July 27, 2009

Today was the most peaceful day of my life.

It only took 22 years to accomplish but who’s counting?

I’m not entirely sure why I’ve become obsessed with peace. I knew that farming was going to bring about changes in my mindset but this? This obsession with peace I was not expecting.

I’ve been wondering about the genesis of the day of peace that I’ve just lived and perhaps it wasn’t 22 years in the making. Perhaps it was only 6 weeks in the making. But when I search my memory I must include many dark and dismal days as part of the genesis process because it was my resolve to move away from my shadow and into the light that brought me to this time.

When I moved to the farm I wasn’t looking to be city-Ilsa living in the country. I wanted to become a brand-new-kind of Ilsa. This meant that the first few weeks living here took their toll on me. I had nightmares and I felt like crap. I anchored myself in getting the farm up and running. I kept to the same time of rising and going to bed. I kept to a decent diet of slow cooked, organic food. And I prayed. A lot. I asked the Universe (or God if you prefer) to give me the strength and the insight to move beyond who I was. I knew that the farming and vegetables and market days and CSA deliveries were all fated to come into existence but my new-self. I wasn’t so sure about that.

I’ve done battle with myself before. I’ve fought all kinds of habits and demons and patterns. I knew what I was in for. But I wanted to write a letter to my self (which was then my current-self) and say, “Self. You’re done for. I’m going to prevail. I’ve kicked your ass in the past and I plan to kick it again in the very near future.”

Nightmares.

Part of my process -- my unconscious -- is so incredibly strong. When Mark Simmons and I were doing Jungian dream work a couple of years back, after a particularly intense session Mark said, “Your old self will try to take you back.” He meant that while we had brought some great stuff out of the Shadow and into consciousness, my old self was going to do her darnedest to make sure that work didn’t stick.

And while I’ve never been too keen on mantras, these past 3 months I’ve turned to them as the newest weapon in my arsenal. I needed to create my own mantras that suited me to a tee. As far as I can tell mantras are a great tool to use when doing tricky, tough heartwork. I felt that there were a ton of unconscious “things” at work and instead of going in search of the yucky, sticky stuff in my unconscious I would use every second of my waking-life to interrupt those well-worn cycles.

It was in the early part of May when Ben and I were working on Dedie King’s land that I hit on the best way to use mantras – while I was hard at work farming. One day we were taking truck loads of wood chips from one field to another, to use as mulch. With each shovelful I said, “I am peaceful.” Then when we dropped mulch near the field with each step I took to distribute the mulch, I said, “I am peaceful.”

I’ve got to tell you, after 8 hours of shoveling and employing mantras I was freaking beat. But I didn’t care. Tough titty. I decided to run my then-self ragged in the hopes that the new-self would emerge. (Admittedly odd logic but I had nothing else to work with.)

Then I started to use mantras all the time. When I weeded. Each time I pulled a weed, “I am peaceful.” Any repetitive, dull task was infused with mantras.

I know that it takes 21 days to create a new habit. 21 days seemed like an awfully short time to take a self that was in turmoil and convert it into a peaceful self.

Then the nightmares started to subside. The internal struggle and self-torment started to lessen.

Then there was today.

A sunny day. A cool breeze. I began the day harvesting for the Harvard Forest order. Delivered that. Then moved onto the CSA harvest. Then moved onto field work.

It was during the early afternoon when I realized that something in me had shifted. In a way being peaceful had a slightly exciting aspect to it. A small shiver or a slightly elevated feeling was moving through me. Unlike the past when I’ve waited to watch a mood move past, this feeling of being at peace lingered. It’s a subtle feeling.

I want to get back to the Genesis of this, the most peaceful day of my life.

Back in April on a gray, rainy, cold day I went for a walk in the forest. I started to think about people around the world who were, had been, or will be -- raped, tortured, or murdered. When I was young I was physically and sexually abused. I don’t let those instances of violence define me. Although I do think they had something to do with my being homeless (as a teenager) and alcoholic (into my late 20s). I’m certain that there are thousands of people who’ve been treated far worse than I was.

What I’ve got control over is the way I chose to deal with the way things had an impact on me. I feel that life is way too short for bitterness. I was bitter for a time in my 20s but then I just couldn’t feature bitterness in my life any longer.

Anyway. I was emerging from the forest on the cold, wet, day in April when I realized that if I wanted people to treat each other more peacefully I had better start with myself and I had better stop tormenting myself. I’m not sure I was doing any sort of world-class treatment on myself. I was probably being overly critical in a way that I know accomplishes nothing.

I don’t know if I employed a mantra at that time. Instead I told myself that it was time to be nicer and gentler with myself. I spent a lot of time telling myself to get over myself. I spent a lot of time reminding myself that I was pretty f*cking lucky to have this opportunity to farm and that I should focus on the good in that.

It bowled me over how much negativity there was in my daily sub-routine. But I just couldn’t take it anymore. Sometimes I just have to push through a feeling if I’m not going to turn to drugs/sex/alcohol (you know the Rock ‘n’ Roll treatment) then I’ve got to do what I call the “hard, heartwork.” I’ve got to face up to who I am and then do whatever it takes to undo that.

