The Mean Time

For all of you loyal readers out there, I must ruin the suspense and let you know what happened between the time my blog dropped right off sometime in 2009, and where we are now in space and time: spring time 2011.

For the rest of 2009, I continued loving and working at the Poughkeepsie Farm Project. My season there was filled to the brim with beautiful crops, fantastic colleagues, sassy teenagers, adorable children, CRAFT visits, new and lasting friendships, and lots of seed saving. My culminating project was Folk Seeds. Check it out here (http://thegreenhorns.wordpress.com/2009/11/04/folk-seeds/) and here (http://www.seedlibrary.org/wp/?p=461).

Words left here will never do justice or pay proper homage to that place, the farm, the people, all I learned, or keep learning about the work going on there. It was hard to leave the PFP and the Hudson Valley, and perhaps one day I will return. I spent a chunk of the winter chicken and house sitting for friends in Beacon, coming down from the highs and pace of the growing season, playing bass in the ephemeral Buff Orpington Quartet, and plotting my next move. I also spent some time with my family in Maryland while my Dad was getting radiation treatment, and was fortunate enough to be around DC for Snowpocalypse '10. I spent the rest of the winter in Guatemala with my dear friend Melissa and studied Spanish at the Proyecto Linguistico Quetzalteco de Espanol in Xela/Quetzaltenango. The PLQ is an excellent cooperative Spanish school of a radical persuasion, and they really try hard to teach and show students the complex cultural and political realities of the country. Learn more about it here: http://www.xelapages.com/plqe/, and go back with me! Pronto!

After returning from Central America, I shimmied up to southern Ontario in March 2010 to begin my apprenticeship at Orchard Hill Farm in St. Thomas. While working at the PFP, I became very conscious of the fact that I had not yet spent a full season doing solely farm work, and decided that before doing anything else related to food or farming, I really wanted that experience and to build my skills and knowledge base. On one of our CRAFT visits in '09, we happened to go to Natural Roots Farm (http://naturalroots.com/), a horse-powered vegetable farm in Conway, Mass. As soon as I witnessed farmer David Fisher wordlessly urge his fleet of four beautiful huge graceful muscular draft horses onto the field, with only the gentle jingle of the harness and the soft breath of the animals as music to our ears, I knew immediately what kind of farm I had to be on the following year. I had already had a sneaking suspicion that working with draft horses was something I needed to try, but seeing them in action for the first time that day simply swept me off my feet. I had been one of those horse-crazy girls growing up, but had been looking for a way to make them a more practical part of my existence. I loved farming, I loved horses, so farming with horses just made loads of sense (for emotional, economic, and ecological reasons too.) Some friends of mine pointed me to Orchard Hill and the likes of Ken and Martha Laing. Ken and Martha are seasoned farmers who have been farming the same land for 30 years, land that has been in Martha's family for six generations. They also have a reputation for being excellent human beings, very skilled growers, and supremely competent teamsters and teachers. (OHF's website is: http://www.orchardhillfarm.ca/).

I learned so much from K + M, and feel like I became more of a real person after spending a season working with their herd of 8 Suffolk Punch Draft horses. This could be a whole 'nother post in itself. It was a very challenging and rewarding season for me there. But I went there primarily to answer the questions: will I enjoy working with draft horses? Can horse-powered organic farms really work? My answers to both questions are a resounding YES. I loved it, I love it, I miss it terribly. It is something I hope to come back to just around the bend in the road, but I also learned that I'm not in a place where I want to "burn the ships" just yet, as a friend of mine put it, and go full steam ahead with starting a horse-powered farm. Which is fine, and good to know, and to be honest about.

So how the heck did I end up on the coast of Maine after moonlighting as a beginning teamster, and getting taste after sweet taste of the draft power world (through lovely gatherings such as Northeast Animal Power Field Days http://www.draftanimalpowernetwork.org/).

I think this is how it goes a bit: I experienced that even while living on the most beautiful idyllic wholesome family farm, one is not immune to the darker parts of life and humanity, crises of trust and faith and rearranging of ways in which you thought the world once worked. And truthfully, after going through some very trying times, more than not being immune or isolated, I actually want to be right in the thick of it. That right now I want and need to be better prepared to help myself, my loved ones, and people I don't even know deal with really hard stuff as it comes up, because it always does, and more is on the way. And that sometimes, you need to leave the farm to develop those skills, or at least I do. Moreover, I came to appreciate more than ever the healing powers of plants, animals, of being outdoors, and I feel a strong pull towards helping make these kinds of therapies and experiences available to more people. I am also deeply committed to the principles and values in food justice and food sovereignty work - and want to be more closely involved in community-based solutions to those systemic levels and structures of injustice out there, right here. And you know what, I don't actually want to be a full time organic farmer right now. There, I said it, its out and I can't take it back. Bless those who do, but I think a better fit for my own cocktail of innate strengths and wide ranging interests, might be part-time farmer, part-time lots of other things. And right now, a city is where I can find those Other things, try some stuff on for size, and be young for a little while longer.

