Tag: Old World

Rock-a-Bye

 

Ahhh, wundaful west and wewaxation, as Elmer Fudd might have said, referring to wonderful rest and relaxation. As the weather warms, there can be few finer ways to gain satisfying rest and relaxation than lying in a hammock. Scientists have not studied a great deal the quality of sleep we get while in a hammock, but what little they have gleaned is that the rocking motion of a hammock along with the lack of pressure points on the sleeper’s body promotes deeper, more restful sleep than average.

 

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Ahhh, living the dream! A hammock on Kuata of the Yasawa Group of islands in the Western Division of Fiji. Photo by Isderion.

Hammocks are not sophisticated technology, though there are options available now with some technology such as lights built into them. A hammock in its basic form without a stand, the kind meant to be strung between two trees or posts, is sleep technology going back centuries and invented in the New World. A net of ropes, sometimes with a length of fabric woven in and sometimes using spreader bars at both ends for the ropes, is suspended from two supports like a sling for the sleeper or napper. It is the sling suspension that does away with pressure points. There is not a lot of hard scientific evidence to support the claim, but people with joint problems such as arthritis do often report the lack of pressure points helps them sleep more comfortably. Judge for yourself if and when you have the opportunity to doze off in a hammock.

How is it that after all the years of technological expertise and research spent on improving conventional beds, the simple hammock remains a more comfortable way to rest yet has never seen widespread adoption for every night sleeping except among sailors on old sailing ships or campers staying in the woods? The portability and light weight of hammocks has worked to their advantage for both sailors and campers, but for people in homes that hasn’t mattered as much as permanence and ease of entry and exit for old people and invalids. It is also pretty nigh impossible to engineer a hammock for comfortable long term use by two people at once. In the home, therefore, the hammock has been relegated to the same niche of peculiarity as the bean bag chair, more so really, since the great majority of folks consider hammocks suitable for outdoor lounging only.

What a shame then that the better quality sleep and more comfortable lounging afforded by hammocks is experienced by many only on summer days in their backyard or on vacations to warm resorts. Though a soothing experience, it’s not entirely idyllic. Going to sleep outdoors under the stars makes for a good snooze until the small hours, when it often gets chilly and dewy. For those lucky enough to have a deep, covered porch on their house, the six to eight foot deep kind that is styled more properly a veranda, and is rarely built even on expensive houses anymore since the general adoption of air conditioning, those lucky folks can sling hammocks outdoors under the eaves, which help to keep the dew from settling on them as they snooze happily away, perhaps pulling a light blanket closer around them to ward off the chill before dawn. A comfortable hammock, a book printed on paper, and a tall, cool drink make summer heat bearable, and all three can be a respite from the technological world we inhabit now.
— Techly

 

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No One Gets Out Alive

 

There’s a wonderful feeling that comes with stepping outside into the cool of the evening after a hot day. There are a lot of little things that go toward making life pleasant if a person has been lucky in their circumstances. Living past middle age into one’s sixties and seventies is a great blessing, and while there may be pain associated with such longevity, most people would accept the trade-off. Asking for more life is almost too much. There are others waiting.

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“Into the Jaws of Death”. United States soldiers of the 1st Infantry Division wade ashore on Omaha Beach, France, on the morning of June 6, 1944. During the initial landings on D-Day, as many as two thirds of the soldiers in some infantry companies became casualties. Photo by Coast Guard Chief Photographer’s Mate Robert F. Sargent.


In the Native American cultures of North America, everything is living and everything eventually returns into the cycle of life when it dies, including people. In Old World cultures, and particularly those of Europe and the Mediterranean Basin, almost everything is regarded as dead or inert, and when people die their passing has finality. No one in either culture knows for certain what happens after death, but it seems evident to some people that in a living world where a person is one part joining a river flowing to the sea, there is less terror in death, and more an acceptance of it as a metamorphosis into another part of life.
— Izzy

 

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Walls of Ivy

 

The middle of winter is time for garden maintenance projects the growing season doesn’t allow time for, such as keeping English Ivy (Hedera helix) at bay by pulling it off trees and structures, or yanking it out of the ground. The idea of eradicating it altogether is best left to fantasy. Besides, some gardeners, like the ones who brought the plant from the Old World to the New in the Eighteenth Century, harbor no ill will toward English Ivy and instead choose to encourage it’s growth. Those who look on it as a pest and choose to discourage it can be left wondering why anyone in their right mind would plant it next to a building and allow it to destructively sink its roots into crevices in mortar or siding.

 

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English Ivy in winter climbing a tree in Poland; photo by Agnieszka Kwiecień.

 

The misconception about ivy’s destructiveness is due to confusion about names, and presents a good argument for learning the scientific names of plants rather than relying on common names. English Ivy, the invasive pest which produces aerial rootlets that find their way into a building’s cracks as it climbs upward, is not to be confused with Boston Ivy (Parthenocissus tricuspidata), which uses suckers to adhere to a building and is therefore less harmful. Boston Ivy is also an introduction from the Old World to the New, though it has a native relative in the Virginia Creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia). Boston Ivy, not English Ivy, is the vine that decorates old brick buildings around New England, and particularly on college campuses, where it lends its name to the Ivy League.
Boston ivy (Parthenocissus tricuspidata)
Boston Ivy in autumn, South campus, State University of NY at Buffalo; photo by Y.G. Lulat.

 

It is no easy or safe task pulling English Ivy off a building where some ill-advised previous gardener had planted it or allowed it to grow under the impression that he or she was evoking some of the atmosphere of tweedy academia. Depending on the building construction and its soundness, chunks of mortar or shards of wood siding are apt to come loose with the ivy where its rootlets have dug in. It’s best to cut the vines at ground level and let them die back in place, drying and shrinking in the process, and then after several months have passed, pulling away the remaining dried bits once they have lost their hold on the structure.
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Wrigley Field, Chicago – Right Field Wall with Boston Ivy; photo by Flickr user wallyg.
Some gardeners think they can manage English Ivy clambering on a well maintained building. They may believe its evergreen and tough-as-nails attributes are worth the trade-off of constant vigilance over the safer alternative of planting the deciduous and better behaved Boston Ivy. More power to them if they think they can keep an eye on it! It is far more likely, however, that where you see English Ivy on a building it is there because someone didn’t know any better and, relying on common names, thought one ivy wasn’t much different than another and so let it go thinking it lent the place a touch of classy greenery. An excellent case can be made here for paying attention to scientific names for plants rather than dismissing them as the affectations of pedantic know-it-alls, and it’s a lesson those gardeners have learned all too well who have spent countless winter hours tugging out skeins of Hedera helix where it has tangled itself into absolutely everything.
― Izzy

 

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