Sundays

On Sunday it was frosty and clear once the sun came up over Sumas Mountain. It felt good to be outside and I took pictures of the frost. I am planning a garden, such as it is covered in black plastic and spare tires. I helped at the Urban Farm on Saturday and came away feeling good about everything. We will have a kick-ass raspberry crop again this year and I have plans to throw in a 20ft row here at home too. We made a rough list of things to grow in the garden, things we think we can handle. Beans, peas, cabbage, kale, the basics. Meanwhile I felt nervous about Monday's surgical event but what can you do, time moves us along and now it's 4 days later. The rain started up again and I wouldn't have walked even if I could have. Tomorrow I will try again.

Circular

I told my daughter tonight that if she wanted to know what sort of mood I was in to check the state of the kitchen sink. If the sink is clean I am feeling good. If there is chaos in the sink I am not in a good place. I think it's important to give kids these clues, to help them navigate the emotional landscape of the people they live with. My mother was not an open book. There were certain things she communicated clearly but teenagers are naturally self absorbed which makes picking up subtle cues challenging, if not entirely off their radar. I don't want to burden my kid with the process I find myself in currently, this period of hormonal readjustment, this life as a creative, self employed, slightly fragile human. This drying up. It's complicated and sometimes scary.

So far, the fall has been good. My daughter has been busy which means I am busy supporting her, in her multiple activities. In many ways being in service to another human makes your own life very simple and directed. It's easy to suppress your own feelings when someone else needs your support. I wake early, make breakfast, make lunch, drive her to the bus or to school, have my day, attend school related functions revolving around sports and music, make supper, plan lunch, sleep. Strangely, I feel the opposite of put upon. I feel like we are this team. I signed up for this and she is working really hard. It's my job to help her be her best. The structure of her life dictates the structure of my life and this holds me together while the rest of me fluctuates wildly. There is no chaos when I look at her. I see the course we are on, I know what to do. I am grateful for her.

I stopped over at the urban farm today, the home of my friend who I have been helping in exchange for fruit and vegetables, since the spring. We picked tomatoes and she gave me the low-down on making sauce, which I will do tomorrow. We weeded a bit, social weeding while catching up pulling out bind weed, that stuff that just spirals around everything. She dug me up a perennial to take home. An Echinops; globe thistle, to be planted in full sun. I made a note on my phone, my memory is poor for these things, these days. The garden is moving along, into a new phase, there is still so much life there.

Wellness

I had a migraine on Tuesday brought on by whatever causes these things. I felt horrendous for about 18 hours and then after the pain subsided I was left with rising anxiety and severe heart palpitations accompanied by acute self awareness spiked with massive dread. These feelings rise up in me and I get thrown off, I feel lost and afraid to be alone. And then as quickly as they arrive the feelings disappear and the intense despair is replaced by my normal happy outlook, keen to embrace the day in all it's mundane wonder and I am left wondering if any of it really happened. 2 versions of the same picture sliding apart and then back together overlapping each other calmly. Fortunately for me I have an extraordinary partner and friends who have known way more misery than I ever will and they are always nearby when I need them most. My work is busy again and to counterbalance the stress of being creative for a living I have been helping my good friend in her garden. I am going once a week. We have a little visit and discuss this and that and then I help her with a few tasks. On my way home last week I felt an overwhelming sense of well-being. I am well. Well I am.

Swept away.

So far it's one of those springs when the weather got hot early and the snow has melted quickly. The local creeks are full and rushing and the combination of this and fine weather seems to draw young men (typically) to fast water. Two were lost at the height of the heatwave in Gold Creek near here, in a swimming hole we have swum in but that was late in the summer and by then the water was tired from rushing and the only danger was the icy temperature. Even my dad leaped into the granite pool carved there by centuries of falling water. Young men have also been lost in capsized canoes in deep interior lakes that bear pioneer women's names. Bodies are washing up on the banks of the Fraser, remains have been found up north in Prince George. Yesterday a boulder crushed two campers, a man and his daughter. Harsh spring, but a beautiful one.

The sun has been shining and so I have had no time to be reflective beyond noticing how tremendously hopeful and happy I feel. On Monday while I hung out the laundry on the clothesline I could hear bees buzzing loudly and naturally thought it sounded like trucks and cars whizzing by on the Trans-Canada highway 5 miles to the north. It turned out it was a bee swarm in a tree above my office. Mark was panicked as he has an irrational fear of bees and he was in the office when they appeared. I was over-the-moon. Let's face it the last few months have been rather hellish in the work department so the appearance of nature's busiest creature felt more symbolic than plagueish to me. The bees have stayed and so have the indications that I will probably be okay after all. I launched my new website, and reinstated my land line after a year and a channel of communication as wide as the Ganges has opened. We borrowed a box for the bees from our neighbor on Tuesday and thanks to the internet we set it in what seems like a good location. We rubbed the box with lemon rind and Mark put a bit of honey near the entrance. He relaxed around the bees and let his natural obsessive tendency kick in checking on the swarm and box every 45 seconds.

