from here to there.

It is Thursday night, the night of Thanksgiving, and I am in bed in my parents’ house in Michigan.  My brother has to wake in two hours to go work at Black Friday.  aagh!

I never took off the clothes in which I slept today, and I never brushed my teeth– both things that seem like good news to me.  I helped my mom cook today; I made polenta for breakfast.  She prepared the turkey and stuffing and cranberry, and together we prepared the organ meats and potato leek soup, and I prepared brussel sprouts and squash ginger apple scones.  yum.  the eats were delicious and now I am sleepy. There is little going on right now, everybody sleep

In life,…ha!… There is so much going on now.  Now that my work on the farm has officially concluded.  !!  I feel sad as I say goodbye to friends and places I love.  Lifestyles I love.  And I feel excited…a little anxious excited and  a little thrilled excited.  Because big changes abound!  A road trip to the South west!  a new/old home!  with Daniel and doggies!

I leave love and I go to love.  Love is prolific and all around me.  everywhere.

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It is morning now.  I slept the sleep.  In a bed.  My first time sleeping in bed in months.  Maybe since the last time I visited.  I’ve slept on a few couches I suppose, yet mostly I am a floor sleeper.  I actually think that floor sleeping seriously aided me in protecting and taking care of my back this season on the farm.  Because on the floor, the back is so supported, so I can truly rest without muscles and spines holding or bending.  solid like ground.  This is not scientific evidence; it is thoughts and thinks.  Slash right now, I am comfortable.  I have a whole life of floor sleeping ahead of me.  yahoo!

I started sorting through my stuff at my parents’ house.  I feel shameful to say good-bye to stuff, as if I fear that my parents will feel sad and think that I have not appreciated these things.  Slash I have.  I loved them while I did.  Yet now, I do not need them and I am ready to donate them.  Somebody else can love them.

I experience relief as I give away stuff, let go of possessions.  In this way (and many other ways), I do not understand consumer culture.  How much more complicated cleaning and moving and organizing becomes when we have stuff abundant.

I am looking forward to moving to New Mexico with a car full of two friends, a few bags of clothes and stuff, and then FOOD GALORE!  I’ve got a freezer full of food!  and a few boxes with jars of sauces and pickles and jams!  and storage veggies!!!!!  as many as I can fit!  and meat!  I am so lucky.  I think Daniel and I will be nourished through the winter on this food.  huzzah!  There are also dry goods and dehydrated foods that are coming along too.  And we’ve got a greenhouse!  I imagine we will grow some hearty greens,  fresh hearty greens, all winter.  mmm.   I am so lucky that my friends want and are willing to take me there.  They are enabling me to live the way I want to live, and to be able to continue to enjoy the fruits of my season’s labor. which was, in my perception, incredibly fruitful.

!!thankful today and always.

telling tales.

in uptown (or downtown) Normal today, I overheard a college student, telling his visiting parents, “It’s like…a real establishment.  Not like franchised or anything.  …  It’s, like, where I take my dates.”

and I thought to myself, “huzzah!  good for the universe that I can hear a college student on the street, recommending  a non-franchised eatery.  that maybe, just maybe, this college kid understands the value of a non-franchised eatery.  “two thumbs up!” I say.

Now on to more or less pressing matters.  I just finished reading J.D. Salinger’s book, RAISE HIGH THE ROOF BEAM, CARPENTERS and SEYMOUR, AN INTRODUCTION, which I found comfortably captivating.  To me, there was something stimulating about the voice of the narrator and his diary-like style of writing.  these sorts of first-person narratives are as if the narrator is letting me in on a secret.  or maybe rather the whole world.  It’s tricky.  this bias which leads me to believe the words of the narrator.  But enough about this.  Maybe I am only writing this paragraph since last night I was re-reading essays I wrote in college.  ha!

I am at one of my favorite places in Normal, Illinois, The Garlic Press, source of all things “quality” kitchen products and delicious foods and treats and cheese.  yum… what good news it is, I think.  Henry sells them rhubarb in the spring for pies and tarts and whatevers they want.  hooray.

