Pussywillows, Cattails and Other Tales

      Treasuring, remembering the promises of Spring   

Pussywillows, cat-tails, soft winds, and roses.

- Gordon Lightfoot, Lyrics and Music

Pussywillows, Cat-Tails (1968)

Folksinger and songwriter, Gordon Lightfoot grew up in Orillia, Ontario, one of many small towns in Canada's Muskoka region that swell with Summer tourists each year.  Lightfoot, who now lives in Canada's largest city - Toronto - would have spent his youth walking along country paths near lakes and ponds where the Pussywillows and Cattails (Bulrushes) grow.

Lightfoot is a legend in Canadian singing and songwriting, with:  If You Could Read My Mind, Did She Mention My Name?, Sundown, Carefree Highway, (That's What You Get) For Lovin' Me, Black Day in July, and The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, to name only a few of his recordings. 

Orillia is also home to the Mariposa Folk Festival, which was founded in 1961.  Over the years, Lightfoot, Bob Dylan, Pete Seeger, Joni Mitchell, Joan Baez, Buffy St Marie, Richie Havens, Donovan, Neil Young, Sonny Terry and Brownie Mcghee, Barenaked Ladies, Loreena Mckennit, and Serena Ryder have all played Mariposa.  

Like the Summer thunderstorms which blow across Muskoka, the Mariposa Folk Festival had a few stormy years.  In 1963, after wild, drunken brawls in the quiet streets of Orillia, the town council banned the folk festival.  So, in '64 the Mariposa Folk Festival took off for the big city of Toronto, where Lightfoot performed, Early Morning Rain for the first time.  Mariposa is Spanish for butterfly, and like the butterfly, the festival has moved many times over the decades, and is finally back in Orillia.

On it's Mariposa Folk Festival website, there's a quote from performer Chick Roberts, who said in 1985, "The history of Mariposa is not of any one person, it's the history of an idea.  Changing hands over and over again, Mariposa becomes like a folk tale...the myth survives and continues to fire the blood".     

There's a Polish folk tale about how Pussywillows came to be.  Kittens were chasing butterflies near the riverbank, when they fell into the water, and began to drown.  The mother cat's cries for help were heard by the willow branches.  The branches arched over, dipping into the river, and the kittens clung to them as they were lifted safely to shore.  Every Spring afterwards, the little kittens would reappear on willow branches.

There are many varieties of Pussywillows, however, the two most common are the small, snowy white, pearl shaped Pussywillow, and larger, Rabbit's Foot Pussywillow in these photographs.  The iconic, big, fluffy Rabbit's Foot variety stands on it's own, or in a floral arrangement.

This being the Ash Wednesday, and the first day of Lent, it is worth noting that Pussywillows have a revered place in Catholic and Orthodox churches throughout the Northern Hemisphere.  Palms do not grow in Northern climates, so, on Palm Sunday, many churches in Europe give Pussywillow branches to their parishioners.  Pussywillows often appear in Easter floral bouquets,

Photographs Copyright of:  Ruth Adams, Widow's Endorphins Photographic Images Incorporated.