Seemingly eons ago, one of my daughter Carolina’s godmothers, Susan, gave me John O’Donohue’s book about spiritual friendship. She said I was an anam cara for her, one of her spiritual friends. In September, I will travel with Susan to FarmAid40, a giant concert, where Carolina will be working. Together, we will honor farmers, those who dedicate themselves to nourishing the lives of plants and animals from birth to harvest through the seasons, every year.
During this sad season, I am learning to garden from my chosen anam cara, my husband, Rob. At first, I panicked when I thought he would die soon and take away with him all his wonderful understanding of the first Bible, Nature. I have watched him turn our simple grassed yard into an oasis. Most recently, I have asked him to teach me. First, we asked for help, from the professional haircutters, and paid them lots of money to make it possible for me to imagine going forward later without Rob. And then just yesterday, I sowed a salad of veggie starts in the planters under our welcome arbor. Who knew that I would ever be interested enough and learn enough from Rob to do that?
During this past Fall and Winter, the harvest and slumber seasons, my pod of anam caras has expanded to these “vegetable box people,” my CSA group. In this case, the letters stand for the Center for Spirituality and Action, not the more common acronym of Community Supported Agriculture. We are a circle of 13, a group of seekers, dedicated to the practices of contemplation and now, by God’s grace, to each other.
It feels so right to me, learning to tend my CSA garden as well as the earth. As the poet explained, one’s anam cara tends to be a single being…so close they share dreams, even breath. Even long ago when I initially heard this Irish notion, I couldn’t quite imagine the singularity of such a friendship. That BFF moniker never quite fit for me anyway. After all, there’s her (that friend who comes to mind) and him and that dear one too. There are my sisters too, for Heaven’s sake. Their names all tumble out in my prayers. We have witnessed sparkles of Glory together. How could I ever judge one more worthy than the other?
Thus I am learning as I consider our CSA baker’s dozen. My heart has the capacity to expand, with God’s help, across continents and oceans as well as the small space between the two of us. Everyone in this web is precious to me, including the one who in this moment is walking past our house with his dogs, greeting the day on the other side of our front yard.
This garden of friendship I am embracing is rich in variety including the simplicity of a blade of grass alongside the depth of a rose. All is gracious. All is blessed. I am open to enjoying it all, a living dance of spirituality and action.
Always Bridging 