We Have Reached The End (Or The Beginning)

“Find what you love and let it kill you”—Charles Bukowski

            If I’ve learned anything this year it’s that farming can break you—and it will. It comes in crashing waves and then calls you back with the sweetest, most irresistible whisper than can only be calmed by the sweet smell of tomato vines lingering on your skin. They key, it seems, is finding a way to remember the things that call your knees to the soil. For me it is the smell of vegetables I have grown simmering in a dish that I will share with others, the long conversations over hours of weeding, the love for my brothers and sisters that comes naturally when I truly feel how connected we all are to this vast world we have grown upon and the people we have grown with. I carry these reasons at the base of my spine and on days when it doesn’t want to bend, when it cannot bend, I pull them out and let them sit around me. There are days where these words do not match up to the crop failure or the pests or the back pain, where you can idealize forever and that will not change the fact that part of your field is flooded. But so far, I always go back. Farming has an incredible way of bringing up the failures and forcing you to deal with them, forcing you to break and build again and again.

            I have learned more about myself this year than anything else, I have learned things that I love, things that don’t work for me, but most importantly I have learned what sustains me and allows my creativity and generosity to flow. I now know well the precarious balance of loving people, loving this earth, and loving myself; farming has taught me how to face that head on. And, yes, I do say this with scars from bug bites on my ankles, a back I have to ice fairly regularly, calluses on my hands and feet (I’m honestly surprised I didn’t hurt myself worse this year). It is beautiful and it is dirty and I cannot imagine living any other way.

            Now, having moved to Raleigh with the intention of being still as my next adventure, I look back on this past year and what lingers at the corners of my eyes are the people I met and the work they are doing to make this world as it was intended to be. Farming is not just about growing food, it’s about love and generosity and solidarity. It is about facing the realities of loss of topsoil, fracking, racism, bullying, war, sexism, mountaintop removal, death, to name only a few. All of these issues came up this year and finally I was in an environment where I felt like I could find a way to do something about it. It is becoming more evident to me that this lifestyle of connection to and dependence upon the land and the community around you is the way that I want to pursue goodness and change. I now face the challenge of finding how to live this way being settled in a city for an extended period of time and I think I’m up for it. As I slowly process the fact that I won’t be traveling or farming on a daily basis for at least a year it induces some panic, some excitement, and a lot of creativity to discover how to include what I’ve learned in my life here. But I have returned a completely different person with passions I had not allowed myself to hear before this trip. I cannot express how thankful I am to those of you who have supported us in so many different ways: with money, letters, food, friendship, books, housing, etc. Thank you to the wonderful people of Koinonia Farm, Green Hill Farm, McGirt Family Farm, Rabbit Moon Farms, Waxwing Farm, Edible Forrest Urban Farm, Bread and Puppet Theatre, and Blue-Zee Farm, you have impacted me more than you will ever know. I will never forget this year or anyone I have met along the way. Having experienced farming for what it truly is: hard work, community, good food, and more than anything else, love, I can say that I have found what I love.

So, with nostalgia and excitement, on to the next adventure!

–Lindsay

Blue-Zee Farm

Our final month was spent at Blue-Zee Farm in Penobscot, Maine, a beautiful little coastal area in the southern part of Maine. Blue-Zee was different than all the other farms we had worked on thus far being the most business-minded and intensive. They farm only 1 1/2 acres of organic vegetables and have several blueberry fields–which are wild low-bush blueberries, a variety I had never seen before. Farming in Maine is especially difficult because of the short season, they have to make their whole income for the year in three short months. So we went to four different farmers markets (3 of which I got to help sell at, which I really enjoyed), sold to the co-op in town, sold to what was more or less an online CSA. and several restaurants in the area. This meant the majority of our work was planting and weeding on Mondays and Tuesdays and harvesting every other day for market. They have a set schedule for the whole summer of what to plant when–they plant lettuce every week, beets every couple weeks, and so on. All of their fields and greenhouses are on a yearly rotational system–their planning was incredibly impressive. 

