Solstice Happenings

And here we are again, in the thick of the dark days, waiting for the light, waiting for the recharge of solar energy into our bones and brains. The year shifts from practice to a bit more theory and planning. We tend to our ecological relations in different ways — in sometimes more subtle ways, sometimes deeper, sometimes gentler…

Our Solstice this year is upended, like much of everything in our lives right now. We walk a fine line of function and focus lately. We don’t have much deep community, no get-togethers, no parties for us; on our days off (for which we didn’t really have this month in order to try and make up for the economic slump that we’re all apparently imagining), we try and rest and clean up. But we miss the days of friends gathering, feeling like we have a place, and a purpose.

We must be doing something right though because folks have really stepped up to help — donated wood, food, bartered goods — these things are so appreciated. We really need these things this season as we are barely getting by. We often discuss middle-class mindsets, and it’s challenging when you have a wide range of education and skills, but if you’re unwilling to compromise your values and something catastrophic happens, it really sets you back. For us, when I got sick with Lyme (and Lyme co-infections), finding appropriate care depleted our financial safety nets, and we have still yet to recover. Sure, starting the business seemed risky, but I couldn’t guarantee I could do other jobs for a long time and this is what he does now, so it was the best decision.

There are many factors why we aren’t more successful: not owning your own business space is a big one, borrowing to get into business is another, not running a capitalist-exploitive business is another, having a business association that values what you do is pretty big, but mostly it’s the place. We genuinely feel that if we were somewhere more connected we would be doing better. It’s not so much that the area doesn’t like what we do, it’s that the majority of folks here don’t seem to value supporting their local economy, small businesses, or mission-based businesses.

It’s a middlin’ America kind of thing — a thing of convenience, a thing of identifying your own values and living by them, a thing of building community (vs. thinking that your neighborhood/town is your community. Community are the folks that show up for you), and likely a thing of complacency. It’s easier not to think about what you eat or read (in our case) or where it comes from, or how it impacts its chain of consequence (before and after). For all the amazing people we have met here, we wish there were just more of them.

As we move closer to the light, we will try and deepen our connections and ignore the impending shadows. We will focus on the small successes. We will be care-full with each other. We will do our best, as we know you are doing yours.

Snow Season

We all tend to love snow the best from our cozy places inside looking out or when we can have time to have fun in it, but it is less on our list when we have to work/school/be out in it for things other than said fun. My sensibilities tend to lose it when it is ‘too cold’ to snow, that even sounds wrong. A nice thick blanket of insulating snow is not only lovely, and better than ice or just a cold rainy season because it also gives our microclimate time to rest and recharge. Most of our favorite things need this process of deep cold and insulation — like New England fruits, Maple trees, all kinds of seeds and animals who hibernate or get various nutrition during this time (you may think it is a particularly lean time but it also offers a necessary variety, as long as it is not too long a season or too harsh). And maybe us, too.

Some folks swear they prefer the Northeast because they ‘need 4 seasons’, and I can see that, though other climates have such lovely different forms of those seasons — some more subtle than others, some you just have to get to know (these NE 4 are a little colonialist fantasy, if you ask me). We loved living in the high desert of New Mexico and having our coffee in the courtyard in just a sweater in February (you want a ton of snow, just go 20 minutes up the mountain right there and you can find snow up into July). Don’t get me wrong, the particulars of NE seasons are wonderful but I prefer they honor the changes the world is going through right now, too. It’s not just the negativity of climate change to focus on, but also the amazing adaptation of our environment (human and nonhuman) — the shift in mushroom fruit available, the renewed stability of some species, the movement of the treeline…and our connection to what we are able to recognize and introduce ourselves to: new friends, old friends all having some time together to make some new and stronger…our strength lies in diversity and consolidation of experience and sense.

With all of that in mind, here are some little moments we are experiencing right now — evenings by the woodstove (our three chairs like the three little bears, the dog in his bed, the cat stealing our seats when we go to get something), crafting/sewing/crocheting warmy things, porcupines in the apple trees (we watched her way too long), shadowy forest cows (deer) on the lawn in the bright moonlight, stews/soups/and casseroles redolent with carmelization and richness (with crusty sourdough bread, of course) or Spanish Tortilla or Ham Hocks with Collards (thank you for most of our meals from Lazy Acres, Snafu Acres, Andrews Farm, Dig Deep Farm, Goranson Farm, and gracious community gifts), lap blankets and family readings of the Norton Short Story Collection, hot cider (maybe with a little Scotch), crunchy snow drifts (and images of the bird bath out in the garden heaped with snow, and all of the other bits we didn’t put away before they became yard mounds), finding family tree notes from my g-ma in old tea dishes, finding studio scenes of a decade of arts from the dancing dervish that is our child, going to bed earlier (maybe to read, maybe to just sleep a little more, a little longer), and getting closer to the longest night to celebrate the returning sun…

Intentional Time

That’s where we’re at these days — defining, living, seeking out, and maybe lamenting the lack of intentional time. Time we spend intentionally being present in our lives, in the world we want to live, is a focus we are trying to pay heed to. It’s hard — because it’s so easy to swept up in the crazy of the day-to-day, in the insanity of our governmental turmoil, and in the erasure of history and community through media. And with the cliff dive of our financial security (however, tenuous it was before that), we’re trying to find the strength in multiple ways.

