Cosmos Bipinnnatus:
Garden Cosmo or Mexican Aster
By Patricia Maher
Trituration Proving
Toronto, Canada
October 25 2012
Three provers: two women, one man, ages 48-63.
Master Prover: Jan Scholten
Natural History:
This is one of three proving that were conducted simultaneously in Toronto, Canada. The plant was procured from a private home garden in Buffalo NY.
Kingdom Plantae
Sub-kingdom Tracheobionta
Super-division Spermatophyta
Division Magnoliophyta
Class Magnoliopsida—Dicotyledons
Subclass Asteridae
Order Asterales
Family Asteracea
Genus Cosmos Cav.—cosmos
Species Cosmos bipinnatus Cav. –garden cosmos
Cosmos bipinnatus, commonly called the garden cosmos or Mexican aster, is a medium-sized flowering herbaceous plant native to Mexico. Spanish priests grew them in their mission gardens in Mexico, where they were inspired by the symmetrical nature of their petals and christened the flower "Cosmos," the Greek word for harmony or ordered universe. (Further exploration of the word “cosmos” reveals the following: according to Wikipedia, “today, the word is generally used as a synonym of the Latin loanword "Universe" …In many Slavic languages such as Russian, Bulgarian, and Serbian, the word ‘cosmos’ means the "outer space". In Mandarin Chinese, cosmos and universe are both translated as… space-time…”) The species and its varieties and cultivars are popular as an ornamental plant in temperate climate gardens. It can also be found in natural areas in much of North America. Cosmos bipinnatus is considered a half-hardy annual, although plants may reappear via self-sowing for several years. The plant height varies from 2–6 ft . When flowering, the plant can become top-heavy. This problem is alleviated when grown in groups, as the bipinnate leaves interlock, and the colony supports itself.
The leaves of Cosmos plant are simple, pinnate, or bipinnate, and are arranged in opposite pairs and finely cut into threadlike segments. The flowers bloom twice a year and only once in the season, and die with first frost. They can regrow in the following spring if seed falls on bare ground, and have achieved weed or invasive status in some parts of the US. Cosmos flowers occur in pink, white, maroon, and pink with deep pink flares. They are produced in a capitulum, surrounded by a ring of broad ray florets and a center of disc florets. Cosmos flowers, 2-4 inches in diameter, come in brightly colored single or double flowers.
Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmos_bipinnatus
http://aggie-
horticulture.tamu.edu/archives/parsons/flowers../cosmos/cosmos.html http://www.theflowerexpert.com/content/aboutflowers/tropicalflowers/cosmos-pink
Toronto, Canada
October 25 2012
Three provers: two women, one man, ages 48-63.
Master Prover: Jan Scholten
Natural History:
This is one of three proving that were conducted simultaneously in Toronto, Canada. The plant was procured from a private home garden in Buffalo NY.
Kingdom Plantae
Sub-kingdom Tracheobionta
Super-division Spermatophyta
Division Magnoliophyta
Class Magnoliopsida—Dicotyledons
Subclass Asteridae
Order Asterales
Family Asteracea
Genus Cosmos Cav.—cosmos
Species Cosmos bipinnatus Cav. –garden cosmos
Cosmos bipinnatus, commonly called the garden cosmos or Mexican aster, is a medium-sized flowering herbaceous plant native to Mexico. Spanish priests grew them in their mission gardens in Mexico, where they were inspired by the symmetrical nature of their petals and christened the flower "Cosmos," the Greek word for harmony or ordered universe. (Further exploration of the word “cosmos” reveals the following: according to Wikipedia, “today, the word is generally used as a synonym of the Latin loanword "Universe" …In many Slavic languages such as Russian, Bulgarian, and Serbian, the word ‘cosmos’ means the "outer space". In Mandarin Chinese, cosmos and universe are both translated as… space-time…”) The species and its varieties and cultivars are popular as an ornamental plant in temperate climate gardens. It can also be found in natural areas in much of North America. Cosmos bipinnatus is considered a half-hardy annual, although plants may reappear via self-sowing for several years. The plant height varies from 2–6 ft . When flowering, the plant can become top-heavy. This problem is alleviated when grown in groups, as the bipinnate leaves interlock, and the colony supports itself.
The leaves of Cosmos plant are simple, pinnate, or bipinnate, and are arranged in opposite pairs and finely cut into threadlike segments. The flowers bloom twice a year and only once in the season, and die with first frost. They can regrow in the following spring if seed falls on bare ground, and have achieved weed or invasive status in some parts of the US. Cosmos flowers occur in pink, white, maroon, and pink with deep pink flares. They are produced in a capitulum, surrounded by a ring of broad ray florets and a center of disc florets. Cosmos flowers, 2-4 inches in diameter, come in brightly colored single or double flowers.
Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmos_bipinnatus
http://aggie-
horticulture.tamu.edu/archives/parsons/flowers../cosmos/cosmos.html http://www.theflowerexpert.com/content/aboutflowers/tropicalflowers/cosmos-pink

Commentary:
“How does it feel
How does it feel
To be on your own
With no direction home
Like a complete unknown
Like a rolling stone? “
Excerpt from Like A Rolling Stone, Bob Dylan
“ One sees clearly only with the heart. What is essential is invisible to the eye.”
Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince
The proving showed the utter aptness of the flower’s name, Cosmos. This is a remedy about being very alienated, very far out there, not understood except through the heart. Cosmo Cramer, the character from the TV sitcom Seinfeld, is a perfect exemplar of an aspect of this remedy—being so eccentric that you can no longer connect. As the provers said, “these plants are so far away they can’t speak,” and “maybe if you’re out of this world they speak to you…” There were many references to outer space, the stars, the universe – all appropriate in light of the plant’s origin.
In an extraordinary interaction, one prover repeatedly argued with the plant, demanding to know why the plant had never spoken to her. (“You never even say good morning!”) She was demanding communication in a way that the pant could not deliver. Interestingly, this same prover was able to manifest alienation, grief, and desire to “be part of” which speaks to the deep desire for connection in this remedy. Once she felt part of the universe, she also expressed a sense of balance and grounded-ness which speaks to the original Greek meaning of the word ‘cosmos” as “ordered universe.”
Another theme that emerged was that of secrets, but not in a clandestine way. It was more reflective of information that needed to be shared so that commonality could be established.
Interestingly, Florence Nightingale emerged as a distinct theme. Two of the provers were nurses, and they thought the mention of this nursing icon was simply a way for the two provers to find commonality. Upon closer examination, Nightingale was not only a radical reformer in patient care, but she was also a religious radical, believing that all sinners had equal access to heaven. (Keep in mind this plant was christened “Cosmos” by priests.) Florence Nightingale may represent an aspect of this remedy – the visionary and humanist who is eccentric yet able to act concretely on her beliefs, not becoming so out there that she loses her head. As one of the provers articulated, if you can let go of your alienation, you feel connected…. Even if you are ahead of your time!
The Nightingale itself -- the bird -- is also connected symbolically to poetry and the Muse. Who is more alienated than the poet yet who is able to make exquisite connections? Who else brings the stars to earth?
According to Jan Scholten’s plant system:
666-44.17
Series: Lanthanide of the lanthanide series
Clade: Angiospermae; Asteranae; Campanulidae; Asterales; Asteraceae; Heliantheae; Cosmos
Phase: 4; sub-phase 4
Stage: 17
Proving:
C1
2: When I looked at it my first thought was they are the least talkative of plants. They don’t say much. It’s the first plant I planted in the place I first did homeopathy. I planted them along the path. They bring an airy feeling.
3: They sway.
1: Innocence and lightness.
2: Cottage gardens.
1: Lace –like.
3: I’m feeling sensitive to hearing – a buzz in my ear.
2: Like you were drinking last night.
3: No didn’t actually – I just had a little wine with dinner.
3: (to prover 1) I like the pastel colors on your nails.
2: They come in pastel colors (the Cosmos flowers).
3: Monet –like.
2: I always feel high in a proving; altered. I just got a whiff of it.
2: My biggest complaint about this plant is that they have nothing to say.
2: I had tons of them -- no one is saying hello to you.
1: They speak volumes to me. Favorite plant, the petals reach out like rays of the sun.
3: They are for people who don’t say much.
2: They can hold secrets. They aren’t blabbermouths. They hold them going in and coming out.
1: Feeling hot.
3. Susun Weed is an herbalist I heard her speak recently.
2: Freud has a book about last names and professions.
1: Like Dr. Blood.
3: Dr. Colon, Dr. Anal.
3: She (Susun Weed) does research about medicinal herbs and she doesn’t like sick people. People listen to her.
2: Who wouldn’t listen to someone named Weed?
3: She is “out there.” Her opinions are out there – too far out in the cosmos – like Cosmos the plant.
2: (To prover1) I do like your nail color.
1: I attended something where women talked about weeds. Look at what weeds are around you and it may point to what you need as a healing.
3: They sneak up on you.
1: I learned weeds are really there to help.
2: I feel heavy.
1: My hearing is very acute. Like Helium? Nitrous oxide? Inside my head feels bigger than my head.
2: Heaviness around my chest. Not oppressive but a heavy fullness, like hands are pressing gently. It is not disturbing.
2: I feel really grounded, connecting downward.
2: The giggly feeling has gone away.
3: Feeling heavier in the chair, leg feels heavy on the other leg. Draggy. [Obs: he closes eyes]
2: Dizzy.
3: Dizzy. A slippery dizziness, falling to left.
2: If I stood up I’d list to the left.
3: I have my eye on that popcorn over there.
2: I’m not in the least bit hungry.
1: Delicate.
2: I think you should speak up [to the Cosmos flower].
1: I think you have issues [to Prover 2].