This week, on the farm, was, in my perception, exciting!!!  cold!!! Thursday in particular was a day of days of days.  One of the days that is one of the days of a life.  A day in which a person really lives.  Not to say that I do not really live on other days because I am very much so, in my perception, alive and vibrant and full, slash Thursday.  The day began at 6:00 a.m. or really maybe 5:30 a.m. when I woke up without an alarm.  I lay in bed, gently stretching and rubbing my belly, as I awaited the approach of 6 a.m. when it came time for me really to rise.  Lately, I seldom sleep until my alarm, since I go to bed as early as I do, and since because of the day’s light arriving later, we have been starting later.  the night before I fell asleep around 9 p.m., so by 5:30 a.m., I had already rejuvenated in a sleeping state for 8 and 1/2 hours.  So.  At 6:00 a.m. I rose and immediately went to the stove to cook my steel cut oats in milk and water with raisins.  I then fried two eggs, and put them on a “bed of” arugula.  I proceeded to eat.  then bundle.  Bundle bundle bundle.  I wore corduroy pants, two pairs of wool socks, wool leg warmers,  a wool tank top, a long sleeve cotton shirt, a tunic of sorts, and four wool sweaters.  One scarf.  a wool cap.  a pair of fingertipless gloves.  Boots.  Ready to work.  Henry had forewarned us that we would not be breaking for lunch because this was an essential day for getting work done.  so I grabbed a hunk of pumpkin bread and set off to the field to begin the harvest.  it was windy and cool, a high of 48 degrees.    And most of the day was generally pleasant for me.  Hiroko brought us some hot soup in the late morning, and then we return to cutting and bunching.  Around one in the afternoon, Henry sent Michelle and me to the sorrel, where we cut and bunched forty bunches.  Sorrel is one of my favorite jobs on the farm.  Sorrel is, perhaps, my forte, some might say.  Every Friday harvest, for most of the season and last season, I began by harvesting the sorrel all alone in silence.  I think I do this work more efficiently when I am alone.  I focus in such a way that time is non-existent.  Thoughts float through my mind without ever sticking.  I grab with my left hand a handful of leaves, and with my right hand, I proceed to slice the stems about four inches about the ground.  I then pull out “bad leaves” with my right hand.  then I take the bunch in my right hand and flip it, pass it back to my left hand and remove the “bad leaves” from the other side.  I hold the bunch in my right hand and remove small, loose, or “bad leaves” from the base of the bunch.  I then, assuming the bunch is still too small, place the leaves in a pile on the ground and begin the process again, until I have a ‘proper-sized’ bunch of worthy leaves.  This requires focus.  I think it is, probably healthy for my mind, like neurofeedback without the sensors.  My mind and body are in sync, working timelessly to create the bunches.  At times, four hours have passed while I have been harvesting sorrel in silence.  Four hours.  I could drive to chicago and part of the way back during that time.  Daniel could run a marthon (or more!) in that time.  And yet, I hardly notice.

Sorrel is kind of an underappreciated vegetable.  But man, talk to a raw foodie, they’ll tell you.  or the sorrel guy.  or Majorie.  or Charlie and I who cooked and ate, super awesome sorrel soup, made with the two of forty-one bunches of sorrel that came back from market yesterday.  seriously sorrel.

On Thursday, returning to the story, harvesting sorrel was a little different.  It was midday, I was working with a partner, and it began to rain.  Rain, sort of, or sleet, rather.  My rain gear was on the other side of the ford in the truck.  Michelle and I decided to wait it out, finish cutting the sorrel, and then retrieve our gear.  By the time gear was retrieved, my shoes and pants were wet wet wet.  And my hands were such that the muscles were stiff and struggling to hold twisties.  oh well.  But my gear still felt…good.  That extra layer of plastic overalls and raincoat was protection not only from the rain, but also from the wind.  Thank goodness.  We worked for another three and half hours in this weather.  In sleet, rain, temperatures in the thirties, wind.  heavy wet clothes.  And when we were done, my body relaxed and began shivering.  Shivering, like after I ran the Chicago Marathon.  In fact, the only thing I can compare it to is running the Chicago Marathon.  the exhaustion.  the relief.  the bodily sensations.  the whole event.  how amazing it is.  The way, as hard as it was, I knew that eventually it would end.  That everything is temporary.  And the way I trusted that once it was done, I would forget about it, or maybe not forget about it; I would realize that it was not so bad.  I think this is inherent to my me-ness.  My ness that gets me through challenging experiences, and painful sensations.  This ever-reliant knowing that everything is temporary.  That things can and do change.  That I am never stuck and nothing is binding.

