not much to report

It’s the big month we’ve been waiting all this time for!  The next 6 weeks are the busiest of the season, bringing in the bulk of Horton’s annual income. 

This week I’ve been into making smoothies with the strawberries and blueberries that seem to have erupted overnight.  The temperature has finally  hit the mid 80’s and it hasn’t rained in weeks – it’s similar to east coast summer except that at night it drops back down to the 40’s and I continue to start the day in a winter hat and insulated boots.  The weather has definitely helped all of our crops as well as my AMAZING farmer tan J. 

The weeds are growing exponentially, but we do so much harvesting these days that we hardly make a dent in it!

Last night I got the weed whacker out and took care of my apprentice garden (yes, it was bad enough to require a power tool…).    Today I carted out around 100 wax boxes and laid them over the cut weeds, which should suppress them for the rest of the season.  Yay for me – but it really changes the aesthetic of our community garden…  

The hoedown is only a few weeks away and we’ve been in hardcore planning mode.  So far, we’ve come up with a lot of fun ideas…hopefully they’ll actually materialize.  We have secured two bands and the beer, which I guess is all we really need.  But, there are grand plans of a carrot shaped piñata, slip and slide, croquet court, eating contests, karaoke, and a photo booth.  I guess our annual hoedown is a highly anticipated event in the farmer’s market circle – last year there were around 100 attendees!  I’m already overwhelmed thinking about cleaning up that mess…

Well, it's 6:15am and I better get sharpening my knife!

yeah fun week!

This week was intense.  Our morning harvests were high volume and fast-paced.  We all seem to have a good handle on how to move through the day with efficiently and purpose, which feels really good and motivates me to work even harder.  This week we began the harvest of carrots, cucumbers, and potatoes.  Potatoes are a fun one.  You take a digging fork and loosen up the soil then pull the plant out – with potatoes attached to the roots.  Then you keep digging and have to search out loose ones.  It’s so exciting and I think of it like digging up buried treasure; you never know what you’re going to get!  Unfortunately some of our potato plants have a disease called ‘black leg’ which is essentially a rotting of the stem (like our cucumbers).  It’s a disease of the soil common in unusually wet and cold conditions (like our entire spring/summer up until this week of 80 degree weather); but, so far the majority of the plants have been harvestable so it’s not as dire as it could have been.

Bill gives us a lesson on potato harvesting



A heart-shaped cull!

On Tuesday we celebrated Lisa’s 36^th birthday which was a night of AMAZING food – beer battered salmon, fresh cucumber, carrot, and radish salads, and a flourless chocolate s’more’s cake! 

Lisa's Birthday Cake!

However, the best part of my week was on Friday when Erin came out to visit and help out in the field!  She spent the afternoon with us in the packout bagging spinach for Saturday market and then helped weed an unruly bed of carrots.  The next morning she was definitely feeling the ‘bent-at-waist-hamstring- burn’ – lol – which is a distant yet eternally familiar memory of my first days out in the field.  It was really fun to have someone I love be a part of my experience out here.  I can’t wait for my mom and dad to get here August 28^th!! 

Erin samples our Nettle Beer!

My garden has been producing some good food as well.  I especially love my thyme-oregano plant – some sort of hybrid that tastes great baked into a pizza crust!  I feel like the more crops we harvest, the more we eat!  All day long we talk about what we could make for dinner with the copious amounts of food we bring in.  Eating has been as much of a learning experience as farm work as been.  Especially living with a professional cook – I never knew all of the things you could do with the most basic ingredients.  Our kitchen is eternally busy with creative energy; all four burners going and dishes piling up.  Today Paul attempted to brew beer but had to call it quits when we ran out of propane.  However this didn’t quell his spirit – he continued drinking and gave us a good laugh when he stepped out into the back yard holding a mug of his last success (a mugwort beer) wearing only a t-shirt and Ashley’s flower print apron.  Unfortunately I have no pictorial evidence of this.

All in all, another great week with beautiful weather and lots of great energy!

Planting baby lettuce!

"mom says you're changing"

 - -  The text I got from my sister, Cait, last Sunday, after telling her that I had just spent all day slaughtering chickens.  Well...half a day - I'd been coming down with a sore throat/cough/something for a few days that I'd been ignoring, but it finally caught up with me Sunday afternoon.  The rest of the conversation went like this:

Cait:  "you are sick in the head.  the family is dying laughing. did u choke it or cut its throat, mom wants to know?"

Me:  "slit throat.  we're eating one tonight"

Cait:  "well, maybe your throat is sore from karma"

Miss That Good Ole' Lamb Family Humor. 


Ashley's friends (Digit, Freedom, Andre, and Carly) invited us apprentices out to their homestead to learn and help them slaughter their chickens.  I jumped at the opportunity at first  (as I recently left the idealized world of vegetarianism to embrace a way of living and eating that is more holistic, in my opinion).   In my head I thought - 'this is exactly what I want to be able to do on my own someday, so, what a perfect opportunity!'  But, a few days before the slaughter, the reality of what I had committed to began to sink in.  I doubted my ability to actually kill a living being and a nervousness crept into the pit of my stomach.  I decided to push on through it.

