Whispering of Willows 51

By Dr. Anna Zhao

Most of the plants in the clinic garden have sprouted. The tiny willow branch I casually pushed into the soil last year has grown thicker than a chopstick. Many fruit trees are blossoming. Last month, Dr. Ali invited Mark, a famous horticulturist to prune the branches. Every time Mark's scissors clicked, my heart trembled. Branches full of buds snipped away appearing like cutting off a fetus from its mother’s womb. But Mark emphasized that only by removing all the weak, overcrowded, and cross-growing branches, will permit these fruit trees to fully bloom and bear more fruit. If the branches are too close to one another, the ventilation and light transmission are compromised, making it difficult for plants to focus their energy on producing new, healthy shoots and branches allowing them to thrive.

This reminds me of the art of painting - especially Chinese landscape painting, where the use of blank space is an often-employed technique. My favourites are often ink works with small areas of ink carefully looming in white expanses – much like the interplay of the north shore mountains and clouds this morning. The ink captures to subject matter, but it is the white expanses that add the vitality. When admiring paintings in the museum, I have the habit of staring at the blank spaces in them. I wonder: When Mark was pruning, was it also to leave blank spaces for the plants? By increasing the space between branches, more light enters the interior – like blank space in painting - therefore increasing the overall health and vitality of the plants and the yard.

There are times I stare at my formula for an herbal medicine. The combination of the herbs occasionally can be a very short list, sometimes only 4 or 5 herbs. Yes, a short formula, but its vitality is rippling...Does even an herbal formula need to have blank space, while one that is too big too messy might disorient the flow of essential energy?

After my father passed away, no matter how busy, every few days, I make a long-distance phone call to talk with my mother. Every time she chatters about trivial matters that I have heard hundred of times. I don’t interrupt her. I simply listen with attention, and joke a bit from time to time. One day she sighed, "I am old now, and my personality has changed. I used to be quite outgoing, but now I don't like chatting with most people anymore. Sometimes I get irritated when I hear voices."

I hurried to ask, "Do you not want to hear my voice, too?"

"No," she answered affirmatively, "I feel your voice is the only soothing one. When you call, I never want to hang up."

"How about I give you a short call every day then?"

"No, this is just right; leaving a few days between calls is perfect so I have something to look forward to," she said, "When I know you will call me that day, I simply wait by the phone. I carry my phone with me wherever I go, even to the bathroom, so I don’t miss your call."

I was very moved when I heard this, and quietly thought to myself, is it possible that even my mother's subconscious mind has realized that it is necessary to leave blank spaces with phone calls?

My favorite book is called "The Little Prince". His new friend, the fox, once said to the little prince, “It would be better to return at the same hour. If, for example, you came at four o’clock in the afternoon, then at three o’clock I shall begin to be happy. I shall feel happier and happier as the hour advances. At four o’clock, I shall already be worrying and jumping about. I shall show you how happy I am! But if you come at just any time, I shall never know at what hour my heart needs to be ready to greet you . . . One must observe the proper rites . . .”

Does friendship also need blank space?

Every day I palpate patient's bodies. When I find stiff, hardened or kinked locations, I consider them points to be treated.

I wonder if even the body needs to have blank spaces? When we eat too much, or exert ourselves too much, slowly our body becomes like an overcrowded room, messy and cluttered. A supple body is a body with blank spaces.

If people in the city are not as healthy as those living in the countryside, is it because the space between urban people is too tight? Overcrowding leaves no blank spaces. Wild plants and animals automatically space themselves to gain optimum development. For us, forests, flowers, springs, creeks, and open sky are so important because they are the blank space left in nature, where our spirit flows.

I have a patient who wants to lose weight. In addition to her treatments, I keep telling her: you need to get more sunlight, you need to do more tapping, stretching, sweating, exercising, soaking your feet in hot water, talk less, eat less overall, eat less sweets, you need to have regular bowel movements, the bladder needs to be obstruction free, you need to destress by strolling more in the forest...

She, loving to get to the bottom of things, often asked: "Why, Dr. Anna? Why do you want me to do this?"

I think next time I will smile and say to her: My dear friend, go take a look at a Chinese landscape painting and see if you can figure out the why.