Taking the Time

My mother recently commented that I am an old soul. It's not the first time I've heard that. From the time a was a toddler, I idolized my great grandmother, begged to spend summers working in the garden with my grandpa and hung out with my older brother's friends. People used to tease that I was the eldest sibling, even though my brother was three years older.

There's something about people who have lived for a long time that makes me want to stop time and just soak in their reflections on it all. I also love to see the spark of youth in their eyes. They have an aura of youthfulness and appreciation for every moment. They don't take life, or people, for granted. I am drawn to people with these characteristics, which makes for an interesting demographic of friends.

In my work, I have been an organizer, a facilitator and an enabler. I have encouraged younger folks to take the time to learn from their elders and for elders to open themselves up to the world of youngsters. Most of this has been through storytelling and music. Now that I am at the threshold, pausing in the doorway before I depart, I am finding that I never gave myself much time to sit at the feet of these elders I have cherished. I have come to know them as friends and spent many hours just talking, listening and bringing people to hear their stories and songs. I have brought them students and sat beside them while they shared their treasures. Often, I was behind a camera, capturing it all. Looking back, I realize how much I have given to those I brought to the feet of the elders. And how I never even thought to step forward and give myself the time to become one of their students.

That is now about to change. Two nights ago, one of my favorite elders, Lee Sexton, told me that he has set his mind on learning me the old timey drop-thumb banjo tunes that he used to play. Now this is a big deal, because Lee Boy has not been playing his drop-thumb for a couple of years now, due to a nasty run-in between his thumb and a raccoon. But he's determined he's going to show me those old tunes, and I'm determined I'm going to learn them. I must admit, I'm a bit dumb-founded that one of the greatest banjo players I know is seeking me out for a student and re-learning what must now be a painful style so that he can teach me.

I feel I am coming to a new phase in my life. I'm going to put my caretaking hat on the hook for awhile and focus on uncovering opportunities for myself. And I'm going to start by going over to Lee Boy's house tomorrow for my first banjo lesson!

the gashlycrumb ladybugs

every year about this time, when the lady bugs sense the first frost is on the way, they start trailing into my house. much like i'd imagine the wagon trains headed west. all the family members, friends, neighbors, strangers, and perhaps even the enemies eventually end up inside. and they mean to stay... at least until they die or spring rolls around.

they linger on the ceiling, in the windowsills, on the walls and take strolls across any surface they choose.

most of them die. some get batted down and swallowed by cats. some fry themselves on light bulbs. others drown in a night stand water glass. then there are those that get squashed by paw, foot. or worse: steamrolled by cat, dog or person turning in their sleep. there are those who die the long slow death, their tradmark red polka-dotted shells turning to dull rust and finally a yellowish brown.

lady bugs don't taste good when you swallow one late at night in your water glass. even if you manage to get the sucker out before you take a sip, the water still tastes sour.

edward gory should have done a book about how all the tinny lady bugs come inside our houses to die in our company.

selfish, selfless?

i've been thinking a lot lately about how it has become the cultural norm to be selfish. at least to a degree. personal happiness and well-being are what we are supposed to seek above all else. what troubles me about this way of thinking is that it isolates us all from each other. what's good for you may not be what's best for the people you love, your neighbors, your whole community. hell, look at the bush family. they are doing quite well for themselves... at the expense of millions, billions of other people. they sure do seem to be enjoying themselves, though.

when i think about the sacrifices that my parents and grandparents made so that i could have a good life... well, it just doesn't add up that every choice i make should be about what makes ME happy. sometimes you've got to put others well-being ahead of your own. how do you know when to make sacrifices and when to step up and demand something for yourself?

i think that for most of my life, i have been an enabler. i like to help and encourage other people to find their happiness. but i often don't take care of my own needs. i'm not really sure that i know how. i love connecting people with each other, growing to love a certain few... but i hate the potential i hold within myself to hurt the people in my life. it terrifies me.

i wonder if happiness is really something a person can seek? shouldn't it just happen?

choices

My last blog entry got a few people worried. I appreciate the concern, of course. And I'm sure I'll not always feel like a squished bug. I am wary of going into the exact reasons why I feel splattered. I try to focus this blog to issues and events concerning Judy Branch. I've been squashed by a combination of stresses from work and a frighteningly hopeless romantic life. And that's about all I'll say here.

