China Bayles' Book of Days (32 page)

• Marjoram: What a joyful day!

• Mustard seed: We have faith in our future.

• Myrtle: Our love is true.

• Red rose: Our desire is for each other.

• Rosemary: We will always remember this day.

• Sage: We will honor our home and keep it sacred.

• Thyme: We will be constant.

• Yarrow: Our love will be everlasting.

Read more about how to choose and use wedding herbs:
Herbs for Weddings & Other Celebrations: A Treasury of

Recipes, Gifts & Decorations
, by Bertha Reppert
The Language of Flowers,
by Kathleen Gips

Young men and maids do ready stand
With sweet Rosemary in their hands—
A perfect token of your virgin’s life.
To wait upon you they intend
Unto the church to make an end,
And God make thee a joyful wedded life.
—OLD BALLAD

JUNE 2

Today is the feast day of St. Elmo, the patron saint of sailors.

The ancient Chinese sailors who used ginger to prevent seasickness were probably right. Ginger’s anti-nausea action relieves motion sickness and dizziness (vertigo) better than the standard drug treatment, Dramamine, according to one study published in the British medical journal
Lancet
.

—MICHAEL CASTLEMAN, THE HEALING HERBS

Herbs for Travelers

It would be a shame to spoil that honeymoon cruise—or family vacation, or business travel—with a queasy stomach or other minor problem. But herbal help is on the way, with this trio of three tried-and-true remedies. Be sure to pack them in your take-along travel kit.

• Ginger. Commercial ginger capsules are probably the most convenient form of this herb for travelers, but a 12-ounce serving of ginger ale (the real thing, not artificially flavored) should contain enough ginger to do the trick. Another option: take powdered ginger in a small bottle, firmly capped. Use 2 teaspoons in a cup of very hot water. Steep ten minutes and sip. (Do not use ginger during pregnancy or breastfeeding.)

• Peppermint. This age-old remedy hasn’t been studied for its efficacy in soothing motion-sickness, but many herbalists prescribe it. Menthol (mint’s essential oil) is an antispasmodic, and soothes the smooth muscle lining of the digestive tract. It is an ingredient in many commercial stomach soothers.

• Marjoram. For take-along convenience, try a tincture of this stomach-calming herb. The recommended dose is ½ to 1 teaspoon, up to three times a day.

In addition to stomach-soothers, take along an herbal first aid kit. Include aloe vera for sunburn, minor burns, and chapping. Witch hazel is a natural FDA-approved astringent for scratches, scrapes, and insect bites. Tea tree oil is an effective antiseptic, and can treat athlete’s foot and other fungal infections. Arnica helps to ease bruises, sprains, and sore muscles.

Read more about these and other herbal helpers:

The Healing Herbs
, by Michael Castleman

These plants [marjorams] are easie to be taken in potions, and therefore to good purpose they may be used and ministred unto such as cannot brooke their meate [tolerate their food], and to such as have a sowre squamish and watery stomacke. . . .

—JOHN GERARD,
HERBAL,
1597

JUNE 3

The week before Pickle Fest, Fannie Couch usually runs a dozen pickling recipes in her newspaper column. Just for fun, I included a brief history of the cucumber, which found its true calling when it was soaked in salt, vinegar, and water, and turned into a pickle.

—A DILLY OF A DEATH: A CHINA BAYLES MYSTERY

“Fit Only for Cows”: A Brief History of the Cucumber

Cousin to the Persian melon, the cucumber has been around for at least three thousand years. The plant originated in India, migrated both east to China and west to the Mediterranean and Europe, and discovered America with Columbus, who carried seeds to Haiti in 1494. The Pilgrims planted cukes in their gardens, where they flourished enthusiastically, and the plant was off to a promising new career in North America.

But by the late 1600s, some in England began to worry that eating raw food might lead to illness, and the uncooked cucumber fell from grace. “This day Sir W. Batten tells me that Mr. Newhouse is dead of eating cowcumbers,” lamented Samuel Pepys in his famous diary. “Fit only for cows,” sniffed another writer.

