Perestroika!

Last year I learned the value of wearing aprons. This year, I am gaining an appreciation for cooking by recipe. Cookbooks have been, for me, a good read and a source from which to garner inspiration, but not necessarily tools to cook with. I learned how to cook instinctually, throwing things together to form a meal, without refrence to a written word. With my ever increasing bounty of fresh garden veggies, I have turned to my cookbook collection for inspired solutions to my increasingly crowded pantry and refrigerator. Could there be a recipe that calls for a large quantities of dill, a few beets, beans, potatos, and carrots?

Why couldn't I think of this myself? Perestroika!

Never in my life have I seen a recipe that calls for as much dill as it does say beans or beets! I found it in The Native Foods Restaurant cookbook. The prep time is lengthy, and if you don't already have the ingredients on hand, it would be pricey to make. But damn, is it ever so tasty! Peretroika means "rebuilding the system," and I'm guessing it must be Russian. Here's the ingredients:

2 medium gold potatos (boiled, peeled & chopped), 3 medium beets (boiled, peeled, chopped), 2 medium carrots (chopped & blanched), 1 cup chopped fresh green beans (blanched), 1 cup fresh or frozen green peas (blanche if frozen), I cup chopped fresh dill, 1 cup Balsamic Vinaigrette (I'd hold back a little on this, maybe 1/2 cup), salt to taste. Just toss them all together in a bowl, garnish with fresh dill sprigs, chopped bell pepper. the book suggests garnishing with Quick Tofu Egg: (1 tsp sunflower oil, 4 oz tofu any style/texture crumbled, 2 pinches tumeric, dash salt: heat oil and saute ingredients until color is uniform)

As I continue to pick several pounds of beans a day, I will no doubt be turning to my cook books for solutions. Hopefully canning is a solution in the near future. Otherwise, does anybody need some beans... say 20 pounds or so?

feeding people

there's very little that can compare to the pleasure of sharing food with friends, especially when it is food you have sown, nurtured, harvested and prepared. tonight i had the rare pleasure of entertaining impromptu dinner guests. living as far off the beaten path as i do, i've grown accustomed to making plans for company several days in advance. tonight was a rare treat, with three friends arriving at my doorstep, serrendipitously at the same time as the sun was just starting to set.

i had invited each in passing conversation, because last night i made a large pot of the most amazing soup. i should insert here, for your reference, the pattern of my summer evenings: when i come home from work, i change into my garden bibs and tend to my garden tasks until there's not enough light left to work by. then i take what i have harvested into the kitchen and get to work on finding an immediate use for my bounty. sometimes i fix something quick, but as the quantity of my harvests has increased, i have gotten more ambitious. recent evenings (nights, really) have found me in my kitchen cooking up large entrees that spotlight my garden goods. this usually takes me to about 10pm. if i'm still on a kick, i'll work on preserving (freezing, drying, etc.) or researching recipes for my goods (right now it's beets, beans, basil, dill and okra). i end the whole night off with playing a few tunes on the banjo and then falling, exhausted into bed.

now, the amazing soup! i spent part of my sunday researching recipes that included okra or beets, and i discovererd a soup that i had to make on the spot: Cape Verde Vegetable Soup. since one of my dearest friends has recently moved to cape verde, i was especially drawn to the recipe. (Cape Verde is the western most point of the african continent. it's a volcanic island, and i know little about it aside from a box set of traditional music of cape verde that i used to own.) i am a big fan of vegetable soup made with fresh veggies, but i tend to make more of a thick stew with a heavy tomato base. this soup is very light, perfect for eating in warmer weather. i found the recipe in Sundays at Moosewood. I won't list it here, but the soup has cabbage, potato, okra, fresh tomato, onion, garlic, ground dried chiles, thyme, cilantro, and lemon. we had it with fried green tomatos and bruschetta topped with fresh basil, dill, tomato and feta. all the veggies were from my garden except the cabbage and the dried chiles.

i had planned to put my beets, beans, dill and potatos to use by making a batch of perestroika (russian salad) tonight, but given the time (nearly 1 am!), i think i'll quit with the boiled beets, and assemble the rest of the ingredients tomorrow! i will then update you on last week's visit by the russians, a whole bus load!