I am also heartbroke at the very real possibility that I will soon have to make the choice to leave Judy Branch.

There's a few possibilities in the air that will enable me to leave my current workplace (and source of much of my misery) but still remain on Judy Branch... at least for a few more months. It's a fellowship that would last three months. If I get it, I'll tell more. For now, I'll avoid jinxing my chances!

splat

so it's happened. life cannot really be compartmentalized. judy branch is a haven, my exile from the stresses and trials of work and the big ugly world. but that world, at some point, is bound to bear down on me. and it is right now.

i feel like a squished bug.

Escape!

I hit the road on Tuesday and headed up to North Carolina with my friend Rich. We were on a mission to go and visit with Onllwyn Male Voice Choir, a miners choir from the valleys of Southern Wales. We had both been to Wales at different times (Rich in the mid 70s and me in 2001), and I had actually spent quite a bit of time with these men when I was doing graduate research in Ystradgynlais (that's in Wales). On the ride over we marveled at how, distance wise, our homes (in Southeast Kentucky and Southwest Virginia) are quite close to the high country of Western North Carolina, yet so much changes on that short drive. You especially seem to notice it once you hit Abingdon and head over the mountain toward Mountain City and Trade, TN and into Ashe and Watauga Counties of NC. A lot of the differences hail back to industry. Coal versus tourism economies. But the geography is also notably different. I'm not sure that these are differences a non-mountaineer would recognize. To an outsider, we may all be lumped together, and I'm sure that we often are. But for me, a girl who grew up and lived most her life in the Blue Ridge of Eastern TN and Western NC, I am disturbed at how I now approach the Blue Ridge as a place less "real" than the landscape I presently inhabit. I wonder if I will ever be able to go back to these other places that I have loved and lived?

As for the choir, it was a short, but worthwhile road trip in which we were blown away by the voices of forty-seven Welsh men and later enjoyed their company over beverages at the bar (drinking in public once again!).

I took a detour on the route home to spend a day and a night at my Faerie Godmother's farm. For over three years I have gone on imaginary trips to her magical home place near Snowflake, Virginia. I am so glad I finally got there in person, because we had ourselves a real fine time. First playing with her new puppies, then making plans for an art project (creating masks for an upcoming masquerade ball). We even embarked on an outing to the big city (Kingsport) to hunt down supplies and scavenge for junk. First item we picked up was an abandoned mannequin for $2! She's perfect, except for the missing fingers and that dog Bella is terrified of her. We hit a goldmine at a thrift store downtown where I found my masquerade dress. The rest of the evening and following morn were spent surrounded by all sorts of feathers, beads, paints coffee, tea, wine and supplies, creating masks and getting high on each others company. I'm looking forward to a repeat tomorrow night when Ms. Faerie Godmother is going to come spend the night on Judy Branch.

1779

Yesterday I was stirred out of Judy Branch by a call from a friend. He needed to get out of his house and get out of town. We drove down into Virginia, about an hour and half southeast, to Abingdon. I had been through Abingdon several times, but I had never really explored. We walked the streets of the old town in an intermittent drizzle, reveling at the well preserved brick structures, reading the historic markers and enjoying the experience of walking through a downtown where it seemed quite normal for people to do such a thing. I think we both had been feeling a bit of burnout for the town where we work (and he lives). The streets are lined with facades of empty and abandoned buildings. On weekends, there's no life in the town center at all. How nice it was to go just a little ways off and find a town that was alive!