Blue-Zee was a good farm to end on, I learned so much about what it means to be a certified organic farm and the business-side of farming, and to be honest it was really hard. We had one other intern working with Lauren and I named Steffi, from Spain, which was awesome because I got to practice my Spanish, and also because she’s really cool. Over lunch one day we found ourselves already talking about what we were going to eat that night for dinner and realized our whole lives consisted of growing food and eating food (which is not a complaint at all, the simplicity there is beautiful). But so much work and so little social interaction was hard for me. There are other farms within about 5 miles from Blue-Zee that also have interns working on them, so we connected with other farmworkers and had our own little farm apprentice community that helped a lot and allowed for a change of pace. I realized while I was working there how much I need community to be the focus of whatever I end up doing, something I already knew but had not felt so fully. I’m sure that knowing it was the end of our trip had a huge factor in my whole experience in Maine. Needless to say, endings are difficult. 

But this is not meant to be the final post, so I’ll leave that part for later and just post some lovely pictures from Maine!

The ocean from Stonington, a little town where we sold our produce at the farmers market

The beaches in Maine are rocky and tree-lined, so beautiful and different from NC!

The propagation greenhouse–all of their vegetables ares tarted in trays in here

Stonington Farmers Market and classical music

This is what the barn looked like after harvesting and packaging up different orders

Found this in the Co-Op in Blue HIll, Bread and Puppet followed us

Their lovely dog, Annie, dressing up for the evening

The farmers’ daughter, Julia!

Blue-Zee Farm Crew

The barn/our humble abode

Greenhouses and vegetables

In case you were curious what a blueberry field in Maine looks like this is it! The grow wild low-bush blueberries

Our final night in Maine was spent around the fire with our intern friends and the beautiful full moon

 

–Lindsay

 

Farming and Activism

Every year Bread and Puppet has a main issue that they focus on during the pageant on Sundays. This year, the focus was on the Tar Sands oil pipeline and the definite loss of the caribou population in Vermont should the pipeline leak. This pipeline will go from Canada through the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont to Portland, ME for export. I’m going to throw a few facts at you about Tar Sands Oil from Tar Sands Free Vermont:

-It is laden with poisonous heavy metals, sulfur, and other carcinogens and neurotoxins

-Removing tar sands oil from the ground has been called the most environmentally damaging project on Earth

-It is hot, acidic, and abrasive, and must be diluted with toxic additives and pumped at high pressure to be moved through a pipeline

-Pipelines carrying tar sands oil have a greater likelihood of leaks and failure

tarsandsfreevermont.org

We were invited to join in on the Fourth of July Parades and, of course, decided that we had to be a part of a production while we were there! So we were dressed up as caribou during the parade, and by this I mean the caribou were made out of cardboard for the head with a branch in the top for the antlers, and a bamboo pole with a white sheet hanging off to cover our heads and bodies.

As we walked through the parade we were supposed to walk and dance around to the circus music the band was playing behind us when suddenly the Tar Sands Monster would come and kill all the caribou. There were also people on stilts dancing around and children dressed up as butterflies with someone carrying a sing that read “Butterflies against the end of the world”.

It was such a cool experience. We participated in the first parade in Cabot, VT (where the cheese is made–yes, we did get cheese samples at the end of the parade) and then watched the parade that afternoon in Barton, VT. The difference between the parades was striking: the first was very receptive, everyone was walking in the parade and the crowd was involved; the second was pretty much just cars driving by with people waving. The entire fire department and police department were in the parade, local businesses, the Free Masons, a wrestling organization which had a float equipped with a wrestling ring, and only a few cars in front of Bread and Puppet was an oil company. Barton is a town that the Tar Sands Pipeline will go directly through, and the town is completely divided over the issue. It was fascinating to hear the woman announcing everyone as they passed and right after announcing the oil company she announced the Bread and Puppet Brass Band as the “Tar Sands End Of The World Brass Band”. I never expected to experience so much contradiction in such a small place. I was struck by how poignant it is that Bread and Puppet has chosen an issue so close to home and is informing people through uncommon avenues such as Fourth of July parades. I wonder what the audience on Barton thought about the performance and how many were aware of the issue. They have a lot of support in Vermont and they have pissed off quite a few people, and there is something really powerful about continuing to perform and participate in such a divided community.

