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Valerian is a perennial, tall flowering plant with a pungent smell and all-heal used for anxiety, stress, and many other conditions. When taken in large quantities it calms nervous activity by increasing GABA in the brain; your main inhibitory neurotransmitter. Valerian may help to sleep better, but there's no good scientific evidence to support most of its uses.  

'Valerian is a sexy plant for me,' wrote artist, filmmaker, poet and activist Derek Jarman in his meditative & furious garden-diary Modern Nature. 'It clung to the old stone walls of the manor at Curry Mallet, and grew in the garden of the bomb-damaged house at the end of the road which the airman Johnny, my first love, took me to on his motorbike, with my hands in his trouser pockets.'  

Valerian—Valerian Root—Valerian Root Extract—Chill Pill—True Calm—Stress Free—Driftoff—Relax All—Relax & Sleep—Relaxing Sleep—Relax Medix—Rest ZZZZ—Herbal Sleep—Sleep—Sleep Mode—Sleep Formula—Sleep Well—Sleep Better—Sleep Perfect—Sleep Optimizer—Deep Sleep—Power to Sleep PM—Valerian Nighttime—Nighty Night Extra—Silent Night—Nighttime Fat Burner—Premium Night Time Fat Burner—Night FatBurn Extreme—Bedtime Burn—Sleep & Wake   

Another Johnny; writer, dog owner and gardener, Jonny Bruce—who has been looking after Jarman's garden at Prospect Cottage and is responsible for its continuation—reminds me that ‘this sexy plant must not have been Valeriana officinalis but Centranthus Ruber or Red Valerian.’ At home between stonework walls and other vertical surfaces, Red Valerian is related to Common Valerian but does not share its medicinal properties. Maybe it doesn’t matter. ‘One of the appeals of natural or alternative medicine is that it does not only offer an alternative philosophy or treatment but an alternative language,’ writes Eula Biss in On Immunity: An Inoculation. I take Valerian to calm nervous activity and relax the immune system. In the spirit of Jarman's turbulent & mesmerising body of work, I take Valerian for a more dreamlike relation to narrative. I imagine--⎻⎺⎺⎻-my immune system--⎻as ---⎻⎻⎻an overgrown garden⎽__⎽--⎻⎺⎺⎻of⎺⎻⎽human⎽--and⎽-more-than-human--⎺intimacy. As dangerous lovemaking in the bushes--⎻⎻far from Self/Non-Self immunetary fast food that makes our body-minds more aggressive.

I invite you to take the Valerian-infused GIF of 'natural answers' and non-magical to-do's disguised as dreams offline. Grab it onto your desktop and⎻-⎻let⎻-it-⎻do--⎻⎻⎻-nothing⎽⎽⎽⎽⎽⎽⎽.