So funny to me to recognize that I have just told this elaborate story, stressing the difficulties and challenges of my life on the farm, AND I am also saying, it’s not that difficult or challenging, and I am okay.  I guess that’s the lesson in it all.  I am okay.  I am okay.  I am okay. I am okay. and I feel proud.

the day concluded with me returning home to a hot shower, that still felt cold on my icy body, followed by a hot meal.  I cooked garbanzo beans with parsnips and cinnamon and garlic and napa cabbage, and Charlie baked us some sweet potatoes.  yum.  I drank a hot cup of ‘chai spices’ and milk, and fell deeply, happily! to sleep.  ooh my favorite thing.  deep happy sleep.

//eyedea:_theBrilliantFlash_of_a_HypergiantStar:.

a tribute to Michael “eyedea” Larson //11.09.1981 – 10.16.2010//

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“Taught himself everything. Magic, martial arts,

instruments, science, metaphysics, dance. Oh yeah!

He use to B-Boy. Haha! Almost forgot that

Free thought and expression was everything to Eyedea.

Learning, analyzing, creating was his religion.”

–Brother Ali

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michaelo_722_72

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He played a huge part, early on, in showing me art and life are flowing streams to be entirely immersed in.

I first met him exactly 10 years ago. With older friends of ours, we used to organize underground hip hop shows. This one was Halloween themed and along with two other friends, we dressed as Three Wise Men. Our wisdoms combined couldn’t hold a candle to to the immense flash of eyedea. That night he performed ‘birth of a fish’ and blew my head open. You know that sensation of a flock of tiny pulses that quickly tip-toe all the way up your spine to a spot just beneath the top of your skull where they sweep up and plug into complimentary molecules and explode in blast of ecstasy? The procession complete when all your hairs stand on end and the body calls a reflexive urge to shake it off so not to internally combust. Eyedea demonstrated the ability of a performer to ignite such an experience in another — he showed me the power of art and the power of language. For the next few years, anytime he was performing within a 10 hour drive, we would try to be there. We used to often record these shows. Even though it dulled the actual experience, we would have a semblance of the experience entombed for posterity. I have dug up some of those recordings. The audio quality is not great, but if you listen closely, you may get a sense of what we were chasing through out the midwest in the late nineties and early post millennium. godspeed on the journey mikey!

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//this is the opening from a show in the evening outside of the union center in Madison, a show that included Atmosphere and Brother Ali//

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//this is from said Halloween show at the Orbit in Chicago. I bought Aesop Rock’s ‘Appleseed’ cd from slug after the show. Sage Francis was there as well. We took him and Adeem to get some fast food before the show. I was driving my dad’s big ole cadillac so there was plenty of room in the car, but Sage wanted to ride in the trunk. Who am I to tell him he cant? In he went. Even though he didn’t know it was a costume party, he had the best one by far. He wore ratty cargo pants, a long hooded parka and a long beard. He’s a funny guy//

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//this is from a show the day after the Orbit show. This show was an afternoon outdoors at a park//

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//this is from a show at the Metro in Chicago. Also performing were Atmosphere, Aesop Rock and MF Doom. It is incredible to me how well he was able to capture the attentions of the 500+ rowdy underground hip hop heads in attendance. No easy feat, to say the least. There are times the crowd is so quiet you can hear sweat drop//

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//this is also from that afternoon show in the park in Madison. I was thrilled to see how he captured the attentions of everybody who happened to be in the area including two uniformed police officers who enthusiastically enjoyed the entire show from just behind the stage//

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//this is from the evening show at the union in Madison//


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i guess it’s time.