inspired rant: communication breakdowns...

recent happenings have gotten me to thinking about how complicated communication really is and how it seems that breakdowns in communication are often more commonplace than we'd like to think. there's so much interference and interpretation between what starts off as a thought in your head and ends up floating through sound waves, paper or cyberspace and into thoughts in somebody else's head.

i am finally home after, once more, going off and away for a week. this time i helped a friend drive a 15 foot moving van to jackson heights, a neighborhood in queens. this particular adventure would be one of the recenet happenings that reminded me of how complicated communication really is, even if you've known someone more than half your life!

this most recent adventure and several other instances in the past few weeks keep bringing my thoughts to rest on the whole communication conundrum. can you ever really know what someone else is trying to say? a recent encounter with a new and unexpected character in my life reminded me that, though it may be rare, you sometimes do run across another person who just seems to understand what you are trying to say and vice versa, even if you tend to speak in inspired rants! at the very moment of exchange, you both know for certain that the other person really gets what you are trying to communicate and that you get what s/he is trying to say as well. but as that moment falls more distant, and miles stretch out between you and said person, you begin to doubt if that "connection" was as real as you thought it was when it happened... who knows?

over the past few years i have come to appreciate, more and more, the saying: "To assume makes an ass out of you and me."

even if you never can really know if you are on the same page with another, i say we should all jump to attention and celebrate those wonderful, unexpected moments in life when your mind, soul and/or heart fuses with another's. on my recent adventure to the big city, i ended up finally connecting, in person, with a woman (my mom's childhood best friend) who i'd always felt as if i was dancing in some kind of strange orbit with. now, i feel that we are alligned, and i can't help but smile and feel my heart lift as i look forward to future encounters and communications with this now familiar, yet still mysterious and wonderful, lady.

the communication breakdown i've been noticing is not only with bi-peds and critters. oh no! apparently my okra did not get what i thought was a loud and clear message. when i was saying my garden goodbyes before this most recent trip, i reassured my unexpected okras that i would be home in less than a week, so please don't over exert yourselves by growing too quickly. can you guess what i came home to? monster okra!!!! i hate to waste any okra at all, because it is one of my all time favorite vegetables, and the key ingredient for so many great dishes. but when they get too big, they just aren't that edible! unless they happen to be red okra, which these are not.

no major damage though. i only had to give up five... sort of. they are still sitting on my kitchen table, because i haven't definitively decided not to eat them. i do wish my garden had consulted with me before jumping into major action, though. i am officially overwhelmed and over my head (literally) in beans, basil, beets, okra, dill and sunflowers. the rest is manageable. today i put away two gallons of beans in my freezer and found a creative way to get rid of some of my basil (how much pesto does a single girl need?). i made the most delicious hummus with ground flax seed and fresh basil:

*1 can garbonzo beans drained*, 1 tablespoon olive oil, 2 tablespoon tahini, 2-4 tablespoon ground flax seed (use a coffee grinder, they are best if you grind them just before you use them), 2-4 tablespoon lemon juice, 2+ garlic cloves, 1/4-1/2 cup fresh basil leaves (or to desired taste), 1 teaspoon Bragg's Liquid Aminos, 1 teaspoon tamari sauce

*save the water from the can o' beans to add to the mixture in case it needs more liquid

blend all ingredients in a food processor. add water from beans to make smooth. i tripled this recipe and froze a yogurt container's worth for a rainy day.

the funniest communication breakdown of my week: before departing judy branch in my friend's moving van (she drove up to judy branch and spend the night en route), i called neighbors bill and billy joe and left a message. i was trying to let them know that the moving van belonged to a friend that i was helping to move to nyc, i'd be back in a week, and please check in on my critters while i'm gone. when i got home, i found the critters well taken care of, but i also learned that billy joe had called both her daughters (one is my landlady, the other my neighbor) and informed them that i had moved to nyc! she nearly gave me a heart attack when she called to let me know a woman was coming to look at my house! it was only for an appraisal... nothing to do with the earlier miscommunication. (sigh!)

Hope

Hope is a funny thing.

