drip, drip, drip

     Four kids in the woods with papa and I on Friday.  About 25 trees tapped, some with two spiles, which makes about 35 pails hanging from maple trees, collecting sap that drips in.  Drip, drip, drip, clear, sweet sap.  The free abundance offered from our great mother quietly, softly, lovingly offered.  'You may share this with the trees my dear people, please receive what you will use and enjoy, it is for all of us here.'  Thank you, yes, yes I will receive what you offer dear mother.  We have a lovely family, don’t we?

Next day early morning as mother has been turning towards grand sun, snow still covers the ground.  Temperatures suggest that dripping may have accumulated in pails.  As the child takes first morning stretches still in bed, I invite the dogs and we walk out to the woods together.  Feeling eager to peek in a pail, lift the lid and take a look.  In the short time since holes were drilled into woody flesh and generously received a tap, tap, tap, what have you offered us?  Its so fun to peek into the pails, like Christmas morning glory of opening presents and celebrating surprises.  

Oh my, well this first pail tells of great things and the collecting buckets are gathered.  So begins the long, slow trudging through the fairly deep, very heavy snow.  Each tree is visited, some holding one pail and others hold two, all holding sap on this beautiful morning.  Remove the lid, lift pail off spile and pour into collecting bucket as sap continues its drip, drip, drip onto the ground.  Replace pail and lid then mindfully lift buckets as their weight builds from the sweet gift they now hold.  Walk slowly over uneven ground to large silver milk cans ready and waiting to hold the harvest, eager to play in the woods, their fun change from holding milk for cheese in the basement.  They are the lucky cans.  

All trees east of the fire pit visited, now heading off to the west.  Carrying light, empty buckets, walk past many pails to far north west tree and begin collecting.  Heading east back towards the fire pit, buckets get heavier and my heart soars with gratitude.  Appreciate the trees, the beautiful weather, my strong, comfortable body, the fire and sugar that will come soon.  

All trees visited, pails emptied, and now seven cans hold thirty-five gallons of maple sap.  Wa-hoo!!!  What a first day!

    Papa and child start the fire around 1 pm, after chores are done and mama has been off visiting friends.  I return to the woods about 3:30, grateful to see a cloud of steam rising from two pans over a roaring fire.   Grateful to find a peaceful scene, happy child, contented papa checking the depth of sap remaining in pans.  Again I walk, filling buckets with sap that has drip, drip, dripped since this morning.  Now cans hold fifteen gallons for next day’s boil.  

This day’s thirty-five gallons is boiled down to ten gallons and hauled back to the house as the earth turns away from the sun, gently ending our glorious day.  Cook stove fire started and built to roaring.  Sap poured into five pots and crocks that absorb heat from the fire and move the sap’s water up and away for us to breathe as sweet, humid air.  Evening chores completed, sleeping clothes on, books read, and snuggles in the bed end this marvelous, sugar sweet day.  

Lice

January 10, 2021 following at least a week, maybe more, of mateo scratching his head, I checked and found adult lice.  I had also been itchy and found lice on myself.  I had been in gentle denial, even sort of pushing mateo to eat butter to treat what I hoped was typical winter dry scalp.  I vaguely remembered our town-friend that visits the farm regularly mentioning that she had lice in the relatively recent past, but who knows and it doesn't matter to me.  

That was a Sunday evening and the laundry began that night with tater and I sleeping in an entirely different bed and room.  I made the decision at that time not to tell my dear church family.  (God forgive me if that was wrong.)  I was desperately hoping “out of sight, out of mind”, if they didn’t know, they wouldn’t look for it and they wouldn’t get it.  I didn’t want anyone to get it from us.

That Sunday evening as the washing machine ran, I drove to the dollar store and paid $8 for two special combs (it was all they had and it was a kit including the chemical wash which I threw in the garbage).  Housemate researched essential oils and lined up on the table what bottles we had.  We had nearly every one recommended to treat Lice.  I made an olive oil, essential oil mixture and covered mateo’s head in it.  Can’t remember if I wrapped him in plastic that night, but I think I did, for sleep.  Then I got my sharpest scissors and cut off my hair, short.  Next morning I spread it in the garden.  I love my hair and was grateful it would grown back.