I watched Digit kill the first chicken and learned how to most effectively slit it's throat.  Then, Ashley took me to get my own chicken, which I had to chase around the coop, corner, and then grab without getting pecked.  It was the first time I had ever held a chicken, and once I finally got him, he was surprisingly calm. Next, Ashley helped me hang the bird by his feet in this little noose.  I looked the bird in the eye and took a moment to connect to it and thank it for it's life energy.  Then I slit it's throat - making a cut that started behind the bird's ear and went straight across it's neck.  It was hard to cut through the feathers, and I had to cut a few more times in order to get at the main artery (which isn't ideal, but, it was my first time). I knew when I finally got it because the blood came pouring out and the bird died shortly thereafter.  Though, it continued to flap it's wings and thrash around which scared the shit out of me!  But, like all creatures, chickens continue to have neurological responses immediately following death.

After the bird drained for awhile, I took it down from the noose and chopped it's head off.  Next, I plunged it into 150 degree water, which loosens the muscles and skin for plucking.  Usually one would stand there and pluck out each individual feather... BUT this summer, Digit invented a bicycle powered chicken plucker!!  I peddled while Digit held my chicken and what would have been a time consuming step in the process took all of five minutes!!!  (However, it was a pretty intense workout!)

Next, I finger plucked some of the random feathers we missed and then cut open the bird at the underbelly, reaching into the cavity and gently pulling out all of the organs.  Then I cut off the feet and rinsed out the inside and put it into a cooler.  The whole process took around 45 minutes, but mostly because I was learning.  We did a total of 13 birds - though I only killed one. 

Paul and Lisa gutting the birds

At the end of the day (eating the best fried chicken of my life  - via Ashley - ), I realized how thankful I was to have participated.  The experience truly deepened my awareness of and connection to food and my place in the overall life/death cycle.

The rest of the week was a blur - I only got sicker and slept for most of the day on Monday and Tuesday.  I tried my best to work but barely made it through today - - my head is still pounding and I look forward to sleeping all weekend - - blahhhhhhhhh

swimming in garlic

It seems impossible to me that a week is 7 days long.  It’s already Thursday night and it feels like yesterday was Monday.  The days are going by so quickly – I’ve never been in a situation like this!  In my past life, Mondays were this depressing dose of reality that I had to trudge through, counting down the days and the hours until it was Friday again.  But, here, I have no fear of Mondays, and by Sunday night I’m actually anticipating getting back out to the field.  

I can’t believe it is already mid-July (and that I’m still wearing my winter hat in the mornings!). This week marked the last time we will sow or plant out new crops aside from lettuce!  Everything else is planted and waiting to be harvested over the next 3 months.  (Also not included is: spinach, salad greens, carrots, radishes, and beets, which are all planted by Bill on his tractor).  

Today we harvested garlic that the crew last year planted.  We carted it all into the barn and layed it out to dry on tables.  Because Oregon is so wet, it will take awhile for it to dry out completely.  This means that our living space will eternally smell like stir-fry.  I guess there are worse smells...like the usual smell of chicken shit wafting over from the giant heap, also located in the barn. 



A sea of garlic!  Directly behind me, the pile of chicken manure. Directly to the right, the door to my room.  I literally have to shuffle sideways in order to get in there now!



This week I spent a lot of time in the packout (washing and packaging things for market and wholesale), something that up to this point, I’d been trying to avoid like my own death.  Mostly, I’ve used the ‘last-one-in-from-the-field’ tactic – which guarantees the 3 blank circles next to ‘packout’ will already have names in them.  Then, for awhile, I had this weird fungus on my ring finger and was automatically exempt from washing - a true blessing in disguise. See, for me, being in the packout is similar to being at market.  It really all comes down to the bleak reality that I just don’t quite have what it takes.  But last week I figured I needed to stop whining about it and get in there and do my part just like everyone else.  The first few times completely overwhelmed me – it was probably similar to what I look like in a grocery store – just standing, mouth slightly agape, with a blank, almost confused look on my face, trying to visualize what I need and how it all is supposed to go.  It was rough.  However, after getting some practice this week I think I have a better handle on the ‘flow’ and have definitely made progress recalling the correct procedures.  But it’s still a freakin’ process…



the packout



For three nights in a row, David Byrne, the barn cat, has showed up at dinnertime to our picnic table, with a half-dead bird.  It’s kind of impressive actually – catching a bird like that - though disturbing because he usually doesn’t kill it all the way and we have to watch the thing squirm and gasp for air.  It doesn’t exactly rouse an appetite.   A few weeks ago David ran into the living room with a live one in his mouth.  The bird got away for a few seconds, but David lept into the air and snatched it in his mouth -blood spattering on the coffee table- and pinned it to the floor!!!!!!  It was wild.  I’ve gotten used to stepping over all of the dead moles, rats, birds and snakes that the cats leave for us in the walkways every week.  The snakes are the worst though – dead or alive.  In the past two weeks it seems like they’re all coming out of their holes just to cross paths with me.  I’m almost to the point of paranoia whenever I walk near black plastic or tall grass.  I’ve always had this fear of snakes – which isn’t really a fear, but an aversion.  Basically, seeing one or thinking about one makes me cringe and feel like I need to violently shake my entire body clean.  Everyone is now aware that when they hear a little girls’ shriek from across the fields, they don’t need to come running, it’s just me somewhere, recovering from a snake sighting.    