2: [to the Cosmos] I’m sick of you not saying anything, you secret- carrier, you.
1: Someone needs to carry secrets.
2: Let’s see what words we can make out of Cosmos.
Observation: Prover 2 writes words on a paper plate, rough anagrams of Cosmos: Osmosis Moss
2: Osmosis – you’re my brother.
1: Osmosis.
3: Fluff, popcorn.
3: Moss is so soft but it gets damp and heavy when wet.
1: I like their buds [referring to Cosmos].
2: I do too.
3: Popcorn was good for about 30 seconds and now it’s starting to taste like crap. It’s kind of greasy.
1: Space – we’re talking about space. It’s copulating/populating.
3: It seeds itself.
1: Who needs men?
2: Como—like Lake Como.
1: Perry Como. Is he still alive?
3: My birthday is the 20th.
2: One of my brothers has that birthday, you are my brother.
2: What is this thing that I want this plant to say something?
2: Why are they called Cosmos?
3: They’re screaming out.
2: Maybe they have the secrets of the Cosmos.
1: See—the blossoms are like stars.
1: [playing with plant] “Hello! Hello!”
1: They remind me of carrots.
2: I have to take this cuff bracelet off [while triturating].
1: Take it off baby, take it off….
2. I’m working up a sweat.
2: Cosmology is outer space.
2: I am upset – they won’t talk. I think plants should say good morning at least.
2: A star in the cosmos. The purple ones [cosmos flowers] didn’t talk either.
1: She’s got issues and I have issues with you.
1: They [Cosmos] talk about innocence and temerity.
2, 3: What is temerity?
1: Persistent. They are virile, prolific pieces of sunshine.
1: White is my least favorite color, but I love them.
1: Prover 3 looks like he is in a druggy funk.
1: Prolific preponderance.
2: These plants are so far away they can’t speak.
1: Maybe if you’re out of this world they speak to you.
2: It is as if they need a medium.
3: A channel.
1: Look at prover 3. You’re so quiet, sitting back. Prover 2 is working away and you’re sitting back.
2: When you have a silent partner, a plant that doesn’t talk.
1: It’s all about the Letter P: prey, partner, prolific, pickle.
1: If you’re quiet you can’t get a word in. You have something in your head but everyone is talking/blabbing, pretty soon you forget what you were going to say and you lose your voice.
1: I like a quiet partner – maybe this will work.
2: [To plant] You are doing this on purpose. You’re withholding.
2: It’s also communicating at a non-human level.
1: Seinfeld – Cosmo Cramer.
2: Maybe he needed this remedy.
3: He had a presence.
2: Nobody understood him because he was so far out.
3: Out there, eccentric, voice of the eccentrics.
2: I feel very grounded, actually. I am doing a good job—living up to my responsibilities.
2: I want to smell it. I want to put my face in it.
1: Then it would talk to you.
2: That gave me a headache and tightness in occiput.
3: The smell of this hotel room is giving me a headache. How come all hotels smell the same?
1: I just thought of Florence Nightingale when I looked at the candle burning…but I am a nurse.
2: I am too! I am a nurse!
1: I am in occupational health for a pharmaceutical company!
2: Oh the shame of it. I’m putting the shame out there – nurse to nurse. There are things we do.
3: Who was Florence Nightingale?
2: She advanced nursing; developed hand washing, hygiene. Flo- Flower—Florence.
3: Mind your P’s and Q’s.
1: I think of her in the battlefield.
2: Neurology and neurosurgery.
[Jan comes in.]
2: Here comes trouble.
1: Do they grow wild or do you plant them?
2: They need space to seed.
3: They need space.
1: They have to be “P”ropagated.
2: I feel like I did in the Earthworm proving, where my feet are actually in the ground.
1: Somnolence.
2: Still dizzy but if I focus it goes away.
3: Dizzy – a bit like cannabis.
Jan: Without the heaviness of tobacco.
2: I am losing my mind…can’t put words together in a sentence…..its ok.
2: It [cosmos plant] never once said anything to me
2: Marty is turning 49. 49 is 7x7—it’s the cosmos.
Jan: 8 petals. 8 and 7 are the same, have a connection.
3: Susun Weed has wild logic.
1,2: Counting up the spikes on the bloom.
3: Susun Weed is opinionated. Her opinions are out there. But she doesn’t treat people .
1: The blossom has striations in it.
Jan: Why doesn’t she [Susun] like people?
3: Susun weed doesn’t like sick people.
2: Left side of my body is falling off or down.
2: The two sides are not even.
2: Dizzy.
2: In spite of it all I’m really grounded,
[Observation: prover 2 lays down on floor.]
Jan: This reminds him of when he smoked pot to the degree that he only wanted to lay down.
2: I feel really sad.
2: I just want to lay outside and look at stars.
2: Something is making me sad. I feel really sad, so small. Everything is so vast [she cries.]
3: I used to get existential angst. When I looked at Time lapse photography of millions of years of earth – freakish, scary. Our insignificance.