The next day, Monday, I called and spoke extensively with two friends who had personal experience with Lice, one of whom was a school teacher and had dealt with nearly hundreds of parents and families around this issue.  That friend also happens to be a “potion maker” and immediately, generously offered to make us a special “smothering oil”.  Mateo and I drove to her house on Tuesday, day 2, to get the oil plus two spay bottles of different oils that kill the adult critters.  By that time mateo had agreed to cut some of his hair which made it easier for me to emotionally handle the combing.  I did not want him to cut all his hair, as I had cut mine, and he agreed.  

By Thursday, day 4, I felt confident we were clear of the adult bugs and I had been doing laundry every day along with a deep cleaning of the large room where we had been sleeping, and diligently keeping outerwear outside in the conveniently cold, dry weather. (Pillows, blankets, stuffed bear, and chair cushion all in the car and large basket full of coats, hats, scarves, and hairbrush  out on the deck, safe from animals looking for a cozy nest.) I felt like I had done the best I could with my and mateo’s personal things.  I made the decision for mateo and I to attend a craft day at a person’s house we had never met before.  It was a wonderful, ongoing opportunity to join a Waldorf community of people and I didn’t want to miss.  Mateo and I both wore cute, new head coverings, hair soaking in oil, and I said nothing to our new friend.  I selfishly hoped that if they didn’t know, they wouldn’t get it.  (At 5 weeks, truth is out, and after inspection, the mama reports her and three children show no signs of Lice, praise God).   

I continued with the laundry and the oil and sporadic combing.  I did find and remove nits from mateo’s head, none from mine.  I was not combing thoroughly.  The friends I had spoken to described the combing process that needed to happen to find and remove all the nits and I was not doing that.  I was casually combing at best.  I don’t remember exactly but around week two, the housemate was itching and he discovered adult Lice on his own head.  I believe he started using the oil and sprays.   After several days, he cut his gorgeous, thick, shoulder length hair fairly short, leaving the long facial hair intact.  He did not do any laundry or keep any of his clothes outside in the cold.  He also told the child that the lice came from the child playing in the chicken coop.  

Sunday February 14th, 5 weeks later, I again found adults on Mateo’s head. I immediately stared laundry and put things out in the cold again.  I called my friend again and spoke specifically about the combing I had not been keeping up with.  I learned that I could get better, different combs.  Next day, after mateo’s and my first day of homeschool together, I drove 34 miles round trip to purchase the combs.  I spoke to the housemate about my perception of his lack of participation in the lice treatment.  After my comments, he put his bedding outside for 8 hours the next day. That’s it.  I heard housemate, the child’s father, telling him that he, the child, got lice because he eats too many sweets.

On the 18th I found four nits on mateo and was really frustrated with the combing.  My friend agreed to come the following day to comb us both.  I put all of housemate’s bedding outside and made up his bed with fresh, clear bedding.  I put his chore clothes outside and did a load of laundry with some of his clothes that were lying around.  I told him what I had done and that my friend was coming next day to comb, the school teacher with loads of experience, the one who had made us the wonderful oil and sprays.  I suggested he be present for her visit.  He replied defensively, telling me that I was being vindictive and that I was confused.  I held my tongue, which was amazing.

Later that evening as mateo and I were getting ready for bed, I felt the gentle inspiration to shave my head clean.  After mateo fell asleep, I sat in the bathroom with an entire pack of new razors that housemate had from years ago, before his beard grew out.  A few passes with one of the razors showed that my hair was too long, so I got my super sharp scissors and cut the hair as short as I could without cutting my scalp.  It was scary.  Then I tried again with the razors.  No go.  It just didn’t work.  I used to shave my legs so I had imagined it would be easy to shave my head.  Nope.  Then I felt clear inspiration to take mateo to the barber shop and have BOTH our heads shaved.  Yes.  That felt clear, easy.  Done.  Then we’d be done.  By this time I had contacted 2 other friends, so a total of four different families had shared their lice experiences with me.  I felt I had enough valid information to make good decisions about treating the lice.  I wanted to be done.  I am not willing to comb.  There is no one to comb me every day and I will not put mateo through the combing, knowing that we are sharing space with someone who is not participating in the treatment process.  

