environment, or any combination of
the three. But isn’t this where science
meets magic?T
hough I find clovers all the
time, I’m not exceptional in this
skill. The Guinness World Re-
cords holder, Edward Martin Sr. from
Cooper Landing, Alaska, had found
111,060 four-leaf clovers when he took
the record in 2007.
It’s the finding I love, not the collect-
ing. I’m happiest to give my “lucky”
clovers away. I pass them on to moth-
ers in parks, who show them to their
wide-eyed kids. I delivered one to
the man at my corner store, where it
hangs above the register. Friends slip
them between the business cards in
their wallets for safekeeping.
People ask how I do it. Well, I love
clover: the sweet smell, the common
variant with its cute trio of leaves. Ilook at it more than most people do. I
expect that’s the first reason I find so
many. I have a habit of dragging my
fingers or toes across a patch, mo-
mentarily separating the individuals,
which brings irregularities into fo-
cus. That’s part of finding them: not
a hardening of focus, but a softening.
The other reason is artful. Do you re-
member those posters from the 1980s
made up of thick dots? If you looked
too hard, all you’d see was the pattern.
But if you let your eyes slip out of focus,
scenes would appear: dinosaurs, land-
scapes, butterflies—a trick of the eye.
It’s the same with four-leaf clovers.
If you try too hard, you will only ever
see the patch. Instead, slip into a lazy,
soft-focus, summer state of mind.
Drift your hand across a thick patch,
letting the clovers reveal themselves.
Appreciate the ones that have only
three leaves. Common things are
beautiful too. And a four-leaf clover
may show itself to you. Just like that.
That day in third grade, I dived into
the clover patch, skimming the sur-
face with my hands, softening my eyes
to look for irregularities. It took only
moments for a four-leaf clover to fall
into my fingers. Just like that.
Whatever little toy I won that day,
my real prize was the gateway that
the simple act of looking for clovers
opened for me into a lifetime of joy de-
rived from looking closely. The magic
of nature coming up as it pleases.The author lets her eyes relax, and the
distinct shapes of four-leaf clovers pop out.the walrus (august 10, 2017), copyright © 2017
by teva harrison, thewalrus.ca.rd.com 107Inspirationdavid p. leonard/courtesy teva harrison