when you have a poor mattress

2007

           

(from a creative nonfiction assignment in grad school)

King of the Fields

          When I was little my grandma, or Yaya as I call her, used to take me to a park that looked like a wooden fortress.  I'd crawl through the maze of wood, take turns on the tire swing and eventually get bored or worn out.  I would go to look for Yaya on the hill, among the pines and shade behind the park.  Sometimes I found her moving along, bent over close to the ground, picking dandelions and putting them in a grocery bag.  "What are you picking those for?" I asked.

            "For Pappou.  To eat," she said.

            I probably wrinkled up my nose wondering why someone would want to eat dandelions.  Yaya would boil the stems and leaves, drain them, and add olive oil and lemon juice.  Pappou ate the greens as if they were any other home cooked dish.

          I was not used to the idea of picking food from a public park.  In fact, I played no role in my own food preparation.  But as I got older I began to understand more about nutrition and marketing and how grocery stores were not necessarily the best place to find foods that are good for me.  I was fascinated with many of Yaya's recipes because they were so different from my mother's.  Yaya, who is from Greece, did not cook the things that many of my friends ate.  Lamb, goat cheese, homemade yogurt, chamomile tea, spanakopita, tiropita, suzukakia, stuffed grape leaves, dzadziki, evgalemono soup—a soup made from egg whites and lemon seasoning.  Whether in name or in make, the foods Yaya made were different—Greek.

            From the time I was born my mother felt it was important for me to be aqcquainted with the part of my heritage that came from dad's side—the Greek side.  My Yaya and Pappou were from two lesser-known islands in Greece and had emigrated to the States in the early fifties.  They managed to raise three children, work and maintain their Greek traditions in a country whose language was and is difficult for them to manipulate.

            When I was about fourteen I decided to go vegetarian.  I never did enjoy seeing the plate of baby lamb come out with the other food at Yaya's.  Vetgetarianism was not an easy concept for Yaya to understand.  Before she lost her ability to work in the kitchen, she'd ask me "You don't eat chicken?"

"No, Yaya, still don't eat meat."

"I make you a nice salad," she'll say.

"Perfect."

          All I really ate in the way of meat was poultry and I decided I could live without it.  My mother, a vegetarian herself, was pleased with my decision.  She had not raised me to hate meat, but she had cooked vegetarian meals for us and I had developed a dislike for the way many meats tasted.  She had also read plenty of books about how to prepare vegetarian foods that provided the necessary nutrients (like protein which, contrary to belief, is possible to get from non-meat foods).  Nowadays when people find out that I don't eat meat, the first thing they say is, "Why?"  I supposed they expect some stock answer, a simple reason.  But my decision has a few different facets.

          I don't believe that people are superior as a species and I don't believe that "dumb animals" only exist for our own fulfillment.  If God had told me to assign names to all the animals in Eden, I would have called them "Jessica" and "Harry."  I also know from personal research that the production of beef, for example, is not efficient.  According to Diet for a Small Planet, if we took the grains that we used to feed cattle and made bread and other grain-based foods, we could feed the world; there would be no starvation if it weren't for the percentage of the population that demanded their beef.

          People always tell me that they couldn't live without their meats.  They would miss the taste too much.  For me, food serves as necessity before pleasure.  I don't need meat, period.

            It was after Darwin that our beliefs regarding a hierarchy of living things was further detailed according to survival.  The food-chain or web illustrates how things are related according to what eats what.  When people consider the purpose of plants in terms of food, they think of animals and insects.  I've heard so many people call a salad "rabbit food."  But there are other cultures that do not depend on meat for their meals.  In India…in Japan and China (in fact studies have shown that because of diets high in soy, women in these countries do not experience the same severe symptoms we Westerners associate with menopause)…and in Greece…

          I remember wondering how Yaya knew that dandelions were edible.  These perennials are thought to have originated in Greece and have spread to regions throughout the northern hemisphere.  The earliest documented use of dandelions is in China from about AD 659 where the weed was used to treat forms of cancer.  In the tenth and eleventh centuries Arabian physicians used dandelions for their nutritional value.  The Welsh incorporated dandelions into their own remedies in the thirteenth century as well.  Today, if you are looking for herbal supplements, many companies offer dandelion root or dandelion extract.  Though the dandelion is considered a nuisance to gardeners and lawn manicurists, it has benefited people since that first curious one plucked the yellow flower and tasted it.  Though we live in an age of synthetic treatments and chemical cures, the dandelion is still recognized as a useful plant.

