My friend Maria and I spend the afternoon in the garden. The broadbeans are spent, it’s the end of their season and we sort the remaining pods for food and seeds to dry. We hold the end and the beginning of life in our hands.
kororia/glory #advent2020
Last night I attended a session of the Faces of Hunger Film Festival 2020 and have to share with you this beautiful visual poem by Alberto Zuniga… “a plate of food is a survivor, a traveler, a passport, an ambassador, an inheritance”. I hope it brings back the flavour of something your Nana used to make and the memory of the taste of childhood. “We eat what we are, what we have been, what we will be”
A treasure hunt of sacred ordinary things. A simple meal. A droop off I don’t have to collect. Strawberries in the rain. It’s the small things. #celebration #whakahari
Today friends with a large mulberry tree shared their abundance with us, a juicy mango from the kinder fundraiser of another friends’ son, apricots from our next door neighbour. The world seems a fruitful, friendly place. #harmony #reretahi #adventwords2019
Breathe. Exhale.
Sip and sigh. Sing and cry.
You can’t change the world, only yourself.
Talitha. Talitha.
Talitha.
itellyouarise
That is what this life is for.
That is the cup that pours.
How the song goes and that cup overflows.
You want the world to be different?
It is, because you are here.
You breathe, and be and bear.
I’ll take your tears and fears and trade you Grace.
See my Face? It’s also yours.
That is the cup that pours.
Breathe and be and bear.
Come near, come here.
This is the cup that pours. This cup is yours.
Talitha Fraser
This month marks the end of living in intentional community in Footscray for eight and a half years (albeit I will still be living in intentional proximity).
In that time, I have lived in six houses and with over 20 different people – some of them twice. I’m packing at the house I’m in now to move again, and found it remarkable to have so much in the ‘storehouse’ to take with me preserved from various houses I’ve lived in. A metaphor somehow, of lives and home shared. I know my experiences of living in community will nourish me in the future as will the preserves I take with me and I’m conscious of the privilege of that. Having good things stored up means the seasons have been fruitful. We have shared abundance together and there’s still some leftover.
I started this blog post wondering whether I might have some insight or wisdom I wanted to share but what comes are memories and gratitude:
Waking up my first morning in a new house to a stranger in the kitchen, the grief and grace of the days your good intentions come to nothing, the awful times when we weren’t sure we’d have anywhere to live, the raw joy when Maria got PR. I remember working with Elizabeth Braid to create a grace resource celebrating something of Melbourne’s small alternative church communities, and the poem-prayer about negotiating everyone’s wants and needs:
A Prayer for the Share House
Take away my resentment that the dishes still have food on them, cold water-full sponge, soap bottle half gone…
and give me gratitude for the dishes that have been done today
Take away my resentment for the planned meal ingredients used and not replaced…
and give me gratitude for the food that has been provided today
Take away my resentment at the passive-aggressive pile of belongings outside my bedroom door…
and give me gratitude for the cleaning that has happened today
Take away my resentment for the sleep lost holding you crying after the nth fight with your boyfriend…
and give me gratitude that I have friends with whom to share life
Take away my resentment for the times you have company and I-just-want-to-be alone, for the reverse of that, and when we each want to be alone and the house just isn’t big enough for the both of us…
and give me gratitude for those moments… the brief, beautiful moments… we get it right.
Take away my resentment for the things said, the things unsaid and those for which we do not have words but our spirit cries
and give me gratitude for the things said, the things unsaid and those for which we do not have words but our spirit cries
Amen
Today I add this addendum…
Take away those moments I felt like I failed, the guilt I felt falling short of all I imagined I should be able to be and do, all my ego thought I could.
and give me gratitude for my humanity, for leaning on and learning from others whose help I need – the seeds sown and fruit grown and the love. God, I’m so grateful for the love.
Thanks to all of you with whom I have lived, loved and shared life. May the road rise up to meet you and may it sometimes lead you back to my door.