I suppose the time has come for an update.  I sit in Eureka Public Library…a little ‘under the weather’ as they say, meaning that my nose is runny and my body achey.  and healing.  I have slept 30 hours the past three nights which is especially amazing seeing as one of the three nights I only slept 4 hours!  guess I needed it.  I do love sleeping.  and dreaming.  and being cozy.  and last night I woke up sweating, sweating intensely, my clothes were soaked, and I thought, “this is my healing body combatting illness.  hooray!”  and today I am getting relief!

Today I have plans to freeze winter squash and greens and pickle hot peppers.  mmm.  winter food.  winter food for New Mexico!!  In about a month and a half, I am going to journey across the country to live in a small mountain town in New Mexico with Daniel and Tunas and Nata.  I feel sad to imagine myself away from my midwestern landscape and community and excited to experience a new space and community and reunite with some of my dear dear deary dear loved ones!  I am looking forward to taking naps in front of our wood stove.  and baking bread and potentially growing food on the seven acres of land that we are renting!  how lucky to have space and a house and a family.  Possibilities do exist.

The days on the farm get shorter and shorter as the daylight diminishes.  as the autumn accelerates and winter approaches.  My body is easily exhausted by the heavy heavy boxes we carry (sweet potatoes, potatoes, winter squash), and by the intense digging experiences we have.  It is also a rewarding time because I can begin to reflect on the process of the season and the food and my own growth and experiences.  I can physically feel the strength that my body has developed, and I feel proud for the ways in which I care for and nourish my strong body.

and I find myself excited to bake bake bake again as the cold sets in and a look for practical ways to warm the trailer so that I don’t have to turn on the heat.  I have been baking sweet potatoes, and winter squash.  I have been making sweet squash breads, and herb breads and a delicious moist rye soda bread with winter squash, apples and raisins.  yummmm.

and I’ve been thinking about the crock pot.  If anyone has any crock pot advice, do share.  I don’t know all that much about the things, but I would love the throw a whole bunch of stuff in it, in the mornings, and after work come home and eat some warm soup or stew.  So.  Ideas are welcome.

I am so lucky to be alive and living the life that I live.  I am proud to be me.  and grateful.

food preservation

This weekend, I preserved food.  That’s about it.  dehydrating molly’s delicious apples and nashi (asian pears), making and freezing pesto and chimichurri and pesto sauce, and making and canning tomato sauce.  Huzzah.  In my perception, it is encompassing work.  Work that takes up time and days AND is so fulfilling.  because… this winter!  I will feast!  huzzah!

I do not definitely know what I will do this winter.  Where I am going.  I do know that I am going to do what I want to do and that if it is not what I want to do, then I will not do it.  !  I want to have continued joy in my days and my life.  I know how to find these gifts.

Currently, my plan includes moving to New Mexico to reunite with Daniel and Tunas and Nata.  I feel excited and fearful for this possibility.  Shameful, as I imagine myself leaving the midwest that I love fervently.  Slash, adventures await!  New friends!  New cities!  New lands!  where I have never been.  I hope to ride my bike again!  and grow food food food food food food food food.  and eat food food food food food food food.  and love.

and who knows?  We might not stay forever.  Daniel would probably return to the midwest.  or maybe I would.  or maybe somewhere else.  Maybe Maine!  or Vermont!  or Canada!  Henry wants to buy land in Canada to prepare for the future when he believes Illinois will be a desert, and futures farmers will be farming the heartland of Canada.  and maybe Daniel and I will be his homesteaders!  Caretaking his land in Canada until he is ready to claim it.  that sounds like fun too.

