Two Friends

Iren by Iren Schio

 

Root Woman

Tree Woman

Sky Woman

Dear friends

Greet,

converse with one another

on the steely silver edge

of Truth and

Change.

Weaving together

roots

twigs, leaves,

clumps of dirt,

the two carve out

an underground story.

Mythic toads instruct them

about the Ground Way

of Being:

“Breathe

sweet summer rain

through leaf and root,

translucent skin.

We are all related.

Sing to the Earth

And S/he will comfort you.

Breathe …”

 

 

Working notes:

 

When I saw this picture that my friend Iren took of herself I knew that a poem would be forthcoming because I was struck by meaning at least for me. Iren sits amongst tree roots. I catch toads. We are both dealing with uncertainty, transitions, and deaths of one sort or another.

 

Trees are, above all, protectors sheltering the living from storms; even when uprooted they provide comfort. Under their gracious canopies new life begins…

 

In myth toads are almost always associated with women, older women in particular. Sometimes wise woman. Neolithic toad images are associated with death and signify the capacity for new birth. Toads live on the edge.

 

Toads shed many skins during one lifetime ingesting them in the process. This peculiar toad habit of eating one’s one skin after shedding it suggests to me the wisdom of not trying to escape one’s past. Being able to let go while incorporating what was into the present as part of the whole is a paradox, but one worthy of our attention.

 

The key to moving through transitions is to breathe through them, to stay as much in the present as possible, to be flexible, to know when to hide out, “to bend like a willow and flow like a river” (the latter phrase belongs to Iren).

I capitalize the word Nature to emphasize the importance of allowing the natural world to teach us how to become more human. We are the youngest species on the planet and definitely the one most lacking in wisdom.

The Seeds of Friendship

(Andrew doesn’t like his picture taken so I added one of me, loving the Earth as a mountain with my pockets full of rocks! Thank you Iren for taking the picture.)

 

I have a friend who carries a precious seed for a very different kind of future. He really cares about trees and people and is genuinely attached to the word “community”. It is a pleasure to be around this young man who knows how to be a man and gives his own mother credit for helping him become who he is.

 

I’ll never forget the day Andrew told me that the first thing he noticed about me was the power of my light. I was stunned. How was it possible that this almost stranger half my age could see who I had become so clearly? Many months into this friendship, I still don’t know, but Andrew has followed this remark with others that reflect that although we are separated by generations he can actually see the woman I have become.

 

He defines himself as an outsider, and this is probably true because he is a visionary thinker and multi-valenced artist, as well as being a person who is able to navigate seemingly impossible odds in a very grounded/concrete way by writing proposals that result, for example, in the procuring of food stamps so that people who do not have the money will still be able to buy fresh vegetables at his outdoor market.

 

He has been able to garner emotional (and financial) support from others, who like me, also long for a relationship oriented culture, one in which the mechanized Iphone/FB isolation of ‘the family of man’ is finally replaced by a paradigm that puts caring and community at its center.

 

If this model can be adopted by even one community, then all is not lost. Of course, Andrew is facing a host of challenges – steep mountains to be climbed. He stands at the beginning of his own winding road as a different kind of leader…but because he embodies his own light, that inner light will guide him. As I have told him on so many occasions my belief in him and his ability to manifest a life sustaining community based reality strengthens with each passing day.

 

Andrew and others like him embody hope not just for humans, but for all non –human species and for the Earth, the planet we call home.

Dr. Gary Stuer

 

Yesterday morning I discovered the Facebook Post that appears below this commentary. Typically, it would never have occurred to Gary to email me about his appointment  as President of the American Holistic Veterinary Medical Association because he possesses a rare gift: deep humility.

I first met Gary when I took a dying rabbit to be euthanized just after he began practicing in Maine. When he injected her he explained to me that it would be 15 minutes before my beloved Midnight actually died,  What struck me forcibly was the way this stranger put his hands over her body. His loving gesture helped calm the rabbit and I felt his deep compassion flowing through my body too, easing my sorrow. I no longer recall our words but I remember leaving his office experiencing both grief and wonder over what I had just witnessed and participated in on a visceral level.

Gary was an Animal Healer.

A life long relationship was born and began to flourish.

Our friendship deepened over many years. I learned to trust Gary’s impeccable diagnostic skill, his willingness to work with me to identify problems, always listening so carefully to what I thought. He respected my judgment. When I dreamed that one of my animals was dying he understood immediately that this was one way I received information and took immediate action on the animal’s behalf.  When any of my dogs were operated on I was welcome in the operating room. I learned to trust Gary on a level that I had only previously experienced with my animals.

When my dog Star was dying Gary had just had open heart surgery and was unable to be present with us. She cried out when a colleague injected her and my last moments with this dog were spent in agony.  I had never felt so abandoned. But then Gary called me. He listened in silence as I wept uncontrollably and then he apologized for putting himself first, healing me with his words.

I can’t express how much these years of deep friendship have meant to me. But I know how much I miss him here in New Mexico… Last summer one of my dogs suddenly became desperately ill and ended up staying in a terrible clinic that I later made a formal complaint to the state about. Terrified and confused by the diagnosis I called Gary and he walked me through the indecipherable notes, told me what tests to request, checked blood work, and helped ease my panic. All this occurred long distance.

Gary heals both animals and their people. He saves lives and is capable of being emotionally present for both living and dying. Anyone who has been fortunate enough to have worked with this man of great integrity, honesty, deep compassion, and humility has been given a great gift.

It is often said that we cannot choose our parents. The same holds true for our children. Although there is but 16 years difference in ages between Gary and me, I have watched this man develop into a remarkable healer and a man I deeply respect. I am as PROUD of his accomplishments, as a mother would be for her son.