On a completely different note, last weekend was the Country Fair – THE big deal of the year out here that has it’s roots in the counter-culture movement, Ken Kesey, and The Grateful Dead.  It’s a 3 day festival/medieval carnival held in 300 acres of woods.  The people of Eugene don’t hold back, that’s for sure, lol.  Lot’s of naked, gender bending, barefoot, dreadlocked, costumed, happy, people!



naked people 'showering' together to dance music.



Spinach Queen!

The past few weeks I’ve really taken to cutting spinach, and so have been designated as ‘The Spinach Queen’, which means I get to harvest it every day J .  It’s really made me appreciate how important weeding and watering is.  The difference between a bed that was well weeded and watered and one that was not makes for two very different harvests.  I’ve been cutting around 15 boxes a day, which, in a well tended bed, usually takes me a good hour and a half.  If it’s weedy and brittle that tacks on an extra half hour or so, which is a lot of time especially when it’s a delivery day. 

On Thursday, Bobby does deliveries, but yesterday we had so many orders that I had to drive a second truck in!  It was quite the intense morning - not rushed, but definitely fast paced.  We had a huge harvest to do, and it all needed to be washed, packaged, and loaded into the truck by noon.  Now that we all have a better idea of what we are supposed to be doing, we’ve been able to move more efficiently throughout the day without constant instructions or reminders.  Our system is this: at 6:30 we start out harvesting the salad greens together.  Once you finish cutting your green into boxes you bring a cartload of the boxes into the packout and water them in (it’s like giving the produce a little drink of water to hold it over until we wash and package it).  Then you sign up on the white board (by putting your initials in the circles next to whatever vegetable is listed next) and get going.  This system gives us a chance to harvest all of the crops - something unique about working on this farm (most farms will train employees on one crop, and that is what you do all day long). The crops are listed in order of importance, as the first crops (usually greens) are more likely to wilt as the sun rises. 

Heading out for the morning

As the days go by, more and more crops are ready for picking!  We’ve started in on the basil, sweet peas, broccoli, beets, parsley, and zucchini – on top of the radishes, salad greens, lettuce, chard, kale, spinach, garlic whistles, cilantro, and green onions that we’ve been doing for some weeks now.  My garden has really taken off as well, though nothing is ready to harvest quite yet.  I made a better effort to weed and water it this week, and I think it really made a difference judging by the look of my plants.  It’s amazing how a plant can change, seemingly, overnight.  I feel like there is so much I haven’t learned about plants, gardening, farming, etc. and that time is running out! 

Grim Reaper style

The 4^th of July was just another work day around here, albeit a fairly relaxing one. Especially for me since I had deliveries to do, which got me into town and to my friend Daniel’s BBQ. 

We’ve been in planning mode for Horton’s infamous annual Hoe Down.  I wish you all lived closer and could come! (Erin, you have no excuse,  you better there.)  It’s an all day and night affair with a live band, farm games, kegs, tacos, a piñata, and camping.  Apparently around 100 people come out for this each year, so I can’t wait to witness what a shit show it’s going to be.  August 20^th people! Mark your calendars! 

In other news, I think it is safe to say now that the woodpecker IS GONE!!!!!!  It’s been exactly 6 days since anyone has heard from him and the silence is like a gift from God.  Though, I really think it helped us all adjust to the early mornings, especially since we just moved to a 6:30 start time.  I’ve been up at five, no problem and have felt really good for the past two weeks, without any weird spells of fatigue or unusual sleepiness.  I think we’ve finally found ourselves in summer’s upswing energy and I feel physically and mentally ready for it. 

Today we had another field trip, this time to Full Circle biodynamic farm, outside of Eugene.  It was drastically different from last week’s trip to Hey Bailes – primarily because Full Circle is biodynamic and operates primarily on bike power and hand tools.  In fact, their barn/workspace was built entirely out of found materials and put together using only hand tools.  They deliver in town by bike – primarily meat, eggs, cheese, butter, and a few kinds of veggies.  We helped Kevin and Katie harvest grass for their cows using scythes - and I thought harvesting with my little knife was fun!



