiteness was inevitable, considering the era and culture that birthed him. 

Bond debuted in Casino Royale, published in 1954 by former British Naval Officer Ian Fleming. Fleming's politics were written into the books: rather than appearing as apolitical, Bond explicitly works for Her Majesty’s Secret Service, and is born out of Cold War paranoia. His enemies and allies often are associated with the respective international relationships that the United Kingdom had with such countries as the United States, Russia (formerly the USSR), China, Japan and Germany. First played onscreen by Sean Connery in 1962's  "Dr. No," Bond is not just an action hero with good taste in cars and shoes. He is an arm of of state politics and an emblem of midcentury British imperialism. 

"You Only Live Twice"

Once you realize that Bond’s actions are never apolitical, you start to understand how deliberate the political subtext (or super text) in these films can be. 

International tensions and cultural stereotypes and resentments are all over the series from the start. They grow harder to ignore in later films. And they're largely shaped by the point-of-view of the Hollywood-adjacent British film industry which, like the British government, is run by white men, and has been slow to cede ground to other points-of-view. 

Bond appears in yellowface for nearly a third of the running time of "You Only Live Twice," and the tense relationship the UK and Japan is discussed in dialogue. When Bond strolls into a hotel room sopping wet in "Die Another Day," the Chinese manager declares decisively, “Hong Kong is our turf now, Bond,” just before he goes to face the film's bad guy, a North Korean dictator's son who has had cosmetic and DNA surgery to become white. In "From Russia with Love," Bond … well, you get the picture. The appeal to the Bond movies implicitly is its geopolitics, even when it’s we're simply reading it as "Bond fights the Russians," and even then, Bond represents certain ideas. (SPECTRE, the recurring terrorist organization that Bond battles against across multiple titles, is fascinating because they are bound not only by ideology, but by the awareness of fraught international relationships: see "You Only Live Twice.") 

But Broccoli is right to say its time for a different kind of Bond. Every entry in the series has, to varying degrees, had to justify the necessity of existing, but that urge became more overt as the distance between Bond and the Cold War turned into a chasm. The Pierce Brosnan films, which kicked off with 1995's "Goldeneye," were already referencing the Cold War in faintly nostalgic terms, as a conflict that was at least more clearly defined than the chaos the character had to deal with after the USSR broke apart. The context of Bond had to change again for 2006’s reboot/origin story "Casino Royale." The shadow of September 11th and the international War on Terror hung over the character, who was now angsty, angry, gritty, and world-weary. Daniel Craig became an emblem of post-9/11 trauma and frustration, even ambivalence. 

The Craig films (consisting of "Casino Royale," "Quantum of Solace," Skyfall," and "Spectre") do what the rest of the franchise don't do: they constantly interrogate Bond’s relevance to the world. Craig's version of Bond is shaped by the brokenness of the society and politics around him. His struggle to “become Bond” in a definite, easily communicable way, as Sean Connery or Roger Moore did so easily, is indicative of how stunted and fractured the world has become. He’s worse at his job (he barely succeeds at missions anymore), and his relationship with his license to kill has soured. His masculinity is starting to bend. Maybe he’s starting to realize the world doesn’t need him anymore. 

In "Spectre," Bond returns to the exotic locales the movies were once iconic for, and encounters little else but rubble and ruin: the result of British Imperialism and colonialism. The film begins somewhat pretentious (in a delightful way): “The dead are alive,” it tells us. Does that makes 007 the ghost of the British Empire? What does Bond even mean in the 21st century? We already know he's a relic of the Cold War—and as M [Judi Dench] calls him in "GoldenEye," “a sexist, misogynist dinosaur”—and he knows it. So now what?

Such questions are central to the Craig films. The answer so far has been implicitly argue that Bond doesn’t need to exist in a world where warfare and espionage are no longer on-the-ground affairs—a curious example of a wildly popular franchise arguing against its own existence. 

All of which brings us to the first reason that a non-white Bond would be not just fresh, but sensible and necessary: casting Bond as non-white would make the franchise's politics a lot more sophisticated and challenging, without contradicting anything that it has shown us in the past. 

