Today's walking was a walking of longing. As the sun heats the earth in the southern hemisphere, I watch the plantain yellow and wilt, and the tips of the gum trees lose their red nascent flushes, and long for the north. Maybe it's because I am actually heading to my other heart home soon that my thoughts fly to English woods, but I miss the wild herbs and plants, and lament the lack of them here in Australia. Everything is cultivated, it seems, and the wild plants I know so little of, lacking as I do the indigneous knowledge that I do. I tend nettles and sage, elderflowers and lavender, lemon balm and mugwort, and wish I could pluck it from wild spaces instead.

Whilst I might wish that I had indigenous plant knowledge, my roots are European, and there is no escaping that. I long for woods and valleys where I can pick wild plants, seasonally, tenderly, picking the blooms in the summer months after their long hibernation mid year. Everything does feel upside down here, sometimes. This is what can happen to the children and grandchildren of migrant families, especially the well travelled ones who have identified with ancestral lands.

Perhaps it was because my winter was so busy that I missed the dark hibernation time that winter gifts me. Too much time was spent busy in bright lights, responding to the loudness of the world and failing to make space to listen to the things brewing under the surface of me. I desperately want to rewind to June, and truly tend seeds in the dark soil of my mind.

And so I imagine wild spaces whilst I pluck cultivated herbs to make a medicinal tea, a calming one in the frantic heat that has South Australia on high fire alert and the weather swirls above, ready to burn the tips of my broad beans whilst the mint cowers under the dying artichokes.

Lemon balm nestles next to the mint and peppermint in my garden, and it is overtaking my mother's cottage garden in great swathes of green, so I had plenty to dry. For hundreds of years, melissa officianilis has been used as a calmative, and though it makes my husband anything but calm (he cannot stand the smell, perhaps because he pulled so much of it from gardens in his other life as a gardener) I find it a gentle sister. It is known to enhance mood and cognitive performance, probably due to it's calming effects.¹ .

Calendula I must admit I add for the pop of orange colour, and I adore drying handfuls of them as they look so darn pretty. I love it for it's adaptablity - not only does has it adapted well as a migrant here, or easily slides into summers salads or winter stews, but it has multiple uses, from wound healing to stimulating the lymph, supporting our immune system. Not only is it a winter tonic herb, but it is also a cooling one for summer as well as bringing summer cheer with it's brightness.

From one sun associated plant to another, with chamomile, like calendula, has sun shaped blooms that have a place in my tea. The sun chases the blues away - an interesting thought, since the oils from both German and Roman chamomile have a blue tinge. The small soft and delicate blooms of chamomile have a subtley that seems to counter the knock your socks off scent of lavender, a sweetness that buzzes sweetly at the tips of my fingers as I pluck at the heads. Both flowers remind me of my roots. My German ancestry fills the quiet spaces of my mind when I cultivate chamomile. It seems poetic that the root word for the latin name for German Chamomile, matricacia, alludes to the mother and the idea of nurture through calm and gentleness. Well known as a nervous system sedative, it calms irritablity and restlessness, something that tends to rise in me at this time of the year as I finish up the term of work and vibrate with energy that does not always arise from a nourished place. I think of my grandmother's kitchen table, chamomile tea and thick slices of apple strudel, and wish she was still here. I think of my mother giving me chamomile tea with brandy to soothe my nerves before heading on a plane for the first time to Europe, landing in Germany.

The bees are loving the lavender. I do wish our beekeeper would come and check to see if we have honey yet - I am so impatient! Lavender flowers pair well with the lemony citrus flavours of lemon balm. Lavender is my favourite calming herb - like lemon balm, it calms the nervous system, and is fabulous for sleep - something I need even with the longer daylight hours and increasing yang energy of summer. Some cultures believed that the new day began with the onset of night. I love this idea - at nighttime, we are like the seed under the earth being nourished by rest, ready to bloom again in the day.

Calming Garden Tea

2 cups of dried lemon balm
1/4 cup calendula
1/4 cup lavender
1 cup chamomile

Mix, pour over hot water and steep for ten minutes before drinking.

What is your favourite soothing tea blend?

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