A lot of my time there was spent thinking about how I relate to their particular form of protest and what activism looks like for me. There are so many different ways to take action, and it was beautiful to see the different approaches that people took, even within that community; there were people who danced, wrote, played instruments, did puppetry, cooked, etc. The more time I spent with them, the more I realized how much I respected and loved their form of protest, but puppetry is not my approach; however, farming for and supporting people who are working more in the public eye was much closer to what I would like to do, I think it may have been the perfect set-up for me. I appreciated the way that the community would stay informed about what is happening in the world in order to find a way to respond. It has become so evident to me how important it is to have many different approaches to working for equality and peace and found myself comparing the different ways people along our trip are involved in their communities and working for this end. Farming and writing seem to be the base for me, I can envision the incredible social and environmental justice work that can be done with growing good food as the jumping off point. Not only will I be able to work with my passions through farming but I can support other organizations and people doing similar work with my produce, my land, my presence, or whatever else they might need. Everyone eats and everyone needs good food; it just takes talking to people, spending time with them, and eating with them (and not just your own food) to build relationships and community. It is incredible to me that every single farm we have worked on has some focus on social and environmental justice embedded in their lifestyle. It seems, not surprisingly, that farming encourages and fuels this kind of work.

The creativity of Bread and Puppet inspired me to find beauty in my work and respond through writing and drawing, through conversations and building relationships. This is where I see myself bringing about change, quite literally starting with the grassroots. 

–Lindsay

‘How ya gonna keep ’em down on the farm now that they’ve seen Paris?’

Arriving at Bread and Puppet felt like we entered a time warp. We pulled up to what appeared to be Bread and Puppet, an old white farmhouse on the road across from an old, colorful school bus, people milling about everywhere. We happened to get into a confusing turn-around scenario with a different car (of course) and suddenly Daniel walks up to our car wearing a sombrero, which turned out to be his gardening hat from the costume room. The first thing we did at Bread and Puppet was to hop in during the middle of a tour of the museum with Elka, one of the founders. The museum is full of old, retired puppets used in past shows such as an Oscar Romero puppet, a series of puppets used during the Vietnam War protests, and so on. And when I say puppets I mean life size or bigger papier mache puppets on sticks, heads that you can wear, hand puppets, puppets to be hung from the ceiling, and the like. This world of varying colors and images, some very sharp, some softer and subtler, felt so surreal—surreal seemed to be the word of choice for our two weeks spent at Bread and Puppet. Elka, short in stature with graying hair, a low voice, and a huge smile, led us through the museum with a fascination in her eyes that only encouraged my infatuation with the place. She had been part of this movement from the beginning and still finds delight in leading a tour and laying eyes on her creations from years past. She told us about the different puppet shows, the different protests, the methods behind making the puppets. Unfortunately we only caught the second half of the tour and then had to end quickly because the puppet show was about to begin. Before the summer really started Bread and Puppet Theatre had a puppet show every Sunday afternoon, and we happened to come on the last Sunday afternoon show. After that, they were showing the puppet show on Friday evenings and then having the “Nothing-Is-Not-Ready” Circus and Pageant on Sunday afternoons.