The Bond franchise has, over the course of its run, turned increasingly inwards; in its last decade or so, it’s been hard to argue that Craig’s cycle of films demonstrated unwavering support of the British government and its implicit heroism, crimes, and misdemeanors.  "Quantum of Solace" showed us that Bond, often a stand-in for British imperial powers, could rampage. "Skyfall" and "Spectre'"s pair of Shakespearean monologues from M (Dench) and Blofeld (Christoph Waltz) confirmed that if the Empire hasn’t already fallen, the series is critical of its nihilistic need to keep going no matter what. 

A non-white Bond would push international audiences to realize that the world view and behavior represented in Bond moves aren't just a white thing. White people are no longer sole arbiters of colonialist attitudes or actions, on the ground or otherwise. 

In that sense, a non-white actor playing Bond would not so much be a subversion of Bond’s politics, but an admittance that those politics are bound to statehood and institution, not always just to race. 

"Quantum of Solace"

However, it would not be sufficient to cast an actor of color as Bond and not change anything else about the movies. 

A non-white Bond would not be a one-dimensional representational win if the franchise continues to make only minor tweaks. A white Bond doesn't demand that we reconsider the politics of the entire franchise. Pretty much any other race or ethnicity would compel it. 

Imagine an Asian Bond after having witnessed the character’s (and Britain’s) relationship with Asian countries in such films as "You Only Live Twice," "Man with the Golden Gun," "Tomorrow Never Dies" and "Die Another Day." A black Bond would make us to think about Britain’s slave territories, represented onscreen in "Live and Let Die," essentially a blaxploitation movie with a black villain and a white hero. What thoughts would be inspired by an Indian Bond, considering the colonial history so glancingly referenced in "Octopussy"?

More to the point, Bond is, in effect, a very handsome supercop. “You are just a stupid policeman,” Dr. No derisively says to him. He has, as Patti LaBelle is want to sing, a license to kill. And while he’s more inclined to work with other government agencies, local and state police are technically his allies. “As lawless as his actions may appear to be, underneath it all Bond really believes in Goodness and Order and Freedom and Democracy and, yes, even Law. Scratch the tuxedo and and you’ll find a police uniform,” writes scholar Greg Forster. 

Considering white-dominated police forces' typically unstable relationship with nonwhites, a black Bond would complicate our racialized understanding of Bond and law rather drastically. As recent films like "Crime + Punishment" are exploring the complicated racial dynamics at play for black police officers, it would be irresponsible for the Bond series to not confront a nonwhite Bond's feelings about being a part of an institution that routinely exercise force against people who look like him. 

None of this should be daunting to the people who hold the keys to the Bond franchise. They should see this moment as an opportunity, in between car chases, gunfights and seductions, to explore new dramatic as well as political territory, and even tackle questions of race and institutional power.

That institution is England. 

"The Spy Who Loved Me"

Bond is so representative of Great Britain and all that she stands for that the series that its self-awareness began to mushroom as early as 1973, when Roger Moore slipped into Bond’s shoes in "Live and Let Die." Only a couple films later, he would he ski jump off a mountain and reveal that his parachute was the Union Jack in "The Spy Who Loved Me" (1977). That was a statement, joking yet serious, that Bond was the UK. 

Politically, the history of the UK is a history of whiteness.

What would it feel like to drop someone like Elba or "Attack the Block"'s John Boyega into Bond’s suit in, say, "The Living Daylights," which takes place in Afghanistan? Could he make jokes about sex and England, about other national cuisines or customs like in "Octopussy"? Would that feel natural, or would there be something off and unusual about shoehorning in a black Bond without somehow addressing those racial implications? 

And what about "GoldenEye," and the line “For England, James?” Alec Trevelyan (Sean Bean) asks that question of Bond, bookending the film, wondering if they still believe in what they’re doing. The answer is different both times. At the end, Bond is allowed to be a little skeptical. Could Boyega be skeptical of England’s ultimate goal, the implication that their version of goodness and lawfulness should be the standard for the rest of the developed world? Would we laugh at the very idea of a black Bond agreeing with the sentiments of a character like Alec Trevelyan? In "Casino Royale," M remarks to Bond, “Any thug can kill.” Could an actor like Daniel Kaluuya shrug off that kind of casual designation of the hierarchy of killing? Or would the moment be more pointed, barbed? Could Idris Elba unquestioningly wear a Union Jack that’s shot out of one of his gadgets, or would doubt begin to inform his character? 