Although, after about ten minutes I was exhausted, lol. Another interesting thing they do is a ‘winter CSA box’ – something I never thought of since most farms are done harvesting by mid-fall.  For $350.00 they offer CSA members boxes of tuber and root veggies (beets, sweet potatoes, squash, potatoes, turnips, parsnips, etc.), dried fruits and veggies, canned tomatoes, dried herbs, etc. that members help put together themselves on a big harvest day.  Katie said that most people LOVED coming out to harvest and pack up their own boxes.  I really liked that idea.  It was refreshing and extremely interesting to learn about a farm so committed and passionate about doing things the old fashioned way. 

who knew i'd ever be into doing it the hard way

This morning we got up at 4:30 and made donuts for Bill’s birthday! We fried them and then made all kinds of glazes from fresh berries, sugar, cocoa, nuts, etc. We all hid in the walk-in cooler and Stacey ran and got Bill, telling him there was a ‘time sensitive matter’. He opened the door and we yelled happy birthday at him – he looked stunned, laughed, and then shut the door on us. 

waiting in the walk-in, giddy with lack of oxygen

On Wednesday we went on a field trip to Hey Bailes Farm, located in Lorane – about an hour away from Horton. Hey Bailes is comparable to Horton in geography, size, and crops grown (they also make most of their income from salad mix), but at the other end of the spectrum in terms of philosophy and method. John, the owner, gave us a tour and was soon obvious that his farm’s aims are to: 1. make money, and 2. spend the least amount of time doing it. We were in complete shock when first of all we saw his apprentices harvesting radishes sitting plopped down in the row. Then he showed us his spinach, carrot, and salad beds, all of which were perfect, uniform rows without a single visible weed! John explained that he spent a few years tilling the beds before any weed went to seed and spread – which worked to basically ‘eliminate’ his weed problem! He said that his crew weeds for a few hours a week (compared to our few hours a day) to keep the little ones at bay, but as he put it “I don’t want to be breaking my fricken' back”. We asked him to pass that along to Bill… lol.

John with his salad harvester

 

The other major difference was in his harvesting methods. He uses a salad cutting machine to harvest the lettuces – something he said saves him a lot of time and money. He also uses a dozen or so greenhouses and other machines to plant, harvest and weed, which seems like not only a time saver, but a way to guarantee the productivity and consistency of a harvest. BUT… my thoughts were: By bringing so much machinery and ‘factory’ style practices into farming, you are necessarily missing out on a deeper connection to the earth and to your food. I have learned to appreciate the silence in the morning when the mist is so thick you can’t see the trees or mountains and it’s just you and your knife, each cut unique – I can’t imagine being in a situation following around machines like a machine myself that are doing the work I am perfectly capable of and enjoying doing. Not only that – but, what would happen if there was no fuel to operate the machines, or to fuel a factory that makes the machines? What is the value in creating more food (or anything for that matter) than one or a community can use or manage? It’s sad really because it made the whole process of farming seem just like everything else in this culture - honoring production and capitalism above all else – the very thing that propelled me into farming! It made me love Bill and Deborah even more - for having the awareness to run a farm as a business, without letting that be the reason for their work. It reminded me of my experience in acupuncture school at Tai Sophia where the motive was never ‘fixing’ a ‘patient’s’ ‘symptom’; healing was about creating a partnership that centered on growing in awareness together to create movement and change, using needles only to augment that. After a year at Tai Sophia I knew that I could never learn acupuncture anywhere else and I feel the same way being at Horton. Because this experience has been so in line with how I want to live my life I know the next chapter in my journey will have to be with a farm, garden, homestead, community, etc. that honors these same kinds of principles. My bar is getting’ high, yo.

sugar snap peas at dawn

cheese and locked keys

On Saturday I biked into Eugene, which ended up being about 36 miles - my longest ride ever! It was easier than I had imagined (aside from the 20 minute uphill climb over the pass) - though running shorts weren’t the best apparel choice since my seat had this little ripped piece that had gouged away at my inner thigh by the time it was over. Thankfully Lisa came into town and gave me a ride back (after we saw X-Men: First Class, which was actually pretty good!). On Sunday I was a witness to a taco eating contest between Paul and Ashley. She never really stood a chance to his bottomless mary-poppins-bag stomach (apparently one time he ate 47 pieces of pizza) though she kept up for a good while. The final score was 15 to 12, and although Paul could have easily eaten another 15, he opted for an ice cream dessert instead. I’ve never seen anything like it.

Before the taco eating, I went out to my garden with my hoe, finally. Woa. My bed, overrun with green smartweed, stood out like a sore thumb in contrast to my barnmates’ brown, kempt beds; though, not including Bobby’s section, which actually looked worse than mine. He told me this morning that he hasn’t decided whether or not he’ll be weeding at all – he said he might just call it a ‘permaculture experiment’. I hope he dosen’t because I often wonder what would happen to our crops if we weren’t out there hoeing for hours a day. I mean, who knows, it could just be a big scam!

My little patch

b. sprouts!

My brussel sprouts are really getting big! Although, there’s a running joke between me and Bill that I’ll be long gone by the time they’re ready to be harvested. He constantly asks me if I’m taking good care of ‘his’ brussel sprouts. I hope he’s wrong, because I really freakin love brussel sprouts. Especially seared (or broiled) in olive oil with garlic, red onion, lemon juice, brown sugar, and lots of salt and pepper. You should try it!