Just when you are about to give up completely, a small, unexpected moment sneaks up, making you think twice about filling your pockets with stone and walking into the river.

My okra has appeared. It has blossomed and given fruit. How could I have ever lost hope in okra?

This past week I was at camp. It was one of those moments when the stars lined up to place a group of people in the same place at the same time far removed from everyone else, creating a space in time that can only be appreciated by those who were there.

I am so grateful that I was there. Just before Saturday a week ago, I was out of luck, love and money and damn near out of hope. My week at camp uncovered an unexpected wellspring of love and hope.

Even though I am heartsick and Ophie may never come home, I know that I am capable of giving myself to a bunch of amazing kids and helping them discover the beauty and music within themselves, each other and the world.

And hey, I've got okra in my garden afterall. There may still be hope for those eggplants...

i thought they were eggplants, but...

for the past couple of weeks i've been in portland, oregon visiting friends. thanks to the friends i was visiting, i have seen a glimpse of how city life can actually include many of the aspects i love about the rural life. for one, they have transformed their backyard into a real garden of eden. the back corner of the yard is guarded by the shade of an old apple tree, and they are workng on building a garden shed beneath it. they have a compost system that is much more organized than my big holey garbage can of worms. it's two open box-like compartments built out of plywood. much easier to turn, shovel or get a rake in! the actual garden consists of several raised beds. in those they had growing tomatos, peppers, herbs, flowers, eggplant, squash, beans, beets, garlic, potatos, lettuce and much more

back home on judy branch...
i think my garden waited for me to go away for a few days so that it could burst into action. both intentionally planted veggies and weeds grew about four times the size they were when i left them. my pole beans are now officially three feet taller than me and still growing. same goes for the corn. the pumpkin patch is looking just beautiful, as is the squash. and the real kicker? what i thought was eggplant all this time.... are tomatos!!! i'm not quite sure how to feel about this. i had been a bit depressed that my tomatos weren't coming up, but incredibly happy that my eggplants were doing so well. i had hoped to come home to find the first emergence of purple fruit. i did come home to find fruit emerging. they are, green, round and dimpled.

beyond the garden, i am trying to spend quality time with the critters to make up for my absence. ophie is still gone, but i haven't been able to let go of my hope she'll return.

beets and borrowed banjos

it seems like i get only a few days on judy branch before life (i.e. work) pulls me away again. this week it was a three-day working retreat with the ky arts council in the middle of central ky's farmland. evenings at home i'll often spend an hour or so playing banjo, but when i'm away from home, feeling a need to be alone, i'll sit and play for four to six hours easily. i taught myself some new tunes this week and played around on sawmill tuning, finally learning "red rocking chair." now if i could only figure out how to play it the way lily may did...

when i got home today i made a shrine to ophie and conducted a little ceremony with our family that i hope will send "come home ophie" signals into the universe. i lit a candle, sprinkled catnip over participating kitties and shrine, and fed all critters (cat and dog alike) a helping of tuna. to top it off, i placed a tuna offering for ophie in a bowl on the porch railing. i'm feeling pretty blue about her prolonged absence, but i'm still holding on to hope.

the best part of today came in the form of beets (i harvested three beautiful beets this evening!) and the promise of a banjo to borrow when i travel to portland. i was a bit worried about flying with my banjo, and now i can relax and plan on bringing an offering of beets for use of a west coast five-string.

The Battle of Morning Glory

For the past few days I have spent an average of five hours in my garden. All of that time has been dedicated to pulling up weeds and tracing the path of morning glory vines so I could pull them up at the root. How quickly that insidious vine invades! After five days of battle, I have successfully cleared my crops of that murderous vine. The beds that still need to be planted will have to wait, and I believe I'll just take the hoe to them. I must confess that I really do enjoy weeding and tending my garden. It slows down my pace of the day and allows me to take time to pull up each and every little unwanted root. I usually work in "the cool of the day," after the sun retreats behind one of the mountains and I can work in the shadow of the hills. If we've had rain, I can hear the creek trickling by. Then there's the sounds of birds and bull frogs, horses and cows and ever so often the distant sound of a not so distant coal train. It's so quiet out here that you can hear the rustle of leaves and grass as a bug lights out or a gentle breeze blows.