Whiteness is also what allowed Bond to come and go from the institution that employs him. Bond has left MI6 or has gone rogue a number of times over the decades, only to be welcomed back. Only someone who was white who could be part of a white dominated institution, doubt it, leave it, and return without much fuss. 

Of all the iterations of the Bond franchise, it's Craig’s films that pave the way for a non-white bond. They have a different understanding of Bond altogether, beyond a broad “grittiness.” Daniel Craig's Bond is alienated. 

"Casino Royale"

Jokes can be made about the one dimensionality of Bond’s character throughout most of the series, but "GoldenEye" nodded to unlocking his psychology and how he felt about the destruction he’s left in his wake. Trevelyan sneers, “I might as well ask you for the vodka martinis that have silenced the screams of all the men you've killed ... or if you find forgiveness in the arms of all those willing women, for all the dead ones you failed to protect.” The Craig Bond films go further, suggesting that you have to be a bit dead inside in the first place to work for an institution like Bond's employer. In "Casino Royale," Vesper Lynd (Eva Green) asks, “You can switch off so easily, can't you? It doesn't bother you? Killing those people?” Bond retorts, “Well, I wouldn’t be very good at my job if it did.” There is unsureness on his face  after he says this. Through Craig, we understand how Bond became a shell. 

If the Craig films are implicitly arguing that Bond has not, as we have assumed, been able to assimilate into the role of a Double-O agent, working for Her Majesty’s Secret Service, what if that extended into a metaphor about how people of color struggle with assimilation on a broader level? 

A non-white Bond could be portrayed as someone who's wearing a white mask in order to survive. That's an intriguing and potentially powerful step beyond the already considerable alienation that Craig brought to the part. 

The most wonderful thing about the Bond franchise is its malleability. The character has been played by many actors. The films constantly morph to fit within whatever genre or style is popular at the moment. And has become increasingly intricate as a character. 

It would be a level up for Bond to confront what it actually means to be Other, not just alienated or ambivalent. 

A non-white Bond could articulate a struggle to assimilate into a broader national or governmental politic, and better establish the push and pull of the character's own agency, and his often unknowing role as a pawn. The unsureness that Bond already exudes, via Craig, would be grounded in psychological and concrete reality. Subtext would become text, but in an electrifying way. A nonwhite actor would make a lot of things official, and turn Bond into something besides a spectre of the past.

from All Content https://ift.tt/AQty5c

[graceivers]

Review #30 - Too Far series

Fallen Too Far & Never Too Far & Forever Too Far Author: Abbi Glines Genre: Contemporary Romance, Pregnancy & Babies Rating: ★★★½ Recommendation: not worth it; once was enough Summary: After the recent loss of her mother, Blaire Wynn turns to her estranged father for help. Her father actually sends her to Rush Finlay, her stepbrother. Though their relationship starts off tense and scarce, they quickly come together and desperately try to cling onto each other while navigating all the family secrets and drama set in their lives.

Female Lead: Blaire is… strong for her age. She has had to deal with a lot before the series even starts—the death of her identical twin sister, her parents’ divorce and her father subsequently deserting them, and then her mother’s cancer and death. So, yes, Blaire is strong having to grow up with not much and taking on such responsibility as a nineteen year old. Keep that in mind. She’s NINETEEN. When Blaire gets sent to Rush, she is very aware and knows her place and knows to be grateful. She had priorities, and I liked that about her. She realized that even with her lack of education, she couldn’t mooch off of Rush forever and be like other people she knew who did that. She wanted to make money, get a job, find a place to live herself. She wouldn’t even eat Rush’s food for a while, for goodness sake. She’s learned to be self-sufficient, independent; she knows that the only person she can really count on now is herself.