            The puppet show started out in the back yard complete with puppets, costumes, and the brass band. The first part lasted about 20 minutes and we were then instructed to follow the band to another part of the yard where a hand-puppet show was, and finally we entered a barn called The Dirt Floor Cathedral, which had wooden bleachers and the stage was the dirt floor at the front with a backdrop. The show they performed here was called “The Situation” and is the show that they have been touring with. It is about the situation we as a society have found ourselves in, and examines the rushed, detached, uncritical life we have become accustomed to. There is a sheet hanging on the side of the barn with poetic prose, written by Peter Schumann, that was read throughout the puppet show. It starts out by saying: “The situation is situated at the top of Mt. Everest and tumbles into valleys below. Every morning when the alarm clock rings it brushes its teeth and drives off to its prison job. It laughs like a fool and preaches like a preacher in high-falutin’ words as if it knew better. It slaves for money like a millionaire, gets sick and tired of itself and then dances the night through…”

            The puppet show ended and everyone was invited outside to have bread and aioli, we learned later that Peter is constantly making bread and serves it at every performance they have. So we mingled and explored, Daniel gave us a tour of the farm and the gardens, got us settled in our tent, and we ate dinner with everyone. Of course, two people at Bread and Puppet were from Boone, our college town, one of which I had seen many times at the coffee shop I frequented sitting outside with his dog. It is amazing the small world of farming and alternative lifestyles, I should have known we would find Boonies there, but it was a real treat, a taste of home so far away. On the other side of that, there were people there from all over the world: Puerto Rico, Germany, Iraq, Qatar, England, Canada, and France, to name a few. I never expected to meet so many people from abroad in rural Vermont, but it made for an amazingly, beautifully, eclectic group. As we met people they kept telling us that we came on the right day because they were having a party that night, and they were right. When it started getting dark we walked over to the circus field and at the top was a huge bonfire. People gathered, drank beer, built a fire, and suddenly the brass band got together and started playing. Everyone knew the circus tunes, such as this lovely one, everyone sang along and danced around the fire. Again, it was so surreal. I found myself completely enchanted by the music, by the atmosphere, and though I was exhausted from traveling couldn’t help but fully enjoy myself. I was instantly struck by how comfortable everyone was with themselves there, if they wanted to dance they danced, if they wanted to sing they sang, there was an air of openness I had never experienced before and found to be incredibly refreshing.

From there on we instantly jumped into life at Bread and Puppet, we ate together for every meal, sang together in the mornings, had siesta after lunch every day until 2, gardened, and went swimming after work almost every single day we were there. Shadow Lake and Claire’s Pond were our two swimming holes and both were incredibly beautiful, clear water, amazing mountains in the background. It was the most perfect way to end the day. In the evenings we usually hung out with people, we made some amazing friends, watched the sunset, sat on the porch and enjoyed each other’s company. We had no cell phone service or internet, so people actually spent time with each other instead of with their phones. I absolutely loved being there. The thing that still sticks with me is how much life there was at Bread and Puppet. All day people were being creative through puppetry, gardening, cooking, etc. It is a lifestyle that fosters creativity and care for the world around you and I cannot even begin to express how glad I am that we landed in such an enchanting place.

–Lindsay

 

The Dumpster Provides

Dumpster Diving is a way of life here at Edible Forrest Urban Farm, they go once or twice a week and feed themselves as well as some neighbors and friends off of the food that is salvaged. For those of you who are unfamiliar with dumpster diving, it is the practice of jumping into dumpsters and taking the food that is not bad out of it. Now, before you completely freak out, let me explain that the food is in bags, so it’s not just open in the dumpster and grocery stores throw out food for all kinds of ridiculous reasons before it is bad. Dumpster diving is a pretty common practice and is often a criticism of the food system as a whole and the insane amount of food waste in this country (about 40% of the food in the US goes uneaten into landfills which then releases methane, the worst greenhouse gas). There’s a really great documentary called Dive! that goes into the lives of dumpster divers and their philosophy behind what they do, you should check it out it’s very well done. Stores will throw out food if it is near it’s expiration date (even cans and packaged food that will take ages to go bad), if there is a case of bottles and one breaks the whole box will get thrown away, if there is a case of tomatoes and one is moldy the whole case will get thrown away, etc. I think you get the picture.