Besides just walking, we also took advantage of opportunities Abingdon offered that our Kentucky hamlets could not. We had a sit down meal at a local pizza place where we were served a vegetarian pizza and two very tall draft beers. Not just any beer. Microbrew from North Carolina! Then we did something most folks who have lived where we do fantasize about doing every weekend. We went to see a movie in a movie theater. Not just any movie, but a somewhat independent film, "Little Miss Sunshine." We capped off our excursion by stopping into Abingdon's oldest bar, The Tavern. It was built in 1779, originally serving as a stagecoach inn and tavern and in its long life serving as a civil war hospital, a house and an assortment of taverns/inns. We once again experienced the novelty of being served a beer in public. And not just any beer. German beer on tap!

the whole beet

i have been blessed with beets this summer, and it looks like this blessing will last into the fall. there are countless reasons to become enamoured with this vegetable. from the wonderful color that seeps out from severed root and stains your skin, to the wine colored veins of the leaves. then there's the indistinguishable flavors of the root, both earthy and sweet at the same time. and the surprisingly spicy undertones of the leaves... every way i have prepared them, from the complicated construction of perestroika to simply boiling the root and stir frying or steaming the greens, they have been utterly delectable. but the other night i prepared beets in a way that has topped all others (excluding borscht). rather than separating the root from the leaf, i tried cooking the entire plant. this works great if you have a handful of small beets. here's what you do:

wash well and remove any inedible parts, leaving them whole and keeping the skin and the leaves. using a heavy pan with a lid that fits securely, heat a couple tablespoons oil, juice from one lemon, some chopped onion, dash dill, dash tarragon, a little bit of garlic (a small clove chopped fine) and some salt. add whole beets and steam over medium heat with lid closed tightly. check after 5minutes, adding a little water if necessary to prevent burning. steam until tender (about 10-15 minutes depending on how many beets). hint: don't be tempted to peel the skin after cooking! trust me, it's edible, tastes good, and the only thing you'll achieve is dying the skin under your fingernails bright pink!

i ate these with homemade garlic mashed potatos, garden peas, kale stir fried in garlic & onion & braggs liquid aminos (you can also use tamari) and broccoli that was stir fried in a sesame orange sauce. it was a great combination of flavors, transforming my garden goods into gourmet fare. while each dish was tasty, the most simply prepared, the beets, left the most notable impression on my palette.

i got the idea from one of my favorite cookboks: Laurel's Kitchen. if the cool, rainy weather sticks around this weekend, i believe i'll try her recipe for whole beet borscht. sounds like a certain success!

Band of Brothers

With my company safely departed, Judy Branch seems quiet these days. Not silence, but the kind of quiet that allows frogs, crickets and distant trains to dominate the night air. The sort of quiet where you can actually hear the percussive beating of a moth's wings or an insect leap onto a broad, damp leaf. If you cut out the intermittent conversations between the Judy Branch pack and neighboring dogs, this place provides the perfect soundtrack for dreaming, reflection, and just being part of the quiet. Sometimes I sit inside and listen from my kitchen table, rocking chair or couch. Other times I contribute the creak of a porch swing, the brush-thumb of a banjo, or, like now, the muted click of a keyboard.

Tonight, I am soaking in the quiet after a turbulent day of withdrawal. For the past few days I have been 100% engaged in living life. I have opened myself to the hearts and minds of people I have come to deeply love, and I have basked in their friendship and affection. I have given myself completely to music and danced for hours without abandon on streets. These days spent in good company of the band (aforementioned house guests) provided me with an essential escape from the poisonous politics of my workplace. In hindsight, I realize that those crazy guys, who now feel like brothers to me, not only gifted me an escape, but reminded me how people should interact with each other every day they are alive. Traveling on the road together as much as they do, you would expect some seriously dysfunctional behavior. Yet they really seem to know how to treat each other and the people that they meet. The times they are stuck together are not only tolerable, but really good. Now that I am out of their fold, I am facing some of the nastiest forms of human interaction and manipulation by day. Even so, my doubt in the goodness of the human spirit is not so intense as it was before. Tonight I am soothed by the symphony on Judy Branch and the recent memories of fine times with friends.