It's 8 days later now, it's been raining and I have returned from Canada to discover the swarm still up in the tree but the bee box is quiet and I fear barren. I have been busy with work and in between things today I took the opportunity to prune a few limbs along the driveway. I found myself under this red twig dogwood and the blossoms were alive with bees. I felt so pleased to discover they were here on the property. I am hoping that there is so much pollen to be had that the bees are lingering around and are enjoying being up that tree. Who can blame them, they have a view of the whole yard. I really want to open the box to see what went on in there. Did they just come in and raid the cupboards, so-to-speak, rob the hive of its honey and move along? It's a possibility but they are still up there so I am still hopeful that they will let me make them a home here.

Wasteful

There is no picture for this post. If there were you wouldn't like it. The distended anus of a chicken as it propels itself forward shitting one final shit as its heart stops and its nerves fire one last time and it lands way off in the corner of the pen causing me to grab at it with the pitch fork. All I can think is what a waste, 3 months of feeding and it can't be eaten. The butchering takes preparation and will happen in two days on another farm near here. If I were a farm wife, I'd know what to do in this situation. I might even have an over-sized pot boiling on the wood cook-stove up in the farmhouse, sharpened knives at the ready. 15 or 20 minutes and it would be ready to cook for my hungry family. If I were a farm wife I wouldn't  have on a Pashmina scarf under my chartreuse green coat, I wouldn't be worried about feathers and blood and guts. I might even have pigs that I could throw the entrails to like little treats or god forbid the entire chicken if it were suspect enough. I am not a farm wife, I am a designer and I have no time to pluck a chicken today because I need to finish a rush job, butchering a suddenly dead chicken was not on my docket for the day. Even still, I feel the futility as the limp body heavy with meat gets tossed into the woods, hopefully some other animal will discover it and eat it. Happy early Thanksgiving.

9 weeks to meat

The chicks arrived last Thursday just as we left for Oregon in the pouring rain. My partner in crime collected them and got them all cozy in the stock tank I had set up for them in my little barn. It's helpful having another person invested in this rather dodgey project. Chicks are fragile and the whole process of raising them feels precarious to me. I once drowned 25 birds by accident early on in the process when they were small and unable to stay warm. My waterer lost suction in the night and filled the metal stock tank with water, just enough to soak each little downy bird and they struggled to pile themselves up on top of each other to reach the light but it was all for naught and in the morning when I discovered the mishap they were just a wet mass of dead chicks. I was horrified. I stood in the barn and screamed for help, no one came. My daughter was 3ish at the time, I had to keep her from seeing them, the pile of transparent limp bodies, their eyes shut but visible through thin skin. I carry this horror with me and each time I go to check on them I feel a slight panic rise up in me as I step across the threshold of the barn. So far they are okay. I don't need to be caring for 30 chicks at the moment but I am, and in a way maybe it's good for me. In an effort to outrun the winter doldrums I have packed my fall beyond recognition so that everyday is filled with multiple activities. At night I write my list and in the morning I follow it like an automaton forcing myself to think less and do more. Surprisingly it seems to be working. I feel okay, less gray than usual and more energetic despite giving up my new found love, coffee. It would be nice not to have to work so hard at feeling reasonable but this is who I am so I have to try new things as my brain chemistry changes. I changed my diet recently too at the suggestion of my naturopath. My blood pressure is still high and at the moment my head is pounding but that is just today. This too shall pass. There is something purposeful about being needed by 30 tiny birds that you will one day butcher and slather in BBQ sauce. For today they need food and clean shavings and to be warm and I can handle that.

Farm Tour Logo

This is a quick little logo for my client Sustainable Connections. Fast and fun and the client liked it which makes me happy. Perhaps not the height of esoteric design but it's friendly, inviting, and legible. Cartoony goodness I would say.

Simple Pleasure

I will not wax poetic, there is no need. For the simple act of going out to the yard on a summer morning to pick a few fresh berries to drop into my granola is poetry enough.

An egg, finally.

Finally, my wretched lazy hens have produced an egg. It's been about a month and half since one was laid, everyone was molting so egg laying was temporarily on hold. I had no idea there was any connection between these two events. A friendly 13yr old in my community filled me in on this and another egg-raiser friend of mine confirmed it. Who knew? I suppose in a perfect egg filled world not all the hens molt at the same time but this year mine did. As my egg supply dwindled I felt increasingly panicked, close to destitute egg-wise. I love the hope eggs embody, one little egg makes a nice healthy meal. I was finally reduced to buying a dozen commercial eggs and they were lame to say the least, pale yellow yolks and runny whites. These eggs are no competition to mine except that there is a constant supply of them. Anywho, I hope to rebuild my egg surplus over the next few weeks, my guests at Christmas will expect to eat a few farm fresh eggs and I will be proud to serve them.