Since we’ve been here everything we’ve eaten is from the dumpster, and it is amazing how well we have eaten–they even have really fancy apple beer imported from Belgium. Once someone goes dumpster diving the next few hours and the next day we take time processing, freezing, and sorting through all of the food salvaged. They have an amazing pantry downstairs of canned goods they have salvaged and the refrigerator and multiple freezers are full of good food. This is a picture of a breakfast I made one morning (I know, so hipster of me) in hopes of showing how much good food is wasted in this country: potato pancakes with tomato, onions, peppers, and avocado on top along with a blueberry, banana, strawberry smoothie.

Now tell me that dumpster food is gross!

Last week after realizing that two different groups of us had planned to go dumpster diving at the same we decided to have a contest. I went with Caleb and Stacy to one of their regular dumpsters while Lauren, Olivia, and Joel ended up going to Delaware for another plentiful dumpster. None of us knew what we were getting ourselves into, we hit the jackpot. We got bags full of different kinds of chips, cases of hummus, boxes of tomatoes, cases of soy yogurt (especially exciting for the Vegans of the adventure), tons of strawberries and peaches, to name a few things.  Here are some photos of the abundance:

 

With the excess of fruit, tomatoes, chips, and hummus we decided to have a smoothie, hummus, salsa, and chips party. Caleb invited the couch surfing community in Philadelphia and we got to have a lovely night of meeting new people and making them food. Couch surfing, for those of you who do not know, is a website/database of people in each city who will let you stay on their couch if you’re traveling or travelers looking for a place to stay. Every host and every traveler is rated based on past couch surfing experiences, it’s a pretty cool network. The couch surfing community in Philadelphia is really active and welcoming, Caleb and Joel host travelers fairly often, and there are always meet ups around Philadelphia for the community. It was awesome to meet everyone and hear their stories. This was a night of everything that I love–good food bringing people together. It’s amazing what abundance and community an excess (or waste in some peoples’ eyes) can create.

The dumpster provides good food–and even friends!

–Lindsay

Tent of Nations Update

Tent of Nations Update

When we were at Koinonia I wrote a blog post about the Tree of Life Conference held about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. We were lucky to have to chance to meet and talk with some visitors from Palestine including Daoud, whose family owns Tent of Nations. Recently, the Israeli army came and tore down all of the olive trees on their farm. They continue to fight for peace and for their land. It was good news to see that the BBC wrote an article about their struggle, click the link above to view the article.

Edible Forrest Urban Farm

We have been hanging out and gardening in Norristown, PA for about two weeks now (apologies for the slow updates). The set up of this farm is far different than anywhere we have been thus far. We’re living in a house with the two brothers–Caleb and Joel–who own it, their roommate Samir, and Caleb’s girlfriend Stacy comes by on regular basis along with others who pop in and out fairly often. Joel has lived here for about 10 years and Caleb has lived here for about 5, both are embedded in the community in different ways. Joel owns houses around Norristown and rents them out while Caleb works most closely with the garden and runs the CSA for the community with 4 whole shares and 8 half shares. CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture and it is a program in which people buy shares of the farmer’s produce at the beginning of the summer and then get a box of produce every week. Norristown is about 45 minutes outside of Philadelphia and is technically its own township, not a suburb of Philly, so when we say urban farm it is definitely more urban than we have experienced all year and is kind of in a neighborhood setting. They own the lot next to their house where the garden is located, it’s about 1/4 of an acre total and it is amazing how much produce can come out of such a small space.