2: Sadness. I felt very insignificant on the planet, when looking at how much bigger everyone is.
2: Separate and alone.
2: I want to see all the stars – millions and millions – to be one with them rather than being separate on one star.
Jan: A desire to feel united with the whole universe?
2: Not united. Just a part of it all.
2: The feeling of separate and alone goes away – it all comes from the heart but my back is really connected to the earth.
2: This is a good, clear feeling – balanced. Never felt this even on drugs.
2: The place where my leg was broken feels dead.
3: Throat feels scratchy.
2: I feel dry but I don’t want water – I don’t want to wreck this feeling.
Jan: What does this have to do with Susun Weed?
2: Her name is diminishing, sad.
Jan: It is a sad name.
2: Separation. I have this name and I want to talk about the healing energy of plants but I don’t want to treat people – people are problematic, disappointing.
Jan: In what sense?
2: When you really need them they are not there; when you don’t , they are.
2: To need connection and love is natural.
2: Completing, balancing, hopeful, peaceful.
3: Sharp pain in L temple. Was wandering around head a bit.
[Observation: They all get quiet.]
2: Something is far away and really close, elusive, vs. something that is so true to the heart vs. a distance.
1: Playfulness, levity, lightness, clarity – usually dizzy but not now. Clarity of mind.
3: Reaching out to the cosmos.
1: Rays from the sun.
Jan: Becoming too spiritual bit others can’t follow you. Not speaking/speaking volumes
1: It’s pleasing, hopeful, radiant.
Jan: Top [of plant] is beautiful and radiating but not much on bottom.
2: They always get too spindly.
Jan: As if you have a beautiful vision, but it is not concrete.
2: I’ve been mad at it for 25 years – it doesn’t even say hi.
2: It’s withholding a secret bit it won’t tell me its secret.
Jan: It tells you the secret all the time but not everyone can hear it.
[Stretch Break before C2—conversation about amulets and Le Petit Prince, the little prince from some asteroid, landing on earth and wanting to connect across difference. He befriends a fox,, who tells him: “if you connect with me, my life will become filled with sunshine….”]
C2
2: The flower smells. I was dumbstruck.
3: Star struck.
2: Asks prover 1 how old she is.
2: I am trying to find out personal info.
2,3: Really hungry.
2: Now cramped on L side.
1: Heaviness in L temporal area.
1: Lost in space.
2,3: Eating cheese and cheesy popcorn.
1: Lost in space, Mandingo. Old TV and movies.
2: The plant is like when you’re in school. There’s someone you like, you want to be friends with, you try and they don’t talk to you.
2: Plants are billion-lingual.
3: Tommy, The Who.
1: There’s Florence over there.
3: See me/hear me/touch me.
2: Saw the Who 5 times live.
1: Went to a concert in ’76 and someone got stabbed. I was raised fear-based, the idea that something bad would happen. I thought I’d get busted.
1: The concert was Blue Oyster Cult and Boston. Boston’s big song was “More than a Feeling.”
3: There was a spaceship on the album cover.
1: I’m ok/you’re ok.
2: Tired.
1: I liked the first part where we were reacting.
3: I’m trying to psychoanalyze you.
1: I hate that.
1, 2: Nurses can get info out of anyone.
1: Or, you see the mayor, and you think, I’ve seen your ass.
3: Can feel the sugar from the cookie rushing through my system.
2: I wish I hadn’t eaten the popcorn.
1: “Why The Face?” “Where’s the Food?” As code for What The Fuck?!
[Observation: sexual joking]
2: Let’s think of all the words that rhyme with grinding.
2: Revealing confidences.
1: What about men?
2: There is just one problem with men – it’s very similar. Weak connection between two sides of brain.
2: I went to a writing workshop. People were supposed to bring their icons or idols from their desks. A guy in my alcove had a tractor, an action figure that looked like Colonel Sanders but it was Freud.
1: Who took my Siggy?
3: Is Col. Sanders the reincarnation of Freud?
1: He does have a secret recipe.
1: I make the connections! Boborygmi. Eructations. Hebrophenia. Embryonic embarkment.
2: The thing is I have spent more effort trying to get the Cosmos to talk…..
1: That’s why you’re so mad.
Prover 1 reveals that she is on the Dog shit remedy.
2: I really like feeling the bottom of my feet, feeling grounded. This is nice. Propagated properly.
3: I want to slap your (Prover 2’s) back.
3: This plant is getting pissed off because we’re talking about other plants?
1: My name means Honey bee.
2: Hard to figure out what it is when I’m in it.
2: Prover 3 looks very relaxed and distant.
3: I’m eyeing the food, thinking about wanting it, eating it but realizing I just wanted to eye it.
1: I’m called M squared or M cubed. My license plate is Honeybee.
3: Susun Weed is pro GMO.
2: Shoulders hurt, pectoral muscles. It feels like it was tight and it relaxed. When it relaxes you feel the tension.
