IN THE MIDST OF DEATH, IN THE MIDST OF LIFE

IN THE MIDST OF DEATH, IN THE MIDST OF LIFE

Hello Ryiad, Rabat, Barbastro, Jerusalem, Teheran, Mega, Rouen, Lisbon and Pawpaw! It is rainy and cool in little Macondo by the Potomac. Roses, irises, oriental poppies, spirea and sweet rocket are blooming, asparagus is ready to harvest and it is time to plant more strawberries. I am about to have a slice of freshly baked corn cheese bread and a cup of espresso. How about you? I am assuming that you also have breakfast, wherever you live and I hope that you have plenty to feed yourself and your family, plus a few extra pennies to blow on books, a box of chocolate, flowers, a bottle of good wine, music, movies, and whatever you like and your religious beliefs permit. Out there, in the big world of realpolitik, things are not so pretty. People are killing each other in Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Darfur, and Sri Lanka, among other places.

I suspect that some of you might think that killing is not such a bad thing. Some of you might believe that you go boom-boom and you fly straight up to where your seventy virgins await you. That is your thing. I confess that I do not understand it. It is not that I am that terribly afraid of dying. I just happen to have seen enough death to gather that it is dadblasted final. Besides, there a few features this side of paradise that I would like to enjoy a little longer.

Being on the sunny side of sixty, I belong to a group whose peers seem to be departing life all too often. Two of mine died within the lat couple of months. A couple of days ago I helped bury a good friend. Actually, some of us who love her scattered her ashes in the confluence of the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers, below Harpers Ferry. It was a sunny afternoon. The sky was as clear as the best aquamarine. Gold flecks shone on the cool river water and and on the hills, the old trees had the achingly beautiful green of new saplings. A gentle breeze turne the surface of the water to a froth of lace. A Pawlonia tree showered us with it royal blue flowers.

After we had scattered ashes and roses into the river, a pair of wild ducks made its leisurely way to the shore. A swallowtail butterfly, old quaint old buildings of the town seemed to huddle together arund gardens where e pink clematis yellow roses bloomed. In the hour long trip home we saw more wildlife than we usually see in a week. Baby turtles sunned themselves on a log on the Potomac. A trio of groundogs played in the grass. Deer watched us from the woods. A great blue heron fed in the shallows. Mourning doves sang in the wheat fields. All about us there were reminders that in the midst of death there is unquenchable life.

I think that you out there in Rabat, Teheran, Rouen, Jerusalem, and I, in this little town in West Virginia are good neighbours. We have more in common than you imagine. We hve known love, loss and we have learnt to carry our burden of grief with dignity. We know that some of that grief could have been avoided if only we could have chosen wise leaders. As it is, we have to do goes on when our best as individuals. We cannot determine the results of the talks between Obama and Netanyahu. We cannot prevail upon Ahmadinejad to stop rattling his nucler saber and bringing the world closer to complete disaster. We cannot stop floods in Brazil, nor keep the swine flu from spreading globally. What we can do is to respect each other. Life is short. We can do nothing better than to honor our shared humanity and tend the seeds of peace as carefully we tend our gardens.

EIN BRERA

Few Americans know all the reasons for Israel's air strike against Hama targets in Gaza. Some see it as another show of force by a country the United States should no longer support. I hear only too often the code words "no more blank checks" and I wonder when was the check ever blank. Israel is the only democratic ally the United States has in the Middle East. That alone adds translate into valuable currency.

That the reasons go back to the ham fisted doings of the British during the Partition, is too long a story to go into at the moment. The fact is that Hamas, bankrolled and otherwise supported by the Iranian government, has been launching missiles at Israeli civilian targets for eight years. Imagine Cuba hurling Kassams at Florida and you get the picture. No country and certainly not the US would tolerate this state of affairs for so long. In fact, we have gone to war at lesser provocation. Point is, the Israeli action was not arrived at on an impulse. Lest we forget, it was Hamas that refused to renew the cease fire brokered by the Egyptians.