Today on my delivery run I fell into one of my old habits: locking the keys in the car. (I’m sure some of you remember my high school and college days when this monthly, sometimes weekly occurrence seemed like a frustratingly inevitable part of my existence…) So, I’m driving around with the windows down, singing along with Roy Orbison, feeling pretty good about my hustle in getting the deliveries done early. I pull into The Kiva, excited with big cheese purchasing plans that are amplified by the free bread I see ahead, sitting on the dumpster. I hurriedly roll up the windows, grab my wallet, flip the lock, and bounce out of the truck eyes on the bread. It was one of those ‘shutting the door but grabbing for it at the same time’ moments where you realize your mistake as your making it. I just stood there silent for minutes, alternatively peering into the truck and scanning the parking lot (for who knows what), cursing my careless nature this time induced by an eagerness for cheese and dumpster diving. I climbed under the truck, pebbles sticking to my sweat-drenched skin, dirt and dust falling into my eyes as I felt around the rods and pipes and whatever else happens under a car, desperately hoping to find a spare despite my clear recollection of Ashely’s ‘one-key warning!’ weeks ago. Finally I got it together and went inside, looked up the number to the farm and used Kiva’s phone to leave a “I’m sorry I screwed up…” message, then went back outside to peer in the window of the truck some more, a part of me honestly feeling like the situation would just fix itself somehow. The other part of me felt sick to my stomach knowing that Ashley was going to have to drive all the way into town (a good 45 minutes) just to bring me Bill’s spare. And it was the fear of this impending situation that kick started me into action, despite my physical and mental exhaustion. So I made my way down 11^th to the St. Vincent DePaul thrift store and begged for a wire hanger which I somehow managed to force between the truck’s door frame and hook around the lock - popping it open within minutes! I screamed out “YES!!!!!!!!!!!!” and jumped in glee of a crisis narrowly avoided due to the years I put in refining my carjacking skills. I love saving my own day.

high times

Since I fell asleep sometime before 7:00pm Wednesday night, I got up at 5:00 yesterday morning and took a field walk. Bill and Ashley have been advising that we do these walks daily to observe changes and get an overall sense of what’s going on around the farm. Usually I’m too tired to do much more than dress myself and throw together a peanut butter and banana sandwich + coffee before work starts at 7 but I think I’m going to try and make it a part of my morning routine because it was really serene and peaceful. 

This week we harvested green onions – which was our first plant out ever! It was an interesting experience to pull out the same onions I had put into the ground. Somewhere in between there they had somehow grown! We also learned how to harvest broccoli – another task involving our knives, which I LOVE. You basically hack it off the stem and then hack off the leaves and pack it into the box. Hack and pack. Oh – and we learned how to harvest Rainbow chard as well. Pretty much the same deal as the kale – snap it off at the stem and make a bouquet. Unfortunately I didn’t get a picture of the bouquets, but I will during the next harvest. The leaves were GIANT; yellow, red, white, green, and pink. 

some rainbow chard

As the weather continues to get warmer, we are slowly but surely rolling up the Agribon FOR GOOD!! It’s a very exciting time for all of us. Each bed we roll up is one less we have to take on and off each day. 15 beds left! 

Barn life this week has been especially fun – I think it’s all of the hysterical, body shaking laughter that starts at breakfast. For some reason every comment, gesture, incident has been overly ridiculous and deserving of loud outbursts. For example, during a frustrating moment searching for the lid to a particular Tupperware container it was suggested that I crawl into the cabinet to have a look, (which seems like the worst idea ever because obviously it’s going to be dark in there, but ultimately I did find the lid when everything came spilling all over the place as I was trying to get out). This kind of environment is like ‘home’ to my spirit and has felt like a re-birth of sorts. I don’t remember laughing this much or hard since 2004, when I lived with the absolutely hilarious Brad Riley and Erin Paul. I think my barnmates were taken aback the first time I reached a state of pure hysteria, something I know all of you can picture – my deep asthma-cough guffaw bursting the blood vessels in my eyes as they pour out tears - and in between gasps of air, my classic outcry: “I’M GONNA PEE”. 

Anyway, it’s been high times. And it’s not just me, which is the beauty of it. Pretty much everyone but Rita has a booming laughter that apparently echos between the hills - tonight at our Pie Friday meeting Deborah reminded us that she is running a silent retreat this coming week and weekend, and asked that we be mindful of loud music, etc. Bill piped in with: “No, for this crew, it’s not their music I hear, it’s all the laughing.” To which we all burst out in laughter.

Yesterday was my meeting with Bill. It went fine, my worry was over nothing. I told him that because he doesn’t give me much feedback, I really was nervous that I hadn’t been doing a good job. He said that he figured we all knew that if he didn’t say anything, then we’re doing it right. Not how I operate, but, o.k. He said that he appreciated my preparedness, attentiveness, and willingness to ask questions. He also said that he’s noticed how discouraged and irritated I get when I don’t learn something or catch on to a task right away, and suggested that I work on not judging myself so harshly. He pointed out how frustrated I had been when we first learned how to cut salad, (in fact, his exact words: “there were some….tense….moments….) and how now I’ve declared it as my favorite thing. I acknowledged that I could make things easier by letting go of the need to be perfect at everything I try and to give myself time to learn something, practice it, be in it before forming a judgment or jumping to “I can’t”, which is something that’s pretty much true in all areas of my life. Other than that he mentioned some things that he had brought up to everybody regarding speed, efficiency, focus, etc. He also assured me that I wouldn’t have to do Saturday Market if I really didn’t want to – I think Ashley must have told him how poor my mental math was last weekend. I gave the wrong change back to at least four people – in fact, it was probably more than that because Ashley just happened to overhear me at those random times. I also charged a man 8.50 for spinach that was 4.50. By the time I realized he had walked away and it was too late. I think he was surprised at the 8.50 price, but paid only because he was also trying to flirt with me. Then on more than several occasions I lost all train of thought and forgot how much the totals were, what bill the person had given me, and how to do the ‘count back’ method, during which I just stood over the money box with wide eyes and waited for Ashley to save me. My god, I’m back on my Saturday Market woes. 