But you could eat a cooked cucumber and live to tell the tale, especially if you cooked it according to the instructions in Mrs. Raffald’s remarkable 1769 cookbook,
The Experienced English Housekeeper
:

TO STEW CUCUMBERS

Peel off the outer rind, slice the cucumbers pretty thick, fry them in fresh butter, and lay them on a sieve to drain. Put them into a tossing pan with a large glass of red wine, the same of strong gravy, a blade or two of mace. Make it pretty thick with flour and butter and when it boils up put in your cucumbers. Keep shaking them and let them boil five minutes, be careful you don’t break them. Pour them into a dish and serve them up.

There. That ought to be safe enough. But wait! There’s another option! You might pickle them, for the pickling process was judged to be enough like cooking to redeem the cucumber from its raw sins. Voila! Pickles became the fad food of the eighteenth century, available in barrels in the coffee shops for snacking on the run.

Cucumbers were in great demand at the local apothecary shop, too, where they were an important pharmaceutical. The seeds were employed to treat inflammations of the bowel and urinary tract and to expel tapeworms, and the pulp and juice were used to ease skin inflammations and treat sunburns. Today, beauty consultants in exclusive spas often recommend placing cooling, soothing slices of cucumber over tired and inflamed eyes, and cucumbers are served raw (gasp!) in the very best restaurants.

Samuel Pepys would be amazed.

Leave cucumbers alone
They’ll chill you to the bone.
—TRADITIONAL LORE

JUNE 4

Keeping your body healthy is an expression of gratitude to the whole cosmos: the trees, the clouds, everything.

—THICH NHAT HANH

Tinctures You Can Make

If you’ve been reading about herbal healing, you’re no doubt aware of tinctures, preparations in which the herbs have been steeped in alcohol. Taking an herb in tincture form is often convenient, especially if you’re traveling. Purchased tinctures are usually fairly expensive, but you can make them at home, using herbs you’ve grown in the garden—and you’ll have the satisfaction of using your own herbs to create something that may benefit your health. This recipe recommends alcohol; you can also choose vinegar and glycerin. If that’s what you prefer, please consult one of the books below for instructions.

WHAT YOU NEED:

• a quart glass jar with a lid, and a wooden spoon

• 2 cups alcohol (brandy, vodka, gin)

• plastic strainer and unbleached coffee filter

• bottles (dark amber with droppers preferred)

• labels

• herb of your choice: 4 oz. dry or 6 oz. fresh. Consult a reliable herbal for guidance (see the list below). Be sure to use the recommended part of the plant: i.e. for echinacea, you’ll use the root; for Saint-John’s-

wort, the leaf.

HOW TO DO IT:

Fill the jar with the herb you’ve chosen. Pour the alcohol over the plant material, pushing it down with the wooden spoon until it is completely covered, adding more alcohol if necessary. Cover the jar and label it with the date, the herb, and the kind of alcohol you’ve used. Put it on a dark shelf for 3-4 weeks, shaking occasionally and checking to see whether you need to add alcohol. Make sure that the plant material remains covered at all times. Strain, using the plastic strainer first, and then the coffee filter. Discard the herbs. Rebottle and label.

Read more about choosing herbs and making tinctures:

Complete Illustrated Guide to the Holistic Herbal
, by David Hoffmann

Herbal Healing for Women: Simple Home Remedies for Women of All Ages
, by Rosemary Gladstar

Making Plant Medicine
, by Richard Cech

It’s a wonderful feeling to stock your medicine chest with herbal products you have made yourself. And it’s such a good feeling to know you’re helping carry on an ancient tradition of healing.

—ROSEMARY GLADSTAR, HERBAL HEALING FOR WOMEN

If you are not ready to alter your way of life, you cannot be healed.

—HIPPOCRATES

JUNE 5

A garden of herbs is a garden of things loved for themselves in their wholeness and integrity. It is not a garden of flowers, but a garden of plants which are sometimes very lovely flowers and are always more than flowers.