So we went to the barber.  It was fun and we took pictures and went out to eat and bought new toys at the thrift store and now we’re done.  Now I can focus on laundry and cleaning without being terrified that there are nits in our hair just waiting to hatch.  We don’t have any hair.  YAY!  

  (I know we could get it from housemate again and I’ll cross that bridge when and if we come to it.  For now, I’m done.)  

Rooster

 Rooster gotta go

     The oldest rooster, he stays.  He was hatched out here by one of our lovely hens and then snatched away by me to be raised in a card board box in the house.  Daily I would put him and a few other chicks in a cage in the yard so they could be safe from cats and feel the sun on their heads and the earth under their feet.  That’s how I used to “do it”, raise chicks.  Now I step back and watch how the hens “do it”.  Anyway, that old rooster, The Rooster, he’s at least five years old, so handsome.  He stays.

     Red rooster gotta go.  He was also hatched out by one of the hens but was then raised by her, with other chicks, running wild and free on the farm.  Red will be three years old this summer.  He is a handsome fellow.  Soon after Red's long, fancy tail feather grew in, and his full crow, he was properly schooled by The Rooster.  Red was not a full year old when this happened.  The Rooster let him know, on no uncertain terms, that Red was an “extra”.  This flock of big, fluffy hens belonged to The Rooster and Red could find his place outside of The Rooster’s range.  Red is a rooster so he acted like one, for a minute.  He kicked his feet forward at The Rooster, aiming his big, sharp spikes at the old guy.  They beat wings and squawked and earnestly tried to kill each other.  The Rooster only has one spike left but he still put Red in his place.  It was a fantastic display of normal rooster behavior.  I love observing the animals in their natural habitat.  They were out in the open, free to roam anywhere on mother earth, so I felt it was a fair fight.  I broke things up once with a broom, just because I was still learning about what normal is for a rooster.  I have watched different roosters fight to the death and I didn’t like it.  I see now the conditions were different for that fight.  This fight was fair because of the age difference and because they had both been raised here on this farm.  No one was defending their territory from an unknown, outside invader.  I imagine The Rooster had observed this young Red growing up and knew what would happen long before I happened to notice a conversation between the two of them.  Oh I love watching the animals.  So bottom line, Red learned his place and has been happily a part of the flock ever since.

     The flock has evolved.  Now, Red gotta go.  

      Black chicken hatched out two chicks and raised them up well.  They are both sort of a creamy white.  They are not white.  There are white chickens in our flock and they are from the store.  I would describe them as aggressive, towards other chickens and towards cats.  Over the years there have been people that lived here, started a little flock of chickens, then moved on, leaving the birds.  So our flock does have some store chickens.  I think black chicken was a store chicken and she still hatched some eggs, that turned out to be cream, not white, chicks.  One of these has now declared himself a rooster with his long tail feather and long, draping neck feathers.  He goes.

    There is a two year old rooster that is generally white but has fantastic decorations on his back and wings.  There are many different colors adorning those feathers and I would describe this rooster as magnificent. He stays.  But the black chick that was hatched out last spring, he goes.  The tail feather and neck feathers have become obviously rooster-ish and that has secured his place with the other young cream rooster and Red.  

    There is another rooster that gets to stay.  Hatched out last spring, this is a beautiful black bird that has developed gold and many other colors on his back and neck.  Before there were any rooster signs, this young gawky teen-age chick was hopping around on one foot.  I generally let the chickens fend for themselves and may the strong survive, but this was such a pretty bird, just hatched and raised by a good mama, it seemed reasonable to help it along just a bit.  I was assuming it was a she, a hen that would lay eggs for us. 