Now, let’s get back to the fact that she’s NINETEEN. Despite all the nice things I said about her character in the above paragraph, Blaire absolutely still acts like the teenager she is because yes, nineteen-year-olds are in fact technically teenagers even though they’re considered legal adults. Blaire is a nineteen-year-old girl who makes mistakes that a nineteen-year-old girl would make. Normally, I have no problem with this because it appears to be consistent, right? Except, my analysis and conclusion after dissecting Glines writing is that the author likely wanted Blaire to come across more like an adult than her actual age. This is where things go wrong. If Glines wants me to believe Blaire is truly independent and mature, then she shouldn’t have written this girl as a pushover. Can I accept that Glines perhaps wanted to show to different sides of Blaire to demonstrate a three-dimensional character? Sure, maybe, fine. Did it sit well with me? No. Which is unfortunate because there were times I loved Blaire—for being strong and independent, for standing up for herself, for having priorities, for being realistic as to her background and what her future entailed—there were also times I was annoyed with her for being a pushover. It is absolutely a good quality of the character to be compassionate and put others before her and showed some grace and bravery in the face of adversity. But when Blaire was referenced and shown to have a backbone, I needed to see that backbone more. She so easily defended Della in the third book, and yet she basically always let Nan walk all over her with the latter’s nastiness. Doesn’t quite make sense to me. Male Lead: Rush Finlay needs to take his words and promises seriously and NEEDS TO SORT OUT HIS PRIORITIES. Good grief, what was wrong with this dude. He was referenced to be twenty-four and had gone to college, but boy, he sure acted like he was nineteen like Blaire. For all that was said about him having to grow up quickly and basically become the parent to Nan, I didn’t really see much of that maturity in him. Once Rush is with Blaire, he constantly says that he will always be there for her and that he will put her first, but he honestly doesn’t. And while some of his competing priorities really did put him in a bind, I could not turn a blind eye to all his broken promises. And again, with that, Rush really needed to figure out what and who should be prioritized. When it was so clear that his life and future was with Blaire, he found a way to neglect her in every book despite his adamant promises that no one else came before her. Dude, seriously. Get your head on straight and figure out who’s worth it and who’s not.

And this is just a personal thing, but the tongue piercing? No, thanks. I mean, I got it, Glines. Rush has piercings; Blaire likes it. I did not need the obsessive descriptions of his tongue piercing during every sex scene. But that’s just my preference. Plot & Writing: Let’s start out with some reading logistics. The Too Far series is the first four books of the Rosemary Beach series. All four books are about the relationship between Rush and Blaire. The fourth and last book, Rush Too Far, is I believe more or less a retelling of Fallen Too Far in Rush’s point of view given that the latter, the first book of the series, was solely in Blaire’s perspective. I did not read Rush Too Far; I might skim it later, but I don’t think anything in there will change my mind about my thoughts and conclusions of this series.

The second thing worth mentioning is the fact that the summary of the series and at least Fallen Too Far states that Rush and Blaire are step-siblings. Normally, I would then categorize this as a forbidden romance because some people might feel icky about that connection between the two characters when they’re going to be involved romantically. I, however, did not classify the series as such for two reasons. One, Glines rarely brings up that link between Rush and Blaire. They didn’t know each other until they met in the beginning of the first book. They did not grow up together and thus were not treated as siblings. And the second reason is that somewhere in Glines writing was I believe the fact that Blaire’s father and and Rush’s mother became separated or got divorced. It is unclear to me but given that we see Blaire’s father in the third book unattached to Rush’s mother indicates to me that they’re not together, which means that Rush and Blaire aren’t step-siblings anymore. Think of it as Josh and Cher from Clueless, will you? No blood relation. Not that icky overall.

Now, let’s talk about the actual writing. To sum it up, Glines needs to get a new editor pronto. For God’s sake, there were so many weird technical things about Glines’ writing that took away from the  overall story. COMMAS ARE YOU FRIEND. Use them wisely, prudently; USE THEM AND USE THEM WELL. And I’m pretty sure I saw some weird punctuation and dialogue errors that bothered me. I know you’re self-published; that shouldn’t excuse you from good editing. As well, the little inserts of Grant’s and Harlow’s perspectives in Forever Too Far to set the stage for the next part of the Rosemary Beach series that would feature them too? Totally unnecessary! Grant and Harlow have their fair share of time showing up in the Too Far series; I don’t need their sides to be invested in reading their books. And the fact that Glines inserted like a little author’s note type thing when she introduced Grant’s and Harlow’s POVs? This is not amateur fanfiction, Glines. You’re publishing this. You’re expecting people to buy these books. Be professional, yeah? Take out those sections and you eliminate this problem entirely.

