Daffodils and Daffiness

From The Daily Tejaniya on Saturday, April 19, 2025:

Trying to keep awareness continuous by trying to keep objects* continuous is a common mistake. Fixating on objects in this way is unskillful because we form craving for objects we like, and aversion towards objects we dislike. The skillful move is to keep awareness, not objects, continuous.
* Objects are thoughts, emotions, sensations, perceptions, etc.

Earlier this week I shared a tender conversation about the wisdom of not using social media for political discussions. I had just read a rather lengthy article about this subject. Very near the end of Stormy Weather: Enjoying the Ride, Joan Tollifson wrote words my heart agrees with deeply, “I do think there’s a place for genuine open dialog about the political issues of the day, but I believe that such dialog is best done in person, not in online comments or on social media. To be truly valuable and constructive, I think dialog about political issues should happen in a spirit of open listening and vulnerability, giving attention both to what others are saying and also to our own triggered reactions and emotions as they arise. Even after years of meditation, I’m still a beginner at that, often failing entirely.”

Nowhere does this truth reveal itself with more voracity than in our every day interactions about virtually every subject. For example, last evening we went for dinner and cards with Linda and Larry (our first opportunity since John and I began our trek north on March 28 and they followed north the next week). Rain was forecast so I drove down while John walked over via a stop at the mailbox.

As I walked in the house I was greeted by the delightful sight and fragrance of spring flowers. “Oh,” I called out, “daffodils!”

“These are jonquils,” Linda responded. I said nothing but admit to a curiosity about whether they are the same or not and later when John asked about picking some for our house for Easter Larry even said daffodils and jonquils are the same.

So, curiosity followed me home and this morning I put fingers to the keyboard with the question, “Are daffodils and jonquils the same?” I read a lot of information. Not all of information was of the same opinion (some generated by AI), but all of the information was presented as fact. The website I considered to offer some of the clearest understanding was a blog post on Wayside Gardens.

Often used interchangeably, daffodils and jonquils do have unique characteristics. All daffodils fall under the botanical name Narcissus, but a jonquil indicates just one type of Narcissus, Narcissus jonquilla and its hybrids.

I went on to read, “While regionally jonquils may be called daffodils, this is botanically inaccurate…. Daffodil flowers are typically lightly scented while golden yellow jonquils are highly perfumed…. Daffodils colors range from bi-colored to white, pink, yellow, and orange.”

My favorite message on the website was that no matter how you refer to them or what variety of Narcissus you grow and enjoy, they are one of nature’s greatest plants. I have some challenge remembering the answer to this-or-that questions so I have decided daffodils don’t smell or have a dull scent – D for daffodils, dull, and don’t. Your nose knows the difference. (Difference is yet another “D” word.)

All of this over spring flowers? Not really. It is more about how humans are having a challenge navigating the information age where we are often ushered into a lane of mistaking an opinion for fact without even being aware of the significance of that nuance.

This led me to look up Gulliver’s Travels, the 1726 novel by Jonathan Swift in which Lilliput and Blefuscu are two fictional island nations. After his son cut himself breaking a boiled egg at the larger end, the Emperor decreed that all eggs be broken on the smaller end. This quarrel ended up giving rise to “six rebellions … wherein one Emperor lost his life, and another his crown”.

Geesh!

Perhaps we should add opinions-thought-to-be-facts to the list of objects that can be fixated on in unskillful ways.

Note* Grandson Brad has a process he uses to ferret out facts. He is considering putting out a YouTube video that shows how easy it is to know what is true.