     Getting hold of her one day a close inspection revealed what I believed to be some sort of injury with inflammation.  So I fed her butter. Butter from the cows here directly reduces inflammation, and its tasty.  Feeding butter to a chicken is easy unless there are other chickens near by that will take the butter and also attack the injured chicken.  The first time I tried to help this bird I caused her quite a bit of grief, and she missed all the butter.   Over time I learned how to wait until she was mostly alone and then throw the butter right in front of her beak so when another chicken came, she had already eaten it and the other chicken got bored and left.  Just two or three days of this and the chicken was now my best friend, seeking me out in the mornings, giving me those lovely chicken eyes and cooing noises, where's my butter?  Well I do love a tame chicken, she instantly became my special little friend, especially with all those pretty colors.  And her foot healed up, she walks completely with ease now.  I mean he, he walks with ease.  Well after I had fallen in love, the long tail feather grew out and the neck feathers became obviously rooster-ish.  OK.  He stays.  

    I love our flock of chickens.  I love how the birds just handle everything and hatch out chicks then raise them up into healthy, sturdy chickens.  They are so generous.  Here you go human.  Have some yummy eggs to eat, and we will just independently replace ourselves too.  You just sit back and watch.  Close our coop every evening and open it up in the morning and we will take care of the rest.  We love you humans, we are dinosaurs and its nice to live with you.  

Welcome to the Butcher Shop

     I have a job in the butcher shop this week.  I don’t have to go, but if I don’t, in nine months there won’t be anything to eat.  I like to eat, so I go to my job.  

     With my previous job it was different.  If I didn’t go then I would have to listen to my boss deal with me.  And I probably wouldn’t get paid.  Going to that job did not seem directly connected to eating, although I did use $ from the job to buy food, that I would eat.  Now I go to the job to harvest the food that I will eat.  No job, no eat.  Simple.  

     Its not really a job but it feels like a job more than anything else I do here on the farm.  There is a leader and I am the minion.  Not really but I can’t do the job without the leader, whereas he could do the job with out me.  He doesn’t want to do my part of the job and I don’t even want to learn his part of the job, so it all works out.  

 In the tall, tall cooler, hangs a one thousand pound animal carcass.  It is our food for one year.  Its also part of our money system because we regularly trade bits of meat for other items that we want or need.  That big beef hanging there is significant, its important, can’t just space out on this one.

     The leader’s part involves knowing where to cut the big beef.  He has knowledge and experience and the will, to turn this huge thing into small cuts that can be wrapped up for the freezer.  Yes, I am the wrapper.  I’m good at it because I’m so obsessive.  Our meat can stay in the freezer for two years perfectly safe from freezer burn.  Its so intimidating to me to look at the entire side of an animal just hanging there.  But the leader looks at it, makes a decision, and he cuts it.  He cuts through meat with a sharp knife and he cuts through bone with a hand saw.  That is one of the parts of the job that I love, when he calls me away from wrapping into the cooler, and says, “catch that when it comes free”.  I love to feel strong and use my body so holding a 45 pound piece of raw beef while a determined man with a saw cuts through bone makes me feel like a bad-ass.  Then he grabs the knife to finish the cut and whoop, the hook it was hanging from rises up and my body braces against the weight now fully in my arms.  I got it, I’m a strong woman farmer.  I carry it out of the cooler and slap it on the butcher’s block.  Yeah, that part is really fun.

     Then leader comes out and looks at the huge slab and again, he makes a decision of where to cut.  He wrestles the chunk onto the band saw, wiggles the meat into the correct position, turns the saw on and eeeeeeeezzzzzzzzzzzzz, cuts off a steak, or something.  He cuts that entire big beef into roasts, ribs, steaks, round steaks, soup bones, brisket, and chunks for hamburger.  Its amazing to me, so impressive.  I so, so appreciate that he can do this and mostly that he wants to and is able to do it.  