So I am returning to community-based food projects, and am, as of Friday, the Youth Programs Assistant at Cultivating Community (http://www.cultivatingcommunity.org/) in Portland, Maine. It's been just great so far. More on that v. soon.

the city by the sea

I am in Maine now. It is high time I started writing here again. Life is always worth documenting, no matter what it holds or where it takes you. I want to give this idea more respect, show more reverence for it.

Sprout and the Bean

Goodness me, it's been over a month since I last wrote in this durn thing. I couldn't possibly capture all that's happened in enough detail (it'd be way past 2012) so I'll just mention some highlights and pepper this post with pictures.

• We attended a Heifer Project Partner Meeting in Holyoke Massachusetts and got to meet all sorts of wonderful people and learn about terrific projects that Heifer International funds domestically. We were hosted by the amazing Nuestra Raices (www.nuestra-raices.org), one of the most dynamic examples of a truly grassroots community based organization. All I can say is that somehow, they make an incubator farm, coral reef project, popsicle business, and paso fino riding stable make sense together. Check it out. They're doing some crazy stuff.
• These are heifers looking at the coral reef growing project.
  

• We have spent a lot of time planning out the seed-saving garden, and are now getting it ready for the first planting! We are going to grow the cinderella style Musquee de Provence winter squash, which I just can't wait to see. As well as the ever elusive blue podded capucijner pea. as well as some crazy pepper that Susan snuck over from Romania. And a Chinese Long Bean (which is not short.) That's just to get your mouth watering, because we growing many other lovely varieties too! Seed saving for ever (and ever and ever!) I think I might want to become a professional seed saver and travel the world teaching people the lost art of seed saving.

• The spring Green Teens program started, which is a job and life skills program that brings urban youth from Poughkeepsie and Beacon to the farm to learn and work. So far the kids have been pretty hilarious, and very good sports (they ate real Stone Soup and enjoy digging parsnips). I look forward to learning from them over the next two months.

• The greenhouse is very green:

This is a young rosemary --->

• We have started our first round of transplanting on the farm. The first day we did it, it was sunny and a bit breezy and we planted beets and lettuce (which have been followed by kale, collards, broccoli, etc). You might not think it, but its incredibly fun to scoot along in the dirt and give these baby plants a new home, every nine inches apart. That day kind of felt like the first REAL day of farm work.

• We are doing tons of potting up, which has become my new favorite past-time (pass-time?). Poke Poke Poke a hole in the soil, deliver deliver deliver a seedling in the hole, pinch the soil back, and waalaa. Aliyah and I have been adopting the rejects (plants too scrawny or too many to pot up) and now basically have our own apartment farm.

• Current favorite seed: Blessed Thistle.

• I have continued my regional explorations. I ventured up to Hudson, Saugerties, Catskill and beyond. I went to an art opening for a display of art that the Hudson Valley Seed Library is using on some of their seed packs. Completely stunning. And then proceeded to get lost in the mountains. But I found some places I want to go back to for hiking, and maybe even fishing! These mountains are magical. I also discovered two lighthouses in one day.

• 

• We attended the Youth Forum/Expo on Food, Farming and Active Living in the Bronx, organized by our new roommate and intern, Sarah.

• We had our first Western Mass/Eastern NY CRAFT Meeting at Markristo Farm. CRAFT = Collaborative Regional Alliance for Farming Training. I learned how (not) to tip a tractor or get caught in the PTO and die, got to see a $30,000 greens washing machine, meet 40 other farmers/farm apprentices in the area, and eat some of the best potluck this side of the Hudson. I feel much more a part of the young local farming community now.
  

Here is a special triangle 3 point hitch that makes changing implements simple as pie.




This is a fancy transplanter, with mother and daughter team showing us how its done






This is one of the farm girls watching the new foal frolic.








And this is the 5 day old babe, snoozing with its muzzle in the dirt.
They mentioned this CRAFT would be about tractor safety,
but I think it was really just a chance to show off the cutie cute.