We ended up arriving in Norristown a day late because Jaimie got a stomach bug in Boone just a few days before we were scheduled to leave (this seems to be an unfortunate trend). Also, as we stated in a previous post, we heard of the death of our friend on the way up here, so needless to say we arrived a little scattered and flustered. We got to know everyone in the house and their awesome neighbor, Olivia, and then a few days later Caleb and Stacy went to Alaska and Joel went up to Michigan. It took a few days for it to hit me how incredibly generous and trusting this was of them. They barely knew us and instantly trusted us to live in their house, eat whatever food we wanted, and work in the garden and harvest for the CSA while they were gone. But it ended up being the perfect set up because the adjustment to being here took longer for me than it has in the past because I needed time to figure out how to say goodbye to William in my own way up here. So our first week we were able to work in the garden at our own pace, we had the schedule for the CSA pickup on Thursday, and I was able to read, write, and process a lot. We also got to spend a lot of time with Samir and Olivia and get to know them–Olivia’s room is right on the other side of our wall, so we can get out on the roof and go in through each others windows, it’s just like Narnia (kind of). It was just what I needed–I found quite a bit of healing and inspiration working in the garden at my own pace and spending time with everyone.

Last week it rained. Every day. Really hard. So, we weren’t able to work in the garden much, just little things most days like weeding and harvesting. All of this down time gave us the opportunity to explore a little bit. We ended up seeing some really cool things:

• Two friends of mine, Josh and Megan, live only about 40 minutes away from us, so they kindly picked me up one day and showed me around Philadelphia. We went to Reading Terminal Market, AKA heaven, and ate breakfast with the Amish and then wandered around as I drooled over all the beautiful produce and fascinating vendors.
   
  We then went to historical Philly and wandered around
   
  until it was time to get ice cream at an adorable old fashioned ice cream shop. I got peach ice cream that was absolutely delicious. Then we went to their favorite bar and drank beer and ate more food. Finally we ended up at their house and played ladder ball, cards against humanity, and ate pizza and drank more beer. Basically, when in Philadelphia, eat. I’ve known Josh since I was about 5 and we don’t get to see each other very often, so it has been such a treat to be up here and able to see him and his wonderful fiancee, Megan. They’re trying to subliminally force me to move up here with them, we’ll see if it works.
• The Theatre! We went to go see a play called 39 Steps at an adorable little theatre right in the heart of Norristown. The play is based off of Alfred Hitchock’s movie and has 130 characters all played by only four actors. It was quite funny and clever, if you ever get the chance to go see it I highly recommend that you do so.
• Story Slam Samir, Olivia, Lauren, Jaimie, and I decided to go to a Story Slam one night. It was hosted at World Cafe Life Philadelphia, which was really cool to see, and we ate dinner beforehand and listened to some live jazz. Then the story slam started. 10 people are chosen out of a hat to tell a story in under 5 minutes and are then judged on their delivery of the story as well as the content. The theme for that night was ‘Close Calls’ so the stories were highly entertaining. It ended up being absolutely hilarious and enthralling, hearing people tell stories about their lives was so great. You can watch the winning story here. Trust me, it’s worth it.
• Farm Park is a park only about 6 blocks away from the farm that is basically a huge farm with biking and hiking trails all through it. It is owned by the mental hospital and their patients used to work on it as a form of therapy until the state came in and shut that down on pretenses of forced labor, which is really unfortunate but that is another rant for another day. Now it is still farmed, mostly just big corn fields, by a farmer that they pay. One afternoon the rain stopped for a short amount of time so we decided to risk it and bring bikes to the park and bike and run (in Lauren’s case) around the trails. It was absolutely beautiful and refreshing, I was so glad to find that I could get to nature so quickly. This is a picture of a creek that runs through the park, we took a hiking trail down to it off of the main bike trail.
  
  When we all met up to go home, Jaimie gave Lauren a bike riding lesson (notice that Jaimie is wearing the helmet in this picture).
  
  Right after that picture the bottoms opened and we had to walk home in the pouring rain. It was quite an adventure!
• This past Saturday Olivia, Jaimie, Lauren, my friend Ben who goes to school up here, and I decided to go into Philadelphia again for the Vegan and Vegetarian Festival. First we went to Reading Terminal Market because I wanted to show Jaimie and Lauren how amazing it was and then headed over to go to VegFest. VegFest was somewhat of a bust, unfortunately, it was pretty gimmicky and there were a lot of trendy t-shirts for sale about how cool it is to be vegan and only a little bit of free food (fake chicken from Whole Foods which was not very exciting). But the area of town it was in was really cool, right by the river and near the historic part of Philadelphia. So we wandered a bit and ended up eating at Twisted Tail Juke Joint and Bar, a delicious restaurant with a southern influence and delicious whiskey. I definitely enjoyed the day of adventures.