     I guess that’s sort of where this started.  I can’t speak for him about whether or not he wants to do it.  I know for me that I also make decisions here on the farm.  I decided that I want to live like this, I want to participate in harvesting meat.  I decided that I don’t want a job that pays money, money I would use to buy food.  I want to put in any labor necessary to harvest my own food.  So when its the week that we spend at the butcher shop, I want to go.  I want to go to my job at the butcher shop.  I know I don’t have to go.  I choose to go.  I desire to go because of the decision I made about what I want to eat.  So its simple.  Some times it feels like I don’t want to go and so I immediately change my attitude.  I am conscious of how I’m feeling and I change things up easily when I’m feeling lazy or resistant.  

     Its the Freedom.  That’s what gets me going.  By walking an eighth of a mile down the road to the butcher shop, I am claiming my freedom.  That is an awesome feeling and it is exhilarating to know that I am Free.  Its a choice I make every day, to be free.  I think it is possible to see the big beef as commanding us to cut it up and so the job in the butcher shop becomes a job, something we “have” to do.  The details are the same but the perspective is different.  I like my perspective.  I am bouncing down the road, claiming freedom, filled with energy from the universal source.  I made my decision and I’m loyal to it and I’m tapped in to the infinite stream of love energy.  I’m ready, let’s go to work.   

46 trips around the sun

 In January of 2020 I felt God telling me it was ok to leave the farm.  Take mateo and go.  I felt inspired to move towards something instead of away from the farm partner.  It became clear to me that I was to take mateo and move towards Community.  I desperately wanted to live with mateo in community with other humans.  It felt wonderful.  There was a twinge of confusion because I was a bit surprised to be leaving this lovely farm, my home, where mateo came to live.  But I felt sure every time I thought about moving towards community living.  

Mateo and I had train tickets to travel to New York state to visit one of two intentional communities that had fit what I was seeking.  Four days before we were getting on that train, the “shut-down” of 2020 began.  Our visit was canceled.  We stayed home.  I praised the Lord in my confusion, knowing for sure that all was well and I was living inside God’s loving arms.  I continued communicating with the 2nd community in the Ozarks, planning to visit.  Then the shut-down got even bigger and that trip was cancelled.  I continued to praise God in my confusion and chose to know, that all was truly well.  

As much of human culture plunged into strangeness and fear, I praised God to be home, to have my child in our home where we are comfortable and we have everything we need.  There is no other place I’d rather be on earth and I was so grateful that I didn’t have to leave.  I gently asked God to show me when I was able to see, what was all that jazz about living in Community?  

The answer came loud and clear and beautifully and so sweetly, so beyond my tiny human imaginings.  The WWOOFers came here!  They are farm laborers looking for temporary assignments on farms.  We have been involved with the program for 4 years and have had occasional WWOOFers, maybe 3 every year, for one week at a time.  Not in 2020, no, things have been very different.  The requests to come here started pouring in and it became challenging and hilarious trying to keep up with it all.  Ok I get it Lord, community is important and I was hearing correctly from you and you are creative and infinite and you Love me and yes, I am living in Community.  Since March, there has been a continuous stream of laborers here, living and working with us.  I tremble at the brilliance of the design.  

This is a picture of my child playing with our current WWOOFer, Bettine from Wisconsin.  Tater is the one in the pink snowsuit pretending to be a snow dragon.  Bettine is gracefully natural with children and she genuinely enjoys playing with mateo, really playing, being silly and fun and light hearted.  What a Blessing!!!  

Today is my birthday and there’s nothing I want more than to know that my child is full of joy and ease and being his full child self, free of any heavy stuff.  I know I am a good mother because I know that I’m a partner with God in my mothering.  When I want something for the child I know that God is infinite and creative in how the desire can be fulfilled.  I do not have to do it all.  Many times its better when I step back and just watch the majesty unfold.  So today is the best birthday ever, because I live in Community, and my child is bursting with sunshine-on-snow sparkle JOY!   