Gary is the son I never had.

That the animals I have had love him is no great surprise. I love him too.

 

Portland Veterinary Specialists (Portland, Maine) ·

PVS congratulates staff veterinarian, Dr. Gary Stuer, on his recent appointment as President of the American Holistic Veterinary Medical Association! This is an honor, but no surprise to anyone who knows him!

Dr. Gary Stuer graduated from Tufts Veterinary School in 1987, but feels that was just the beginning of his veterinary education. He has studied and integrated into his practice several complementary methods of treating patients. In 2004, he was certified in Veterinary Acupuncture by the International Veterinary Acupuncture Society (IVAS) and completed Reiki Master Training. In 2014, he also completed IVAS certification in Chinese Herbal Medicine. He is also on the staff of Portland Veterinary Specialists, where he practices Integrative Medicine with a team of Board Certified Specialists.
Dr. Stuer knew from a very early age—around 9 years old—that he wanted to become a veterinarian. He was influenced early on in his life by a family cat that was hit by a car who completely recovered with extensive medical care. He also spent a lot of time around horses when he was growing up.
Dr. Stuer is originally from Lowell, MA and moved to Maine in 1994. He and his wife enjoy being part of their community, and they also enjoy hiking and snowshoeing with their Labrador Retriever. In warmer weather, they enjoy kayaking and paddle boarding. He also has two cats, neither of whom has expressed an interest in hiking or snowshoeing.
Dr. Stuer is inspired to offer patients and their people integrative care, combining Western medicine with Eastern influences, where each animal is treated as an individual. His medicine constantly evolves as he learns more from his patients every day. He loves what he does and he is honored to be a caregiver for his clients’ treasured animals.

A Sense of Wonder…

Whenever I go to my friend Iren’s house I am astonished anew by the art – work that defines this particular landscape, inside and out. Iren creates art in every medium I can think of often utilizing Nature as her collaborator by using found objects, wood, stone, bones, shells, metal, glass to create highly original sculptured art forms.

Take the garage for example, not usually a place one thinks of as an artist’s canvas. The windows are made of old bottles whose colors shine brilliantly – amber, grass green, and cobalt – in the late afternoon sun. There are wooden panels replete with metal objects arranged in such a way that my eye returns again and again to the powerful and intriguing designs; these panels are hanging on the walls above the carpenter’s equipment that lines one side of the room.

Iren uses the chain saw like an old friend to cut the log I brought with me in two. Turning next to the table saw, she shapes one piece of the pinion pine into what will become another piece of Iren’s most original art. Awed by her expertise using these machines I ask her where she learned these skills. Iren tells me that her father taught her to use these tools as a child. I suddenly think of the gorgeous dining room table and chairs inside the house built by her dad…

I am delighted, excited, honored to be witness to this process of hers. Ideas are flowing, even as she runs the edges of the split log over rough sandpaper. We both comment on the sweet intoxicating scent of the newly cut wood as she shaves off its irregular edges effortlessly. We run our hands over the extraordinarily beautiful design that the bark beetles created while they devoured the cambium layer beneath the bark of what once was the trunk or branch of a tree. I am amazed by the fact that this destructive beetle created such beauty while it was killing the evergreen, and how Iren’s creative mind and hand is turning a piece of this conifer into an object that is more than a canvas depicting natural art.

“We can drill three holes in the top for sticks.” This remark excites me. The use of the word “we” is more than generous, since I am simply observing. But it reveals a lot about Iren’s character, her generosity of spirit, the manner in which she invites and draws a person into her world… I suddenly imagine gnarled roots coming out of the newly flattened and lightly sanded top with its three holes… “Which size drill shall we use?” she asks next, as she shows me the different sizes and we both agree on the same one.

“We could bore holes for some stones on the side,” she states more as a question to which I instantly agree. In the next breath she hands me the wood and gives me a pencil to mark the places where the holes will go to complement Beetle’s designs. I love every idea that springs to her mind. Iren picks up the drill and I watch as the drill bit grinds three holes in seconds. Each is quickly sanded. We discuss what we might do to bring out the design. Perhaps a little more sanding. Olive oil and beeswax are two other possibilities.

We leave the garage in the golden late afternoon sun walking swiftly to the studio. My eyes fasten on the rounded metal sculpture with scissors to my left, and then jump to the beautifully sculptured adobe wall with a niche containing what looks like a small statue of a goddess that Iren built to hide a gas tank. Every time I pass the wall I want to go through the small inviting wooden door! As usual I am lagging behind her. There is just too much about this landscape to feast my eyes on.

Once inside the spacious studio with its tower that overlooks the river, and which has to be the best place in the world to watch the full moon appear over the eastern horizon, Iren pulls out tin boxes. One is hexagonal in shape. Even Iren’s containers intrigue me. I pour through the stones with the eyes of a child, thrilled. There are three holes to fill. The blue green copper pieces catch my eye. I choose two. “How about a piece of coral?” she asks. Perfect, I think, as I choose a small irregular shape, a fragment of the sea creature that lives at the bottom of the sea… Iren’s already rolling little glue balls and puts a couple in the holes before handing the wood to me to press the last glue ball and the three chosen objects into place.

Just like that we are done.

“We’re running a bit late,” Iren remarks as I snap back into linear time. I shake my head trying to catch up with the switch. This whole art-making process took less than two hours and it’s time to go back to the house to feed my two little girls (that happen to be canines)…

As always I leave here with regret. Once again I have spent a mystical, magical afternoon at Iren’s house with a woman who stops time, allowing me to become the child I once was. Thank you Iren.

Above: Picture of half a log – look at the designs!