—HENRY BESTON, HERBS AND THE EARTH

More than Flowers

Aloe vera is one of our most helpful plant allies, but it’s certainly not treasured for its yellow or orange flowers (it only blooms under optimum conditions). It is highly valued because of the healing properties of its leaves, used since the dawn of history to treat infections, burns and wounds, bites and stings, acne, and as a laxative. Aloe even ignited a war. In 332 BCE, Alexander the Great learned that this pharmaceutical treasure was growing on an island off the coast of Somalia and dispatched his troops to capture the island—and the plant.

GROWING ALOE VERA

Aloe looks like a cactus, but it belongs to the lily family. It is a fine pot plant, ideal for a sunny kitchen window, and it requires little water or extra care. You can grow it outdoors in a well-drained patch of garden, if you’ll remember to bring it in when the temperature drops below about 40°F. The aloe will produce offshoots called pups, which you can repot and give to a grateful friend. Make that friends, plural. When an aloe is happy, it pups often.

THE BAND-AID PLANT

It’s the healing gel in aloe’s leaves that works its herbal magic. To treat a wound or a scrape, wash it with soap and water. Then cut off one of the aloe’s lower leaves, slice it lengthwise (as if you were filleting it) and apply. The gel forms a protective coating on the skin as it dries—hence its name: the Band-Aid plant. Modern scientific research confirms the plant’s efficacy as a wound healer. Aloe juice is no longer recommended as a laxative, and the aloe latex (the yellow sap from just beneath the skin) should not be taken internally.

COSMETIC ALOE

It is said that aloe was one of Cleopatra’s beauty secrets, and it is still used in cosmetics and soap. To make a nighttime aloe-enriched moisturizer, blend together thoroughly (use a blender or beater) 3 tablespoons almond oil and 2 tablespoons aloe gel. In a double boiler, melt 2 tablespoons liquid lanolin and blend in the aloe-almond mixture. (You can purchase liquid lanolin in a drugstore. It is a heavy-duty moisturizer with the consistency of petroleum jelly.) Remove from heat and add 2 tablespoons rose water, beating until the mixture has cooled. Spoon into a small jar with a lid.

Read more about the virtues of aloe:

Aloe Vera: Nature’s Soothing Healer
, by Diane Gage

JUNE 6

Sometimes the tiniest flowers smell the sweetest.

—EMILIE BARNES

The smell of sweet herbs and all kinds of wholesome growth made the whole air a great nosegay.

—CHARLES DICKENS, BLEAK HOUSE

Tussie-Mussies

The word
tusmose
, or
tussie-mussie
, first appeared in English about 1440. By 1558, it was “tuzziemuzzie, a sweete posie, a nose-gay.” Around the same time, it was a “tuttie.” But whatever this small, handheld bouquet was called, it was always associated with the “sweet” herbs that warded off the unpleasant smells that offended sensitive noses in the heat of a London summer.

By Victorian times, these little nosegays were not so necessary for “gaying” the nose, but had become popular personal gifts. Every lady who understood the language of flowers (probably a prerequisite to being a lady) would have understood the special, secret meaning of each herb or blossom. The small bouquet was arranged in a circlet of tidy symmetry, with an added ribbon or touch of lace, and presented in a silver holder.

HOW TO MAKE A TUSSIE-MUSSIE

Start with a single rose or a daisy, or a cluster of violets. Holding the stems, surround it with a circlet of small green leaves, such as rosemary, thyme, fern, or laurel. Tuck in a few forget-me-nots, lilies of the valley, violets, and silvery lambs ears. Other silver-gray sprigs, such as artemisia, add a nice accent, while scented geraniums, basil, and mint lend their sweet scent. Secure the stems with a rubber band or floral tape and push them through a slit in a lacy paper doily. For an elegant touch, use a silvery tussie-mussie holder (available at some florist shops and on-line). If you like, include a card with the meanings of the flowers and herbs. And be sure to point out to the recipient that when the tussie-mussie has dried, it can be used as an attention-getting table decoration.