Serenity in the Japanese Garden

12th Century Bronze Buddha

One of our guests' favorite gardens is our Japanese Garden, which is notable for its age and that it was the first privately owned Japanese garden in North America. Mary Clark Thompson was a woman who lead the way in garden design to be sure.

And except for the waterlilies that appear in the garden's ponds during summer, this garden features no flowers. But that does not diminish its beauty. Much to the contrary, it enhances it as it allows the visitor to quietly take in the natural surroundings simply accented by stone lanterns, the Tea House, and of course, our 12th century bronze Japanese Buddha. If you talk to the guests about the garden, this larger than life-sized statue is the one piece of the garden that is almost always mentioned for the statue has an amazing and palpable serene presence.

The statue sits in the corner of the garden nearest to the Roman Bath -- always peaceful and always quiet. It is a peace that is infectious for most. But there is a story about this statue rumored to have taken place after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Supposedly two local men were going to destroy the statue with axes as some sort of punitive act for the bombing. And sure enough, there are two cuts in the chest of the statue that had to be created with a bladed instrument and some degree of force. But only two cuts.

Is the story real? I don't truly know but I've heard it from a couple of sources and it is at least part of the Sonnenberg lore some like to share. If it is true, why did the men stop at one stroke each? Did that peaceful gaze look down into their hearts and cool their thirst for vengeance? Perhaps.

Two cuts are visible on the statue's chest

Offerings often appear in the statue's hands

Marking the Day in Your Garden

Waiting for dawn at Stonehenge on the Winter Solstice (photo: Wikimedia: Mike Peel, www.mikepeel.net)

Tomorrow is the Winter Solstice. Here we will have a mere 8 hours & 59 minutes of daylight, our shortest of the year, with the sun raising at 7:38 am and setting at 4:37 pm (source). This is almost 6 and half hours less sunlight than we see on the Summer Solstice.

Our ancient ancestors marked these days well for their very survival was dependent upon knowing times to plant, harvest, animal migrations, livestock birthing, or other seasonal observances and the solar clock was steady and unchanging in marking the year for them. Structures such as the 5,000 year old Newgrange in Ireland and the Temple of Amun in Karnak, Egypt mark the winter solstice. Other sites are scattered about the entire world from many different peoples and eras that mark the solstices, equinoxes, stars, lunar cycles and more.

You can welcome the sun into your garden and landscape as well with very simple materials and techniques creating your own solar wheel calendar.

Marking the Solstice in Your Garden

1. Pick a spot with an unobstructed view to the eastern horizon. A 360 view is even better as you can see and mark sunsets if you wish, but you at least want to see the rising sun.
2. Get a stake with a length of rope loosely attached. Length is your choice as it will be half the diameter of the finished wheel calendar.
3. Push the stake into the spot that will be the center.
4. Materials used are up to you - purchased pavers, found river stones, decorative stakes, or anything else that suits your tastes and garden. There is no right or wrong answer.
5. And the exact design is also up to you. You can use smaller stones to mark the circle's circumference by placing a stone at the end of the rope every couple of feet (or as needed) around the circle's edge. I personally only marked the solstices and equinoxes and did not create a full circle.
6. Use the same process to mark the solstice - the rope should point directly from the center reference point to the spot where the sun break's the horizon at dawn. Put a special marker there. You can repeat throughout the year for other key days so save your stake and rope.
7. I like to use a large flat stepping stone for the center point. Something I can stand or sit on to see the sun rise over my marker on my marked days. Move the stone as needed to mark or remark days.

If you expand out the idea, whole garden areas could be created and aligned in this manner. This is a great activity to share with young people.

Mythical Spotlight: Pan

One of the things you will quickly realize when looking at the statuary and other carved art pieces that grace the Sonnenberg Estate is that many characters are from the Classical Mythology of Ancient Greece and Rome. It is rather like a Greco-Roman mythology who's-who. Here is a quick spotlight of one of those characters that can be seen at Sonnenberg.

