Freedom from? Freedom to? In(ter)dependence?

Day after tomorrow is Independence Day. We suspect that Mother Nature will provide many of the fireworks. According to the Minnesota Weather Guide, by now we should see field corn near six feet high. Nothing we’ve noticed around here comes close, and the lack of rain isn’t helping.

for Independence Day enjoyment

Photo by J. Harrington

The Sunrise River marshes are full of water although where it came from is anyone’s guess. We had a very wet Spring but are way below average precipitation since early May. If Tuesday’s thunderstorms are really scattered, they won’t help much. I’m disappointed because the brush pile burn we didn’t do on Solstice could have helped celebrate Independence Day, but the combination of moderate drought and potential thunder storms with lightning is enough to give it a pass. It’s far from traditional, but we may celebrate the festival of Lughnasadh on August 1 by lighting the brush pile then, or not. We’ll take it all one day at a time this summer and maybe this year and henceforward.

We’re now in the season of bird’s foot trefoil, and, in a few weeks, spotted horsemint. It’s also the time of whitetail fawns, Canada goose goslings, and sandhill crane colts. More lilies are blooming by the day. Unfortunately, more horseflies are hatching daily also. The blue ball is accumulating more and more horsefly corpses by the day.

I’ve been enjoying reading a book my sister sent for the Better Half to read, Andrea Wulf’s Founding Gardeners: The Revolutionary Generation, Nature, and the Shaping of the American Nation. It makes clear that we have been a strongly divided people since our early days, agrarian versus mercantilist. So far we’ve managed to temper our differences by focusing on what we share in common. We can continue to do so, but not if we keep emphasizing our disagreements more than our agreements. Let’s remember we have our commons in common. Also, as we learned years ago from Bobby McGee, “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to loose."

A Nation's Strength

William Ralph Emerson

What makes a nation's pillars high
And its foundations strong?
What makes it mighty to defy
The foes that round it throng?

It is not gold. Its kingdoms grand
Go down in battle shock;
Its shafts are laid on sinking sand,
Not on abiding rock.

Is it the sword? Ask the red dust
Of empires passed away;
The blood has turned their stones to rust,
Their glory to decay.

And is it pride? Ah, that bright crown
Has seemed to nations sweet;
But God has struck its luster down
In ashes at his feet.

Not gold but only men can make
A people great and strong;
Men who for truth and honor's sake
Stand fast and suffer long.

Brave men who work while others sleep,
Who dare while others fly...
They build a nation's pillars deep
And lift them to the sky.

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