And now we move onto the actual plot. Too sum this up? Too much drama may lead to inconsistencies. First of all, I personally didn’t even get the major conflict that was revealed at the end of the first book. Or at least, I just didn’t understand why it was so earth-shattering and devastating. Yes, I understand that people are tarnishing Blaire’s mother’s reputation and that Blaire shockingly found out that she’s supposedly related to Nan who is basically her number one enemy. But… I thought she overreacted? Like a lot? And yes, sure, it’s devastating that Rush knew this and BASICALLY THE ENTIRE TOWN SEEMED TO KNOW ABOUT THIS SECRET and kept it from her, but I really don’t get why she was so devastated. My mind was prepared for something epic to be revealed, but all I got was that Blaire’s dad neglected Rush and Nan’s mother and Nan as a child in favor of Blaire’s mother. Uh… I don’t know. Wasn’t that earth-shattering to me…

But then! In Never Too Far, all that supposedly shocking stuff revealed in the first book just kind of gets wiped out! Seriously. Glines basically rewrites her drama like this is a soap opera retconning bad storylines. Well, this whole series is like one bad teen soap anyway. So, spoiler alert, Nan is not Blaire’s father’s child; Nan is not half-siblings with Blaire like we were led to believe. Ugh. This decision was not a good one by Glines because it doesn’t make anyone look good and basically erases all the reactions and emotions conjured up by the original decision. I was disappointed. No, this second revelation by Blaire’s father did not change my mind about how I felt about all the characters involved, but I still thought it was a poor decision to make. Here, the writing felt inconsistent to me because instead of believing in one version of the story, I was distrusting of Glines and the writing as I inevitably waited for another major secret to reveal itself and change the facts that were previously established. That’s not really a way to keep readers hooked, if you ask me.

You know what else I had a problem with? Rush and Blaire seemed to have no ambition. Yes, fine, Rush is really rich. He kind of alludes to what else he does when it’s not summer, but I mean, is it an actual job? Does he have a job title? Does he just waste away and throw parties and do whatever he wants whenever he wants because he got a lot of money from ‘playing numbers’? And then Blaire. Yeah, she came from a kind of poor background and didn’t immediately have the opportunity for more schooling, but she seemed kind of aimless too. I mean, she had her priorities and was adamant about keeping a job, and yet once she and Rush were officially together, she seemed pretty content about… not doing anything. She said she didn’t want to mooch off of Rush. Honestly? That’s kind of what she’s doing…

And because this is me, I must mention the unsafe sex Rush and Blaire had, which subsequently led to Blaire’s pregnancy. I almost said teenage pregnancy, but I don’t know if Blaire turned twenty or not when she had the baby. Either way, she was still nineteen when she got pregnant! I mean, the first time they had sex, a condom was used, and I was so proud. But then there was no condom used and the pull-out method was mentioned. I hysterically cackle and curse every time the pull-out method is mentioned or used in books. And honestly, I’m still trying to understand why Glines decided to make Blaire pregnant. What purpose did it serve? Rush seemed to clearly want to be with Blaire regardless, so I honestly am not sure what the use of having Blaire pregnant was for the overall story. Let me also mention the fact that Glines kind of ghosted over actually writing when Blaire found out she was pregnant. There was the whole buying the pregnancy test thing, and then suddenly the girl is referencing her pregnancy and baby. I was like, whoa! Where was the part where she actually took the pregnancy test and found this information out? Is she actually pregnant because Glines never specifically stated! But alas, Blaire was indeed pregnant…

Finally, Rush and Blaire as a couple. Was it instalove? Yes. Did I believe in it? Kind of. Enough to give it a pass. Rush and his declarations of love were kind of cheesy to me, actually. I was digging his standoffish and yet possessive behavior in the first book, but then the stuff he said in the second and third books to Blaire about how much he loved her and would always put her first (when he didn’t!) was kind of corny. I did more or less buy the fact that both loved each other and couldn’t be without each other because it was nicely aided with a healthy dose of angst, which I admit to enjoying. So, yeah, I was sucked in to their relationship. Enough that I read all three books in the series despite all the other issues I had with the writing and story. Secondary Characters & Plots: Nan is the worst. THE WORST. The end.