I just wish that Judy Branch dogs Bingo, Monkey, Lucy, Sally and Frankie Mophead would stop it with the solo breaks already!

Strange Company

Six days ago, five house guests arrived at Judy Branch. Much of the heavy yard and house labor I threw myself into the days leading up to their arrival was in anticipation of their arrival. I knew that Judy Branch was plenty big enough to host five grown men, even if they were musicians, but I had no idea how easy they would make it on me! Since they were visiting from the West Coast, I prepared a bunch of good southern cooking for them, mostly from my garden: stewed okra & tomatos, green beans, homemade mac & cheese, black eyed peas, corn bread, bannana pudding. And a couple of more cosmopolitan snacks like coffee cake and my basil hummus.

During their time here they had a couple of gigs to play music, but during the days, I arranged home visits to some of the old time musicians who live nearby. I know my guests were really impressed by the musicians they met, and I was tickeled to see how much joy the old timers got out of swapping tunes with young musicians who appreciate their musical traditions.

It was one of the easiest hostessing experiences I've ever had, and then they turned round and decided to host me. I flew the coop with my guests after two days to accompany them on their journey south through Carter Family country. We stopped by the fold and the graveyard where Sarah, A.P., Janette and Joe are buried. Then I got to be their guest as they worked at the Rhythm and Roots Reunion down in Bristol.

As I am usually somewhat reclusive, I haven't been venturing out of Judy Branch to check out many of the nearby happenings. I really enjoyed spending some time in Bristol and hearing so many wonderful musicians. In fact, I will have to give big thanks to my house guests for getting me out on the town. I danced so much in the streets of Bristol that for the past two days I've been limping painfully with each step.

What strikes me the most is how I managed to spend five solid days and nights in the company of five men and not go insane. I enjoy the company of friends, but after a few hours, I am usually ready to retreat to the quiet of my home. I didn't once have a single urge to flee. That's a first for me. I am now soaking in the quiet of Judy Branch with rain thumping on tin roof. It is nice to be back home.

work... and work

i dedicated the entire weekend to intensive manual labor at judy branch. and i enjoyed every bit of it, from pulling up thorny pigweed in the garden to washing out the compost bins. there's something immensely satisfying about tending to the homeplace.

sometimes it seems like there's a riotous game of marbles going on in my head. ideas and counter-arguments to those ideas roll around and knock each other about in all sorts of directions until they all lay scattered in a mess or none remain at all. this can make those big life decisions very difficult. i remember growing up in church and the story of doubting thomas. boy, did i ever relate to that guy! fortunately, through many years of experinence and the help of some wise native american and buddhist friends, i have grown about 89% at ease with not knowing anything at all when it comes to those BIG questions. if i manage to remember that i am okay with just not knowing, i can keep my mind somewhat serene with only one or two major moments of panic and doubt (that would be the marble games) each day.

work in the garden and around the house provides me with an escape from the maddening marble games, the big unknowns and my life's other work. problem: there's a big section of johnny grass and pig weed invading my garden. solution: get my garden gloves on, get down on my knees and pull those suckers up by the root. then, when that task is done, great possiblilites lay at my feet. time to hoe that freshly uncovered dirt and plant fall crops! turnips, spinach, greens, mescalin mix, broccoli, kale, chard, carrots, cilantro and more beets! when i rise to my feet after planting and turn around, i see the fruits of my spring planting. the last of the beans (i hope!) need picking. the okra just keeps producing more tender fruit, and the tomatos are about to fall off the vine. basil is still big and bushy, and the dll needs to be used soon before it turns yellow. and those beets are just waiting patiently to become borscht!