So those are just the highlights, really, I swear. I had some lovely visitors too (Jon and Jonna thanks for coming! Come again soon!)

This week: more seeding, more transplanting, green teens, seed garden, a food politics discussion, bike repair, bread baking (25lbs of hard whole wheat from Wild Hive!), jogging and blogging.

Spotted Cows and Silver Lights

By now I am rounding out the end of my first two weeks at the PFP, so I think a *real* update is due.

Since I have been and will be about spending half of my days at the farm and half doing program work, I'll use that format to frame this post.

On the Farm Front, even though the season is still doing a warm-up stretch and jumping jacks, there is a lot of prep work to do. Asher, our trusty farmer, is so well organized its just impressive. We have a blue binder which is essentially the farm bible, and is filled to the top with excel spread sheets documenting every detail you could want to know about the greenhouse, tilling schedules, planting schedules, fertilizer applications, and esoteric secrets of the universe (well I'm just guessing there's a tab for that in there somewhere.)

Most of the focus right now is on seeding in the greenhouse (things like onions, chard, beets, broccoli, cauliflower, herbs, flowers, lettuce, brassicas, and goodness knows what else) and making sure our leetle friends stay alive. In the morning and sometimes at other times throughout the day, one of us checks on the seedlings' progress and waters them, uncovers them, and moves them around as needed. I keep wanting to catch some seeds in the act of emergence but I know it is nigh impossible. Also I like to do physical impressions of emerging seedlings, especially beets for some reason, with their little cotyledon limbs reaching out and over into the air. With seedlings, you have to be very conscientious about proper germination temperature, light conditions, water levels and everything else that could affect their growth at this vulnerable stage. It's really interesting to observe how putting them too close to a warming light bulb or not watering the edge of a tray can mean the difference between life and death for these little guys. We are learning to be very detail oriented and very very careful about pretty much everything we do with them, because you can easily see the direct results of your actions or inattentions.

We are also doing lots of spring things, like pruning the blueberry bushes (such a joy), re-adjusting and spacing tractor implements, and random cleaning tasks (like nasty fridges). There isn't the hurried pressure yet, and all the staff are great about taking time to explain things and answer our questions.

On the education front, I am taking time to look over lots of amazing resources on community education, and teaching people about food and farming. Its nice to have the time to let ideas sink in and hopefully soon I will come up with some concrete ways to share them with people in ways that are relevant and exciting to them. But for now I am just marking things up, taking notes, and relishing in all the good work that people have already done on this subject.

Another big thrust right now is planning our seed-saving garden! Wendy, the farm and program manager, has given some terrific lessons on seed-saving basics, and festooned us with probably over 10 seed catalogues and reference books galore. I am geeking out on this stuff pretty hard and fast--and was surprised to discover that onions are really part of the amaryliddaceae family as opposed to the lilyaceae family as previously thought. It's hard to keep up to date with the changes happening in the plant systematics world, isn't it?! So now we are picking out varieties to grow for the seed-saving project and mapping out the garden layout. There's a lot to keep in mind when planning a seed-saving garden. It's like putting together a delicate puzzle where you have to keep in mind and fit together planting and harvest times, proper isolation distances and techniques, different kinds of pollinators, and different techniques for ensuring purity in multiple varieties of the same species. It's pretty complex stuff. To think that this has been fundamental to human survival and adaptation for thousands of years, and yet it is a set of skills and knowledge that is fast dying out, is enough to make me consider devoting the rest of my life to practicing and teaching seed-saving. So yeah, I'm into it. I'll save more of my comments and insights for when we are actually doing it!

So that's the kind of mischief we've been up to at the PFP.

But I had the weekend off, and besides yelling at the phone company and assembling a frustrating futon, there were a couple of big highlights. On Saturday morning, I drove out to Clinton Corners to visit the Wild Hive Bakery and Cafe (http://www.wildhivefarm.com/). They buy local grains, mill them, and bake delicious things with them. They also run an adorable cafe which is just the sunniest and most pleasant spot I have found yet. They also have a great little local foods store featuring the bounties of other local growers. And cheery friendly staff, and copies of Acres USA lying around. I'm going back, with you! (if you come visit!)

On Sunday (which I am going to try to keep as outdoor adventure day), I paid a visit to the Mohonk Preserve (and I do mean paid--nature conservation ain't cheap around here) near New Paltz, NY (conveniently just across the Hudson River from Poughkeepsie). I hiked up to and up the Bonticou Crag. Now Bonticou is a dutch word which means "spotted cow". Locals think they named the trail/area that because of a certain lichen which grows in splotches. I took a picture of what I think (am pretty sure) is that lichen. Please don't tell me if I'm wrong. Anyways I'll let the pictures do the talking. Hiking is a really nice complement to doing farm work--because you don't have to plan, or manage or tend or anything. You just have to observe, respect and enjoy.