This Saturday, which is tomorrow, I will thankfully not be at Market. I’m hoping for some good biking weather and a bonfire or two. Maybe some coconut banana chocolate chip cookies. Yeah Weekend!

Summer is here!

I went with an open, positive, ready-for-anything attitude. It’s just not my thing. At the end of Saturday Market I was practically in tears from the stress of it all. I came on at 10 and worked till 4 with one other person (hired from town, not from the farm) who had only closed down the stand one other time. That’s to say, we had an idea of what was supposed to happen, but when it came time it was us just throwing things into the truck, racing against the clock, shouting out “I don’t know, and WHO CARES!”. 

To give you a little background about market (and Horton in general): There is a very specific way to do everything here, including packing up the market truck. Things don’t just ‘go in’. Baskets are to be ‘nestled in’ first, followed by the tables and wooden table pieces which are strapped onto the sides in a particular way. Then come the tents and signs and shade covers and at least 100 empty boxes, Tupperware tubs, leftover and traded food, bags, tablecloths, brooms, buckets, compost, and random other things. Loading must not take longer than 30 minutes or other vendors start to complain (because we are blocking the road and they can’t start packing up until we leave), which gets back to Bill and Deborah and we get a ‘reminder talk’ – which has already happened twice. It’s a friggin stressful situation. And on top of all that, it was pouring rain. I was done and ready to leave at 4:30, but hadn’t been quick enough to avoid the traffic jam and had to sit there, cold and wet, stomach eating away at itself, until 5:00 - irritated as all hell because apparently my frantic rush had been for nothing. I could go into how it’s not even over at that point, because then there’s a 45 minute unpack once you get back – but I’m so sick of thinking about it – let’s just move on. 

I went out to water my garden today and am surprised at how the chard and brussel sprouts have grown in just a few days! The weeds are creeping in too – I still haven’t given it a good hoe yet – which I hope will just be fine for another week or so. I’m trying to take a very low stress, low maintenance approach to my garden, and in my head, I imagine it working out even better than meticulous, continuous attention and care. I have a suspicion that I’m in the trappings of a delusional thought process. 

This week we have our mid-season reviews with Bill, who has conferenced with Ashley and Stacey to give us some individual feedback. I’m pretty nervous, mostly because there has been almost no feedback up until now. I literally have no idea if I’m going a good job or not. I’ve decided to just prepare for the worst because things are never be as bad as you imagine them to be. Actually, I take that back. We’ll see on Thursday…

On Sunday Bobby and I turned the compost pile – another project started but not exactly followed through on. I don’t think anyone had even looked over at it in a week. Oh well, it will just take longer to break down, which I noticed has already started to happen - the compost materials (straw, food, poop, etc.) have already become more of a homogenous glop. Impressive!

Tonight we had our monthly barn dinner at Stacey’s house. Grilled pizza’s, PBR, and s’mores. I think it’s definitely summer. The fire her (firefighter) fiancé, Tenzin built for the s’mores, was wild. We had to face away while we roasted marshmallows, our eyebrows practically singeing off. As much as I roll eyes at the thought of another ‘group meal’ (all that preparation, mess, and clean up) – it always ends up being really nice. 

attempting to roast marshmallows

Hilling Home

This morning we spent three hours in the potatoes, ‘hilling’ them, which basically means using the Ozark Hoe to pull soil around the stem of the plant, making a little ‘hill’. This is usually done a few times a season to vegetables that are considered ‘tubers’ (the edible part being the stem as opposed to the root or flower of the plant). That was some slave work right there – we even burst out with a round of “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” (which my dyslexic/language-challenged brain always thought was “Sweet Low, Sweet Cherry High”, lol). Even though my hands were swelling with blisters after all was said and done, I actually really enjoyed it. Although my body is fatigued at times, I really do like the physical jobs more than the detail orientated, little-movement tasks like washing salad or sowing seeds. Plus, I want some John Henry-working-on-the-railroad pipes by the end of this season! 

Paul shot at the woodpecker with a garden hose!  Only he came back 20 minutes later...