 

Pig - the story continues

      2013 I lived in Ypsilanti from March until October.  Miguel got piglets that spring and fed them all summer.  I moved back to the farm in October and would sometimes go with miguel in the van as he drove the pig milk down the road to Jake’s where his pigs were kept.  I remember it was December 26th when he finally shot and butchered those pigs.  There was deep snow on the ground.  I had started feeding round steaks  to the pigs because I felt awful that they were still alive with nothing to forage, no hay, no grain and minimal milk to drink.  I distinctly remember an argument with miguel where I was defending my position, trying to get him to understand that I was thrilled to participate in butchering but I was obviously NOT able or willing to initiate the activity. I don't use guns.  He bought pigs and fed them all summer while I was living and working 90 miles away from the farm.  I remember being so frustrated and confused in that situation, day after Christmas and he’s dragging his feet to butcher the pigs, making vague comments about how I should do it if I think they need to be butchered.  This was the beginning of a ride that I have been so confused about.   This fall, 2020, I was so anxious about discussing and planning the pig butcher with miguel that I arranged to have a mediator present.  What he made clear in that conversation, was that I needed to allow him to get in the right frame of mind to butcher the pig.

Now I know.  Now, after 8 years of the same situation, the same arguments, the same confusion, I can see and it feels good to have clarity.  I am a good farmer.  I am able to look at the whole picture and evaluate pieces of information that inform a reasonable decision.  Then I make a decision and follow through with it, taking full responsibility for my actions and the outcome.  I learn from the parts that go well and the parts that don’t, and I keep it all in mind when I’m evaluating the situation the next time it arises.  

    This post is a follow-up to the 11/19/2019 post "Pig".

    So 2013 I remember clearly and 2014 there weren't pigs to butcher because they died during the summer.  I don't remember details of '15 through '17 but I remember 2018 was the year he, by his own description, didn’t sight down the barrel and then proceeded to cut the foot off the pig while it was still alive, causing it to scream.

2019 - Pig - already written about

2020  -  A week before Thanksgiving, I made a casual comment to miguel that made it clear I thought the pig could / should be butchered before Thanksgiving.  He heard me and said something, so I clarified and confirmed my thoughts. He did not comment.  In order for things to be ready, I cleaned the side porch where the pig hangs after butcher.  I trained the pig to calmly enter, and then be locked in, the kill pen for his milk every day while the other two pigs followed me to the other side of their pasture for their milk.  I was ready and I felt strongly that the pig was ready and I didn’t have words for it yet.  The clarity came later.  

Four days before Thanksgiving I was feeling strong anxiety about continuing to feed the pig when I didn’t know how long it would be before it was butchered.  I knew that the pig should be harvested at its peak but I didn’t have that language for it.   I also knew from my past experiences here with miguel that him deciding to butcher the pig would be an uncomfortable, confusing struggle and it would happen later than I was comfortable with.  On that particular morning we were out in the pasture locating the cows and bringing them up to the milk house.  Miguel was furthest to the East and he headed back West to where I stood with two of the three cows we are milking.  He started moving the two cows towards the milk house and commented that he didn’t know where Judles was and that we’d have enough milk without her.  It was obvious to me that she was to the East, he just had chosen not to continue walking far enough to see her.   This confirmed my suspicion that he was avoiding thinking about, or considering the fact that there was a pig to be butchered.  If he was literally leaving a cow out of the milking and saying that we had enough milk with out her, then he and I were thinking completely different things about the pig.  I knew it had reached its peak and was ready to be harvested.  By leaving Judles out in the pasture, he was actively cutting the amount of milk available for the animal.  Normally I would have just written him off as the guy who didn’t feel like walking that far, turned around, and gone East myself to get her.  But this was the perfect moment demonstrating what I knew to be true.  He had put the pig out of his mind and was not thinking about the fact that it needed to be butchered.  The pig was not an issue for him.  The pig was real for me.  I was feeding it every day, knowing that it was ready to be butchered, knowing exactly how much milk he was getting compared to what he used to get, and understanding the whole picture which includes the lower temperatures at night and the condition of the pasture this late in the season.  I knew from his current behavior in the pasture along with his behavior in the past, that miguel had pushed the pig out of his mind and was refusing to consider his role in the whole reason for that pig being on our farm.  

