the Yerba Mate Tea Gourd

These are not sugar plums. These are the fairies.

If it were not for the fairies we would not be thinking of sugar plums.

If it were not for the fact that the fairies have kept all of the sugar plums to themselves--or else have been so slipshod at arranging a harvest of the little things--we'd've been tooth and belly-aching with the over-eating of sugar-plum laden goodies for hundreds of years now.

Nevertheless... we leafy green gods of herbology do not pretend to know all about the erstwhile habits of the spry and fruity, pink, wand-toting bugs. They flit hither and thither while we slurp lazily in the undergrowth; content to chaw on bitter leaf and acrid stem, smell wafting scent of smoking wood, scorch our whiskers with steaming stream and inhale breath of bursting bubbles. The faeries are but a glimpse of sun-reflected heaven on evening cloud to us. Even the nutcracker is a down-to-earth beast in comparison to the faeries; choosing to put his faith in the hard and substantive: the "real" nut. It takes him to high heights. Verily! to dance with the faeries themselves. But everyone knows a nut; how droll. Sometimes it's enough for an aspiring and hard-working bird just to know there's work to do. The faeries could care less for that type of solace. The faeries have a whole other occupation the high-flying nutcracker only rubs elbows with and we bitter gourd-scraping rodents know nothing about--nor want to.

Think about it: we haven't, each one of us, even found all of nature's flavours of the world... and yet we have invented a thousand artificial flavors to take the place of the one's we already know! Artificial cherry flavor--my gosh!--evidently because cherries are so elusive!

It may be simple-minded... but we are trying, turning over, every leaf--tasting to make certain that every one is like the last. WE won't have time to douse them with a sugar-plummy elixir any time soon now; that is a heady occupation for faeries of high mind. Just knowing, for us, that there is a flavor we do not possess the knowledge to understand is a better state of being for us. Perhaps it is the mindset of a bush-living vegetarian to shun the artifice and seek the out-of-mind reality... however we prefer to think of it as superior emotional protection... for a fickle faery could spend its life searching for an elusive imaginary flavor and move right on to the next or (even worse!) invent an artificial one when the ultimate one didn't make the head dance with it.

But we would be so terribly heart-tweaked (if we admit to it!) Like the child who dreams of elusive sugar-plums and awakes to find: ice on the inside of his window, a family that loves him--making murmuring sounds--fast asleep, a cold wood floor, a sense of new wonder grown from desire... and almost, if he could breathe a bit deeper, the smell of sugar plums! We silently admit to ourselves that we like the idea of tempering our life with bitter herbs... with the thought that there are sugar plum faeries hoarding the best flavors of all just to themselves. Have a happy holiday season and to all a good mate!

Labels: artificial flavors, bitter, fairies, flavored, flavour, gourd, green, happy holiday, herb, herbology, nutcracker, sugar plum, sugar plum fairy, yerba mate