A PLANT STORY

 Plants and plant medicine is like an old friend moving in and out of my life. Growing up in Berkeley, California exposed me to the aromas of essential oils while wandering the streets with my elder cousins. I fell in love with plants as a teenager while living with my Grandparents. I learned how a plant’s spirit can soften one’s heart, as well as bring daily comfort and joy.

I turned to Acupuncture and Chinese herbs when my annual struggle with allergies affected my job performance as an artist and educator in my twenties and thirties. I also tried using a variety of Western herbal medicines with my youngest daughter. She struggled with insomnia, back pain and other ailments while she was a teenager. But with 4 urban children and a full-time job I had little time to care for plants.

My nephew rekindled my love of growing plants when he lovingly revived our neglected backyard. While traveling with friends through the Pacific Northwest, Grandma Dottie, a Makah elder of the Coast Salish people, introduced a small group of friends to her ceremonial practices and the gathering of medicines. She had us pray while gathering Usnea and then making tinctures. She then sent us on a search for Columbine and instructed us to plant it in our yards. That year, along with my nephew, we revived our garden in San Francisco. I focused on medicinal herbs and flowers. He planted exquisite succulents.

Grandma Dottie sparked my interest in making tinctures and planted the seed that made me daydream of gardens while I was teaching art in the public schools of San Francisco. I began studying herbal medicine part-time. After years of teaching, I followed my dream of immersing myself fully in the world of plants and plant medicine.

Fast forward to 2020. I wanted be an organic farmer. Yet not having land or additional helping hands led me in a different direction. When my school offered the Clinical Program I immediately signed up. It was love at first client! Connecting with people to share the magic of plants and the ability of plants to heal continues to be fulfilling. Teaching never left as I've taught in a variety of settings in the San Francisco Bay Area. I also mentor budding herbalists through my annual Intern/Mentor program.

In early 2020 I was obsessed with researching SARS2-COVID19 and shared what I learned with my Interns. The Stay-In-Place orders brought the gift of time to return to my garden. It has been the gift of balance, reciprocity, order, harmony, timelessness and joy. It is a time of great grief over deaths and the global response to police brutality. Yet I am greeted by a bounty of roses and other flowers. The mini-forest of bay, pine, fir, CA buckeye, oak, and cedar trees bring peace while the storm of life roars around us. Visiting birds enjoy the cherries and other fruits while singing greetings to the sun each morning or welcoming the coming dusk. Whether I am weeding, helping new seeds germinate or just basking in the silence of my garden I am thankful to get dirt in my fingernails, feel the sun on my skin, listen to the wind or raindrops and bask in another day of life, thankful to breathe.