Left Out

It’s this crazy thing I do every day that somehow now feels somewhat normal. Although, I can’t say I’m 100% completely feeling like this is where I’ve always wanted to be and that I’m doing what I’ve always wanted to do- but for now it works. Somewhat.

I live in someone else’s barn for crying out loud. Wash my clothes in their washing machine. Work 8-9 hours a day helping them live out their dream. I’m a farmhand pretty much. I’m hired help. The crew. I work here. I do what I’m ask, what I’m told in a timely manner to the best of my ability, but at the end of the day- my opinion holds no weight. I can’t change things, make decisions, or suggestions (not that I know very much about very much...)

And sometimes, I just want what everyone else wants- what everyone else HAS, or so it seems. Nice jobs. Respectable jobs. Cars. Babies. Summer vacations. A space of their own.  Houses and yards and weekends off. Friends and permanent addresses. I do realize that all of this comes with a price, no less.

More than anything else I long for a place, a space, of my own. That could mean land, or a house, or a rental. Something lasting. Something with some staying power.

Nesting. There I said it. I’m 32 and I want to settle down.

Living here and working here, I feel old. I feel like I should have had this experience ten years ago. I feel like at this point in my life I should be starting my own farm- not working on one for $1,500 a month plus room and board. (And all the fresh veggies you can eat. Which isn’t so bad at all.) I feel like I’m better than this job sometimes. Like it’s not challenging enough. Physically yes. Otherwise, I’m dieing! (or maybe I just miss feeling a part of community…) 

Spider on my Chest

Days are simply full of activity. There are not enough hours. And yet, there are still phone calls that need to be made between 8:00 and 5:00, doctor’s visits, appointments, sickness, packages to be mailed at the post office that is only open between 8:00 & 5:00.

The heat and lack of rain is wreaking havoc on many plants. Broccoli continues to bolt, squash plants and cucumbers are shriveling into crispy resembles of what they once were, it’s slow going with the tomato plants and the lettuce plants are trying to hold their own in 80 and 90 degree temperatures.

Today we harvested three varieties of beets in lovely shads of red, pink and yellow. The first two hours of the morning were spent picking and picking and picking tomatoes in the greenhouse. Bins and bins of pink, green, yellow, orange, striped, and even some nearly three-pound heirlooms. (I know. We weighed them.)

During the last hour of the day, Chris and I picked 144 bunches of cilantro. It smells heavenly in the herbs rows; basil, dill, cilantro. Somewhere in-between bunch number 78 and 79 I felt a tickle on my chest, when I looked down and saw a spider. There was a granddaddy longlegs crawling between my sports bra uniboob. No lie. I grabbed him with my t-shirt and squished him pretty good, leaving one leg twitching on my chest. Turning the top of my shirt inside out, I tossed the rest of him on the ground. This is me now.

Then the eggplants attacked me. Thorns, scratches, blood- but I still got the eggplant. So, I win right? Just another day at the office.

Dirt and bugs and spiders and whole milk and mashed potatoes and eating the egg yolks and fresh cheese and glasses of wine were not normal parts of each day prior to living on the farm. Neither were stillness and quietness and reading my Bible daily and taking time to write and sitting in the shade watching geese and seeing the sunset and sleeping with all the windows open and hearing nothing but crickets and bullfrogs. I’ve changed. I’m different and I wonder what will remain in three months from now when this time is over. What will stay in me from the days on the farm? Too much or not enough?

Visit from The Mercks!

 The Mercks let us go swimming in their fancy hotel swimming pool. 

I don't know who enjoyed it more, Baby Lewis or me!

Ice-cream sundays bring big smiles 

Lewis observing the farm the best possible way

Lewis and Seamus out on the farm

Into August we go...

 

I survived July, on a wing and a prayer and Chris and I both boast with a grin, “we are in the downhill coast.” Well, not really coasting. But we’ve made it more than halfway through this thing, so what’s three more months?

Besides more transplanting, more seeding, more weeding, more harvesting, CSA box packing, three more months of early Farmer’s Market Saturdays, and preparing the farm/ soil/ greenhouses/ crops for the winter. We’ll be planting fall garlic and harvesting pumpkins before you know it.

Jon’s three-week stay on the farm was a nice change of pace. Nice to have family here and very nice to have some extra help too! On his last day we all visited The Ice Cream Man where he took ice cream eating to an entirely new level with The Banana Bucket (a six scoop, six topping, banana split with a mound of whipped topping. Meant for sharing. He finished about ½ of this half-gallon’s worth of ice cream before announcing, “I’m full.” The guys told him it wasn’t about being full and that he needed to simply power through and finish. This did not happen.

…

I wish I had some wonderful farm news to share, but each day is full of so much activity and so many tasks that I can’t even recall what I did two days ago. Weeding. Picking tomatoes for 142 families, washing beets- it’s pretty mundane and needs no explaining. Dig potatoes, pull onions, spray clay on broccoli to prevent flea beetle damage, pull weeds in the cucumber beds.

My days are long and hard. My wrists ache with this arthritis/ carpel tunnel ping. I’m self-diagnosing here, but I hope it goes away when I’m not crawling all day long. We are on all fours to weed, to plant, to harvest…. Maybe it’s just the 140+ pounds of weight bearing down on my little ole wrists every single day.

…

I’ve canned more beets, spicy green beans, my Nana’s bead and butter pickles, and peach preserves. (Only after no less than three calls to my mother.) I’m doing this canning thing for the first time on my very own and I wish I had some wiser, older person in the kitchen with me sometimes. There are so many variables that I feel like sometimes it’s a little too easy to mess up. Everyone does pickles different. Cold pack. Hot pack. Times are different, seasonings vary, refrigerate overnight… Oh, well. I got to learn sometime.

This weekend I’m canning a very small batch of Brandied Peach Preserves. It takes three days to make… And better be worth it. I currently have four canning/ recipes books from the library and I’ve almost made them my own. My favorite one has been Well Preserved- small batch canning for the new cook.

We are still here. We are working and living and trying to decide what’s next for The Chambers. I did manage a day off from Farmers Market and will be spending my Saturday getting a massage in Clifton Park (45 minutes away). It is well overdue and a gift from a dear friend in NYC- birthday/ going away in late March. Overdue indeed.  

(husk cherries- a new fun, favorite treat!) 

Surviving July

Beautifully mulched eggplant rows. Lovely. 

Twisted Carrots

I'll have the LARGE ice cream please.

John's attempt to consume the "Banana Bucket" Six scoop, six topping $10.00 banana split 

Defeated. This is where he stopped 

Harvesting List for the week 

Seamus sleeping in the potato washer. Obviously 

Stefani attempting a pose with the pitchfork 

Jon and Chis digging new potatoes