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Moon Jellies & Smudging Wands

Moon Jellies

Spent the majority of the day in the water with my daughter making the most of the very last day of her summer holiday. We went kayaking in Deep Cove for the 1st time together (she got some practice in her summer camp and seems to like it!) and than went for a cherry picnic in Deep Cove's beautiful and quiet little beach. Followed, of course, by a swim in the cool water noon water (the tide was coming in). I noticed many moon jellies in the water earlier as we were kayaking - it was hard to tell if they were alive or dead, since they looked mostly passive and nearly floated above the water surface. I did not expect to see them closer to the shore - and so many of them. I asked a lady on the beach if they sting, and she said they do; however, while knocking into tiny or bigger ones was inevitable for a swimmer with so many of them in the water, I did not feel any stinging so I just kept on going... Coming out of the cove, once my skin dried in the hot noon sun, I couldn't help but notice that my skin smelled a little like clay... Which is how slimy and slippery the cove's floor is.

There's a dock/diving board in Deep Cove's beach, and there were three kids playing on it. At first I didn't want to interfere with their play, so I kept swimming way past it. But when they were still there when I returned, I figured that I might as well climb on the dock and enjoy the sun for a bit. As long as you don't try to hard to pretend like you're an adult around kids, they usually won't mind a grown-up being next to them... And if anything, you'll learn a thing or two that you didn't know before. They were lying on the dock facing the water, and talking about crabs... Well, the water in Deep Cove is clear enough that you can see the crabs crawling underneath the water from some 3-4m waters... It was crawling sideways as it should... And they were also catching moon jellies and watching them melt in the sun (it does not take very long...). They also told me that the moon jellies don't sting, which turns out to be true. Only the big purple jelly fish here are of the stinging kind.

I also tried some kai perfume oil which I was surprised to find at a little cute shop called Room6. It's kinda fun at first, with beachy and heady white florals (I think the idea behind it is exotic tropical flowers like gardenia, pikake and frangipani), but after a couple of hours, the white musk takes over and now I'm regretting that I've put it on. Might take a day or more for it to subside and before I can test any of my perfumes again reliably...

While packing orders this afternoon in between beach hopping, a courier stopped by with a giant box reeking of a tea shop aroma... It was no other than the samples of the new tins I'm planning to use when the new teas are ready this fall; plus about 50(!) samples of teas that I've never asked for. Some of them might be useful (lapsang suchong, white tea, organic assam and darjeeling), but most of them are just fun fruity flavours of aromatized teas that would probably end up as gifts in my private tea parties in October and to friends who enjoy fruity aromatized teas.

The day went along quite uneventful - went to the post office to ship orders in the afternoon, stopped at the health food store for some school snacks and got revolted by freshly bound smudging wands of cedar and sage - the aroma is so potent it was sickening to be around it... Yet, I'm somehow haunted by it and if I know myself at all, I will be at that shop again tomorrow sniffing that disturbing, medicinal-bordering-on-the-toxic aroma.

Then we went for another beach picnic (watermelon with Macedonian feta) and another long swim in the (warmer) water of Sunset Beach, and spotting my seal friend yet again; and baking chocolate cookies in the evening, so we have something to send the teacher on 1st day of school rather than wait till the last... And also to say goodbye to the horseback riding teacher because we're starting with a new one. So the day ends with the smell of cookies baking, and being up since 6am (and needing to wake up around that time tomorrow and the rest of the week), I think it's time to close the lid on my laptop...

Moon Jellies & Smudging Wands

Moon Jellies

Spent the majority of the day in the water with my daughter making the most of the very last day of her summer holiday. We went kayaking in Deep Cove for the 1st time together (she got some practice in her summer camp and seems to like it!) and than went for a cherry picnic in Deep Cove's beautiful and quiet little beach. Followed, of course, by a swim in the cool water noon water (the tide was coming in). I noticed many moon jellies in the water earlier as we were kayaking - it was hard to tell if they were alive or dead, since they looked mostly passive and nearly floated above the water surface. I did not expect to see them closer to the shore - and so many of them. I asked a lady on the beach if they sting, and she said they do; however, while knocking into tiny or bigger ones was inevitable for a swimmer with so many of them in the water, I did not feel any stinging so I just kept on going... Coming out of the cove, once my skin dried in the hot noon sun, I couldn't help but notice that my skin smelled a little like clay... Which is how slimy and slippery the cove's floor is.

There's a dock/diving board in Deep Cove's beach, and there were three kids playing on it. At first I didn't want to interfere with their play, so I kept swimming way past it. But when they were still there when I returned, I figured that I might as well climb on the dock and enjoy the sun for a bit. As long as you don't try to hard to pretend like you're an adult around kids, they usually won't mind a grown-up being next to them... And if anything, you'll learn a thing or two that you didn't know before. They were lying on the dock facing the water, and talking about crabs... Well, the water in Deep Cove is clear enough that you can see the crabs crawling underneath the water from some 3-4m waters... It was crawling sideways as it should... And they were also catching moon jellies and watching them melt in the sun (it does not take very long...). They also told me that the moon jellies don't sting, which turns out to be true. Only the big purple jelly fish here are of the stinging kind.

