a little farm update

It’s been a while since I posted. It seems like when the farm gets this busy, writing is the first thing that falls to the way side even though it’s almost just as important as breathing. For me, even though I know my writing often needs some serious help, it is a way to send things; experiences, joy and traumas away so they don’t keep rolling around in my head. It’s the pressure release valve. Just seeing words flow out also helps me think of things in a different way. Sometimes in just writing things down I come up with solutions and new ideas.

It’s like spring here. Fall is a very good growing season in Oklahoma.  When things should be dying and resting for winter I plant radishes, turnips, kale, chard, arugula, lettuce, boc choy, tatsoi, mustard and broccoli rabbe. It may be fall and it may be time to let go, let things die, sleep and rest but eating and feeding people is a driving force stronger than slumber. Even still, this time of year my internal calendar is slowing and letting go of the seasons before. It’s a quieter time, still very busy, but more reflective. 

Over the next several days the last of my planting will be complete. This will be the greenhouses that will be harvested in late December into March. I have a lot out in the field that will carry us until then. But planting will soon be over until February when it will begin again. Winter months are harvest months. Along with all that we are making steps to prepare for winter. Cutting wood has risen to nearly the top of the list, winterizing the yurt, the barns and generally making sure we are all, animal and human safe, warm and sound through a possible bad winter. 

We’ve had an excellent spring and summer, the best so far. The last of the farm table dinners for the season was last Saturday and along with a great relief that I survived it I’m also feeling a great sense of relief and excitement about the future. Like wow I just might be able to get good at this farming thing. But I know better than to test that theory. I’ll stay firmly planted in the beginners mind, more exciting that way!

This is the new greenhouse that I will be planting today. I’ve been a very busy girl!

when things go right

Much to my surprise yesterday shaped up to be a very productive day. In spite of lack of sleep I was able to muster up quite a bit of energy and first thing after milking I hit the garden with my hoe and weeded several beds. I was feeling pretty good about things and so I thought, well I might as well get all the pieces to the new greenhouse laid out, and before I knew it, I had the thing squared, four posts pounded in and all the hoops put together. Holla! I actually think I can get the rest of the posts in today. I love when this happens. What makes this even more phenomenal is I got a 30 minute nap in after lunch! and and ...I was fed and in bed by 9pm! ROCK ON!

Some times things go right. Actually most of the time they do, but when I'm off track I feel it more acutely. I walk a fine line, I know I do. I survive on very little, very well but I have no cushion, no room for failure. so when failure comes and it does it hurts a little more and it forces me to look hard at whats going on. Seems the easiest thing for me to do is to beat myself up, go through all the self tormenting. The hard part is to sit in quiet and breathe. I go with whats familiar. I'm slowly making progress in that area.

Days like yesterday renew my sense of faith in myself, especially when I accomplish something I didn't think I could. I'm always surprising myself. When I'm not scared. I can really focus and become my work, but I get scared sometimes. I worry.  I suppose a little of that is good for a person and I'll take a healthy helping, but the feeling I have right now, the feeling that I can do it, is a feeling that must be close to flying. I just need to stop worrying that in any moment I'm going to smack into a plate glass window.

upon further reflection

The weather is changing and fast. I'm running now to keep up. The last few days I have not been able to sleep and have been feeling pretty stressed out. Saturday I couldn't sleep because I was stressed out about money. Was I going to have enough this winter? how was I going to pay for the rest of the hay I need ? will the greenhouse be put up in time? Last night it was fire wood and repairs that need to be made to the yurt before cold weather sets in, as I woke up shivering. During my sit this morning I felt hypothermic (at 51 degrees) and felt like crying! Aghhhhhh!

Stress ugly unrelenting stress. The kind of stress that only a good friend or sweet heart can talk you down from. Stress that disobeys logic and reason, that kind of stress. The question of survival stress. okay do you get it? ....... STRESS!!!!

I always manage to make it. I'll be okay. things will be tight, tough and cooler but I'll be fine. I'll be fed and safe and loved and those are the fruits to survive on. Wood will eventually get cut, repairs will eventually get made and things will all get done. Its October 1st. I am alive. Yes alive and well.

Radishes of inspiration!

I harvested around 60 bunches of radishes the other day. As I was washing them I was just stunned by the color. Radishes always seemed to boring until now. The sun was shining just perfectly. and everything seemed to be illuminated. Its funny how just the right light can make all the difference of how you look at something.