No, but actually, I did rather enjoy most all of the secondary characters. Not any of the parents who were horrible people that didn’t understand what parenting and responsibility meant (save for Blaire’s mom), but the group of friends between Rush and Blaire, most of them were pretty cool. I didn’t think I would like Bethy, but she came around and was a great friend to Blaire. And I loved Jimmy too.

I did like Grant, Rush’s ex-stepbrother, up until the point in the third book where it was revealed that he had been sleeping with Nan and thought he could fall in love with her. I’m sorry, what?! I also was extremely grossed out when I read that because I originally thought Grant shared the same mother as Rush and Nan, and that would’ve made him and Nan blood siblings. Alas, worry not. I went back to reread and figure out that Grant was Rush and Nan’s stepbrother when his dad and their mom were married. I admit to my mistake. But still, I was disappointed that he would even go there, and that kind of ruined his character for me.

Woods Kerrington! I didn’t really like him in the beginning based off of first impressions of him, but Woods quickly became my favorite friend of the group. Seriously, he took care of Blaire when Rush was too busy trying to appease Nan and didn’t know that Blaire was pregnant. I mean, Woods took Blaire to her OB appointment! As a male friend! You don’t get any better than that. And he was basically the only one out of all the guys that actually worked and had a job and wanted a job and a career! Good for you, buddy! I skimmed all the summaries for the rest of the Rosemary Beach books, and I can tell you now that I am only going to read Woo Favorite Part(s): The scene in Fallen Too Far when Rush learns that all Blaire has been eating while staying in his house is the peanut butter sandwiches she makes from her own money. And in a very controlled way, he goes ballistic. At that point, it was clear to me that Rush was affected by Blaire and that he cared about her a lot and in more than just a sexual way. That was the alpha male side of Rush that I enjoyed. He always wanted to feed her after that! I not so secretly loved those moments. Final Thoughts: So, three and a half stars for a series I admittedly had some heavy criticism for and recommended as not worth it. Doesn’t make sense? Here’s why. Do I honestly believe after everything I said that this series is worth reading? No. See the entire plot and writing section for evidence why. Then why did I give this series three and a half stars? The angst. I said before, I’m a sucker for angst, and for all the cheesy stuff that Rush did say, I was personally kind of hooked to all his desperate moments when trying to win back Blaire and keep her. Yep. The sole reason this series gets three and a half stars is angst. In all honesty, if Glines cleaned up the series a lot and eliminated some poor drama choices, this would’ve gotten a higher rating. But unless a rewrite happens, the Too Far series is probably not worth your time (unless you’re really bored and want to check out the angst).

[birdseyetea]

March Newsletter

AWAKENING!

By the looks of the day outside my window, it is hard for me to believe it is almost mid March. Last week it was snowing, and no significant breaks in the rain expected this week. I heard lots of frustrated rumblings from other farmers at the farmers markets recently. The growing season is definitely off to a slow start. I have hundreds of flats in my greenhouse and almost nothing has germinated...YET. Chamomile is a champ and is the first to germinate in my cold greenhouse. My greenhouse is unheated, so the grey skies and cold weather is holding a lot of seeds dormant. I bought some heat pads that I will utilize to force germinate seeds this week. Each growing season has a full spectrum of unpredictabilities that have to be tended to with grace and patience. Discipline is my number one ally...oh, and my ability to try to see the silver lining in almost any situation.

Spring Equinox is March 20th. At which point we are officially half way from the shortest to the longest day of the year. Huge changes take place between spring equinox and summer solstice. The entire natural world seems to beautifully renew right before our eyes. Each day new birds, insects, plants enter our field of awareness as they reemerge to converse with the world around them. Our bodies change as well. We have more access to fresh nutritious foods which renew the body, our energy increases as daylight and the sun return, and we naturally become more extroverted.