Toward dusk, a couple members of the Judy Branch dog pack decided that they were lap dogs. Frankie Mophead was the first to take advantage of my seated position. I didn't mind the company until Lucy, a little beagle, decided that she should also sit in my lap while I weeded. The result was a lively canine version of king of the hill. They both ended up losing when I decided it was time to stand up and call it quits for the day.

It's a motley family I've created for myself here on Judy Branch. Some of the critters I love can turn on others, and it is a difficult thing to reconcile. A few nights ago, the Judy Branch Pack sniffed out cat Ophie in the woods and chased her off onto the mountain. She's not come home yet, and I'm having a hard time dealing with the pack's constant presence on my porch. I can't help but hope that Ophie is in hiding somewhere deep in those woods, just waiting for a quiet, safe moment to come home, and that she won't do that as long as these dogs are headquartered on my porch. I also can't help thinking that she met her demise. I know that either way, it's just nature's way, and I'm trying to be at peace with it. I still hope and wish with all my heart that little Ophie will come home.

west virginia, by god!

from childhood into my early twenties, i would tell my folks that one day i'd settle down somewhere in the heart of west virginia. my reasoning: west virginia was the one state i knew that was entirely mountainous. i still love that country, and after spending a night in morgantown, i am also in love with its cities. although morgantown is a little more northern than i've ever been comfortable with, i was surprised to find how much i liked it.

at common ground, i was among a few other folks from wv and ky who were "ambassadors" from central appalachia. we spent a lot of time discussing and explaining mountaintop removal to concerned, conscientious folks. i spent one day of my film class showing films about coal sludge spills and floods. i was glad to share these stories with such a captive and caring audience, but i found it emotionally and even physically exhausting. i got so homesick, that even when showing these awful images of coal companies, those images nearly knocked me over with intense yearning to be back home. it's times like these jean ritchie lyrics swell inside me, like the l&n don't stop here anymore:

"Never thought I'd ever live to love that coal dust
Never thought I'd pray to hear those tipples roar"

the best thing i brought back from common ground was learning how to do the charleston from the amazing rhiannon giddens, who we all decided must be channelling an ancestor when she gets to doing that dance.

nearly half my drive home i was bouncing with the bow-legged charleston groove while i drove. my plans for this weekend (after working in the garden, of course) are to put on some old records and charleston myself dizzy on the kitchen dance floor.

Do I really sound like that?

I'm spending a week in Maryland, teaching at Common Ground. Here's a couple of things that really strike me when I'm far away from home:

* I can suddenly hear how my voice sounds when I speak.
* My accent seems to get deeper, and I fall into using a language that is out of place here, but transplants me back home as I speak.


What I'm wondering is:

* Do I really speak with a thicker accent when I'm out of my element and surrounded by people who do not speak like my homefolks OR is it that I'm more conscious of my way of speaking when I'm dropped into a group of people who don't speak the way I do?

Last night I called neigbor Billy Joe under the pretense of checking in on my furry house critters. Really, I was just calling to hear my neigbor's voice and chat for a little about the little things we always talk about: the weather, the animals, the garden, the work that needs doing and how nice it's been to see so many good friends this summer. After giving me an update on Bella's activities (she's been camping out with the Judy Branch pack the past couple of nights), Billy Joe figured the real reason behind my call:

I was feeling homesick for Judy Branch.

Blissful exhaustion

I am recovering from my favorite week of the year: Cowan Creek Mountain Music School, and it has left me delirious, exhausted and somewhat in pain. The pain is mostly from a banjo playing injury I incurred the very first square dance on Monday night. I think it must have been the banjo gods trying to wean me from using my left index finger too much.The blister continues to grow after that forty minute tune, six days ago.... and I have learned how to play with minimum use of said injured finger.

Each year Cowan Music School has become more and more akin to a family reunion. It is a small gathering that grows just a little each year. So many of the people who come to the school feel like cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents. I love the balance of children with adults and the nurturing spirit that seems to envelop us all. There's no competition to be the greatest musician or to play the fastest or the most like Art Stamper. Everyone is here to play, listen, learn and visit. It is the happiest I ever feel. The only bad part of the week is when it comes to an end.