Finding quiet

A farm cam be a really noisy place. Roosters crowing, dogs barking, life moving all around. Its hard sometimes to find a quiet place. This morning like many mornings I try to sit in meditation for about 20 minutes. Sometimes I'm lucky and at 5:30am all is quiet but most of the time its when the rest of the farm is waking up too. Bella the cat might be meowing outside, and the dogs are scratching, biting, chewing, eating and generally making really annoying sounds, the roosters starting their mornings call outs. Geez how a girl supposed to meditate?

But I sit any way, and try to become the sound. I learned to do this when I was very young at the yoga studio my aunt used to drag me to at 13. The studio was near a huge construction site so we learned to concentrate on the sounds as part of our meditation practice. It worked. Since then rarely do sounds like that bother me. But the dogs seem pretty motivated to get my attention in various ways, so this morning I gave up. I came to the house to sit. Left the dogs in the yurt and I was absolutely amazed how quiet it is here. So I'll now move my morning sit to the house. afternoon and evening sits can stay in the yurt. Finally I've got this worked out!

Last night we got some much needed rain. Some how we just cant find time to fix the leak in our yurt roof so there was the constant drip. I was too damn  tired to do a thing about it so instead I scolded myself for not just getting it done. Sometimes you just cant wait to coordinate things with another person you have to suck it up and git er done. This has been going on for a while. We've even had to throw out a really nice rug because of mold. So this projct just jumped to the top of the priority list.

October is just around the corner and I'm trying to stay calm about all the winter prep I have not done yet. There is wood to be cut, hay to put up, alfalfa to pick up and the ten thousand other things that will make winter more habitable. But this is how it goes sometimes and I know I will eventually get there but just not today. You might hear a little angst in this post and yes I am feeling it. So I'm just trying to breath and not get to wound up about things I just cant control. So no matter the craziness farm life offers I'll try to find the quiet in all this noise as best I can.
  

Good morning sunshine!

Its a glorious day here on the farm. There was a bit of a rough start but hopefully the rest of the day will only get better. Jai is home and doing well, maybe too well. He is on limited movement. He has the degenerative disc disorder that dachshunds tend to get. Only whats baffling is he is only three years old. But its bed rest for him. Unfortunately he doesn't know this and took his second dive bomb off the bed. Ugh both of our stomachs just sank. So the boy cant be trusted and seems to be feeling a bit like his old self. No more being up on the bed for him.

Today will be another full day in the field. I took this picture this morning. I'm feeling mighty good about fall prospects. Soon to put the third greenhouse up and start up for the winter harvest.

Even if you cant see the sun today, rest assure its still there. Have a great day!

Shut the hell up already

I got back yesterday from a zen meditation retreat (Sesshin) at the Osage Forest of Peace. Seems like I've been going to a lot of these lately.The more I sit and the deeper my practice becomes the more I feel a need for a community. I suppose this is pretty natural. I suppose  that's why synagogs are packed on Saturdays and churches are packed each Sunday. Having that support in our practice, whatever our spiritual belief, is helpful. Having a safe place to experience the sacredness of this life has helped me greatly.

I faced off this weekend with that inner narrator that is constantly jabbering away in my head. Telling me the wind is going through the leaves, telling me the sun is rising or setting and lots and lots of other things in between.  I know this inner voice is there to keep me safe. Its there to try to help. Even though I know this is my own voice somehow it always seems separate. Like someone else is doing the talking. Apparently there is a word for this, its called duality. That same voice that is pointing out and makes sure I'm witnessing all the beauty and such is also the same voice that is telling me that I am guilty, that I'm not good enough, that I am a failure, okay basically this voice is my best friend and my worst enemy.

So I'm trying to quite the voice. shhhhhh......... I spent a entire 15 minutes the other day just shhhing. It worked for a while.

But what I came to realize is that voice is so loud sometimes and so forceful that I have noticed that I pay more attention to it than I do the real world. So my practice is now shisshing the voice and experiencing reality just how it is offered. I'm not saying the voice isn't helpful at times and needs to go away all together I just need to listen more wisely maybe. Some times that voice paralyzes me with fear.  I have to say the first time I really experience it (not having the voice blabbing away) I felt completely naked and light as a feather. So I tasted it and I liked it. It takes some getting used to and at times its a struggle. That voice always pops in at the most inconvenient times. and I think gosh can I ever just shut up? 

Today I'll work in the field where I will try to experience every stroke of my hoe, every step my feet take and hear every rustling leaf. You know, live in the real world, not the one I'm creating in my head. Wish me luck.