Above: rhubarb reemerging (left) and the naturalized Rosa rugosa leafing out (right)

Spring is a profoundly sensual season. Our minds awaken to the drama that unfolds outside. New sensations catalyze into fresh perspectives, creative inspiration, and put us on the path toward shedding anxieties and fears along with our wool sweaters and thermal under ware.

Just be aware that March and April can also be a highly volatile time for humans and their emotions. The weather is so unpredictable. Wind thrusts clouds across the sky at dizzying shapes and speeds, and moments of hot piercing sun are sandwiched between squalling sheets of rain drained from nearly charcoal colored cumulonimbus monstrosities. The constant flux between hot and cold, light and dark, gusty and still overwhelm our slowly awakening senses and we can become spectacularly emotional.

Notice if you feel as though the spring winds have invaded your body and stirred up your internal wind. Some symptoms of internal wind are tension, stiffness, spasms, pics, clumsiness, headaches, allergies, and shifting pain. When we start to feel the aforementioned symptoms the liver becomes congested (more about this next month) resulting in anger, frustration, irritability, stiff upper body, hypertension, depression, mood swings, and menstrual irregularity.

It is easy to simply become an expression of the weather because it literally feels like it is invading our internal body space. 

I love and embrace the spring, despite it’s inevitable moments of wild turgidity. Spring helps flush out the cobwebs of our inner life, reminding us what is real and what is not. It beckons us to pay attention and hones our senses so we can attune to the world around us. Early Spring can be a treacherous time for relationships. It is easy to place blame when we find ourselves in volatile emotional states. Frustration, tension, and anger can easily arise and if reacted to can cause major communication mishaps.

If you find yourself more tense than normal this spring, just pay attention to it and notice if it just a natural reaction to the changing season. I experience really confusing emotions this time of year as my body is acclimating to the dramatic changes each day during spring. I am excited for the growing season, take on a larger workload, and have to constantly negotiate my farm schedule and plan based on weather. I have the urge to strongly react to minor inconveniences and get all frustrated by silly miscommunications this time of year. I have been monitoring my spring moods for a long time so I have a pretty clear understanding of my pattern, but that does not keep me above the fray all the time. Just yesterday I was about ready to throw in the towel half a dozen times, my pendulating emotions also bring forth pride and joy, because the frustrations inspire creativity and the impulse to overcome obstacles. Conflict resolution is very important to me, this time of year I have to practice it diligently.

Our bodies are highly attuned to seasonal shifts. We spend a lot of our lives clinging to the idea of consistency and ignoring some of the most basic sensations that are affecting our thoughts and emotions. Our lives are shaped around narratives regarding consistency. We build structures and social systems that force us into an idea or pattern of consistency, which does not honor the daily changes that take place in our bodies or in the natural world around us. Winter is a season where consistency is easier to manage, but after the relatively consistent patterns of winter, spring shows up and gives us an energetic jolt. Our nervous systems are jarred by the overwhelming experience of waking up and experiencing so many forms of change in one single day. Nature is being transformed rapidly starting in March and so are we, we are not above the laws of nature, we are right there deeply imbedded in the lush atmosphere of growth and renewal in spring. 

The sensations that are arising from within you mimic the rollercoaster of this particular part of the season. It is a tough beat when, instead of finding curiosity and joy in unpredictability, we get caught in the blame game and project our fluctuating emotions onto people or things that we know we can get a reaction from. Just remember that within you is the clarity and emotional awareness to be fully present and accepting of yourself and carry within you total kindness toward what you are going through. Use the excitement and stress of spring to build good natured humor, physical strength, tolerance, and acceptance.  

Do not let early spring overwhelm you, just let it be what it is and enjoy the marvel of being alive to witness it. 

Spring is a time to cleanse the body and shake off excesses and sluggishness. Physical activity, healthy diet, and herbal teas are your best allies for this. Your body might not be as agile as you think when you start increasing your physical activity. I have been injured twice already this growing season because I overestimated my body’s fitness. During early spring make sure you warm up your muscles and stretch before heading out to do yard work or exercise. Eating lots of leafy greens such as nettles, kale, chard, and mustards cleanse the blood and liver. *Adding lemon juice to your spring greens helps increase absorption of iron. If you have sluggish digestion cook your greens before you eat them and try adding some garlic and slightly bitter greens to the mix. Eating lots of cooked vegetables and non-red meats also encourages liver health. Over the next few months I will be creating teas that support spring imbalances. The three teas this month are designed for early spring clearing and renewal.