            Dandelion has a slightly bitter taste, but the extent of its bitterness depends on when you pick it and which part of it that you eat.  Experts recommend that you pick dandelions early in the spring, after the leaves have come through the soil, when they are less bitter.  For sweeter dandelion greens, you should pick the stems before the bud grows.  The pH of the soil the weed grows in affects its bitterness as well.  The stem and leaves can be used in a salad, like my Yaya made, or mixed in with other greens like spinach, as well as sweeter vegetables (like carrots) that offset the bitterness.  There is dandelion tea, dandelion wine, dandelion coffee (a diuretic without the same side effects as the bean) and the canary colored petals have even been used to make a fine stout beer.  Aside from their versatility as a food, dandelions are full of vitamins and minerals that support the health of the human body.

            Dandelions are rich in potassium and iron, and also contain boron, calcium, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus, selenium and zinc.  As far as vitamins go, dandelions provide A, B-complex, C and D.  Potassium helps the body to maintain a healthy heartbeat, regulate water retention (no one likes being bloated), and is often lost with the use of synthetic diuretics.  Not only do dandelions act as a natural diuretic, they can serve as a mild laxative and help the body to rid itself of toxins.

            It is difficult to find foods that are not processed, loaded with preservatives, empty calories, and sugar or flavor enhancers.  Although agriculture is still the means through which a percentage of our food is grown, many people have never eaten fresh foods, ripe from the earth.  I remember learning that the grocery store in town uses red-tinted lights to make the tomatoes look more appealing.  It is sad that vegetables, like meat, have fallen victim to steroids and marketable forms of genetic modifications.  A man walking through Central Park plucked a dandelion and popped it into his mouth.  People may find this absurd, but how many of us have eaten something straight from the ground?  

            I am no botanist, but I remember something my friend said to me:  "Plants are more like people than most people realize."  The three basic organs of a plant are leaves, stems and roots, each of which are protected by a skin that is made up of three layers (dermal, vascular, and ground).  When a person's skin is broken they bleed.  Dandelions bleed as well, though it is a milky substance that seeps from inside them rather than hemoglobin.  The sticky liquid is white but will stain dark brown on human skin, similar to blood.  Is it possible that the dandelion's significance is not measured according to its use?  According to how little or how much they can benefit people?  In an ethnocentric world people will remain at the top of every food-chain and organism hierarchy.  As a species, we are concerned, preoccupied even, with our own survival and endurance; we don't want to become extinct.  But people have a very different sort of impact on the world around them compared to most plants.  Plants are natural Taoists; they have perfected the art of just being…The biggest difference between plants and people is that people think.  Plants just do; they take what they need to sustain their own lives but they do not invade, destroy, conquer and squelch they way that people have.   

            Plants breathe, too; they inhale the carbon dioxide animals like us exhale, cleansing the air and recycling breath for the forms of life that depend on oxygen to breathe.  Dandelions' bright blossom imitates the source of its energy--the sun.  Plants harness their energy from the sun, rather than from food sources like mammals and other beings.  Photosynthesis depends on light, carbon dioxide and water to convert sunlight into energy.  Chlorophyll absorbs the light energy and chemical reactions convert that energy within chloroplasts.  The leaves of a dandelion spread out from the taproot, forming a kind of shelf close to the ground.  They are angled, designed so that rainwater runs toward their center, down toward the roots where the water is needed.

            The way that flowers reproduce is also not so different from the way people do.  The reproduction of plants depends on a seed produced by an ovary.  The seed is fertilized by sex cells carried in pollen, produced by "the male parts" of a flower.

            Bees play a role in the fertilization of dandelions as well, carrying the pollen (that contains the sex cells) to another flower's unfertilized seeds.  But dandelions also play a role in honey production.  The time that a dandelion yields nectar and pollen extends beyond the period of time when other plants provide these honey-making ingredients.  When bees cannot rely on other plants in the early spring and later toward autumn, they can still rely on the dandelion.  I love passing by fields blanketed with a layer of dandelions, though I don't think those fields would be the best for frolicking since there are at least ninety-two insects aside from bees that frequent the dandelion.

            The dandelion is not threatened by bugs and can endure a longer season than other plants, though they are still sensitive to colder temperatures.  They close up in the evening as the day's heat begins to dissipate and open again in the early morning like eyes reacting to the coming light and heat.  Overnight fuzzy seed stalks can replace the long narrow petals.  The sun-colored head becomes a gray downy puff, composed of the seeds that will scatter to make more dandelions.  The dandelion is such an expert at multiplying because of the way it releases its hundreds of tiny seeds; they ride on a breeze, a gale, a gust or the puff of air from a child's wishing lips and settle onto the ground where the wind takes them.  Dandelions grow virtually anywhere that there is dirt and their seeds can travel miles before settling into the earth.

            I have not read anything about an overabundance of dandelions, nor have I heard mention of their extinction.  They grow like weeds.  People use chemicals to wipe them out of their picturesque backyards, but there seems to be no issue in the population control of dandelions.