My friends, Adriane and Kris, prepare to be farmers next year.  I wonder what it feels like to have this plan or goal, to be in charge of it, totally responsible for all of it.  To make a choice, a life change, to take a risk.  It is similar and different from things I have experienced in my life.  hmm.  I feel excited for them and proud for what they are doing, and proud that they are friends I know and love.

oh man.  My friends and my family rule.

ps-Daniel!!!!!  write a blog!  seriously!!!!!!!!!

hot hot hot!

the hottest july on record.    I know.  It’s august. woah woah woah.  It is wednesday afternoon.  hump day as they say, although for me, it sort of is and sort of isn’t.  It is sort of like the whole week build up to this wild wild wildness, friday.  the long long day.  high and lows and continuances.
I am on lunch break.  I sit here.  in a puddle of my fluids.  sweat from every one of my pores.  I look as though I have just stepped out of a sauna.  skin red.  shiny.  sweat beads on the tip on my nose and on my chin.  I have a sweat moustache and a sweat goatee.
Charlie and I ate a muskmelon as soon as we returned from work this morning.  93 degrees with a heat index up to 109 degrees.  It is the humidity this year.  We haven’t had a day hotter than the mid-90s but with the heat index it has frequently “felt like” 110.  woah woah woah woah. I say.  I survive it.  I thrive.  I love it.  I hate it.  I want to wipe my sweat out of my eyes with my shirt but my shirt is drenched in sweat and dirt.  ugh.  I try to wipe my chin on my shoulder sleeve, but my shoulder sleeve is drenched in sweat and dirt.  Maybe a cold shower will help before I return to work.  Maybe not.  and I itch.  plant oils irritate my skin, mosquitoes suck my blood, give me welts and rashes and I scratch, and sweat drips into them and they itch itch itch more more more.

my life

My life is ever-continuingly awesome.  enough said.  maybe there is more to say.  slash it is past my bedtime.  and charlie didn’t coerce me to eat this chocolate bar.  slash I am loving it.  My life and chocolate bars.

“no one expects to find goats in the chicken shed. full size goats. not making a peep.”

I wrote this blog Sunday, July 11, and have been waiting for the opportunity to plug into the multimedia universe and post it.  huzzah!

tonight I spent almost two hours tearing my hair apart.  ripping it from itself from the knots into which it has tied itself.
the processes of my hair… are … to me … an incredible thing.  It has been as long as it has since I have taken a brush or a comb to it.  Maybe last fall I might have taken a comb to it.  and before that maybe the previous spring.  and before that maybe the previous fall…and back then I had short short short hair.    a different story.  A month ago, I bought myself a brush…and a comb…of the sorts that I could believe in…the sorts that I thought were “well-made” of “natural” materials.  a sort of self-pampering.  in preparation for the process on which I considered embarking.
My hair has become knots.  My hair has been extensive knots.  My friends have called them dreadlocks.  and beautiful.  I relate.  I just let my hair do what it does when it wants to.  No need for me to control it.  because it is … was… uncontrollable.  I could no longer separate the strands enough so that I could truly braid it.  all I could do was tie it back in a bun.
I considered just accepting the dreadlocks forever and loving them.  I considered shaving my head (although I did fear sunburn).  and I considered attempting to brush my hair out.

Last night at the encouragement of my friend Adriane, I rubbed my head with extra virgin olive oil and wrapped my head in a bandana.  We had not decided I would definitely brush it.  We were getting prepared, just in case.  Adriane said to me, “Your hair is pretty beautiful as it is”  and don’t I know it.

Today I had a day of friends and conversations, of air and ice cream, of computing and then.  I took my bandana off of my head. I took my brush and comb outside with me and I sat on a sycamore vegetable box and began the process.  Charlie reheated leftovers and brought me a shot of tequila and talked to me as I ripped and tore my hair apart and out.  as I winced.
I am lucky to live with this sensitive character.  this Charlie who keeps me company and talks to me and listens to me and doesn’t think it’s gross that I have this big pile of hair sitting next to me when I am finally done.
I tell Charlie that I think my mom always thought that me not brushing my hair was me not taking care of myself.  me not valuing myself.  but I always thought that it was more the other way around.  Me not brushing my hair was me recognizing that my hair is just a part of me, not me and I am more than my hair and my appearance.  recognizing that there are more important things in my life than the “quality” of my hair.