I’ve read some good interviews recently, one being with author and OSU professor Kathleen Dean Moore who suggests that our personal identities are strongly tied to ‘place’. Not only are our bodies composed of the minerals and particles we share with the water, air, and soil specific to our geography – but our ‘Self’ is also constructed from location and landscape – by way of memory. Memories are easily conjured when we return to specific places, for example; the front porch of the home you grew up in, or the oceanside you vacationed at for years. She uses this context to explore what our obligations are to the landbase and the psychological ramifications of neglecting this – which is interesting, but I won’t delve into now. I think that because I am so immersed in nature every single day, the idea of ‘place’ being a part of my identity is especially apparent and relevant to my life right now. Since I moved to the Pacific Northwest I have been in complete awe of the old growth forests, golden-green mosses, pensive gray mists, and other random, strange-looking things. But because I have no history with or knowledge of my ‘place’ here yet, a deep part of me has begun to long for what is familiar - red pine-needled forest floors, black flies, trees swelling with summer lime-green leaves, and other random, unexplainable sensations and happenings of nature that I grew up with and was a part of. I’m beginning to notice more and more that I don’t have any solid sense of what the rhythms of this ecosystem are – which leaves me with a vague feeling of dislocation and disconnect. I don’t know whether this is a unconscious longing to regress back to what is comfortable and familiar – or if it’s a feeling that signifies a need for my body and spirit to eventually return ‘Home’ – not necessarily my childhood home, but to a place I feel in sync with and am able to give and draw wisdom to and from. Guess I’ll just have to wait and see what happens next…

The Adirondacks with Dad!

1/2 way to 28!

She's saying that I'm One Hot Hipster, lol

Today was my 27 and ½ birthday! This morning I opened the door to the kitchen as was greeted by half-naked Lady Gaga, a six pack of IPA, a pack of smokes and a sign that said “1/2 Birthdays Are Meant To Be Celebrated With Vices!” At lunch I ate a giant cupcake with miniature silverware and everyone sang their own rendition of what ½ of “Happy Birthday” would be. It was pretty sweet. 

Today we harvested garlic whistles. A garlic ‘whistle’ is the flowering part of the plant. It curls around – apparently like a whistle. I don’t really see it. During our harvest training, Deborah warned us that from now on, we will forever reek of garlic – as the scent soaks into clothing and is perpetuated by the washer machine. (As if my cracked, mud-crusted hands and fingernails weren’t enough to keep me ever getting a date…) Ever since we harvested green garlic out of the compost pile (too long of an explanation) I haven’t really been able to get excited by that smell. In fact, the odor of un-cooked garlic now makes me slightly nauseous, as it’s become exceedingly difficult to distinguish 'garlic' from 'compost'. Uhhg.

I had another major mishap this afternoon – it seems like every week it’s someone else’s turn to screw up. In fact, we’ve started a running list of everyone’s big fuck ups. Last week it was a double whammy – first Rita went to market and forgot all of the CSA boxes. Then on Bobby’s delivery run, the dolly flew out of the back of the pickup truck and got STOLEN within minutes! No joke. By the time Bobby did a U turn to go retrieve it, it was gone. He was informed by a gas station attendant who had witnessed the entire event that the driver behind Bobby had leapt out of his car, shoved it in his trunk and sped off!!!

 

Anyway, back to my mistake. I was pulling a cart filled with corn starts out to one of the back fields (like this). I came upon one of the irrigation pipes. I pulled the cart, one wheel at a time, over the pipe, and as the back was just about to clear it, it didn’t. Instead the sharp edge came down hard and pierced through the metal – spraying water up and out and everywhere! I let out a shrill “Jeezus!!!!” Bobby tried to turn off the water at the source but didn’t know what he was doing and instead ripped a piece of the handle off. Someone yelled ‘go get Bill’ and I started to run towards the packout - - but Bill had seen the whole thing from across the field and was already on his way. We just stood there, getting soaked like idiots, waiting. I felt really, really terrible, even though it could have happened to anyone. Bill took it in stride, like he usually does, (though I had a flash of what he told us all last week about biting off heads and it just being too bad). He told me that it happens every year and to just be more careful. And that was it! For as much as he rags on Buddhism (his wife, Deborah, is a Buddhist and runs events in the farm zendo – to which Bill jokes “we should be charging for that”) his way of being is reminiscent of a wise master/monk of sorts. 

So, it’s my weekend to go to market this Saturday, and I am not looking forward to it. It’s going to be a high stress day – starting early, with lots of loading, unloading, stocking, spritzing, mental math struggling, caffeine buzzes and crashes, and TONS of minute details that I’m probably going to forget. After last market, which I did enjoy, I decided that the whole ‘market’ part just wasn’t for me. I’d much rather be out in the field, breaking my back, then be worrying about all the time restraints, paperwork, presentation, and organization.We'll see how it goes, but I'm pretty sure this'll be my last.

Apparantly Still Adjusting...

Today I planted out my starts into the apprentice garden! I have chard, lettuce, green onions, thyme, brussel sprouts, Roma tomatoes, broccoli, and parsley. I’d been so worried about my stuff dying off in a cold night, but Bill told me “Rachael, it’s now, or never”. Planting my own garden was such a different experience than planting for ‘work’. For one thing, I let my careless nature run rampant – deciding not to pre-weed because it was going to take too long, then dropping the plants into the isles with things spilling all over. Secondly, I REFUSED to be in the bent-at-waist position – opting for a nice, relaxing kneeling position right into the bed. I also decided to plant my crops in a pattern based on size and color - as opposed to planting rows of one thing, because it looks cooler. When I was done, I realized that my rice was probably done cooking inside and just left the plants out there, un-watered. Oh, to be free. Lol.