Israelis are well aware that world opinion is, as it has been for centuries, far from objective when it comes to Jews. For example, there was no hue and cry from the world press when the Islamic terrorists in Mumbai sexually mutilated and murdered a young rabbi and his wife. There were no demonstrations in European capitals in support of the victims of missile attacks in Sderot. But there were demonstrations against Israel immediately following the air strikes. For weeks there will be hue and cry all over the world against the "Zionist entity."

It is important to remember that the Israelis had exhausted other possibilities. The blood is the the hands of Ahmadinejad and his Hamas henchmen. No self-respecting Jew rejoices at war. No one in his right mind fails to feel sympathy for the beleaguered Palestinian people Hamas so shamelessly exploits. No decent human being applauds the use of force against civilian targets. Yet Hamas gives Israel no alternative when it shells Israeli civilians, then hides behind Palestinian civilians when the Israeli military retaliates. Will the pc intellectuals if the First World see all these nuances or will their minds be so clouded by partisan propaganda issuing from sources such as Al Jazeera, that they will once again brand Israelis as ruthless aggressors? Quite possibly.

Where does that leave me, a Jew who us relatively safe in the Diaspora?Am I glad that the IAF is beating the tar out of Hamas? Certainly not. Alpha strikes are all very well on a computer screen, but the cost in human lives and the spiritual erosion they occasion is tremendous. Jews are people of peace. The average Palestinian, freed from the evil influence of rogue Moslems of Hamas & Company, no doubt wants what we all want--peace, a modicum of happiness and a healthy share of hope for the future. I grieve for Palestinian victims as I grieve for the young people of the IDF who must carry out these air strikes. Grief or no grief, in this fight, my heart is with Israel. Ein brera, no alternative.

PHOTOSHOPPING WAR TOYS

Below, Asian radish pods.Below, johnny jump ups and Asian salad greens.

Sweet 100 cherry tomatoes

Below, Oaxaca tomatoes.

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Oh the shamelessness of the small Iranian chap, who allowed his underlings to Photoshop his missiles in order to give the impression that he can strike at Israel from the comfort of his office. The phallic war toys of his his are ugly enough in the singular; presented in the fake plural, they are ludicrous. Better that he should grow a garden--Iranians have a rich and ancient culture and gardens are very much part of it. Gardening teaches respect for human life and no one who has nurtured seedlings, amended the soil into which to plant a food crop, revelled in the pleasure of serving homegrown fruit and vegetables to friends and family contemplate the possibility of war without taking its long term impact into account. Maybe the little Iranian chap likes to spice his salads with enriched plutonium. Maybe he thinks that the entire Middle East should share his taste for hot hell. I happen to think that he is in error. I happen to think that imperialistic jihadism is the greatest of follies. Al-Andalus is lost to Islam, guy. Get over it. Grow tomatoes, grow daylilies. It is a more productive and honest occupation than trying to push Israel into a war the United States will be forced to support, Israel being our only democratic ally in the Middle East.

Our commander in chief would do well to plant a garden too. He might see the light then, bring the troops home and literally turn swords into ploughshares. Enough of this nonsense about being policeman of the world. We have enough to do home. Just the other day I met a family whose property is being foreclosed. Their material poverty is shocking. Our country has the resources to keep American families from homelessness and here we are frittering away these resources in Iraq. There four little children in this family I met and I will not go into detail about the way they are living because they have their dignity. They deserve justice, not pity. It ius enough to say that not since I left the Third World have I seen anyone struggle with such difficult living conditions.

Here is how I met these folks--I joined the local Freecycle chapter and posted a request for peonies and irises. Two people responded. The first lives in a middle class enclave; the other lives in a working class neighborhood. Both wanted to share their plants with a complete stranger because good gardeners practice generosity. Should not their example shame Iranian PM and our president out of their selfish warmongering? Isn't self-evident that kindness is better than war? Apparently not, therefore I have a proposition--let the Iranian PM and Mr. Bush trade places with lady whose house is being taken away by a bank. Let them learn the kind of courage it takes to lose everything but the ability to be generous. Gardening helps; killing people, on the other hand, is highly unproductive. Everyone knows that, right?