That is our stay in Norristown so far in a nutshell! Just a few more fun facts to throw at you: Caleb, Joel, Stacy, and Olivia are all vegan and everything they eat is either from the garden or from the dumpster! We live with dumpster divers! Don’t worry, there is a whole post on that coming up, we had a diving competition last night. Also there is a bike trail than runs along the Schuylkill (pronounced skoo-kill) River and connects Norristown to Philadelphia, Jaimie took a nice 32-ish mile bike ride round trip one day. And finally we currently have some bats living in our room; they got in through the chimney, and are very chatty in the walls in the late evening. I kind of like them and we may have named them already.

–Lindsay

Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier

“Of course, in her previous life, Ada had taken little part in the garden Monroe had always paid someone to grow for them, and her mind, in consequence, had latched itself to the product–the food on the table–not the job of getting it there. Ruby disabused her of that practice. The rudeness of eating, of living, that’s where Ruby seemed to aim Ada every day that first month. She held Ada’s nose to the dirt to see it’s purpose”

For Brandon, A Poem

When I was in Boone a friend of mine left to go on a solo trip to move across the country. He’s been talking about traveling ever since I met him and he’s finally gotten the chance to do so and taking his time camping and exploring his way out to California. Before he left he asked me for travel advice and I could think of absolutely nothing on the spot. So as I thought about it more I ended up writing a poem about my year so far:

For Brandon

Fellow Vagabond, Dear Friend,
you asked for travel advice and my mind suddenly turned
to a bowl,
void of all wise thoughts I like to imagine reside there.

I wanted to pour experience, desire, passion, and intellect
down your throat, impress you with the great insight
gained from collecting dirt under my fingernails
from so many different landscapes in such a short time,
but nothing came.

How appropriate.

I have lived among people whose lives reflect their hearts,
their hopes, dreams, and values planted in their soil,
bloom delicate flowers in their hair,
and I desire nothing more than to find my own seeds in myself to plant.

I have worked beside those who
have been enfolded in a darkness stronger than I can imagine
and emit so much light from their eyes
I can barely stand to look at it.

I have received so much generosity,
in all different forms,
that I can now recognize its shy face
in a simple cypress knee,
a murmuration of starlings,
a homemade potion for growing wings from a 7-year-old.

I am learning to be a vessel,
to leave my hands open and take in
the boundless beauty that threads through each town I visit
and reflect it in my own eyes,
let it awaken the sleeping stardust in my stomach,
knit it into every poem I write, interaction I have, and seed that I plant.

I am learning to take the desolation that inevitably comes
with the decision to uproot
by sitting and listening to the stream of sorrow
and letting it flow through my body and water the soil between my toes.

Because there have been days more enchanting than words can capture
alongside days of devastation that no ocean could hold
and it was the time in between,
when my center was shaken,
that I would have to fold my arms into myself
and feel the strength beneath my skin.

Remember that you have made the choice to be where you are
and remember to trust it,
you can trust yourself.

Curiosity, I know, dwells in your chest,
feed it.

Leave the loneliness tugging at your ribs dangling there,
wear it like jewelry,
it is far more valuable than you realize.

Bitterness is an easy escape,
don’t give in to its soothing melody.

Fight.

But something tells me you know all this already,
you chose to be where you are,
remember.

My mind was a bowl when you asked for my advice
and that, I think,
is the greatest thing I’m learning this year:
to hold and to share,
none of this is mine.