1: I feel like a naughty shit.
1: At work I am responsible for making sure everyone gets a flu shot. Land of contradictions.
3: Feeling very stoned.
2: Pressure ameliorates the chest pain.
3: Getting lost in the scent of the Cosmos.
2: Feels like I’m on Opium, laudanum.
3: On a sensual trip in a bunch of soft cobwebs – not scary. I don’t want out. Soft.
3: Stop trying to psychoanalyze me.
Observation: Prover 3 begins to sing “Like a Rolling Stone” by Bob Dylan., especially the lyric “no direction home/like a complete unknown”.
Observation: Big discussion about Dylan. Provers and supervisor revealed information about his personal life.
2: He wanted to be a poet. He didn’t want people asking him questions.
2: What about me? I’ve never purported to be nice!
1: Sarah smile- song from the 70s.
Jan returns. Discussion about proving, and possible stages of this remedy. 5, 18. 16, 17.
Discussion: What’s the problem? Alienation. What’s the solution? Getting connected. Unity. If you can let go of your alienation you feel connected. Reaching out, longing to be connected, to be part of the same.
C3
1: Florence Nightingale.
2: Saints and saint cards.
1: Protestant. The letter P is the 16th letter. 2x8.
2: Feels more stoned, weird.
2: Ribcage is hurting. Intercostals are relaxing.
1: Something you (prover 3) are drawn to that you need.
1: If someone tells me not to, then I want it. Defiant.
3: Reverse psychology.
3: Time is changing.
2: I’m noticing how lovely Prover 1’s handwriting is.
3: I have a heightened sense of taste.
2: I went to pee and peed a gallon.
1: Ears are hot.
1: I feel misunderstood.
1: We’re talking about words.
2: But we’re talking about each other. We’re looking to connect – intimacy.
Observation: Discussion: Stage 18? Pallandra by CS Lewis. Supervisor talks about St-Exupery, author of The Little Prince. Plane crashes. St Exupery was killed in a plane crash.
2: Pain in her pancreas. Joints and wrists really ache.
2,3: Feel really stoned.
Observation: Discussion—Florence Nightingale. What is the meaning of it?
2: Finding connection, commonality, we’re both Nurses.
3: Shaking, edge of weakness, extension of stoned feeling.
2: I had a long pee, very yellow.
1: Polyuria.
1,2,3: Eyes watered. Tingly and watery.
2: Wants Potato chips. Can’t wait to get out of the “P paradigm”.
Prover 1 talks about her Dog shit remedy.
“How does it feel
How does it feel
To be on your own
With no direction home
Like a complete unknown
Like a rolling stone? “
Excerpt from Like A Rolling Stone, Bob Dylan
“ One sees clearly only with the heart. What is essential is invisible to the eye.”
Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince
The proving showed the utter aptness of the flower’s name, Cosmos. This is a remedy about being very alienated, very far out there, not understood except through the heart. Cosmo Cramer, the character from the TV sitcom Seinfeld, is a perfect exemplar of an aspect of this remedy—being so eccentric that you can no longer connect. As the provers said, “these plants are so far away they can’t speak,” and “maybe if you’re out of this world they speak to you…” There were many references to outer space, the stars, the universe – all appropriate in light of the plant’s origin.
In an extraordinary interaction, one prover repeatedly argued with the plant, demanding to know why the plant had never spoken to her. (“You never even say good morning!”) She was demanding communication in a way that the pant could not deliver. Interestingly, this same prover was able to manifest alienation, grief, and desire to “be part of” which speaks to the deep desire for connection in this remedy. Once she felt part of the universe, she also expressed a sense of balance and grounded-ness which speaks to the original Greek meaning of the word ‘cosmos” as “ordered universe.”
Another theme that emerged was that of secrets, but not in a clandestine way. It was more reflective of information that needed to be shared so that commonality could be established.
Interestingly, Florence Nightingale emerged as a distinct theme. Two of the provers were nurses, and they thought the mention of this nursing icon was simply a way for the two provers to find commonality. Upon closer examination, Nightingale was not only a radical reformer in patient care, but she was also a religious radical, believing that all sinners had equal access to heaven. (Keep in mind this plant was christened “Cosmos” by priests.) Florence Nightingale may represent an aspect of this remedy – the visionary and humanist who is eccentric yet able to act concretely on her beliefs, not becoming so out there that she loses her head. As one of the provers articulated, if you can let go of your alienation, you feel connected…. Even if you are ahead of your time!
The Nightingale itself -- the bird -- is also connected symbolically to poetry and the Muse. Who is more alienated than the poet yet who is able to make exquisite connections? Who else brings the stars to earth?
According to Jan Scholten’s plant system:
666-44.17
Series: Lanthanide of the lanthanide series
Clade: Angiospermae; Asteranae; Campanulidae; Asterales; Asteraceae; Heliantheae; Cosmos
Phase: 4; sub-phase 4
Stage: 17
Proving:
C1
2: When I looked at it my first thought was they are the least talkative of plants. They don’t say much. It’s the first plant I planted in the place I first did homeopathy. I planted them along the path. They bring an airy feeling.