Slash I am feeling very happy and excited.  I no longer think that I will “have to” shave my head if I ever want to have hair again.  and I still have the old dreadlock.  the big long one.  that one’s not going anywhere.  and I think I will french braid my hair tomorrow…it is getting so long!  It was last cut two years ago!!
I feel a little freedom.  as if the fate of my hair is no longer set in stone.  there are possibilities for me and this scalp of mine.

storms and breezes and breaths

I breezed through Chicago this weekend.  How long and short it is.  How it is the length that it is.  I continue to recognize how lucky I am.  I have these friends, who take me into their homes (and hearts)– feed me, support me, shelter me and be with me.  hooray!

delicious meals.  rich conversations.  rest.  and busy-ness.  I could probably really use a nap before my sleep tonight.  I slightly dread returning to the farm and the potential exhaustion…and also…I think I will be okay.  I am in my perception strong and persistent, ever becoming stronger and more persistent.  inspired.  hopeful.

oh food glorious food.  On Friday, we harvested the first Japanese cucumbers of the season!  and eggplant!  and greenbeans!

There have been greens abundant and peas abundant and life abundant.

and there is something amazing happening to my hair.  as I never brush it, as it faces wind and rain and dirt and sun, it is getting so knotty…dreadlocky.  twisted.  I bought a brush and a comb today with intentions to soak my hair in oil and then brush it until all the knots except my one dreadlock are dissipated.  there will be much hair loss.

when I look in the mirror, I think, oh what wild interesting beautiful hair I do have.  hair of many colors.  and shapes.  maybe I will grow it out until I leave the farm.  and then maybe I will cut it.  or leave it.  I do not know.

It seems like there has always been a struggle to “manage” my hair. even as I let it be.

I would like to write more.  and I am falling asleep writing.

hmmm.

before I must resign myself to sleep…I want to send deep congratulations and love to May and Dan for creating a space that was a most glorious  loving honest sensitive fun wedding.

okay.  naptime.  and then riding back to the farm.

Val is cooking me eggs.  what a queen she is.  (*smiles at Val)

dazzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzze

here I sit.  Hiding in the office of the Unicorn, the cafe which is as home to me as anywhere else.  Needing my me time.  my aloned-ness.  so tired.  beat beat beat. beat. beat. beet (!).  tired in the way where my body feels like it shivering, and eyes see cloudy and throat is dry- a little sore- probably just a depleted immune system- nothing I can’t cure with some rest, garlic, chiles, peppermint ‘tea’ and chocolate.

mmm.

last night I went to bed around 9:30 p.m.  to wake at 1:15 a.m.  To ready myself for a week and a half away from the farm.  for city, and friends and commotion and the wedding of May and Dan (this is a whole nother blog entry).  I worked all morning until around 1 p.m. at the farmer’s market !!  I. love. food. especially food that I have nourished and tended and harvested and prepared sell and or eat.  mmm.  totes arugula in my belly.

what a journey it is.  what a as full as it is experience it is to go on this journey.  the excitement I feel as I walk down the lane to wait for the big truck to pull up and to hop in and talk to Henry in the quiet of the night.  There was a thick fog this morning.  I felt fearful as we mucked through it.  or trucked through it.  “what if?”

from harvest through market is a marathon.  or maybe harvest is a sort of race.  a long long race.  there’s lots of time to go through lots of stuff.  body stuff.  mental stuff.  and then to the market.  once the race is over, but I can’t go home till I clean up all the cups left on the ground and get my medal.  sometime a giddy game.  challenging.  enlivening.  exhilerating.  exhausting.

mmm…how powerful is this exhaustion.  how I sink into this chair I sit on.  as solid as it is, it absorbs my weight.  I smile too because there is a heady lightness that balances the heavy … heaviness.

and I’ve got these awesome friends.  I am so lucky.