Last week I learned that Judy Branch has secret healing powers. Early in the week I was suffering with a tension headache. I retreated to Judy Branch to recover, and I got an urge to work in my garden. The very moment I knelt on the ground and put my fingers in the soil, the headache lifted. I wonder if that magic soil would heal my banjo injury.... Perhaps I'll give it a try this evening.

13 Aprons

I returned from my Grandma's to Judy Branch with a bag full of aprons.

Yes, aprons. Nine aprons to be exact. Each handmade, and each with its own distinct character. I found them in Grandma's hallway closet, and I entertained her at the "hospital" with a fashion show that took her back in time. I chose old jewelry to go with each apron and arrived at the rehab center with all props in hand for a evening's worth of entertainment. (Granny's recovering from a fall that broke her arm, and that's one of the many reasons why I set out to visit her last week.) I modeled each apron, and she told me who they once belonged to and who most likely made them. On several occasions she had to closely inspect the stitch to see if it was left or right-handed. The aprons belonged to and were made by great aunts: Mammie (maker) and Ruth (wearer, whose figure was much like mine apparently), Great Grandmother McCandless (maker), Great Grandma or "Nanny," as I always called her and, of course, Grandma. Nanny embroidered her apron. Together we examined the stitchwork and design, the stains and the holes and recreated a history for each and every apron.

I learned that the women of Grandma's life always tried to give her aprons because they thought she should wear them. But she never would. Unless some of the aprons were hand-me-downs or used by others, I think she may be telling me a little fib. We won't dwell on details, though.

The aprons now belong to me, and for some reason that just makes me incredibly happy.

Just a few years ago, I discovered the great usefulness of aprons and had begun a small collection for myself (total: four). Now, with my inheritance, Judy Branch is well stocked with 13 aprons. What a great excuse to make a mess in the kitchen!

almost a portland winter...

but it's only a kentucky summer.

a few days ago i left a dry, hot judy branch on a journey to visit my grandma in nashville. i came home through potholes that had become ponds and roadside waterfalls that splashed down rock face onto pavement to become waterways. this was not the first time i attempted to wish myself into a tall pick-up truck on my drive home. even so, i found myself singing silly songs praising rain and pup bella as she soaked herself in the downpour out the side window, tail wagging, as i slowly inched my way through thickly slicked roads, closer and closer home.

i love visiting my grandma. but from the moment i arrived in nashville, i became intensely homesick for the pace and space of life that judy branch provides. i can handle the city traffic just fine, and i am able to enjoy what a city has to offer. i just don't ever wish that kind of environment for myself. it's a shame that so many of the cities in this nation are exclusively car-centric and so consumer driven. it makes no sense to me at all.

i am far from all that now with all the joys that judy branch has to offer on a saturday night: the sounds of steady rain fall mixed with my favorite community radio station WMMT, four loving housemates (all fuzzy and shedding like crazy), fresh veggies to cook for supper and no plans for tomorrow other than to get ready for my favorite week of the entire year... cowan creek mountain music school!

Explaining Okra...

I have a few friends who live across the pond. I'm not talking about neighbors Bill & Billy Joe who do happen to live on the other side of the Judy Branch fish pond. I mean that big Atlantic Ocean pond! After reading my blog, a friend from across the pond had a few questions. It made me realize that even in our increasingly homogenized, globalized world, we each have our own realities and our own language for describing them. Here's what needs clarification:

So what are :- Mojitos (you ate them in miami), what is okra (and what do you do with it).
And is there a burger place & pub nearby?

Mojitos are a tasty carribean drink (common in Cuba and Haiti and surely other places) made with a large amount of fresh crushed mint leaves. It is a cousin of the Brazilian cocktail, Caipirinha. A mojito is traditionally made of five ingredients: mint, rum, powdered sugar, lime juice, and club soda. I sipped on one of these with friends in Miami while eating at a Haitian restaurant located in the heart of one of Miami's Haitian neigborhoods. Being someone who is more of a beer or wine person, I was surprised how yummy and refreshing the mojito was, and I'm determined to learn how to make it once I grow a good crop of fresh mint!