So I walked along with him and the two cows and felt it was the right moment to express my anxiety about feeding the pigs.  I knew that if I continued to feed the pigs, it would allow miguel to continue not thinking about the pig.  I knew that the pig was ready to harvest so I did not want to continue feeding it.  If miguel thought that the pig was not ready to harvest, then he was welcome to feed the animal.  I don’t want to participate in something I don’t agree with.  So I told him as we walked through the pasture with two cows, I am having anxiety about feeding the pigs so I want you to start doing it.   He said what’s so hard about feeding the pigs, and I said its not hard, I am having anxiety about feeding them.  He never asked me why or what it was about and I didn’t offer that information because I knew he didn’t care, as he displayed by not inquiring.  Let the defensive pattern surrounding pig butchering begin, every year we go through this dance.  

Later in the house I asked him to please answer the question I brought up earlier.  He refused to feed the pigs.  He told me to get a WWOOFer to do it.  I knew that I wanted him to be conscious of the pig and how much it was getting to eat so he would have to consider his own behavior of putting off the butcher.  Getting a WWOOFer to feed the pig didn’t address the issue at all.  Here we go again.  

At some point he mentioned that in years past we butcher when the ground was frozen and did I want the pig to be flopping around in a bunch of mud when it was shot.  No.  And:

The purpose of the pig on this farm is, during the warm months, to store extra milk from cheese and butter making.  A pig on this farm can forage and drink milk and grow fat, meaning, it is making food for us with its physical body.  

The purpose of the pig has been fulfilled when it stops making food for us, when it stops growing fat. This happens when there is not excess milk and the temperatures turn cold.  The pig stops making food for us and begins using its body simply to stay warm.  

When the pig’s purpose has been fulfilled or completed, it should be harvested.  It should be harvested at its peak, or at the beginning of the time when it starts using its physical reserves just to stay warm.  

     So miguel was writing off the decision to butcher the pig simply because the ground was not frozen.  I had looked at the 10 day forecast and saw nothing indicating that the ground would be freezing.  Its been such a mild fall, who knows when the ground is going to freeze?  That is a ridiculous parameter to lead the decision about when to butcher an animal.  Totally consistent with what I’ve seen from him in the past.  Its taken me this long, how many years, to finally gain clarity and language about when the pig should be butchered.  I know for sure back in 2013 that the ground had long been frozen well before that snowy December day when miguel finally got up the gumption to shoot the pigs he had purchased and fed all summer.  

     I am so glad I finally learned that it doesn’t have to be some weird, twisted head game.  There is a time when the pig is ripe, like a grape on the vine.  Just pick it. 

     A friend of ours needed to learn and miguel made a plan with her to butcher, when I would be away at church.  He told me clearly, twice, that he didn't want me around for the butcher.  I decided to stay home from church because its important to me to be present when food for my family is being harvested.  I am a farmer, this is my home, that is food that I helped raise and my child will eat for the next year.  I will be present when it is harvested.  I have integrity.  I will not be intimidated away from my own home and my own food.  

    Yesterday I put a thick layer of leaves inside the kill pen.  I brought the milk and calmly, easily, skillfully led the pig into the kill pen.  miguel shot the pig.  It fell.  It kicked and its hide did not get muddy because the unfrozen ground was covered with leaves.  miguel got the chain on the foot and I had already gotten up on the tractor when he told me to raise it up.  I was present and able to anticipate what needed to happen. I am good at butchering and my contribution makes things smooth.  The pig died well.  Its over for this year.  

    Ultimately I do appreciate all of these experiences.  They are painful to go through but I do know and Love that it is how I learn, its how I practice presence and listening.  I want to learn all this stuff and I am grateful that the intense learning is over for a moment and I can breathe easier for a bit.  

     I am letting go of all the confusion.  I am letting go of feeling bad because someone else is trying to put their junk on me.  I am an intelligent, thoughtful person and I have gained clarity about raising pigs and no one can take that away from me.  He can blame me for not allowing him to be in the right frame of mind and I can finally see through that and know that I am ok, that he has issues, as we all do, and I am not going to accept any negativity from him.  He can offer it and I will just be still in my own peace.  I know when to harvest a pig and that feels good.  I am sorry if you haven't let yourself learn when to harvest a pig, but that doesn't change the wisdom I have gained in my own life.  