3: They sway.
1: Innocence and lightness.
2: Cottage gardens.
1: Lace –like.
3: I’m feeling sensitive to hearing – a buzz in my ear.
2: Like you were drinking last night.
3: No didn’t actually – I just had a little wine with dinner.
3: (to prover 1) I like the pastel colors on your nails.
2: They come in pastel colors (the Cosmos flowers).
3: Monet –like.
2: I always feel high in a proving; altered. I just got a whiff of it.
2: My biggest complaint about this plant is that they have nothing to say.
2: I had tons of them -- no one is saying hello to you.
1: They speak volumes to me. Favorite plant, the petals reach out like rays of the sun.
3: They are for people who don’t say much.
2: They can hold secrets. They aren’t blabbermouths. They hold them going in and coming out.
1: Feeling hot.
3. Susun Weed is an herbalist I heard her speak recently.
2: Freud has a book about last names and professions.
1: Like Dr. Blood.
3: Dr. Colon, Dr. Anal.
3: She (Susun Weed) does research about medicinal herbs and she doesn’t like sick people. People listen to her.
2: Who wouldn’t listen to someone named Weed?
3: She is “out there.” Her opinions are out there – too far out in the cosmos – like Cosmos the plant.
2: (To prover1) I do like your nail color.
1: I attended something where women talked about weeds. Look at what weeds are around you and it may point to what you need as a healing.
3: They sneak up on you.
1: I learned weeds are really there to help.
2: I feel heavy.
1: My hearing is very acute. Like Helium? Nitrous oxide? Inside my head feels bigger than my head.
2: Heaviness around my chest. Not oppressive but a heavy fullness, like hands are pressing gently. It is not disturbing.
2: I feel really grounded, connecting downward.
2: The giggly feeling has gone away.
3: Feeling heavier in the chair, leg feels heavy on the other leg. Draggy. [Obs: he closes eyes]
2: Dizzy.
3: Dizzy. A slippery dizziness, falling to left.
2: If I stood up I’d list to the left.
3: I have my eye on that popcorn over there.
2: I’m not in the least bit hungry.
1: Delicate.
2: I think you should speak up [to the Cosmos flower].
1: I think you have issues [to Prover 2].
2: [to the Cosmos] I’m sick of you not saying anything, you secret- carrier, you.
1: Someone needs to carry secrets.
2: Let’s see what words we can make out of Cosmos.
Observation: Prover 2 writes words on a paper plate, rough anagrams of Cosmos: Osmosis Moss
2: Osmosis – you’re my brother.
1: Osmosis.
3: Fluff, popcorn.
3: Moss is so soft but it gets damp and heavy when wet.
1: I like their buds [referring to Cosmos].
2: I do too.
3: Popcorn was good for about 30 seconds and now it’s starting to taste like crap. It’s kind of greasy.
1: Space – we’re talking about space. It’s copulating/populating.
3: It seeds itself.
1: Who needs men?
2: Como—like Lake Como.
1: Perry Como. Is he still alive?
3: My birthday is the 20th.
2: One of my brothers has that birthday, you are my brother.
2: What is this thing that I want this plant to say something?
2: Why are they called Cosmos?
3: They’re screaming out.
2: Maybe they have the secrets of the Cosmos.
1: See—the blossoms are like stars.
1: [playing with plant] “Hello! Hello!”
1: They remind me of carrots.
2: I have to take this cuff bracelet off [while triturating].
1: Take it off baby, take it off….
2. I’m working up a sweat.
2: Cosmology is outer space.
2: I am upset – they won’t talk. I think plants should say good morning at least.
2: A star in the cosmos. The purple ones [cosmos flowers] didn’t talk either.
1: She’s got issues and I have issues with you.
1: They [Cosmos] talk about innocence and temerity.
2, 3: What is temerity?
1: Persistent. They are virile, prolific pieces of sunshine.
1: White is my least favorite color, but I love them.
1: Prover 3 looks like he is in a druggy funk.
1: Prolific preponderance.
2: These plants are so far away they can’t speak.
1: Maybe if you’re out of this world they speak to you.
2: It is as if they need a medium.
3: A channel.
1: Look at prover 3. You’re so quiet, sitting back. Prover 2 is working away and you’re sitting back.
2: When you have a silent partner, a plant that doesn’t talk.
1: It’s all about the Letter P: prey, partner, prolific, pickle.
1: If you’re quiet you can’t get a word in. You have something in your head but everyone is talking/blabbing, pretty soon you forget what you were going to say and you lose your voice.
1: I like a quiet partner – maybe this will work.
2: [To plant] You are doing this on purpose. You’re withholding.
2: It’s also communicating at a non-human level.
1: Seinfeld – Cosmo Cramer.