            When I was young I called them "dandy lions," though the name comes from the shape of a lion's tooth (dent de lion) rather than a lion's demeanor.  The dandelion has other aliases as well.  Priest's Crown, for the way the bald bud looks when the seeds have all been lifted from it.  Telltime because children thought that how many breaths it took to blow off the seeds was equal to the hour of the day.  Puffball, Cankerwort, Blow Ball, Swine Snout, White Endive and Wild Endive.  Its botanical name is Taraxacum officinale, meaning "official remedy for disorders."  Taraxacum comes from the ancient Greek words taraxos, "disorder," and akos, "remedy."  I asked my Pappou if he was familiar with either of these terms.

            "No," he said, "We call them rathikia."

            Pappou jokes about the "Old Country."  It is a place that shaped him, that contained the wisdom of ancient philosophers but also holds memories of unequaled pain.  Pappou and Yaya have achieved the dream that this country promised but they retain an old-world sensitivity that cannot be untaught.  I cannot imagine leaving my eight siblings, mother and father behind for a place where people do not speak my language.  But I do know what it is like to try and maintain personal practices based on beliefs that are foreign or at least unpopular.

            Regardless of its name, the dandelion has traveled far.  It was the early settlers that brought them here, intentionally, from Europe.  They were listed in medicinal books for ages, before people knew that each part of the plant could serve some purpose, before science had broken the plant down into subcategories.  Dandelions have survived through wars and famine, through droughts and floods.  They have managed to persevere even with the onset of new herbicides.  Most farmers seek to eradicate them from their fields, but dandelions can be grown and harvested like other crops.  It is difficult to keep them in one spot, however, since their parachute-like seeds can travel distances. In terms of survival, dandelions must be among the fittest.

            When we consider life, we may consider purpose.  Just as people may disagree over their individual or collective purpose, so might they argue over the purpose of something as small as the dandelion.  Although the spectrum of life does not depend solely on the lion's tooth, the dandelion does aid the survival of other life forms, from the honeybee to a person with too many toxins clogging their system.  And who knows how many ancient remedies the dandelion played a role in.

          I respect dandelions.  They are considered weeds, but what is a weed?  A plant that tends to dominate the ground it grows in?  A plant not as aesthetically pleasing as the tulip or the rose?  I suppose weeds are unwanted because they can strangle whatever growth a person is aiming for.  But the dandelion seems unperturbed by its reputation.  Garden variety plants are limited to the plot of soil in which they're planted, but dandelions make full use of the earth around them, growing where their seeds happen to scatter and then cooperating with their environments to sustain life.  People's feet are mobile, free to roam, not rooted to one place in the soil.  Yet the dandelion knows a freedom that most people do not while the motions of humanity bring harm and tension to their world.

            Though it is not difficult to find herbal supplements of any variety in health-food stores and online, remedies have become more synthetic as science has advanced further from the field and deeper into the lab.  There seems to have been a shift from the simplicity of nature's offerings toward the manipulation of nature's patterns.  At some point people recognized that the very plants growing around them could assist the body's ability to thrive.  But in a culture impressed with the effectiveness of pharmaceuticals, with pills that adjust every imperfection, it is easy to ignore the natural world and the similarity and interdependency of life.  We tend to distinguish between natural and artificial but medicines, flavors and scents have been taken from the natural world, manufactured to imitate their origins or produce an isolated effect.

            Dandelions don't concern most people because they do not make a nice bouquet, though I can remember picking them as a child for just that purpose.  Most flowers are cultivated for the purpose of decorating someone's yard, or to hang in a basket on someone's porch.  Flower shops cater to the needs of funerals, weddings, holidays and any occasion when someone wants to show they care for someone else.  Though these examples relate to the human capacity for empathy or compassion, the plants are limited to symbol, representations of the human emotion—they exist for our viewing and smelling pleasure and nothing more.

            I imagine the dandelion, surviving the designs of man, persisting in places that, to most people, represent waste, death, entropy—an end.  That ambitious dandelion, petals shining amidst rusted car parts and contorted machines beyond repair.  That exposed dandelion that dares to poke through the crack in the sidewalk where feet stampede.  That lonely dandelion on the side of a busy highway, blown by exhaust and the momentum of fast-moving cars.

            Perhaps that is why I am pleased to see those yellow fields.  So many flowers growing at once, together, in a place where they are not threatened by plough or feet.  Should a child come and break one from its roots, it is only to blow seeds to new life—toward a new flower, insignificant and unique in a formidable environment.  I am reassured by the presence of this weed.  It persists in a world that has come to believe nature is another phenomenon for our pleasure or to be controlled.  There are people who still recognize how plants can help us.  Either way, the dandelion does not mind if it is overlooked, if its fans compose only a small percentage of the human population.  Humans are experts at exploitation so maybe the dandelion prefers to keep a low profile, dominating those fields where people only come by in speeding cars, drivers focused on where they have to be, not the green and yellow fields to the side.