Tag: food

Humanity

I do not know

Lovelovemotherexpletive

Second birthday is done now. Onto the Christmas thing.

Just made three different kinds of cookies to give as gifts. It was hours in the kitchen and I gave up on holding onto my sanity and it went right out the front door. I watched it go, that skanky bitch. She had a fucking swagger, she did.

My eyes are dry and I’m slightly sticky from all the sugar. I don’t know, man. Its a chance to say thank you to people, to show them a little generosity: of time, of thought, sometimes of money. I like it, actually, but not the wild stampede of my guilt and overwhelm as I try to fit in all the things and the planning and the grocery. Its all the steps that get me, the ways in which I am overwhelmed three weeks before the thing, the way my brain carves a groove in the ‘is this worth it’ platter holding the cheeses we’ll eat on the Eve.

My kids have Christmas with their dad the day before they have it with me. Mine is smaller this year than it ever has been and I’m just so done with all the things I think about that. Man, I need a good therapist, and I’m just so damn mad at myself that I am still falling into old patterns, ones which I’ve already tired out a few therapists with. OOOOLD news. so fucking old.

I don’t even care about them anymore, those old pieces of shit, to tell you the truth. But they come up AGAIN with the overwhelm and the fear that I’m not doing enough, that I’m not appreciated, that maybe I’m still invisible, like I was then.

so shit. i do not know. and here i am, all cookie-d out. and i look forward to giving them out tomorrow. I have to be in early, and its cozy day, so i’m just wearing a gigantic sweatshirt that almost comes to my ankles. I may not ‘rally’ and ‘be lively’. I predict a sort-of dazed experience of the day.

Love you guys. Be merry if you want to. 🙂

Cookies! So many goddamned cookies.

Humanity

Leaving the farm.

Lovelovemotherexpletive

Is it on? Is this thing on?

I sat down to write about how it felt to climb down off the tractor and to know I won’t be climbing back up. There is so much in this for me. I tried paper and pen but couldn’t bear it. The beauty the beauty. Unbearable.

It was heavy. My whole chest was physically constricted. And I know it has to be done, is being done, but I still have not come to grips. I cannot believe it.

I’ve gotten a job, a grown up job that has benefits and the same hours every day and a salary, and possibly sick days and things like that that i haven’t even considered.

And I’m starting tomorrow. And it precludes/excludes the ‘squeezing in of hours’ that my life before allowed.

And I’m in mourning. For the woman who started there, as a way to fill in the times when the kids were with their dad. It was really like that. They were young, i was always there. Always.

Seeds

I started there probably seven years ago, my eldest would have been 13, and the youngest just six. It felt like a lot of money because it was farmwork and when i did it in high school, i was just paid $7 an hour, under the table. So it was way way more than that, and I would start having references again. It was a step, a little one, an it got me talking to people in the world again.

And I helped people pick out the good veggies and the farmers washed and harvested and put everything out at the beginning and away at the end of every night.

Now i harvest (only a little bit but i do.) and wash, and set up, and break down, and make the board and think about next week’s setup and keep it all stocked and i know so many of the customers intimately. And I seed the baby plants and run the plant sale and I take care of thousands of eggs and chickens per week and I drive the goddamned tractor. I’ve watched the farmer’s kid grow into a really cool girl, and i love my farmers isn’t just a bumper sticker over here.

Sigh. Sky.

And I worry that I’ll lose my connection to the work and the joy and pain of being outside year round. And what if my dad stops being proud of me? Or Grammie, or Joel, or Kate Crowley? Or the goddamned farmer? What if they move on like i was never there? I WAS THERE. (From heaven, three of them, because i have issues and need therapy. Always.)

And then, there is the beauty. I don’t think you know how beautiful it is out there. The dirt in a tractor tire, the lean of a fence post, the water sluicing the dirt off the carrots, the shocking color of the Swiss chard. I don’t think you know the wild variety of egg. Shells and breakage and boxes and delivering the food to people, feeding, knowing that what is happening, the exchange of energy is pure goodness. Pure.

Dirt is the way. The beginning and the end. And I WAS THERE.

What? I was.

Humanity

Farm

Lovelovemotherexpletive

I don’t think it’s just me, but I’ve hit the wall (and climbed it) of apocalyptic thoughts, feelings and mind lapses. I’m mostly happy about it, the theatrical world knows my connection to the fears we all have right now. Which, in itself, is a whole post.