I love being a farmer.  I love learning and adjusting things year by year.  I am good at it.  This is my bliss and I am thriving here.  I appreciate him trying to drag me in to his confusion, it makes my own clarity so much the sweeter.  

Had we practiced leading the pig into the small pen together, it would have gone differently.  I was doing it by myself for the week leading up to yesterday and I always put a bit of milk in the big pig's pan to keep him quiet.  Because you chose not to participate in the practicing, you didn't know, and were unable to anticipate, the big pig trying to follow me with the bucket of milk to the other pigs' pan.  

Blossom

   Blossom had her calf yesterday.  Farm partner saw her out in the little swamp with the sac poking out of her rear.  He came to find me at the house with the kid and we made a plan to meet back there after his next load of compost.  When we met up again Blossom was licking a healthy little bull calf.  He was all slimy and wobbly like they are, with bright eyes and obvious determination to master his legs enough to stand up and get himself some milk.  Thank God the sun felt warm and it was early in the day, but partner wondered aloud why she had looked so incredibly wide earlier and Blossom’s behavior now indicated that she might not be done.  Twins?  So we made another plan to let her relax and have a good opportunity to move the second baby out, then we would walk her across the road to our primary pasture with the milk cows.  

     Partner moved many more loads of compost from the barn, spreading it on the hay field.  I gathered the garlic to plant for next year’s harvest.  Child did not want to go to the hill garden and I gave us both a pep talk about how we use the garlic to flavor our beef jerky and our pork sausage.  He came along willingly and we brought a cat with us too.  What a gorgeous day.  Then we found papa encouraging Blossom and her new calf out of the swamp and towards the road.  He had seen feet when he first arrived and he guessed they were back feet.  Blossom needed help.  I put a twine halter on the little guy and partner got Blossom moving down the road to the next gate.  I love living on a dirt road.  We let them free in the primary pasture and went home to change clothes and put the tractor away.  

     I found her close to where she was last seen, laying down pushing with feet poking out.  By this time the bulls and young cows had come over to investigate so we started moving her towards the milk house where she could be away from them and we could tie her up.  My anxiety was real high by this time.  It was basically dark and I like it so much better when the calf just comes out all easy and natural and we don’t even participate.  90% of the time we walk out to the pasture in the morning to get the milk cows and there’s a new calf standing up looking at us all wide eyed and full of milk.  That’s how I like things.  And I totally trust partner to handle everything.  He has pulled countless calves in his 40 + years of dairy farming so the pressure to save the cow’s life is not on me.  It’s a strange dynamic.  We work well together in these situations.  Again, thank God Blossom walked to the milk house nice and easy and left her slow, sleepy bull calf out in the pasture.  She seemed to have good energy which was reassuring.  

     The child was so helpful in the process too.  He followed us and then ran ahead to his safe spot in the hay feeder.  When we got up there I told him we’d need the flashlights in the milk house and he proudly ran ahead and met us there with both lights.  We got a halter on Blossom and tied her up real easy.  I massaged her back and cried a little while papa got himself a pail of soapy water.  She was quite calm and receptive to our plans.  Papa pulled a foot out and broke the sac and I got a piece of twine around it.  I held tension on that leg while papa got the second, back foot out.  We put a towel on the twine to protect our hands and we pulled.  Blossom was pushing and it wasn’t long before the calf was out far enough that I let myself breathe and know that we were almost done.  I imagined the calf was dead but I really wanted Blossom to be ok so it made every thing we did well worth the effort.  A few more pulls and then that glorious, fantastic event of the calf slipping out of the mother.  Now she was free.  I was free.  She could go back out to the pasture and care for her healthy bull calf and I could go back to my simple life where things are generally easy and not scary and bloody and life threatening.  That’s how I like things.