The baker is baking, that’s what he does for you and for him (it keeps him sane-ish, and feeds folks which makes him feel purposeful) and taking care of us, the kid is arting (always fruitful critical thinking and imagining for a new world), and I try and write/run a social justice center/take care of my mother who is very ill when I can (and she lets me) and be at the shop/running events. There is not much on the homestead that calls to me these days. I call it a success that we picked all kinds of fruit (which grew despite our neglect), made a little wine and foraged some medicinals (I add dried hawthorne berries and reishi to our coffee to help). We are packing up books and other goods so that we can clean up this house to hopefully sell next summer (though it is unlikely we can buy anything, we will just be out of debt on this place; it’s been an adventure having our own place for a bit).

We didn’t even put the garden to bed. We just one day, stopped going out there. Who knows the state of things or the clean up that I could still probably do (it really has only snowed one light snow so far)! I can still see fat red Wolf River apples hanging from the bare tree — the deer are going to love them all winter. And if it snows and they fall on the ground and get buried, they will dig them up. Most of even the tiny multiflora rose hips are gone from the birds getting their daily vitamins; Mr. Cardinal is just as red among them, keeping a nest deep within the thorny canes we can only vaguely see in the winter.

And so it goes that, like many others, our business and therefore our life struggles…and we were already on the cusp of concern, now we are on the precipice. Many things might change our world in the very near future, but we cannot rely on them nor gauge how they will affect us. We will just have to wait and see. If this were like a few years ago, when we were able to homestead full-time, I wouldn’t be as worried — in fact, we were pretty self-secure during the pandemic, at least how it felt food and house-wise. Time to put our heads down and muscle through, as they say. At least as long as we can. We get a lot of flak for spending what little funds we have (and our income has just been halved, so it’s even less) on organic/local/clean food but it is for our health — we don’t have health insurance anymore either (not that gov’t healthcare helped us at all, we haven’t been able to find anyone to take it in years).

Until then, we try and get most of our goods from the local farm, barter pig’s feet and ground beef for bread when we can, and stretch what is left in the pantry. We are likely to cancel our internet soon and ration our wood (a winter of many sweaters!! all at once!), as they are the only things we have left. I’ve squirreled away a couple of small gifts through the year so we’ll have a meager Winter Solstice but it will be a real testament to celebrating the hopeful survival of a lean season. The kid and I salted lemons yesterday so in month we can save up for olives and a roast chicken to have her favorite Moroccan Chicken with Preserved Lemons & Olives (djej emshmel) for our celebratory dinner.

The ‘holidays’ are always very stressful for us — at this time of the year, when there is always little money, we are ostracized by our families because we don’t want to celebrate colonial or christian lies, and they do their best to make sure we are not respected, and our own struggles with life traumas during these times. We used to have some great chosen families over the years, and we miss them terribly, though in order to see them or get them to gather we had to host — which we loved, but now that we are unable, there is no gathering. And we’re so worn out these days, it is hard to seek out a gathering that might welcome us.

This is not an uplifting post, but it is a reminder that we are trying to find the intentionality to go on. To live with intention is to notice the small things that do work and where we find joy. On grey days, it is a struggle, but we are grateful for our love for each other and that we have the three of us to make our days worth focusing on.

Foliage and Past Autumns

The autumn of things is in their focus inward; saving all the resplendent energies to rest, repair, and then to rebuild (as seasons cycle). The colors of this fading summer woo us with promises of rebirth, sure, but generally, we are on the same path and find that we are much more wooed by the intimacy that winter can bring. We are in New England, after all.

Fires in the woodstove, blankets and sweaters, hand warmers and ear muffs, garlic planting and first frosts, stews and roasts, warm bread and butter, seed catalogs and long epics, family game nights, all set off for us with the baker’s birthday. We can’t celebrate much this year, but the marvelous child made a beautiful cake, and we got tickets to go see Ms. Ezra Furman in Portland (it was a great show!). We got take out (which we only get to do once or twice a year) and played some games together. Life with a teenager is on her terms much of the time, so we’re grateful she still likes to play with us.

As we celebrate Samhain, we lean into the family time, time to talk about our ancestors, about those who came before us, about the cycles of life. The kid likes costume (it’s practically her life, perhaps her calling) and finds the creative aspect of it incredibly inspirational. Last year she was an Arctic Fox (with a tail, paws, ears, a fuzzy lace-up skirt and bodice) and this year the Queen of Hearts made an appearance helping out at the town Trick or Treat (of course, we give out Vit C pops, it’s my concession since I really want to give out raisins).

