The Sunday Slow is a sinking in to the meditation and the life lessons around food, nourishment and the center of our homes. In truth, that center is wherever you are, wherever you place it, wherever you eat regularly. It’s slow because it is in the slowing down that we feel more, experience deeper and really receive the beauty and vibrancy life offers us every second of every day. The Sunday Slow is basically my conversation with the divine through the crucible of my kitchen, food and the spaces I create to nourish myself and those around me.
*This post was written in January 2015, but remained tucked away in the recesses of this website for a time while I traveled and settled into the family cabin in California.*
I’ve been home now for a few weeks. It’s not only hard to believe that we are in 2015 already, but that I only spent about 3 months last year in this house. When I arrived back here in our little home on Maui after spending the holidays in California, I cried. Like a dramatic, drop the bags on the floor right at the entry, deep gulps of air kind of cry. It’s only in the arms of your refuge that you allow yourself to feel how exhausted you truly are. I felt it in my bones when I finally walked in through our front door.
I don’t think it’s without significance either that when you walk in through our front door, you are staring right into our kitchen. The open floor plan holds the living room, dining room and the kitchen in one long bright airy space. And there, greeting me with open arms was my favorite space in the house, complete with a window sill still boasting sprouting avocado seeds.
The last couple of weeks here have been quiet, slow, nurturing as only home can be. But what has been even more nourishing is the fact that all 3 of the orange trees that surround our home have been bursting with fruit. Like… BURSTING. Bursting as in, everyone I know is getting oranges and orange juice. Bursting as in all the creatures that life outside are having a feast with what is falling to the ground right now.
Last year we left just as the oranges were coming on the scene, but this year, I’m here and it’s this marvelous dance outside that pulls me out there every couple of days to pluck the bounty these trees are so gloriously offering us. This has been a blessing in so many ways. Rooting me to this space once more, these oranges makes looking outside my kitchen window about more than enjoying the scenery.
I’m tending, watching as this growth takes place, made aware again and again that seasons do indeed change and life is so much bigger than my small world. It paces me, paces the weeks, and on Sundays, like today, it pulls me into an intimate communication with the freely offered bounty and sustenance offered up by this land I’m so so fortunate to live on.
For now, I do not know what types of oranges we have growing here. The skin is often rough, a bit marred and though super thick, easy to peal off. But the oranges themselves? It’s the promise of Summer, even if it’s still Winter. It’s sweet, juicy and honestly, it’s what I imagine gold to taste like. All this from a girl that isn’t all that enamored with oranges.
They are magic.
So I picked a basket full of oranges on a bright sunny Sunday, washed them all and proceeded to juice them. One huge pitcher full for us, and 2 other bottles to share with friends. Next Sunday, I’ll be doing the same. It feels simple, primal, totally elemental. It took quite a while to juice them all, I had nothing else to do, nothing else on my mind, but ripe sweet bursting oranges. I need these days. The noise drops away, the long list of tasks to tackle disappears, and I’m back in the moment engulfed in brilliant orange, sweetness and juice for my little family and friends. It’s impossible for me not to be rawly aware of how abundance is always around us all… we just have to allow ourselves to see it.
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