One Whole Year

Feeding the chickens today—and they look like hell by the way, everyone is molting—I remembered that it was my blog's birthday. I have managed to keep writing through a whole year. I realize none of it is polished and some it probably does not make sense to anyone but me but it makes me happy to do it. Like feeding those damn chickens, its just nice to do. They all gather around and they make happy little sounds. Quite an array of sounds too. One day I will record those. It's impossible to describe their sound with words. Mere crappy words who have no pitch.

I am not sure where all this putting down words will lead but I am willing to do it and see where it takes me.

I let the broody hen stay on her nest after all. I stopped worrying about how she would eat and drink and let her instinct guide me. Eventually two chicks appeared and I cleaned the nest of the blank shells while they cheeped around the henhouse. The mama hen did do a good job of keeping the chicks tucked under her wings. After awhile I built a little ramp so the fledgling chicks could get outside. They went cheerfully. The weather changed, a few wet windy nights and when I went to perform my daily chores they were no where to be found. The hen was back with the flock like nothing had happened.

Next time this happens I will swoop in and get the chicks into a separate nursery where they can grow up out of danger from predators (is that what got these ones?) and the other hens.

Garden Update

I feel the time is right to reveal what happened with the garden project from earlier in the spring. I think it is safe to say I have learned many things about my commitment to growing food. We had high hopes for an abundant garden where participants could drop over, plant a few seeds, pull a few weeds and in the course of time harvest a bit of veg. Seems good right?

In reality I could never make it to the farm more than twice in a week and often when I got there I was overwhelmed by what needed to be done and also not sure how to do things like mix soil, space seeds, run a rototiller. Pearl was not as stoked about the whole experience either so when we went to the farm we generally ended up visiting the river and throwing stones instead of doing actual farm work.

By June when it was still frigid out I swore I would always have a CSA share and try to support a farmer regardless of how many of the veggies languished in my fridge. Farming is fucking hard work. There is no disputing this. I planted 3 100ft rows of beets and it nearly killed my back. I see now that I put the micro seeds too close together and the beets are crowded.

Here's the catch. The fact that the beets are growing, and the fact that today we harvested carrots that Pearl planted draws me deeper into the whole process. We dropped those seeds into soil and they miraculously grew. I asked Pearl what she thought of the carrots she grew and she said they were the best she had tasted, and they are.

So here's the plan for next year. In February I will join a CSA, I am not sure who's yet, but someone from my immediate area. This will be a hedge against my tendency for laziness and over ambitious plans. I will also endeavor to grow some stuff BUT I will do it at my own place so I can tend the garden easily without having to make a trip in the car. I have berries, cherries and apples growing here and if I could grow a few things either in a garden or greenhouse that would be great. We'll see how it goes.

First Day at the Field

On Tuesday this week I picked Pearl up from school and went over to Nancy's farm. It was our first day of helping out there. The field is located on the Nooksack River that flows through Everson. The whole valley along the river is a rich agricultural area. The soil is clay and sandy and good for growing. Our job on tuesday was to help tie up the 4, 250ft rows of raspberries. Pearl's job was to cut the string for the 3 adults who were tying up the berries. We also cleaned up last years canes out of the rows as well as pulling up great dry stalks of lambs quarters from the previous season. It was sunny and quite windy but totally pleasant. We worked for about an hour and a half, not so long on our first day out. Nancy came over to our house for a bowl of Barley soup and we looked over some seed catalogs to see what we wanted to plant. There seems to be a consensus on Sungold Tomatoes, I wanted some Fingerling potatoes, and Nancy has seed leftover from previous years for cabbage, broccoli, carrots, etc. She suggested we grow a few pumpkins too and said we could carve designs and words into them gently when they were small and the designs would expand as the pumpkins grew. I felt a bit tired from all the bending over and moving up and down the rows but it felt good to have put in our first day in the field.

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Just Grow It!

This is my good friend Nancy. She has a gift when it comes to growing food. Nancy has a great sense of what to grow. I think we have similar taste palettes. She loves purple vegetables, so do I. Life as a farmer is a tough one though and over the past few months we have been talking about the farm and the act of farming and of providing people with food.

For the past few years I have been involved with one CSA or another. Harmony Farms (Nancy's farm) was by far the best for my tastes. This year I decided I wanted to participate a little more in the whole process of growing the vegetables and Nan has been kind enough to invite a few of us over to farm. I've never really grown much food successfully so I feel that it's time and I am looking forward to participating in an activity with purpose that allows me to get my hands down into the earth.

Pearl and I popped down to the farm last night, it's near the Nooksack River in Everson. Nancy showed us around a bit and we talked about what needs to be done to get planting. I want Pearl to learn the importance of being able to grow food. When we were in Vancouver the other day I noticed several gardens in peoples yards, tight spaces where lawns had been, now tilled up earth ready for planting. Vines tied, perennial vegetables acting as decorative borders. Every inch of space dedicated to the effort. And we out here have space, it's disgraceful not to grow a little, eat well, and put some away.

So when I am not home on summer evenings, you'll know where I am.