I also tried some kai perfume oil which I was surprised to find at a little cute shop called Room6. It's kinda fun at first, with beachy and heady white florals (I think the idea behind it is exotic tropical flowers like gardenia, pikake and frangipani), but after a couple of hours, the white musk takes over and now I'm regretting that I've put it on. Might take a day or more for it to subside and before I can test any of my perfumes again reliably...

While packing orders this afternoon in between beach hopping, a courier stopped by with a giant box reeking of a tea shop aroma... It was no other than the samples of the new tins I'm planning to use when the new teas are ready this fall; plus about 50(!) samples of teas that I've never asked for. Some of them might be useful (lapsang suchong, white tea, organic assam and darjeeling), but most of them are just fun fruity flavours of aromatized teas that would probably end up as gifts in my private tea parties in October and to friends who enjoy fruity aromatized teas.

The day went along quite uneventful - went to the post office to ship orders in the afternoon, stopped at the health food store for some school snacks and got revolted by freshly bound smudging wands of cedar and sage - the aroma is so potent it was sickening to be around it... Yet, I'm somehow haunted by it and if I know myself at all, I will be at that shop again tomorrow sniffing that disturbing, medicinal-bordering-on-the-toxic aroma.

Then we went for another beach picnic (watermelon with Macedonian feta) and another long swim in the (warmer) water of Sunset Beach, and spotting my seal friend yet again; and baking chocolate cookies in the evening, so we have something to send the teacher on 1st day of school rather than wait till the last... And also to say goodbye to the horseback riding teacher because we're starting with a new one. So the day ends with the smell of cookies baking, and being up since 6am (and needing to wake up around that time tomorrow and the rest of the week), I think it's time to close the lid on my laptop...

Yearning, Waves & Agony

Dangerous Beach by Ayala Moriel
Dangerous Beach, a photo by Ayala Moriel on Flickr.

I'm reading Diane Ackerman's Natural History of the Senses - a thought provoking book, that is also sensually inspiring. It's amazing how our world relays first and foremost on our senses, how our senses limit our perception and contain our experiences within a certain range of decibels, light frequencies, odour perceptions and and also free us.

Strangely enough, the chapter I was most inspired by is actually the one on the sense of touch. There is so much emotion and expression tied to this sense, that when we are deeply affected by something (or somebody), we say "we are touched" by it... Although this sense is considered a "lower" or "animalic" sense in the hierarchy the Aristotle created (he viewed hearing and vision as higher, more refined or intelligent senses as they don't require direct contact with the object they are sensing - something that of course we could argue otherwise, with what we now know about light waves, particles, etc. - it's not as if nothing touches the eyes to stimulate vision!) - there is so much power to it and it is so commonly overlooked in our everyday life... And now that I've just completed the chapter about hearing, I'm yet again awed by the power of sound and the nearly magical effect of music on our psyche.





"...no end to the yearning, longing, rapture, and misery of love: world, power, fame, honor, chivalry, loyalty, and friendship, scattered like an insubstantial dream; one thing alone left living: longing, longing unquenchable, desire forever renewing itself, craving and languishing; one sole redemption: death, surcease of being, the sleep that knows no waking!” - Richard Wagner, of his Tristan und Isolde prelude ...

When nothing seems to soothe my soul, and I feel that I can't breathe, let alone inhale a perfume; on days when even the most beautiful music feels like it pinches my heart and hammers on my brain from the inside - disturbing whatever bit of peace I may have left, instead of providing an outlet for powerful emotions -- on days like this, I turn to the ocean, and am thankful for its proximity and healing power.

As I lay on the beach, I become aware of my skin being caressed by the wind, my toes dipped in the gritty warm sand and occasionally tickled by sand fleas. The waves reach for the shore, as if quietly licking my wounds... Their repetitive whispers quiet my mind, full of heart-clenching melodies charged with too much emotion... Each waves does not return to the ocean empty handed – it brings back a handful of tears, which might be why the ocean is so salty… And I begin to swim, every inch of my body embraced by heavy, cold water that shares my burden and lightens my load of sorrows by dispersing them evenly among the myriads of H2O molecules… And sodium chloride… and fish and algae - whose smell I begin to detect because finally I can breath.. And with each breast stroke, the world seems bigger and more full of wonders. And even a sudden death at sea (by a boat or a musk rat – ahum, disappointingly this was the only wild creature I swam next to this year…) does not seem all that bad if I will become a wave and take someone’s sorrow away. Wagner and his fellow Romanticists were so wrong… Death is not redemption in the sense of eternal rest and end of suffering (too bad for Ophelia, Isolde, Romeo & Juliet who lost their lives over love just because they couldn’t wait long enough to get over a breakup before taking up their own lives)… It is merely the beginning of another life form(s) and energy redistributed in the universe.


The waves remind me that everything is temporary. Can you even tell where a wave begins and where it ends? And when does the next wave begin? The waves are energy, flowing within the fabric of the universe, constantly changing, and carried in many different forms and patterns. And just when things seem to go only downhill, another peak arrives… And just when we think that the pain is unbearable and we can’t take it anymore – its peak is over and it withdraws and disappears without leaving a mark. The most beautiful things in the world don't last forever, but so does pain and suffering. It's all part of something bigger - life, the universe - we are a small part of it, and whatever we experience has its place in the greater scheme of things, even though we cannot always understand the whys and the hows. We just have to be.



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