The free and easy wanderer

March is wind. The sap rises whether we are ready or not, and in a person that rising shows as irritability, a tight chest, sighing, a cycle that comes crooked, a temper that snaps at small things. The Chinese physicians called this the liver failing to flow, and their answer has been carried for nine centuries: Xiao Yao San, the free and easy wanderer. Bupleurum unlocks the gate and peppermint opens the window; dong quai and white peony soften and feed what the pushing has bruised; bai zhu, poria, ginger and licorice keep the digestion steady while the weather passes through. It is the formula I reach for when someone says they feel stuck and cannot say where. In the sky its stars sit between the Chinese and the Western quarters, and that is fitting, because half the world uses it now.