Pan
Location: Rock Garden
Type: Free-standing Statue
Mythology Origin: Ancient Greece

Description:
Pan was the god of wild places and the patron deity of shepherds. He is depicted in much the same manner as a faun with the hindquarters and horns of a goat. Pan's origins are unclear. Some tales say he is the son of Hermes while others point to Zeus or other gods. Pan was also associated with music and he was said to have created the syrinx or panpipes. (The Sonnenberg statue shows Pan holding a set of these pipes.) Being a pastoral god, natural caves and grottos instead of man-made temples are where people worshipped him. Pan is said to be the origin of the word panic due to his terror-inducing shouts.

More Info:
Pan (Wikipedia)
Pan (Ancient History)
Pan (Theoi)

Pan overlooking the Rock Garden
(Click on image to see a larger view)

When is the Best Time to Visit?

You learn a lot about people answering the phone and fielding their questions. You learn that the disconnect with the natural world is pervasive and cross-generational as evidenced in the simple - yet very common - question, "When is the best time to visit the park?"

The real answer, which I always give first, is that there is no one time. And that the park is always beautiful and is an ever changing tapestry of sights, sounds, and scents. The natural world is a cycle not a single point in time - this is true even for the manicured, man-created ornamental gardens. Every day of every year has its own unique beauty and unique sights that will NEVER be exactly the same ever again. That too is nature.

"Always beautiful" always falls flat as an answer. The pause of dead-air on the phone or the blank stare if you are speaking in person tells you the listener is quite disappointed in the honest and true answer you have just given. An invisible and silent sigh crosses through your mind and you begin to tell about some of the sights to look for at different parts of the season. Even though you did not answer the question, they are satisfied with this information and move on. And that is so very sad because if they come only at those times, they are missing so much.

My real suggestion as to when to come is this: visit whenever you want and visit often. You will see much and start to learn the character of the place and find that beauty can be found here every day. You will also develop your own list of favorite times and sights which will certainly vary from mine.

It is the Small Things

Perhaps it is because I am a plant nerd and field identification is one of my great loves that I zero in small details so much. Of course it could be wired into my DNA as I'm from a long line of people that never failed to notice or forgot anything from the tiniest details to decade old feuds. (Thankfully, I am not cursed with hanging onto grudges forever.) And so to me, "God is in the details" - it is the small stuff that means the most and always catches my eye.

On a walk through Sonnenberg you can't help but to see the big things - the Italian Garden, the Mansion, the fountains, the ponds, the Tea House, and more. They are the iconic things, the historic treasures that thousands of people come to see every year. But in my walks, those are just backdrops. I see the tiny and ever changing minutia of the gardens and Nature in general. A bit of bark on moss. A green katydid on a daylily. Dew on a leaf and the patterned spread of lichen on a rock. Each with their own amazing beauty and incredible stories to wonder at.

I urge you on your next visit to stop for a moment and look. Really look. Become fully present in that one moment of seeing. You will be amazed by what you see when you drop - or elevate - to that level of seeing. Your visits will never be the same again.

Spring 2017

Self-planted violas sprinkled with evergreen pollen

Tulip tree's young leaves reaching out

Aloe in the Greenhouse

Paper Birch bark on pine needles

Weeping beech leaves opening
and looking like tiny fans

Copper Beech with blooms hanging
like earrings

Morel mushrooms in a quiet corner

The brick walkway dusted in
pollen from the Pinetum

One final thought....

Enjoying the view? If so, bring along some young people and share looking at the tiny stuff with them. The group of you will have a whole safari of exploration and fun. And young kids are really great at this kind of seeing and will undoubtedly point out things you never saw. I'll guarantee you that priceless memories will be made by all.

Learning More About the Thompsons

Archivist and Board Member, Barbara Stahl, recently did the presentation titled For the Love of Gardens: the Artistry of Mary Clark Thompson at the Naples Library. The was recorded and is included below. Enjoy!

All the Faces Looking Back at You

When you visit Sonnenberg Gardens and walk around the estate, something becomes abundantly clear: there are many sculpted faces looking back at you. So here is a bit of fun - how well do you know Sonnenberg? Can you place all these faces? These faces taken out of context makes this visual scavenger hunt deceptively difficult.

Face 1

Face 2

Face 3

Face 4

Face 5

Face 6

Face 7

Face 8

Face 9

Face 10

Face 11

Face 12

Face 13

Face 14

Face 15

Face 16