Kandahar and Isfahan readers, shalom and salaam.

Nasturtiums to please the eye, tease the nose and startle the tongue, a fountain made from a pot from the discount store, seashells, a bit of sand, a mirror square. There you have it--a pocket Alhambra, your own beach fir the vacation you spend at home with good books, music, a dish of sherbet drenched in rose brandy.

Speaking of books, DIARY OF A ROSE LOVER, by Henri Delbard has a recipe for rose brandy--add 100 grams of sugar, 100 grams rose petals to a bottle of brandy and allow steep for three weeks. Serve fruit sherbet. Delbard also offers a recipe for stuffed zucchini blossoms cooked in mussel broth that has been flavored with rose butter. In addition, he also offers a recipe for salmon in rose butter. Besides recipes, Delbard writes about a gardens designed to engage the five senses. He is passionate about the beneficial role of nature in our lives and he is equally passionate about roses. His text and Florence Moireau make this an essential book for rose enthusiasts.

THE BLOOD OF FLOWERS, Iranian American Anita Amirrezvani's first novel deals with other kind of gardens --those depicted in Persian carpets. This is a beautifully wrought story about strength, creative and the role of women in Seventeenth Century Persian society. Not to be missed.

ALLELOPATHIC THUGS OR

GRRRR, MY HEART'S ABHORRRENCE!

Methinks I've got an Ampelopsis brevipedunculata. The good news is that it is not fatal; the bad news is that it is a new invasive pest I must eradicate from my garden. Right now it lies in pieces under one of my oldest and best beloved roses, the rugosa Sir Thomas Lipton, but who is to say that somewhere near Hokaido, vestigial roots are not rushing toward my roses?

Botanical thuggery is nothing new to me. I have been fighting a loosing battle with invasive weeds ever since I started gardening in a previously uncultivated piece of land. It did not help that the land's most recent owner had detonated Meadow in a Can all over the property. The first year after this ill-considered action, pretty oxeye and shasta daisies popped up as did several greeny things that did not look in the least threatening. By the second year of my tenancy, the pretty flowers were gone. There remained vetch, Canadian thistle, and horrors too numerous to list.

Today, they are part of of axis of evil that threatens my perennials. True, it is unlikely that Ailanthus altissima, the very worst of the lot came from Previous Owner's Meadow in a Can. My personal opinion is that it came from a much hotter location. I mean, really, really hot. Ailanthus is a cunning tree. It seems to grow particularly well next to non-invasive shrubs trees. Since its tissues secrete a killer substance called ailanthone, it easily destroys defenseless competitors for nutrients and space. This year, I lost a lovely Nanho Blue buddleia whose lush branches hid an ailanthus from view. I fear this will not be the last victim to the Asian monster.

Along with ailanthus, multiflora rose, creeping charlie, virginia creeper, poison ivy, bindweed, bitter, inedible wild blackberry and several unidentified vines flourish in my neighborhood. I read with alarm that ailanthus seeds remain viable for twenty years, that of multiflora rose will sprout after fifty years of slumber, that wild blackberries have roots fifteen feet long. I will say nothing of poison ivy, but I will mention that the Japanese and Chinese wisteria I bought from a fancy nursery in New England, are showing terrifyingly imperialistic tendencies.

What do? I understand that nothing short of nuclear holocaust will complete rid my neighborhood of these botanical thugs. I don't want to go kaboom and neither do I want to rely on harsh chemicals to keep these undesirable aliens from proliferating. Please excuse me, I must call the guys at Homeland Security. I hope they do plants.

P.S. Note to our Commander-in-Chief

I hear you have been thinking of duking it out with the Iranian chap. I have a better idea. Let's just send him some of my weeds of mass destruction.