2: Maybe he needed this remedy.
3: He had a presence.
2: Nobody understood him because he was so far out.
3: Out there, eccentric, voice of the eccentrics.
2: I feel very grounded, actually. I am doing a good job—living up to my responsibilities.
2: I want to smell it. I want to put my face in it.
1: Then it would talk to you.
2: That gave me a headache and tightness in occiput.
3: The smell of this hotel room is giving me a headache. How come all hotels smell the same?
1: I just thought of Florence Nightingale when I looked at the candle burning…but I am a nurse.
2: I am too! I am a nurse!
1: I am in occupational health for a pharmaceutical company!
2: Oh the shame of it. I’m putting the shame out there – nurse to nurse. There are things we do.
3: Who was Florence Nightingale?
2: She advanced nursing; developed hand washing, hygiene. Flo- Flower—Florence.
3: Mind your P’s and Q’s.
1: I think of her in the battlefield.
2: Neurology and neurosurgery.
[Jan comes in.]
2: Here comes trouble.
1: Do they grow wild or do you plant them?
2: They need space to seed.
3: They need space.
1: They have to be “P”ropagated.
2: I feel like I did in the Earthworm proving, where my feet are actually in the ground.
1: Somnolence.
2: Still dizzy but if I focus it goes away.
3: Dizzy – a bit like cannabis.
Jan: Without the heaviness of tobacco.
2: I am losing my mind…can’t put words together in a sentence…..its ok.
2: It [cosmos plant] never once said anything to me
2: Marty is turning 49. 49 is 7x7—it’s the cosmos.
Jan: 8 petals. 8 and 7 are the same, have a connection.
3: Susun Weed has wild logic.
1,2: Counting up the spikes on the bloom.
3: Susun Weed is opinionated. Her opinions are out there. But she doesn’t treat people .
1: The blossom has striations in it.
Jan: Why doesn’t she [Susun] like people?
3: Susun weed doesn’t like sick people.
2: Left side of my body is falling off or down.
2: The two sides are not even.
2: Dizzy.
2: In spite of it all I’m really grounded,
[Observation: prover 2 lays down on floor.]
Jan: This reminds him of when he smoked pot to the degree that he only wanted to lay down.
2: I feel really sad.
2: I just want to lay outside and look at stars.
2: Something is making me sad. I feel really sad, so small. Everything is so vast [she cries.]
3: I used to get existential angst. When I looked at Time lapse photography of millions of years of earth – freakish, scary. Our insignificance.
2: Sadness. I felt very insignificant on the planet, when looking at how much bigger everyone is.
2: Separate and alone.
2: I want to see all the stars – millions and millions – to be one with them rather than being separate on one star.
Jan: A desire to feel united with the whole universe?
2: Not united. Just a part of it all.
2: The feeling of separate and alone goes away – it all comes from the heart but my back is really connected to the earth.
2: This is a good, clear feeling – balanced. Never felt this even on drugs.
2: The place where my leg was broken feels dead.
3: Throat feels scratchy.
2: I feel dry but I don’t want water – I don’t want to wreck this feeling.
Jan: What does this have to do with Susun Weed?
2: Her name is diminishing, sad.
Jan: It is a sad name.
2: Separation. I have this name and I want to talk about the healing energy of plants but I don’t want to treat people – people are problematic, disappointing.
Jan: In what sense?
2: When you really need them they are not there; when you don’t , they are.
2: To need connection and love is natural.
2: Completing, balancing, hopeful, peaceful.
3: Sharp pain in L temple. Was wandering around head a bit.
[Observation: They all get quiet.]
2: Something is far away and really close, elusive, vs. something that is so true to the heart vs. a distance.
1: Playfulness, levity, lightness, clarity – usually dizzy but not now. Clarity of mind.
3: Reaching out to the cosmos.
1: Rays from the sun.
Jan: Becoming too spiritual bit others can’t follow you. Not speaking/speaking volumes
1: It’s pleasing, hopeful, radiant.
Jan: Top [of plant] is beautiful and radiating but not much on bottom.
2: They always get too spindly.
Jan: As if you have a beautiful vision, but it is not concrete.
2: I’ve been mad at it for 25 years – it doesn’t even say hi.
2: It’s withholding a secret bit it won’t tell me its secret.
Jan: It tells you the secret all the time but not everyone can hear it.
[Stretch Break before C2—conversation about amulets and Le Petit Prince, the little prince from some asteroid, landing on earth and wanting to connect across difference. He befriends a fox,, who tells him: “if you connect with me, my life will become filled with sunshine….”]
C2
2: The flower smells. I was dumbstruck.
3: Star struck.
2: Asks prover 1 how old she is.
2: I am trying to find out personal info.
2,3: Really hungry.
2: Now cramped on L side.
1: Heaviness in L temporal area.
1: Lost in space.
2,3: Eating cheese and cheesy popcorn.
1: Lost in space, Mandingo. Old TV and movies.