–Lindsay

Oh, Boone

It’s interesting visiting a place you once called home, the memories and habits that jump out at you, the pure happiness and the familiar sadness, and hovering over everything the decision you made to leave it all behind. There are things about Boone that I love and things about Boone that I really dislike and yet despite all of that Boone has a huge claim on my heart and I’m sure it always will. Being back in Boone was an interesting experience for me. Having left in such a rush and such a desire to get out as soon as possible, I had a hard time with the idea of living there again, even for such a short amount of time. The first half of my time there was slightly disorienting. I had such a desire to see everyone as well as a strong desire to be working out on the farm with Kathleen, that I often found myself feeling caught between two different worlds. I would spend time in Boone and then feel the overwhelming desire to be back on the farm where I could find peace and quiet, which was an interesting balance to discover. While I was living in Todd, NC I wanted to be in Boone all the time, to be with my friends and community, so I found it hard to make the 20 minute drive home when I would just want to turn around and be back in town. This time around I found myself falling into the habit of thinking I wanted to go into Boone at any sign of down time on the farm and then quickly realizing that wasn’t necessarily the case. I wanted to spend time with Kathleen, her roommates, and Jaimie (and of course her dog, Bonnie) out at the farm which was definitely on its own time and own pace, one that is much more natural for me. I’ve become more comfortable with being on my own, being what I would have considered “isolated” last year has become a welcome lifestyle for me. Living in Boone again brought up old habits, both healthy and unhealthy, and I was able to reevaluate them and I find peace with them. I was able to see how much I’ve changed and at the same time how exactly the same I feel when I’m with my wonderful friends in Boone. I began to realize that the farm and Boone were not two different worlds but they could, in fact, exist and work well together (shocker), they finally started to merge in my mind. By the time we left I was feeling comfortable being there again, fully enjoying my time with my friends out on the farm as well as my friends in town.

The last few days out on the farm I got to spend a lot more time with Kathleen as she got a break from work and meetings, and eating and farming with her was so revitalizing. On our last night there Kathleen and I played badminton, drank beer, and then went to a rock ‘n roll show at Espresso News. She tempted me to stay for the whole summer and we could always have badminton, beer, and bands (she knows all of my weaknesses, which does include alliterations) and had the rest of our trip not been planned out I probably would have.

Once I was able to balance myself in Boone I was so glad to be back. Being in Asheville and Boone both were like a vacation from our trip, although, as my quirky Agroecology professor, Christoff, reminded me: “Vacation? Yeah, but, you’re still doing the same thing”. Being able to see people that I’ve missed all year was just the refresher I needed for the rest of our trip. I’ve missed a lot this year not being within driving distance of my friends, although it has been completely worth it, I got to make up for some of that. One of the saddest nights in Georgia at the beginning of our trip was the night two of my friends played their first show as their new band, Someday Rumble, and while I was in Boone I finally got to see them!

You should go get their EP for free right here.

Also I have missed so many shows this year that I would have gone to had I been in NC and those of you who know me have heard me complain so many times about bands coming to wherever I’m not. I finally got to see some live music with some great friends! We went to Charlotte to see Manchester Orchestra, Kevin Devine and the Goddamn Band, and Balance and Composure, and it was fantastic. It was my first time seeing them and it was most definitely worth it.

Farming in the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains again and being around my beloved Boone community made it hard to say goodbye again. This time especially I had to say goodbye to a lot of people who are moving away from Boone in a  few weeks, slowly my friends are beginning to spread out. It is hard knowing that people will not be in a town so easily accessible for me, but they are all going on to do amazing things. Look out Ireland, California, Colorado, Seattle, DC, Asheville, Durham, and so many more places, Boone folks are coming for ya! Fortunately I do still have some friends staying for at least another year in Boone and, selfishly, I’m glad they will be so close once I’m back in North Carolina. Each time I leave NC I find it more and more difficult to do so, but the last leg of our trip is bound to be an exciting one. As we got in the car to head up to Norristown I realized that it was the last time we were going to leave NC before we’re all back for good (or at least for a year). So, it’s only goodbye for now, NC, and as much as I don’t want to admit it, I love you, Boone.

–Lindsay