Ah, Okra.... It'a a staple garden food of southeastern US, and an especially popular ingredient in southern, cajun, creole and soul food cuisines. Also common in African and Indian cuisine. Okra is actually originally from Africa. The plant grows to be almost as tall as a corn stalk and produces a beautiful flower from which a long fruit emerges (which is the part you eat). Last year I grew both green and red okra. Some people really despise okra because when cooked the interior of the vegetable has a slimy texture. I love okra in a variety of forms. Cut into bits, deep fried and breaded, it makes for a great salty snack that I have often thought should be available at movie theaters like popcorn. Cut up and stewed in a gumbo or just by itself with tomatoes and herbs, okra makes for a really savory addition to any meal. In my family, okra is the key ingredient to making a perfect vegetable soup. As you simmer your soup, you gently press the okra pieces against the side of the pot, thus creating the perfect consistancy for your broth. More can be discovered about okra at target="_blank"Wikipedia

Although it would be most interesting to visit a pub located in this neighborhood, I'm afraid to say that there is no pub (nor a burger place) anywhere near Judy Branch. You must drive at least 30 minutes to arrive at a place that serves any sort of food, and even further to find yourself in a place you can obtain an alcoholic beverage. Judy Branch is located in a "dry" county, a concept that is nearly impossible to explain to our friends across the Atlantic. What it means is that no alcohol can be legally bought or sold within the county limits. It makes for a thriving blackmarket of bootleg beer, hooch and moonshine, and there are folks who make a good living at these arts around here. And that's one of the reasons our county hasn't been able to pass a referendum to allow alcohol to be sold!

The U.S. has never had a the sort of thriving pub culture of Scotland and Ireland. We have bars, the majority of which are not worth the visit. In Kentucky, we have honky tonks. Now these are worth an occasional visit, but you have to have your wits about you. There's an entire culture built up around honky tonking, and regulars at these joints are very serious about their night life! Loud country music and bar fights are an essential element to most of these places, and if you're not a regular, you stick out like a sore thumb. Not the kind of place you go for a drink and a mellow chat with friends. Hazard and Pikeville are the two nearest towns where you can go out honky tonking. They are each about an hour's drive away. I'm more of a quiet type, so I don't go out to the honky tonks but once a year or so, and it's usually with much encouraging from a big group of friends.

Here's my neighborhood pub: I dust off the Guinness poster on my living room wall and invite friends to come out to Judy Branch for an evening or a weekend of playing music, telling stories and sipping on a few beers. If it's winter, we sit around the fire place. In warmer weather, we sit around a fire pit in the yard or on the porch. Judy Branch serves so many purposes in my life, and depending on the company, it's as close to a pub as you'll get in this part of the world, smoking ban and all!

Star Wars

Out on Judy Branch you can really see the stars. And being a child of the 70s and early 80s, a good long session of star gazing leads my mind to drift to the epic stories that reigned my childhood. Yes, Star Wars. Princess Lei will always be trapped somewhere inside of me, fighting so fiercely (and with attitude) against the evil empire.

When I was in grad school, the most important book I read was John Gaventa's dissertation: Power and Powerlessness: Quiessence and Rebellion in an Appalachian Valley. For me, he was the first person who ever laid out the complexity of the power relationships that cause all the horrible inequalities we see happening around the world today. I still can't get my head around it all, and I have a feeling that this is one of the reason's I'm nestled as far back as I can possibly get in this holler. I need a place to escape to each and every day. And Judy Branch is the ideal place to go.

Besides being raised with the ideals of the small band of rebels of Star Wars, I was raised by a family that somehow instilled in both myself and my brother that we should not sit by while others suffer. I was raised to think and to care and to try to make a difference. My brother took this literally, first as a vigil anti fighting neo-nazis, now as a paramedic. I took to the hollers, trying to figure out how to make my homeland a place that people can still make a living and find a community.