2: The plant is like when you’re in school. There’s someone you like, you want to be friends with, you try and they don’t talk to you.
2: Plants are billion-lingual.
3: Tommy, The Who.
1: There’s Florence over there.
3: See me/hear me/touch me.
2: Saw the Who 5 times live.
1: Went to a concert in ’76 and someone got stabbed. I was raised fear-based, the idea that something bad would happen. I thought I’d get busted.
1: The concert was Blue Oyster Cult and Boston. Boston’s big song was “More than a Feeling.”
3: There was a spaceship on the album cover.
1: I’m ok/you’re ok.
2: Tired.
1: I liked the first part where we were reacting.
3: I’m trying to psychoanalyze you.
1: I hate that.
1, 2: Nurses can get info out of anyone.
1: Or, you see the mayor, and you think, I’ve seen your ass.
3: Can feel the sugar from the cookie rushing through my system.
2: I wish I hadn’t eaten the popcorn.
1: “Why The Face?” “Where’s the Food?” As code for What The Fuck?!
[Observation: sexual joking]
2: Let’s think of all the words that rhyme with grinding.
2: Revealing confidences.
1: What about men?
2: There is just one problem with men – it’s very similar. Weak connection between two sides of brain.
2: I went to a writing workshop. People were supposed to bring their icons or idols from their desks. A guy in my alcove had a tractor, an action figure that looked like Colonel Sanders but it was Freud.
1: Who took my Siggy?
3: Is Col. Sanders the reincarnation of Freud?
1: He does have a secret recipe.
1: I make the connections! Boborygmi. Eructations. Hebrophenia. Embryonic embarkment.
2: The thing is I have spent more effort trying to get the Cosmos to talk…..
1: That’s why you’re so mad.
Prover 1 reveals that she is on the Dog shit remedy.
2: I really like feeling the bottom of my feet, feeling grounded. This is nice. Propagated properly.
3: I want to slap your (Prover 2’s) back.
3: This plant is getting pissed off because we’re talking about other plants?
1: My name means Honey bee.
2: Hard to figure out what it is when I’m in it.
2: Prover 3 looks very relaxed and distant.
3: I’m eyeing the food, thinking about wanting it, eating it but realizing I just wanted to eye it.
1: I’m called M squared or M cubed. My license plate is Honeybee.
3: Susun Weed is pro GMO.
2: Shoulders hurt, pectoral muscles. It feels like it was tight and it relaxed. When it relaxes you feel the tension.
1: I feel like a naughty shit.
1: At work I am responsible for making sure everyone gets a flu shot. Land of contradictions.
3: Feeling very stoned.
2: Pressure ameliorates the chest pain.
3: Getting lost in the scent of the Cosmos.
2: Feels like I’m on Opium, laudanum.
3: On a sensual trip in a bunch of soft cobwebs – not scary. I don’t want out. Soft.
3: Stop trying to psychoanalyze me.
Observation: Prover 3 begins to sing “Like a Rolling Stone” by Bob Dylan., especially the lyric “no direction home/like a complete unknown”.
Observation: Big discussion about Dylan. Provers and supervisor revealed information about his personal life.
2: He wanted to be a poet. He didn’t want people asking him questions.
2: What about me? I’ve never purported to be nice!
1: Sarah smile- song from the 70s.
Jan returns. Discussion about proving, and possible stages of this remedy. 5, 18. 16, 17.
Discussion: What’s the problem? Alienation. What’s the solution? Getting connected. Unity. If you can let go of your alienation you feel connected. Reaching out, longing to be connected, to be part of the same.
C3
1: Florence Nightingale.
2: Saints and saint cards.
1: Protestant. The letter P is the 16th letter. 2x8.
2: Feels more stoned, weird.
2: Ribcage is hurting. Intercostals are relaxing.
1: Something you (prover 3) are drawn to that you need.
1: If someone tells me not to, then I want it. Defiant.
3: Reverse psychology.
3: Time is changing.
2: I’m noticing how lovely Prover 1’s handwriting is.
3: I have a heightened sense of taste.
2: I went to pee and peed a gallon.
1: Ears are hot.
1: I feel misunderstood.
1: We’re talking about words.
2: But we’re talking about each other. We’re looking to connect – intimacy.
Observation: Discussion: Stage 18? Pallandra by CS Lewis. Supervisor talks about St-Exupery, author of The Little Prince. Plane crashes. St Exupery was killed in a plane crash.
2: Pain in her pancreas. Joints and wrists really ache.
2,3: Feel really stoned.
Observation: Discussion—Florence Nightingale. What is the meaning of it?
2: Finding connection, commonality, we’re both Nurses.
3: Shaking, edge of weakness, extension of stoned feeling.
2: I had a long pee, very yellow.
1: Polyuria.
1,2,3: Eyes watered. Tingly and watery.
2: Wants Potato chips. Can’t wait to get out of the “P paradigm”.
Prover 1 talks about her Dog shit remedy.