I’m thrilled by all the movies/series which suit me right now. Last of Us. Any Walking Dead. A million more i can’t think of right now.

But man, one of the weirdest things I keep thinking about is farming.

I’m aging out of the work a little bit; the heat is too hot, the baskets too heavy, the monetary payment is too light. (It’s time to get into serious retirement discussions, selling the house cannot be my entire plan. It cannot.)

But I’ve been wafting back and forth in my apocalysm daydreams, while seeding hundreds of baby things, wondering how future generations will know how to get broccoli. I mean, food is the most important thing, right? Food and water. And, will the home gardeners save us all? Really? Better get out those zucchini recipes.

When we finally decide to stop flying produce from country to country, or spraying it with shit to slow down the ripening, or to speed it up, as the case warrants, what then?

Will ‘we’ tolerate not having bananas? Will i be able to grow bananas in New England?

I know, i know, focus on the here and now. Be mindful, be present. And all that is true, and yes, my small world is all that i can control.

When my sons want to eat meat at every meal and I feel such exhaustion that i throw frozen meat patties on a grill again and again, its that whole butterfly wing again, and I’m upset also that its such a recurring thing in my brain and yet millions of millionaires exist and I don’t think they are wrapped up in tinfoil about this.

I suppose they’ll get the last bananas.

Sigh.

Tell me I’m wrong. About the bananas, I mean.

-love love.

Humanity

Plant sale, midstream

Lovelovemotherexpletive

There is a second weekend of plant sale. It arriveth momentarily. Based on the numbers so far, I have outspent my profits by a factor of three. In some ways, this makes total sense, because my expenses included things that I will never have to purchase again. Grow lights, a seedling heat mat, a shelving unit for the trays, etc. Next year’s numbers will look radically different.

But man, it doesn’t make my heart flutter in a good way.

I’ve been coming home from longer work days (everyone is doing the same thing at the same time and my back is sore and I’ve already got a farmer’s tan.) and then repeating the work in my own garden. I cannot get the dirt out of the creases of my hands.

There is something glorious in this, and utterly romantic to the girl who feels romantic about these things, and yet I’m fall down tired, middle-aged, and the kids keep wanting food. I don’t even like pizza anymore and its so damn expensive to fall that way. They just keep wanting food.

The one thing that i did sell that was a boon was bouquets. I made little bouquets from the flowers given to me by flower boss and they jumped right out of my hands. At eight bucks, they were a steal and they were stolen. Makes me wonder and feel happy that i’ve been planting my flower beds so well this year. I wonder if there is a drive-by market for bouquets on my street. Hmm.

But I’m tired, man. Very tired. And yes, energized in my core. Growing things is pretty damn magical.

IF YOU WANNA SING OUT, SING OUT.

Humanity

Beef Stew

Lovelovemotherexpletive

I made a nice beef stew this week. What? Kate cooked while the kids were away, and it didn’t involve eggs?! Why yes, yes I did.

Can you tell I’ve been quiet for too long today? Yes, maybe. Third person referencing is a sure sign.

But I did make a nice stew, with tips from cheffy friends, (bakers’ chocolate? oh yes.) and I took it down to my father-in-law, who is in grief and is feeling isolated. I cooked the beef in a bone broth and the nourishment is off the charts. His children call and visit beautifully, but in-between, he is not having visitors regularly and the house is echoing. I can understand. Part of the reason for my visit is that the kids are gone, I have too much time, and I know his son is away for the weekend. (with the same kids I’m missing). The sheer isolation is enough to make life warp strangely.

God, it is hard to grieve. So damn hard. How to incorporate these prickles of loss, joy, -with appreciation, love, self-reflections on our own mortality, a life reflected upon, memories of earliest life, and latest, all the temperatures mix and all at one single minute and then you are left on a ravaged beach after a tsunami. not even ready to look at the remains.

just blank.

and it happens over and over again.

I needed a very strong hug after the visit. I made it happen.

I think I need another one today. Maybe I can finagle one from my flower farm boss. I think she’s not a fan of the hugging though. I’ll go hug the guy at the quickie mart, give him a story to tell.

Its how I roll.

Love love, hug your people out there. Hug them good.

-me