What I've learned: It's not easy trying to make the world a better place, no matter how you go about it. Sometimes the only place I can bear to be is way back here at the head of Judy Branch. Let the deer nibble at my garden, the poison ivy brush against my feet and the racoons raid my compsost bin.... These challenges are welcome compared to the unthinkable beasts of the rest of the world.

When I first read Tolkein, I must have been 8 or 9 years old. I decided right then that there was NO way that I was human. I was of Elvin stock, and that was that. There was no way that I could ever understand the ways of Man. There was no way I could ever be on of THEM. Somehow, I missed the boat.

I still feel that way.

Thunderstorms are approaching Judy Branch. Time to switch off the electric window to the world and read myself to sleep by candle light.

Terrified and In Love

.... with revolution and a piece of land.

And saddened that the nation I was born into is the cause of so much of the world's misery.

I always knew a little about Fidel, but I never realized how narrow the views of him I'd been given in my life. Now I am in love. And I think Alice Walker is too. It is nice to be reminded of your mentors and heros and people who really have made a difference in the world and tried to do good.

Viva la revolucion!

My goal this summer is that once the sun has set and the 360 degree TV is only useful to feline eyes, I will dedicate my pre-sleep hours to reading the writings and stories of people who have inspired revolution and truly changed the world. Ghandi. Castro, Lumumba, Don West, Mother Jones and Jimmy Carter are all high on my list.

In those hours leading up to sunset, I'll work in my garden and let the teachings soak into me at the root.

"Ignorance is cheap," I saw a sign somewhere saying that. The worst kind of ignorance is when you think your way of thinking is the only way to think.

360 degree TV

My house has many windows and a wrap around porch. Depending on which window you choose, you'll find yourself peering into woodland thickets, a long meadow and garden patch or a porch that is home to a variety of dogs, birds, bugs and sometimes people. In warm weather all the windows are open, providing not only a view of these environments, but also the sounds and scents.

For my feline housemates, the windows are a complex, multimedia entertainment system. If one window is made inaccessible (say by closing a door), it diminishes the surround sound/smell/sight quality of the entertainment system.

In window world, everything is timed just so. Sid Vicious (cat) will be sitting and staring at the study window, and suddenly he'll bolt from his perch and speed across the house to the french doors or a kitchen window. Imagine if people would turn off their "reality tv" and switch to the 360 degree window entertainment my cats enjoy. What a different world we'd live in! Maybe then, we wouldn't be an obsese nation of greedy, dimwitted sleepers. Look out your windows! There's a world out there just waiting to entertain you. And get this.... it's absolutely free and there's no commercials!

House guests

I don't have house guests or parties that often out on Judy Branch, namely because of the far removed location of this place. It's not perched on the side of a mountain like some of my previous homes have been. Even so, the roads are croked and narrow and sometimes not altogether there.

Last night I hosted a potluck to celebrate the arrival of friends Carla & Mitch (http://www.zoespeaks.com/) who are in town to play at the Seedtime Festival. My kitchen table was overloaded with scrumptous dishes. Neighbors Bill and Billy Joe came over with dishes made from garden fresh pickings. Work friends and visiting musician friends and just plain friends-friends arrived, arms full of savory and sweet edibles, and intentions to make the evening truly delightful. Carla cooked up fresh Kale greens from her garden. Rich took on the role of grill master. And the kids played capture the flag in the yard with the help of six dogs.

We feasted porchside on home-cooked dishes that seemed to come from every corner of the world. One young lady became quite popular with the crowd for bringing a cherry pie made from cherries she picked that very day! I should mention that it is the season of interns, the time when several young college kids intern with non-profits in our county, bringing new perspectives into our daily lives and vibrant, hopeful energy to our communities. I think the evening was a healthy dose of Judy Branch living for them. I especially enjoyed how we all gathered in the living room after eating and had a big old fashioned song swap. Four of my all time favorite kids were in attendance, and we enjoyed the song circle "by the sea." Key ingredient: a big jar of sea shells inherited from my aunt. When the music started to soak in, and I saw the kids sitting right in the center of it all, I knew those shells were meant for moments like these. With the music encircling us, we poured the shells onto a quilt and each picked out our seven favorites: five to keep for ourselves and two to give as gifts to our parents. There were some moments of tough bartering and a quibble or two over a particular shell, but for the most part, we enjoyed showing each other the bounty of treasures we liberated from an old jar.