there are only a few moments in my garden work that i feel down. sometimes when i'm pulling up weeds, especially if i have to pull up milkweed, i feel like i am no different than those greedy bastards who clear cut virgin timber and rainforests. i certainly must seem like a monster to all the slugs, mushrooms, wooly worms and caterpillars whose shade and food i uproot! mainly it's the milkweed that makes me feel this guilt. so, i make sure to let a good crop of milkweek border my garden, and i even pull up the morning glory vines that try to pull them down. in this way, i can at least be a somewhat sustainable garden forester through selective logging/weeding!

up in flames

sometimes i think that my empathy meter is defective. i feel far too intensely for others. feeling my own emotions is hard enough to handle, and boy do i feel those! but when i top them with feeling for my friends, i can either skyrocket into a blissful heaven or drill myself dizzy into the depths of despair.

i have been up and down about issues with my current vocation, a topic i strictly choose not to discuss here in this space. all i will say is that i am having to seriously reconsider my career choice, and for the first time in three years i find myself in a hallway full of doors of all shapes and sizes with absolutely no sense of direction. right now they all seem to be oddly shaped, mysterious and a bit spooky, but who knows what will happen when one opens? i sit befuddled in this hallway , driving myself dimwitted over the BIG questions of what do i really want for myself, my life, my love...

all this begins to spin in a spiral when one of my best girl friends calls to say she's splitting up with her husband. or when i go into work to learn that one of my favorite co-workers and friends here got his house burnt down... the fourth time this has happened to him in his life! with all these things happening to the people i love, my feelings of panic and depression over signing up for unemployment seem rather silly. but they don't go away. i just feel more helpless and hopeless!

thank the heavens that i have a place like judy branch for a retreat. i came home today and harvested okra. then i cooked up the most wonderful supper. i started by sautéing red onion, then adding chopped okra, garlic, chopped celery, chopped tomatos, black eyed peas (already cooked, but not mushy), some blanched green beans and a few bay leaves. I added a couple of spoonfuls of homemade salsa, some dried basil and cajun spices. i let it all saute on low while a pone of cornbread baked in the oven. it was light with a citrus-like tanginess from the fresh tomatos. much lighter than the cajun dishes i make in the winter (when i use canned, stewed tomatos).

there's nothing like fresh food to lift your spirits. i just wish i could use it to life my buddy's house out of the ashes.

unions

i celebrated a different sort of union this labor day weekend. twice.

two weddings. two couples who really seem to be a match for each other. four people who give me hope that a person can find a home in another's love. that we are not all alone in this world. and that this can happen when you're 60 or almost 30.

events over the past year have led me to find comfort in cynicism, especially when it comes to love and the human condition. couples i had thought to be the perfect match split up. i met someone with whom i feel a connection and attraction to like i've never felt before, but i'm beginning to believe that it is all just my imagination. i question my intuition and doubt whether anything i feel toward another person is actually reciprocal.

even if for a short while, this weekend gave me a glimmer of hope. i am hopeful for my newly betrothed friends. and after a weekend of dancing to cajun music with a few fine gentlemen, i am hopeful that i still have a few chances left at romance... or at least a few scandalous love affairs!

Labor Day

"Up, up mountain toilers and hear what I tell. In a land of plenty there's hunger and hell! We dig and we shovel. We weave and we sweat. But when comes the harvest, it's little we get... O this is the story of you and the rest. And if I'm lying, my name's not Don West ."

The "news" today isn't really news. Many of us have seen and felt it happening for years. Maybe even a lifetime. Minimum wage, benefits and workers' rights are at the lowest they have been in fifty years. The top echelons are seeing record profits, while the working people's wages are nowhere remotely alligned with the increased cost of living. What would old Don West be feeling if he were alive today? How is it that so little has changed in all these years? How is it that we end up back in that same old predicament? Won't we ever learn to not be complacent?

Where is my Don West today? Who is speaking out for our welfare?

"Your welfare ain't on the rich man's mind, oh no! You're welfare ain't on the rich man's mind."
I hope that Hazel Dickens' music will live on and remind people. I hope that they (and we all know who they are!) will never be able to keep us down for long.

I hope that I will find some hope on this labor day weekend....

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.