By Mandy Feder —
Cruising a newly paved stretch of Highway 20 in the valley, sipping a lemonade, The Who”s Baba O”Riley blasting way too loud for a middle-aged woman to justify — I turned my head toward the rows of sunflowers in the fields surrounding me.
The sun was blazing off to the right and all the sunflowers appeared to be worshipping it with bright, alert and bold faces positioned the exact same direction.
I drove back that way after a couple of hours, while Rufus Wainwright softly and slowly sang Leonard Cohen”s “Hallelujah” on my iPod.
The now-orange sun, losing its edge, appeared tired from a long day of hanging out high in the sky and it dipped down closer to the mountains and ridges.
The flowers followed suit and slouched. It was as though they picked up on the mood lighting. Was it just my imagination or did those flowers turn to follow the sun?
After years of wondering about this, I finally decided to seek the answer to my question.
According to the University of Texas, Austin, “Ask Mr. Smarty Plants,” question and answer service, the phenomenon is called heliotropism, “the term used to describe the tracking of the sun by the flower buds of sunflowers.”
I am definitely impressed. I know people who “are not smart enough to come in out of the rain,” as the old saying goes.
I knew sunflowers were pretty and practical too, they supply food, but I didn”t know they were smart.
During my quest for an answer, I learned this:
“There is a collection of specialized cells at the base of the flower bud or leaf called a pulvinus that carry the “motor” cells that enable the plant leaf or flower to track the sun. These cells enlarge or shrink according the turgor pressure from the water inside them. In response to blue wavelength light, potassium ion concentration increases in the ?motor” cells on the shadow side of the pulvinus. With the increase of potassium ions the osmotic potential in the cells becomes more negative and the cells absorb more water and elongate, turning the face of the flower to the sun,” according to Ask Mr. Smarty Plants.
Pretty, smart flowers can be checked off my list of questions now. I can move on to something completely different and certainly more difficult to answer: How do we deal with homelessness?
I”ve been wondering this since I first saw Steve”s sad little face pressed up against the backseat car window.
“What are you looking at?” I asked, as I jabbed two fingers into my favorite brother”s forearm.
We were in the single-digits, but I don”t really remember how old.
“You see that family in there?” He asked me, as he pressed his index finger against the glass in the direction of a burned out, abandoned high-rise somewhere on the drive between Grandma and Grandpa”s place in Co-op City and Greenwich Village.
I did see a little light, a man and a woman, sitting around in a semi-circle on the floor with a couple of small children.
After Steve first noticed the family, we saw them a lot.
We looked for them.
Steve made plans from the Bronx to Manhattan about how he would buy that building, make it nice and take care of people who didn”t have homes.
The building was eventually demolished. All that remained were enormous chunks of concrete, brick and debris. I don”t remember talking about the family or Steve”s planned purchase of the building again.
But I thought about the memory last week when my daughter Nicole showed me an article and photos of a mobile homeless shelter created by Paul Elkins.
Elkins is well-known for designing the “Burning Man Bicycle/Camper.”
The mobile homeless shelter is a sensible, portable, lightweight, insulated box on wheels.
It even has a rainwater catcher with a filter that leads to a little sink.
It seemed like a simple and brilliant answer to my question, at least in the short-term. But alas, more questions emerged.
Who will buy these? Certainly not people who don”t have food, shoes or money.
What if a person or charity purchased the units for people who are faced with the sad reality of homelessness?
OK, that sounds reasonable, right?
I”m not sure.
Let”s just assume each homeless person is supplied with a portable shelter.
Nicole pointed out that it could mean more than just a dry place to sleep; it could also symbolize hope, or elevation of status, because it is a place, however small, to call their own and to take care of.
That was a great point. Perhaps it would be a positive push for some to seek services, employment or even decide to make lifestyle changes.
Who knows?
Questions that pose realistic problems might include: Where will the units be parked at night or during sleeping hours?
On private property or public land?
Liability issues would surely arise.
Can landowners or public entities afford a lawsuit or medical bills, should someone be injured on the property?
Also, what were the circumstances that led to homelessness?
Perhaps mental illness, problems with law enforcement, alcohol and/or substance abuse will be common.
People may be placed in harm”s way while practicing good will and intent.
And what would become of waste?
Trash and human waste would need to be disposed of somewhere.
Would property owners be required to provide facilities and removal services?
I like the sunflowers. That was a question with a definitive answer.
The original question I asked multiplied, making me feel a bit like Alice in Wonderland with everything getting curiouser and curiouser.
Voltaire wrote, “Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers.”
I do think the more questions that are asked by willing learners and listeners result in solutions, if not right away, then eventually.
“There are works which wait, and which one does not understand for a long time; the reason is that they bring answers to questions which have not yet been raised; for the question often arrives a terribly long time after the answer.” ? Oscar Wilde
Mandy Feder is the Managing Editor at Lake County Publishing. She can be reached at mandyfeder@yahoo.com or 263-5636 ext. 32. Follow on Twitter @mandyfeder1.