Texas Depression

For the most part, I love to travel. But there's a difference in travel by choice and travel by "executive order." I took up administrative slack at work so that "the organization" could manintain good face as a partner/member of an influential national arts network. My "pay" has been that I get to travel to the network meetings, which are required. Over the past two years I've travelled to: Los Angeles, where I got to visit an old gypsy travelling companion of days gone by and ride a roller coaster on the Santa Monica pier (thus inspiring her 30th bday boardwalk celebration a year later). New Orleans, a few months before Katrina, where I strolled down streets filled with childhood memories of summer pilgramages to visit my momma's family. Miami, in December, where I examined beached jelly fish up close, sipped coffee at tiny neighborhood Cuban bakeries and feasted on Haitian food washed down with real Mojitos.

And now.... a suburburban sprawl on the outskirts of Dallas. I have been homesick since a week before I left to come out here.

In my mind, I am at Mount Airy, surrounded by friends, crooked fiddle tunes and moonshine.

In my reality, I'm counting the hours until I arrive back home to Judy Branch.....

Where is Judy Branch?

To get to Judy Branch you have to drive a good while. On this drive, you follow a creek to where it meets a river, and then follow that river to where it meets up with a railroad line. You then follow both river and track, passing several stages of the coal and gas industry: two or three mine entrances (mainly strip), a few fluctuating roadside gas wells, a processing plant, a tipple, a loading track (to put the coal on the train), repair shops for trucks and equipment, riverbank graveyards for unfixable parts, another processing plant and a deep mine...

It may be hard to imagine, but there's immense beautry and life alongside these industrial eyesores. Fall, spring and summer are best. It's always best when the leaves are on the trees. Those leaves remind you that there is still life here despite the constant pillage.

I have grown to love the drive to Judy Branch and all the places it takes me. I have not grown into comfort with my own complicity and participation in the system that makes things so. I hate that by simply being a human being living in our current society, I am inextricably linked to the complex system that brings all these industrial monstrosities to my distant holler. I have spent my entire life participating in systems that I do not believe in. I have yet to discover a way to feel okay about that.

Judy Branch is the place I find myself right in the middle of it but with a quiet distance to reflect. Every time I come home or leave, I go on a journey that forces me to think about the real costs of our "quality of living." When I get home, I go on a journey of rediscovering the challenge of growing your own food and fending for yourself. Neighbor Billy Joe (Neighbor Bill's wife. She calls him William.) thinks that if folks would go back to getting by with what they have, our world (and country) would be in a lot better place. I tend to agree.

Okra planted, time to sleep

Despite the heat and the possibility of taking catnaps on a much-needed day off, I worked in the garden. I have been working tirelessly in this garden since April, even though I know the odds are against me. Neighbor Bill has told me all about the farming difficulties here on Judy Branch. Soil is rocky and not very rich. Been over-farmed and strip mined to boot. Then you have the deer. Hundreds of deer roaming these parts, and the dogs don't do too much to keep them out of the garden. Even if you build a tall fence, you still have to reckon with the racoons, and possibly the groundhogs. If somehow you can manage to keep those out, then you've got the bugs and the soil problems. Somehow, though, he has done it. A real garden of Eden, just the next house up. He even has asparagus.

The last place I lived was on a river that flooded. After the flood, the garden only required that I drop seeds on the mud and cover them over. What a bounty! For two years I had more corn, okra and tomatos than I knew what to do with. More, even, than I could give away. To this day, I dread to think what kind of toxins were in that rich silt left by that flood. Whatever they were, they gave me three months supply of green tomotoes. And that's the only good thing I can remember about that place.

Today I finished my fence and planted okra. Last week I punctured my foot in a failed attempt to drive a T stake in the ground for my garden fence and learned one of the most important lessons in life: steel T stakes should NEVER be mistaken for pogo sticks. I'm stubbornly independent and I like a challenge. On the matter of the fence, these characteristics did not work toward my personal well being. I do hope that they will at least produce a good crop of okra.