 

It’s been a slow start for me this week. I’ve had a few hard mornings, partly due to the woodpecker, whose machinegun-like tapping has grown progressively earlier. It used to begin at 5:20, exactly, which was early, but became manageable. Now he starts in some time before 5am – I’m usually too tired to even check my watch. So there was that. Also, I’ve had another week of exhaustion. I can’t figure it out. The last two weeks I was going strong, even venturing into town for a beer a couple of nights. But, already I’ve had two nights of PASSING OUT by 7pm, and one lunch break nap. I guess I’m still adjusting? People have suggested anemia, chronic fatigue syndrome, and hypoglycemia – all those ‘catch-alls’ - - possible but I doubt it. I’m just trying to go with it – sleeping when I feel tired, and opting out of the extra-curriculars. Oh well. 

 

Actually, we were all talking about this yesterday - how when we first got here we were full of youthful energy - baking, making projects, going on hikes and staying up for one more beer – but how over the past month those things have kind of tapered off due to lack of energy after a day’s work (except the beer drinking:). It’s disappointing to think that we have all of this time and the space to create but it often goes unused. But, when it comes down to it, I am here to learn how to farm – working on my tan, etc., is just a bonus. I think in some ways I am still so used to living with a distinct separation between ‘work’ and ‘real life’. It’s hard to do that here, but I do find myself counting down the hours until lunch sometimes or choosing to forget all things associated with the farm on my days off. And thinking about this now, I realize that this is exactly the opposite of how I want to live my life. I want to be fully immersed and committed to each action I take because it will be meaningful and authentic to who I am and what I want to create in the world. But, I think this will take some time to cultivate, since I’ve spent 27 years dissociating during the hard, boring, in-between moments and maintaining a ‘socially acceptable self’ that was separate from my true self. I see my experience here as being my first step towards integration by living in a way that finally feels more authentic. 

end of the day...

"Seriously, it's June 7th and I'm pulling on my winter coat?!"



Kale in "Quad 1"



So.  It’s Sunday afternoon and I haven’t written a single thing all week.  Well, that’s not exactly true – I spent most of my evenings this week writing an article for the CSA newsletter and countless other hours working on recipe revisions (a bullshit task that I had already spent hours on the first time around.  The nit picking on font size, ‘personalization blurbs’, and more ‘storage tips’ finally breached my tolerance level Friday night, when I tried to knock the rest of it out, and after yet another formatting issue (and a few beers) I had my first real outburst since coming to the farm.  You all know me well enough to know what that looked like… lol… I think I really startled Paul, and definitely woke Lisa who was asleep upstairs.) 

Other than the stress of writing deadlines, the week was enjoyable.  The rain was minimal and we only spent one day of 9 hour hell in the bent-at-waist position (which I can now do two hours of without the urge to howl in pain!)  The hard day was Thursday – after spending the entire 4.5 hour morning weeding we jumped back into it after lunch and then finished the day planting out tomato starts (rolling out plastic, measuring out 18 in. intervals, cutting 4X4 squares in the plastic, digging a six inch hole, sprinkling each hole with bone meal, dropping plants at each site, and then finally putting them in the soil).  After we finished the two beds I seriously almost fainted when Stacey called out for one of us to go get the hoops and set up the row cover… we were far from done. 

We got a talking to from Bill earlier in the week regarding our performance as a group.  Apparently we are slow, compared to past apprentices.  Bill made it clear that we needed to pick it up, especially as harvesting exponentially increases next week and continues on through September.  I laughed out loud when he said:  “Have the occasional chat – you don’t’ need to work in silence… but you can have the chat without staring longingly into each other’s eyes.”  He also warned us that with the upcoming increased workload, there is an increase of stress all-around.  I laughed out loud again when he said:  “…To be honest, I’ll probably bite someone’s head off……(pause 5 seconds)…..and that’ll just be too bad!”  bahahah.  (Hope it’s not me.)

This week we harvested: salad mix, kale, radishes, spinach, and cilantro.  The fields are growing bigger each day, and we’ve cleared out most of South Dakota already.  The salad beds are only used once in a season – this is to assure that nothing wonky happens, since salad mix is Horton’s most profitable and popular crop.  The other beds are tilled and replanted, but with a different crop, preferably in another family of vegetable.  Crop rotation helps the spread of disease and assures that the soil doesn’t get drained out of a particular nutrient. 

This weekend a few of us took a road/camping trip to Canon Beach along the coast of Oregon.  What a relief to not wake up to that damn woodpecker, if only for one night.  The coast is absolutely beautiful – pristine and magical looking.  

Well, that’s all for now.  I’ll be better about writing next week, I promise!



Doin a sampler at the Rogue Brewery in Newport