We live in times where the focus is on those things that divide rather than connect us but as Chappo (Peter Chapman) says “You should share communion together, it has a unique power to unite beyond words.”
For many years I was a co-ordinator for a local community project called Sharing Abundance, the idea behind the project was food sustainability through food rescue and food redistribution. If we noticed a home in our neighbourhood had produce growing, especially if they didn’t seem to be using it, we’d knock and ask if we could pick it and donate it on to people in need: through our local church foodbank and outreach projects offering a community meal. Mostly people were happy to get rid of it seeing the produce as something that attracted lots of birds and bats or made a mess on the lawn below.
We knew when we started that an outcome would be produce: jam, chutney, cordial… what I didn’t know was how well this would work as a shared vision for bringing people together. A chain formed where people donated fruit, some people collected jars, some people picked produce, others were available for the processing and cooking days, a jar of the finished product might go back to the donor and others out to the projects for distribution. The members of this network didn’t necessarily meet one another but often the links were special points of connection. Connection to where our food comes from, to the seasons, to place, to the wisdom of our elders, to our neighbours, to each other. We learned about reducing waste, edible weeds, what to make with 5kg of parsley, what a loquat is and how to eat it (just bite it actually but mind the pips!). No one person had it all but the neighbourhood working together created more than the sum of its parts. Share the abundance and you will know what it is to be rich.
Ingredients
1kg apricots, halved and stoned, then quartered (or 1 kg of any fruit)
juice of a whole lemon (30-40ml)
1kg caster sugar
1 tsp butter (optional)
Method
Prepare: Wash fruit well then cut into even pieces discarding any leaves, stalks, stones, etc.
Sterilising jars
To sterilize the jars in the oven start by preheating the oven to 130 degrees Celsius/ 275 degrees Fahrenheit. Wash the jars and the lids very thoroughly. Place the jars on a baking tray and put them in the oven for 20 minutes. In the meantime, boil the lids in a small pot full with water, drain in a colander.
Assemble: Put a saucer in the freezer to use to test the jam later. Place the apricots, lemon juice and sugar in a large non-reactive saucepan (like stainless steel or enamel). Use a large, wide pot for cooking the jam. The fruit-sugar mixture should only come one third up the sides of the pot. If you use a tall pot with a smaller diameter, the jam will need much longer until it sets.
Bring slowly to the boil, stirring occasionally. If you like use a potato masher to work the jam and sugar together — this releases moisture from the fruit and gets them cooking faster.
Boil the fruit for 15-20 minutes: Bring the fruit to a boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally. The mixture will start with big, juicy bubbles and slowly progress to small, tighter bubbles as the jam gets closer to doneness. If foam forms on the top of your jam mixture move pot away from the heat and scoop it out with a spoon or add a knob of butter (about 1 tsp) to make it break down and return to low heat until butter is melted.
Know when the jam is done: After 15 mins, simply dribble some hot jam from the pot onto the frozen saucer and wait a few seconds for it to cool. Run your finger through the jam — if it makes a clear path through the jam and doesn’t fill in, then you have a good set. If setting point has not been reached, boil for a few minutes more, then test again.
Jar and store the jam: When the jam is set to your liking, remove the jam from the heat and transfer to the clean jars. Do not fill the hot jam in cold jars or the jars may shatter. Make sure that the sterilized jars are still hot when you fill them.
Use a soup ladle to fill the jars with the jam. Or pour some of the jam in a heat proof jug and then pour the jam into the jars. Use a wet paper towel or tea towel to clean any spilled jam from around the top of the jar and immediately place the lids on top and tighten. Ideally you want to place these jars somewhere they can stay without being moved for 24 hours cooling slowly you will hear the ‘plink’ of the lids sealing as the metal contracts as the jars cool and securely seal.
24 hours later check the jars. If the lids have sealed tight and flat, store jam in a cool, dark place. If the jar lid did not seal keep it in the fridge and enjoy straight away.
itellyouarise 