Viva Rhino!

Yes, OF COURSE that was Rhino in the beach shot at Salt Pond Bay. Rhino is a cheap date, requiring no airline seat of his own. Therefore he goes on all family trips.
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He doesn’t need many snacks on the road, but he does insist on stopping at every scenic overlook.

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He loves swimming almost as much as William.

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AND he is a natural at snorkelling.

More Old Friends

Our walks to the beach were a time for me to

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dawdle behind the group visiting with Flower friends. I have no idea how others travel through the world but for me, everywhere I go I am so happy to see Flowers I love. When in St John I get to visit with Flowers I don’t see very often. The visits are so sweet because of their rarity.

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Though were I to live in St John, these visits would be a daily occurence. So many Flowers are like Dandelions in New Hampshire. Momordica charantia, on our line up with its nickname Maiden Apple is one that grows on wastegrounds everywhere. This makes her no less special. As a traditional herbal, Momordica has a lot of nicknames including jumbie pumpkin. I was delighted to get a picture of this jumbie pumpkin for you as well as an overdue picture of its Flower, so reminiscent of northern squash blossoms.

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I had been warned last trip about these vivid red seeds. Everyone had a different story about whether the squash was edible or not. I like how Flower Essences bypass the issues of toxicity by simply not being about the chemical components of the plant. I can look at these fruits and seeds not to consider whether it would be a deadly snack, but to consider what they tell me about the wisdom of Maiden Apple’s Flower Essence.

These startling red seeds contained within this elegant yellow squash suggest to me Maiden Apple’s wisdom about containing our life force wisely and expressing ourselves clearly. As Maiden Apple says, ” I AM a radical friend but also one that helps you move peacefully, confidently and clearly towards your destiny.”

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Speaking of startling red, I was thrilled to find Wild Red Morning Glory blooming. This was an Essence I made on a trip to St John in 1997 and I had not seen this plant flowering since then. My St John Flora and Fauna remarked that this was a rare plant for St John, found only by the NY Botanical botanist who wrote the book right where I had seen this plant myself, in the upper Maho campground parking lot. This time I found it growing in a different spot, giving rise to a hope that it was expanding its territory. I love how Wild Red Morning Glory is a such an unabashed fiesta of morale support. We certainly still need its affirming gifts about the power and glory of womanhood.

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Ginger Thomas also known as Yellow Elder, Yellow Cedar, Torchwood, and Christmas Hope. This small tree, native of the new world, feels like a wise elder that sits and listens to any sorting out of our troubles and then helps us translate these jumbled thoughts into a settled and wise course of action. Every time I lifted my head to see its blossoms in the branches above my head, I felt cheered on. Elder indeed!

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Coralita! Coralita! How overdue a picture of this gem is. We have long been using this Essence in our mixes including “Watch Your Back” and offering it as an individual Flower Essence for its stunning ability to untangle electrical tangles in the main chakras and generally recharge and revitalize the electrical system of the body. What a sweetheart! What a powerhouse! This Flower reminds me that Love conquers all.

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Bacopa monnieri comes in a variety of shades. Here she is a soft shade of pink.
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Here she is in a deeper shade of magenta. Always Bacopa brings information about finding joy in daily life, unfettered happiness and delight no matter the circumstances.

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Arriving at the beach, there is always gorgeous Seaside Mahoe, offering her gifts of vibrational support for anyone grieving the end of a romantic partnership. There is something so soothing about this Flower, so intensely beautiful as well.

And after my sweet moments with all these Flowers, it was such a tough gig to have to jump back into the water with amphibious William to cool off.
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Visiting with some old Flower Friends

As I work on definitions for the new Flower Essences I brought back from St John this trip, I pause to share photos I took of some of the St John Flower Essences we have offered during the last decade.

Today, I start with those Flower Essences made in the desert like terrain of the eastern coast of St John in the Salt Pond Bay area. Very little rain falls here and the vegetation includes cactus and small scrubby bushes that thrive in the extremes of much heat, much wind, and little moisture.

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Here we begin our hike up Ram’s Head, the eastern most tip of the island,

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moving up through a terrain thick with cactus including Turk’s Cap Cactus.
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You can see the hint of pink that forms the Flowers in the part of the cactus plant at the bottom of the picture.

Turk’s Cap Cactus Essence is all about helping us to unapologetically know our right to be who and where we are. It also supports us to gracefully move on when the circumstances call for change and we know its time to go. The prickles of this beauty underscore this plant’s understanding of boundaries and the right to be. This cactus transplants itself across a landscape away from shade always towards maximum light, reflecting its clarity about moving as necessary, ever clear of its right to be where it wants to be.

At the end of Ram’s Head we looked east and south east with only the island of St Croix between us and Africa.

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One plant thriving in this eco-system is West Indian Sage.

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When I visit with West Indian Sage, I always rub its leaves. Its essential oils create an intense penetrating fragrance. This fragrance, like its Flower Essence, brings us into a vivid experience of SELF experiencing itself more deeply.

All the Sage Essences orient us in time and space, giving us a clearer sense of where we are and who we are. This one, with its tremendously strong presence in an extreme landscape, reminds us how to have a vibrant experience of both self and the inner life of our soul, even amidst an outer life that is extreme, challenging, or distracting. West Indian Sage has an ability to create a “stop all the presses” moment that anchors us to the eternal verity of our souls.

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Coming down off the cliff, we encountered a very old Flower Essence friend.

This orchid, with the cumbersome name of Psychilis macconnelliae, rises dramatically about five feet above the scrubby landscape. It is always such a delight to meet up with this Orchid again.

This Orchid helps us to ground ourselves emotionally and physically when we have been grafted to a new landscape. The Orchid helps us adapt to change. including both vibrational as well as human made changes on earth. Psychilis Macconnelliae recommends itself for finding stability amidst any kind of radical change, be it our movement to a new location or our accomodation of the rapid changes in our world right now. The very fact that it can thrive season after season in a landscape so alien to itself reflects its vibrational wisdom about thriving wherever we find ourselves.
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William and I walked over to another extreme environment, the salt pond at the base of the Ram’s Head. All around William is a mass of Sea Purslane, a Flower with an Essence that supports us to expand our definition and experience of love. This Flower thrives in an environment of flying salt foam and relentless salty winds.

After a visit with Sea Purslane, it was time for
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more swimming!

Hello Again!

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Over the holidays, we left the serious snow and all access to the computer behind….. to camp in one of our favorite places, St. John in the US Virgin Islands.

Among other things, it was a chance to re-aquaint ourselves with lots of beloved plant friends including

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this gorgeous Papaya
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and this Jerusalem Thorn Tree, sporting an iguana in its branches.

The island was in better shape vibrationally than it had been two years ago when we were last there. Because there have been fewer hurricanes, the water was cooler so the coral was healthier. The sea urchin population, so important to reef health, was also on the rebound.
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On land, there were many Flowers blooming that I had not seen before and all the plant life seemed more vibrant.

I was particularly delighted to encounter honeybees everywhere we went. I had never seen honeybees on St. John before. With their gifts of balancing the vibration of land, I give them a lot of the credit for bringing the landscape of St. John back into better balance and harmony.
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Here a honeybee, laden with pollen, heads for the flowers of Sea Plum (chrysobalanus icaco) on St. Francis beach.

Chickens on the beach were also something new, though none of us credit them with anything but an ability to eat our snacks every time we turned our back.

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I made a lot of Flower Essences, both old and new and took pictures of the Flowers in their natural environment. I look forward to sharing these Essences and these pictures with you in blogs to come.

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We’ll dive into all this in the next few weeks!