Volume+good will

Today was all about volume. We cut 1500 plants for propagation and thinned dozens of apple trees all before lunch. It's amazing what you can do with 77 hands (one of us has a sprained wrist) and a whole lot of enthusiasm. This evening eight of us got together to bake 25 pies in the farm center for a wedding this weekend. Again, I'm astonished by the simple power of numbers (sprinkled with a touch of good will.)

Propagate!

Again the blend of lessons and wilderness collide. Our down garden manager brought a virtual forest of perennials into the classroom today. Seamlessly weaving his lecture on propagation, the dgm cut into the root, stocks and shoots of tender young plants- casting the dregs to the floor as if the concrete were the duff of his pretend woody perennial forest. If it must be done inside, nothing helps inside learning like outside props. Still, eight hours of lecture in a small room on a gorgeous day is hard to tolerate. I've become accustomed to working outside. Stretching my legs and training my body to physical work. Sitting for a whole day seems like a chore, even when what we're learning is interesting. 

Regardless, after the lesson today on asexual propagation, I find myself eyeing perennials with new lust. The knowledge keys of infinite propagation have been handed down to us. The ability to genetically clone nearly any established plant. Gardens and chaparral beware! I'm armed with a set of felcos and nail clippers and I'm coming for you. 

Lettuce Lecture

On the farm lectures blend with meals and meals with lessons.

Bright and early Orin was slicing apart butter lettuces, showing us their structure and inside color, talking about their growth habits and how long they take to head up. The morning fog swirled around the chalet deck and we crunched on baby romaine and let the home made blue cheese dressing dribble down our chins.

Like a seed

For the past two weeks I've been doing a 'sub-rotation' in the Chadwick garden propagation area. In layman's terms that means I've intensively studying the system of plant sexual and asexual propagation as operated in the original Chadwick up-garden. Complete with aging greenhouses built by the apprentices of yesteryear, hand operated ventilation systems, ropes and pulleys, ancient thermometers, hand made flat boxes, and homestyle watering, the prop area, and indeed the garden itself; has won my heart. Indeed, I've quite fallen. I suppose I am yet just another devotee.

The prop area is tucked into the far corner of the thickly planted orchard-garden that is bewitched with plants, wildlife, and the possibility of magic around every curved branch and border path. The footprint of the garden is smaller than most parking lots and I still get lost trying to get from one side to the next. Hundreds of varieties of apples hinder my attempted straight lines, both in planting up beds and while meandering from one task to the next. My very nature is challenged by the layout. Perhaps that's why I've been won over. My heart likes the seemingly insurmountable challenge the garden presents. Just the slope alone would scare off most gardeners- and indeed, I'm just getting used to running up and down the hills with a full wheelbarrow. 

The best metaphor for my present state was eloquently plodded out by our resident Irish seed saver this evening- he described a seed. He said that seeds are at the middle place in a long line of ancestry, how many hundreds and thousands of plants and people lined it's history on it's way to becoming what it is now, and at the same time, it's holds the potential for an equally complex and beautiful future of co-evolution with ecosystems and humans. That's what the up-garden, and indeed my life at present feel like. A seed; perfectly balanced in between all of the experiences it took to get me to where I stand now- looking out to the future of a mass of experiences and growth yet to come. It's an exciting time to be a live.

Cooking for 40. Take 1.

My first day cooking started late last night. Faced with the time old question: ‘what is the difference between muffins and cupcakes?’ Ms Mexicali and I rocked out to the Pixies, suckering passerby’s into our taste testing adventure. Several cups of cocoa powder into our first batch of fifty we began to discern a distinction. Weighing in on the conversation, we had several people pucker their faces at the idea of so much sugar in the morning, others weighed in with excitement about the idea of desert for breakfast.

In folly, looking to morning the recipe, we halved the honey in the recipe and added molasses. Overpowering in taste, the molasses turned our delicately balanced baked goods into leathery shoes, wanting of icing to mask the strong flavor.  Defeated, we began our second batch at midnight.

As I sit in the farm center at 6:30, people stumble in searching for caffeine. The sun shines low through the south-facing window and as he approaches the breakfast table, our Irish apprentice looks at the dozens of baked goods placed out before him and poses the question- ‘what is the difference between muffins and cupcakes’. I sit back and smile.

 

Happiness is...

waking up to the morning chill still hugging your hot water bottle

excitedly dancing around our may pole -a stick stuffed in an empty half gallon organic beer container- to the tune of a mandolin and a fiddle and voices- all before breakfast

listening to Orin talk about roses for hours then
slowly picking a bucket of flowers
and sitting on your stoop to arrange them

stretching on the floor of your tent while
watching suncaught rainbows dance on the afternoon canvas

observing your thighs grow as the bike ride up the hill gets steadily easier

strapping on a nitrogenous fish emultion filled back pack sprayer and
dousing rows of baby plants as a light rain falls

inescapably smelling like cow shit
being up to your knees in compost

ending the day being dirtier than you've ever been
mud covered shoes
weed wacked grass stained pants
hair caked in dust and pollen

braving a cold solar shower in the brave hope of being clean

crawling under the pile of ever blanket you own
drifting towards dreams of what happiness is...