Let the Light In

Ingredients: nettle, coriander, hawthorn, cinnamon, fennel, orange zest, bay leaf

Let the Light In tea is a nutrient rich blend for circulation, cellular renewal, and digestion. This comforting blend is perfect for March. It is a little warming, digestive, and gives your body extra nourishment to rebuild tissues as we become metabolically more active in spring. As winter opens to spring we find ourselves desperate to get outside and enjoy the outdoors. During the active parts of the year we simply need more nutrient dense foods and teas. Nettles are the first dark leafy green to come up in spring where I live so I immediately gravitate toward it as a food and herbal supplement. Nettles are a powerhouse of minerals to help renew tissues. Nettles pretty much supports the whole body. Nettles also help clear liver and kidney congestion which is often a symptom poor diet and sedentary lifestyle. Hawthorn is a great cardiovascular support herb. Hawthorn is a heart tonic. It’s main ability is to improve coronary circulation. Coriander, cinnamon, fennel, orange zest, and bay leaf are culinary herbs that support digestion, immunity, and circulation. Cinnamon specifically can lower cholesterol and blood sugar so for folks who routinely get very “hangry” should be aware that drinking tea with lots of cinnamon on an empty stomach might make the hangry human hangrier. 

Traveler Tea

Ingredients: assam tea, sage, winter savory, rosemary, thyme, cinnamon, & licorice 

Traveler Tea is a bit of a savory blend. It combines digestive and antimicrobial herbs and black tea. I have been making a version of this tea for a few years now and each time I make it I find it more interesting and comforting. It was inspired by research on nomadic groups and lifestyles. My friends and I contemplate how to live a nomadic lifestyle in Oregon and Washington and we have spent a lot of time researching modern nomads. During my studies I learned about the Bedouins in North Africa and parts of the Middle East. The social tea they drink is usually just a combination of locally foraged desert plants. Wild thyme and relatives of sage are common ingredients in Bedouin tea. This tea is very loosely inspired by Bedouin tribes. Most of the herbs in this blend are common culinary herbs that grow easily in the pacific Northwest. 

Traveler tea is a wonderful blend for people in flux. Whether you are traveling to work or long distance via plane, car, or animal, or foot this blends provides energy and protects the immune system. The blend is a little drying and great for people who are cold and damp. Spring often brings on colds that are wet in nature with lots of mucus and damp congestion. Traveler tea helps dry up excessive mucus in the mouth, throat, and lungs. Thyme, savory, and sage in the tea also helps relieve digestive upset that is associated with stress and poor diet.

Rebuild Tea

Ingredients: nettle, skullcap, eleuthro, ashwagandha, mint, dandelion root, gotu kola, and licorice root. 

Rebuild is a fabulous tea for an engaged and active lifestyle. It has been indispensable for me during spring and summer for the last six years. This blend rejuvenates the body in times of increased physical activity or physical stress. 

Eleuthro and ashwagandha are adaptogen herbs helping the body adapt to stress. Eleuthro specifically is great for athletes. It helps muscles and nerve tissue recover quickly from physical stress. Ashwagandha is to Ayurveda what ginseng is to Traditional Chinese Medicine. It has a strong rejuvenative quality that aids bodies that have become debilitated by stress, nervous exhaustion, or inactivity. But where ginseng is stimulating, ashwagandha is calming. Studies have shown that ashwagandha benefits individuals with chronic anxiety and insomnia. Dandelion root supports the liver and gallbladder, specifically inflammation and congestion of the liver and gallbladder. Gotu kola is used in the Ayurvedic tradition for a mental boost and has been extensively researched for it’s aid in mental acuity and memory. Mints are included in this blend for their nutritive properties and to balance the flavor of this blend. Nettles are practically a superfood, they provide a storehouse of micronutrients essential to healthy tissue maintenance. Licorice is also adaptogen and adds a touch of sweetness to the blend.