It would be hard for me to define who I was a few months ago. Mostly I was run down. But I said, “Too bad. Pick yourself up and make something new of yourself. Otherwise you might as well go back to Manhattan, sit in your apartment (or at a desk job) and just rot.” The idea of rotting away, really more like not wanting to rot, is what motivated me.

And when I found myself doing anything vaguely self-tormenting, I brought my focus back to the farm. Break new ground. Add amendments. Propagate seeds. Build beds. Mulch. Transplant seedlings. And eventually the new-self took over.

Per haps, you the reader can see the Genesis point. For me there’s nothing to be gained in looking any further. I found what I was looking for. O\r rather I fashioned myself into a newer, more peaceful Ilsa.

And in a couple of months I’ll learn it it’s the real deal when I head back to Manhattan. It’s one thing to feel at peace on a beautiful day in the country. If I can maintain this peace in the Big Apple I should be all set.

Baby potatoes!

These are Red Norland and Yukon Gold -- a couple weeks before the late blight hit.

So yeah. Then the late blight hit. This means that the potatoes have got to be eaten within a couple of days of harvest. This also means that next year it's going to be a lot harder to come by seed-potato.

One day I was in the field and I looked at the potato plants, the foliage was green. Literally 2 days later I looked into the same field and every single plant had died and turned brown and I noticed the smell of rot.

It's all kind of sad. But that's farming. Nothing much I can do about it now.

I've been eating and selling the Red Norland at a fast clip. They're effing tasty and while I'm bummed out they won't keep... like I said before, that's farming.

I ate the whole thing.

Meet Hon Tsai Tai. A flowering brassica. You eat the flowers, the leaves, the stems. As my mother put it, "I didn't know if I should eat it or put it in a vase."

I say, "Put it in skillet, saute it, and eat it. Damn good eats!"

New Red Fire

Waldmann's Dark Green

Belstar.

A classic car kind of day.

This was the second consecutive day of sun. After 3 weeks of nothing but gray and rain, I have to say I was feeling a bit Novemberish. I'm old enough that the weather doesn't effect my moods. But the vegetables -- well, warm weather crops such as eggplants, peppers, and tomatoes, they require a bit of sun. Our plants are suffering from arrested development. I'm a novice farmer (to say the least) but I'm hoping that my peppers and eggplants are as eager to emerge as I am eager to see them emerge. But I fear that if they have to take their course they'll be a long time in coming.

I've seen summer squash offered at other farmers' stands and I'm thinking, "How did they do that?" I can't even guess at when I'll have squash ready for market.

The forecast looks good for the next couple of days and after three weeks of rain, with a couple of flash floods, and last Friday, lightning storms that set three buildings on fire in the town next to mine -- yeah, a couple of days of sun is going to do wonders for my soul.

I have a feeling that a lot of other people around these parts feel the same. This was the first Sunday all season where dudes took their classic cars out of the garage for a Sunday afternoon drive.

While I was driving around today, in my 1999 Volvo that needs about $2000.00 in repairs (gulp)I had a sudden bout of melancholy. About 10 years ago my life was filled with sudden deaths. A co-worker died from acute lukemia, a former co-worker was murdered, and a young guy who washed windows in the building where I worked fell 12 stories to his instantaneous death. This all happened within the span of 3 months. At that time I turned to The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. I wasn't looking for anwers. I was looking for coping mechanisms. One of the concepts that I explored was that of "attachment." While I was bummed-out or grieving, it was suggested that I let go of that. The idea is that everything is impermanent and to hang on to things (to be attached to them) is about choice.

There is a corollary to letting go of when things don't feel so good. In my daily practice I let go of the things that do feel good.

But what I've really done, after I read Thich Nhat Hanh, is that I've learned to finesse things a bit. When I'm in a really bad mood and I can't just let go, I give my mood the royal treatment. I take it to lunch or a movie, or I carry it around like a new born baby and I mother it. Eventually it gets the attention it needs and abates.

Today, in all that glorious, blissfull, much-needed sunshine, I had to say, "This too shall pass." I let the sun soak into my skin, observed a wonderfully blue sky, perfectly populated with white fluffy clouds, felt the cool breeze on my skin and I thought, "This is one of the most beautiful days I have ever lived." Then I said, "Let it go."

I don't mind feeling melancholy. In fact I think I'm a better mood on gray days, because I'm a bit of a contrarian. While everyone is lamenting the rain, "I'm thinking, it's no big deal. It'll be sunny soon enough." On sunny days there seems to be an expectation that folks should be in a great mood. Today I liked having a mellow, enjoy-it-while-it's-here kind of mood. I watered the greenhouse. Drove Carly to the bus. Took the weekly CSA share to my mother. (See photos for some of our awesome veggies.) And just let it roll.

And for anyone who's interested in buying some of our veggies, you can find us on Saturdays at the Barre Farmer's Market and the Shutesbury Farmer's Market. We haven't settled on our weekday markets mostly becasue it's been raining for the past month. Did I mention that it just rained for the past 3 weeks?

And the kids who are enrolled in the Harvard Forest summer program have been eating our prouduce for the past 3 weeks.

And now I've got to get back outside to enjoy some of that yummy sunshine.

Here's wishing all of you a few sunny days, some slow cooked food, and access to fresh, locally grown produce your heart desires.