Big Things, Small Packages
June Recap: a small garden, a small gathering, a small daily goal
Issue #26/ Welcome to the Good and Beautiful Things newsletter, I’m so glad you’re here.
June has been a month of big things for our family.
We experienced the grandeur of Acadia National Park in Maine.
Our daughter returned home after ten months of studying abroad in France.
And, finally, this week we celebrated our third child’s graduation from high school.
The question that inevitably shows up in conversations with friends lately is this — “What will it be like when you have only one child at home in the fall?”
I try to explain that I’m not thinking about that time yet, that I’m trying to enjoy the next seven weeks while almost our entire family is under one roof.
Maybe my heart isn’t ready to hold onto the big transitions ahead or even the big things that have happened this month because I find myself focusing on the smaller things.
A Small Garden
We have a small garden, you could even call it a miniature garden compared to most other gardens. By comparison, we have a friend in the neighborhood who has been cultivating his formal English garden for years now, complete with a hand-built stone wall and an archway. My husband, on the other hand, has been lucky to find the time to plant a few zinnias, dahlias, and coax the return of a single hibiscus bush from last summer. It’s not a garden that would leave a big impression on the friend who is currently installing his own pond. It is, however, leaving quite the impression on me.
This week, droves of people gathered at our house for our son’s graduation party. In the week leading up to the celebration, I methodically worked through my to-do list. I bought decorations and groceries, I cleaned and arranged and (with the help of a friend) prepared. I spent a lot of money to get things just right. At the very last minute, I cut a few flowers from the backyard and put them in miscellaneous glass containers. To my surprise my eyes drifted again and again to the pop of color each little vase created throughout the house rather than all of the store bought decorations and carefully prepared food. This morning, when it was time to dispose of the balloons and restore order to the house, the flowers kept drawing my attention their way.
Similarly, we have only a few tomato and pepper plants and one very hearty basil plant. We aren’t the people trying to figure out what to do with an overflowing cornucopia of zucchini and squash. But when I found the few ripe cherry tomatoes that my husband had placed on the kitchen window sill last week, I put one in my mouth and closed my eyes, wondering if store-bought tomatoes had ever tasted like this nickel-sized delight.
Just like the cherry tomatoes with their small packaging and big flavor, our little garden provides a big return of taste and beauty. (Thank you, dear husband).
A Handful of People Might be Just Right
In the past, when we have held a graduation celebration for a child, we’ve included a ceremony once the large crowd has arrived. Typically, I take ten to fifteen minutes to speak over the graduate, then my husband might say a few words and pray before we give out the diploma. This year, for our son’s high school graduation, we did things differently. We asked a smaller group of friends to gather, and in that more intimate setting, I read a brief letter to our son followed by a collective time of prayer over him. It turns out, you don’t need seventy-five people to make the words and prayers count. Yes, we were thankful for each person who showed up for the larger open house gathering that we also hosted, knowing that our son felt loved and honored by those willing to crowd into our house to celebrate him. But I’ll remember fondly the sweetness of the smaller group, when a handful of people turned out to be just right.
Five Minutes of Art-Making
With all the big things going on, I haven’t had time to make art in the last few weeks. I’m hoping to eventually take some of my pictures from our Maine trip and do something similar to the grid drawing I made of our trip to Étretat (in France) last year. Hopefully, I’ll get to it this next week.
Until then, I quickly sketched out one of the photos from Maine onto my journal page earlier this week and guess what? A few minutes of rubbing my fingers through the greens and reds scratched the creative itch just fine, until a wider window of time opens up.
A Chapter A Day is Still Something
A formally voracious reader, my appetite and patience for reading began to change several years ago. When I started struggling with chronic pain, I found it easier to concentrate on tv shows and movies as a way to get through the pain, rather than reading a book. As the pain continued and we entered a world-wide pandemic, digital entertainment continued to provide easy distraction. Now (and I’m sure I’m not the only one) my patience for the focused work of reading has dwindled.
Summer is traditionally a time that I take on a challenging tome, maybe a classic that I’ve always wanted to read. One year it was Anna Karenina, another year it was The Brothers Karamazov.
I’m determined to recondition my reading muscle this summer. I’ve made a commitment to myself to read one chapter a day. In the current book that I’m reading (for the second time), The Lovely War by Julie Berry, the chapters are pretty short, so the finish line for each chapter is always in sight. Sometimes, I read more than one chapter. Sometimes, I skip a day. But I always return to my one chapter.
Eventually, the next chapter will be the last chapter. Small but steady steps are my method of choice at the moment for accomplishing bigger things.
Small Things, Continued
In addition to all of the things I’ve mentioned so far, I can’t help but add in a few more small things from the month of June:
tiny, baby bunnies in the backyard,
baby birds in our hanging fern with their fluffy eyebrows and beaks peaking over the edge,
and a miniature piece of art that I brought home from Maine.
This month I’m thankful for the big things that disguise themselves in small packages.
What small things are bringing you delight this summer? I’d love to hear about it or see a photo in the comments.
From the Sketchbook
A Fun Fact: The image I used to create a title header for this newsletter was originally just a quick sketch from an old photo in the corner of my journal. I came across it when I first started the newsletter six months ago and decided to use it. (You can see the header on the email version, but not on the Substack App.)
Favorite Find
Charlene Storey at Haver and Sparrow hosts a Substack Notes thread each weekend themed on “Everyday Magic”. People post photos and I love glimpsing the mundane beauty that gets shared on her thread.
Words to Remember
“
We need to feed our souls, too.”-Haejin Shim Fujimura, wife of artist, Makoto Fujimura.
This was her response when Makoto criticized her for buying flowers from the store during a time in their lives when they barely had the money to eat. He tells this story in his book, Culture Care.
Blessings from the Guest Nest,
-Aimee
Hi Aimee, I’m so glad I found you on Charlene’s thread this morning. I love Acadia National Park. I have been reflecting a lot lately on the gifts of small production in the garden. When asking myself what I will do with my tomatoes and blackberries this year, the answer is eat them. They taste so good straight from the vine. I understand your sentiments exactly. Bigger is not better. Here’s a link to my weekly Substack if you want to check it out. I’m trying to grow myself and my writing and avoid the noise. Cheers! https://pocketfulofprose.substack.com/p/taking-a-creative-leap
Your flowers are lovely. I have always enjoy your having fresh flowers in your home over the years when I visit.