It’s a day when our small world seems to be holding its breath, waiting for what’s to come.
It’s day when much of the state is already in flames, including three fires on the other side of these mountains, yet still uncomfortably close, all of them eating up acreage, the largest (and nearest) one growing exponentially and still at zero percent containment. The forecast this day is for catastrophic winds, and the weather folks are already describing it as potentially the most significant day in fire/weather recorded history for the state.
They don’t mean “significant” in a good way.
At the moment, the winds are low here, in relative terms: certainly more than a breeze, but nowhere near the force and fury of what’s to come. For now, the skies are blue and still clear of the haze of dust and smoke, a single puffy white cloud scudding across the middle of the southeastern sky; the grass is greening steadily, and all the trees save the aspens (always the last to leaf) are sprouting their own pale young green now. The alpine dandelions are already spreading alongside the cement outside Wings’s studio, and there are buds near ready to open on the lilacs soon.
Here, despite the wind, it’s all the promise of plant and petal, of growth and life and healing.
Just over the ridgelines, the promise this day is only of flames and smoke.
We are fortunate indeed.
This week’s Friday Feature consists of two works, both from Wings’s gemstone bead jewelry collections: one necklace; one coil bracelet. Both, despite names and identities more evocative of summer than of spring, nonetheless share in the shades of young green visible outside the window now. And both share in the promise of medicine to come.
We begin with the necklace, one which was in the fact the first in its larger series. It’s perfect for this season, all gentle hues and softly irregular edges, comprising some very old natural beads and a beautiful shimmering refraction of the light. From its description in The Beaded Hoop Collection in the Necklaces Gallery here on the site:
Petals of Summer Necklace
The petals of summer paint a warming world bright and new. Wings evokes the greening world and the gentle pink of the summer wildflowers with this bead necklace, a graduated collection of orbs and nuggets in shades of rose and jade. The strand is anchored at either end by tiny chips of brilliantly translucent peridot, highly polished yet still freeform and wild as the new growth of leaves. Each section leads to a short length of four round beads of green garnet in ethereal shades of gold and green and rose and wine, each small orb aswirl with shimmering inclusions. The garnet flows into textured nuggety lengths of rhodochrosite, lightly polished chips like geometric petals flowering of their own accord. The rhodochrosite beads flank the bold center section of the strand: sixteen perfect round spheres of unakite, small worlds marbled in the green of summer grass and the antique rose of Indian paintbrush. Beads are strung on sturdy but flexible wrapped bead wire and held with sterling silver findings. Strand is 18″ long, excluding findings (dimensions approximate). Designed jointly by Wings and Aji. First in The Beaded Hoop Collection. Coordinates with From Smallest Seeds earrings (sold). Another view shown at top.
Bead wire; sterling silver; unakite; rhodochrosite; green garnet; peridot
$375 + shipping, handling, and insurance
Aside from the dandelions and lilacs, both more usually blooms of May, most of our flowers, wild and otherwise, begin to show their petals in June. That’s not true so much in town, of course, but we have several small snowlines and just enough difference in elevation to delay ours until it’s a bit consistently warmer here.
The plus side of that phenomenon is that many of our wildflower species last well into autumn, and so we are able to harvest beauty into the cooler season and medicines to put up for the long winter ahead. And this work, for me, has always called to mind those medicines, particularly the colors of Indian paintbrush, which we normally begin to see here in June.
It’s a work the coordinates beautifully with an item in another of Wings’s gemstone bead series, a work similarly built around the animating spirit of medicine plants. From its description in The Coiled Power Collections of the Bracelets Gallery:
Tobacco Coil Bracelet
The spirit of generosity compels us to offer a gift when we seek a favor; it shows respect. It’s customary, when seeking the blessing of the spirits or the assistance of our fellow man or woman, especially an elder, to offer a small gift in the form of tobacco. It shows respect and gratitude, and assures the recipient that his or her assistance is not taken for granted. in our cultures, indigenous tobacco is its own plant, or mix of plants, and Wings summons their spirits with this coil bracelet in the colors of the plants themselves. Dark green fluorite nuggets, as deep in hue as raw emeralds, trace the center of the spiral; to either side, crystalline nuggets of bright lime green peridot, the color of the new plant, stretch outward; and at either end, the strand terminates in tiny green turquoise chips. Each segment of gems is separated by a short length of brilliant amber that glows like the lit bowl of a ceremonial pipe. Beads are strung on memory wire, which expands and contracts to fit nearly and size wrist. Jointly designed by Wings and Aji.
Memory wire; green fluorite; peridot; green turquoise; amber
$325 + shipping, handling, and insurance
In our cultures, the word (and use of) “tobacco” can mean many things: traditional tobacco, consisting of bearberry by itself or in combination with other plants; the plant the outside world knows now as tobacco; or even modern commercial tobacco, whether loose or in the form of cigarettes. It’s traditional, in many of our cultures, to present it as an offering, to the spirits, to an elder, to someone doing a favor or in exchange for something of value. It also has its own healing properties; Wings and I both smoke traditional tobacco to keep our lungs clear when allergy season here is at its worst (not here that I am not talking about modern commercial tobacco, but dried plants from the first category listed, above, which have anti-inflammatory effects).
And depending on the plant so labeled, tobacco has its own bright beauty, too. This coil was crafted in a way to make the association recognizeable even to those who don’t know our ways, from the green of the growing plant to the amber color of the processed portion — and, of course, its fiery glow when lit. It’s a little like having medicine always to hand, encircling your wrist like the caring touch of a friend.
As I have been writing, the winds have arrived. So, too, has the smoke plume from the fires to the south and southeast, now a giant wall of dirty white climbing the southeast sky and drifting across the ridgeline for miles. Most of the haze remains distant from us at the moment, although the air is a little less bright even here than it was only minutes ago.
This is a dangerous day, and there is much to pray for: people, animals, plants, habitat, all in the path of the flames now. Among our prayers must be the possibility of a land still alive once the fires are gone. There is potential; fire cleanses and cauterizes and permits healthy growth, but only when handled with the proper respect.
Colonialism’s climate catastrophe has been anything but respectful.
Now, the tees are bent nearly horizontal; a brown wall of dirt bulldozes its way across the land as another gust sweeps through. The smoke plume has spread drastically in the just the last few moments, and we know that this will be a long and terrible day for too much of this region and its inhabitants.
But the promise and plant and petal remains. When this wave of wildfires is done, we need to recommit ourselves to its fulfillment.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2022; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