"The Spotted Cow"

"Ah oui, Bonticou!"

Crag? What crag?



A lovely sugar bush.

PFP, yeah you know me

Well gosh a lot has happened since that last wimpy blog post.

Let's just say that in the past 2 months, I kept busy working at Urban Harvest (terrific Toronto-based seed and gardening co., shameless plug: www.uharvest.ca), volunteering at a community kitchen and a new food alliance, moping and dwelling, applying to programs, laying low in Greektown, and eating popcorn.

One of the places I applied to work at was the Poughkeepsie Farm Project (www.farmproject.org) and after a heady visit, it turned out they liked me enough to offer me the position of Full Season Program Intern. After much strife, tears, long chats, and a really late night, I decided that this was an opportunity I shouldn't miss.

I am 2/5 of the way through my first week at the PFP, and so far it is going great. Because there is so much going on and I am so thrilled to be diving head first into all of it, I plan to use this space to document the season to some extent. I will be posting pictures, updates, reflections, etc in the hopes that this will help me remember the crazy times that I know are ahead.

I think that's what people use these things for!

A Place for Reconsideration

Well, lots of people have told me to start a blog, so I finally decided I would give it a whirl. My hope is that it will help me gain some clarity, and encourage me to reflect more thoroughly on what I see and what I do, and ways I choose to be in the world. Maybe, just maybe, it will be relevant to others, especially young people, who are trying desperately to make sense of this upside-down world we live in, and travel a path that is meaningful, personally fulfilling, and contributes to the restoration of people and the planet.

For starters, some background:

I feel young, very young indeed. I am twenty three years old, but feel like I am just beginning in a way. I graduated from the University of Toronto this past June, with a B.A. in Environment and Society. I learned a lot there, but mostly wanted that portion of my education to be over, so I could start the rest of my life, and be in a position to put things other than my academics first. Now that I can, I am finding it to be much more challenging than I ever anticipated.

I supposed you could say I am looking for a job. But really, its turning out to be much more than that. I finally have enough time and space to really think hard about and explore WHAT I WANT TO DO WITH MY LIFE. Now I know that I will only really find this out over time and through experience, if I'm that lucky. But I can understand that intellectually and still need to try as hard as I can, right now, to decipher my values, gifts, interests, and what constitutes a good, balanced life in my opinion, in order to make informed, intentional decisions.

I guess I took on this process seriously a few months ago, while working on a quiet farm and traveling on the west coast, but in the past few weeks, since returning to the city, I have started to combine this internal project with taking external action.

At first, I was frustrated and a bit angry that "my education" didn't prepare me more for this next phase in my life. Why don't they make you think more about these looming life questions in college, before you are done and vulnerable? Why don't they help you look harder inside? But that frustration soon passed. I realized that the point of university is to teach you other things, and maybe even help you find the right questions to ask. Now I am feeling very grateful for having a chance to entertain these moral deliberations with my full attention, and also wishing to high heaven I had more distractions from them.

So, to recap, I am done with undergrad, don't have a job, and have too much free-time (otherwise, how could I possibly have a post this long, or a blog at all, right?). But I am trying to take advantage of this unique situation of not being really busy to think hard, sit with my feelings, talk to people, look into various opportunities, and find some meaningful work. And not get depressed. Transitions are beautiful monsters, aren't they?

Most importantly I think: I am experiencing the apparently normal confusion and existential dilemmas of a recent grad looking for a job in combination with extreme sensitivity to mounting social and ecological crises. So in addition to feeling inexperienced and a bit lost, I feel a great sense of urgency to get to work right away, and concentrate my energies and skills where they can be of use most. I think that I am at a point in my life where I am asking important questions about what right livelihood is, but so are a lot of other people the world over, because the answers we have relied on for the past few decades (really much longer) clearly aren't working anymore.

Maybe if I document and examine my journey closely, and share it, it will help.

In closing: According to Paul Hawken in Blessed Unrest, "inspiration is not garnered from the recitation of what is flawed; it resides, rather, in humanity's willingness to restore, redress, reform, rebuild, recover, reimagine, and reconsider. 'Consider' (con sidere) means 'with the stars'; reconsider means to rejoin the movement and cycle of heaven and life." (4)

More to come soon.