Fall. How fitting a word for the surrender of summer.

Catching Up on our ‘Weekend’

Someone walked into the shop the other day and before we could even greet them accusingly inquired, “Why are you closed on Wednesday and Thursday?!” and I get it, it’s the middle of the week but it’s just the two of us so we need to take some time off and since we are also part of the retail environment we would be crazy to take the actual weekend off. When we first started the shop we took no days off in order to figure out the best times to be closed. This is what we’ve worked out, and we might even add another day to our ‘weekend’ because we don’t really get the time off (especially the baker — he processes orders, sends out reminders for members, pays bills, etc, and then even comes in for a couple of hours on Thursdays to make sure we have a little something on Friday. He probably works about 80 hours a week). I know we don’t look like it, but we are literally a Mom & Pop spot.

So, what do we do on our weekends besides a little more work for the shop? We try and get our household together a bit (during our work week it really becomes a drop off, with minimal dinners or teen-made dinners, not that I am criticizing those — they are great, but limited and leave as much mess as they do feed us). We don’t really get to enjoy going out or going places (we both probably work a total of 120 hours and make as much together as he did on his own in a 40-hour job), so we try and focus on what we can do to keep us connected to our lives: homesteading, art/writing, family time together, and sometimes doing very little — just trying to relax a bit. We have no money, no time, and no community to hang out with so we tend to ‘cave’ in our little house.

Don’t get me wrong, our time is spent nicely together. We read and then talk about big ideas, we make food together and clean up gardens together, we do household chores and sometimes run errands, we try and spend a little time in the studio and sleeping in, and watching movies if we have enough oompf (though, honestly, we are generally more inclined to go to bed early and read). Though we have lived in Maine for 17 years and have never been to Acadia, Bangor, Rangeley, Moxie Falls, Peaks Island, MDI, and lots of other places we should’ve been able to go to at some point. I think we’ve even only been to Lewiston twice (and for very specific reasons, no lollygagging). We’ve never been to Vaughn Woods if that says anything about our life. We haven’t been to the beach in maybe 3 years and even then only once or twice a year before that. I like to say that I’ve lived now in New England for just over 30 years and I’ve only ever seen one moose butt (from Rt 7, just outside Bennington, VT). I think if we had a little more time, money, and wherewithal, we could seek out some spectacular places in Maine that might make us feel more connected.

Until then intrepid travelers, visit places for us and bring back all that good energy from wilds unknown.

Tuesday Happenings: Common Ground Fair 2025

Happy Autumnal Equinox! Our favorite family celebration for years now has been the Common Ground Country Fair. Taking our little pea is always an adventure — we love taking her up to the MOFGA (Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association) grounds for any kind of event (workshops, ME Apple Weekend, etc) but the Fair is our favorite. The energy is just so positive and uplifting and so many things to see. Now that she is no longer little, she can go off on her own to visit the spinners she’s been getting to know for years, eat popcorn from the popcorn truck, get handshaved ice with blueberry syrup, ogle the yarn and bunnies, admire the cows and horses, watch sheep-shearing, goat-milking and visit all kinds of folks we know. We ran into a bunch of lovely folks and previous vendors from our shop in our community.

This fair was particularly fun, too, as I (R) co-presented the work that The Good Life Center does and is planning to do — thank you so much to all the friends who came for the talk and stopped by to visit. We (as the GLC) always have a table in the Social & Political Action Tent to support the legacy of Scott & Helen Nearing. This year, our amazing volunteers and staff built a Story Booth to record anecdotes and inspirations from folks who knew or met or have been inspired by the work of The Nearings or The Good Life Center. The resident stewards humaned the table for most of the weekend, meeting and greeting so many interested homesteaders, social justice advocates, economists, compost renegades, and people interested in renewing their relationship with their personal response-ability in the world.

We got all kinds of lovely goodies and talked to so many creative people about how they are negotiating these troubled times — making and being a part of such a vibrant community is invigoratng! That’s what we get reminded of from the Common Ground Fair — how to be a part of regenerative life cycle.

And now we need a couple of days to recover, pick apples, and clean up the gardens.

Thursday: Focus on the Food

It’s easy to get caught up with everything that needs to be done on a homestead. And with the shop, we’ve been very neglectful with the day to day care of things like trimming hedges and shaping gardens, even with caring for our medicinal and marvelous food plants and trees. When we were here full-time (as you can go back and see) it was still hard to keep up with it all. It’s good to listen to both yourself and your abilities and the land you grow on. It’s all well and good to have plans but be open to the reality that plans can change, have to adapt, and are open to editing.

We thought for sure we would have an apple orchard, but with the onslaught of drought and then wet conditions, we couldn’t keep up with the struggles the trees went through (between the apple borers, the tent caterpillars, the voles, the deer all on top of the crazy water needs we were doomed). We thought we’d have a great water system in place for the gardens and for awhile it was pretty good but eventually all systems fail or need to be upgraded. After I got (finally diagnosed after many years with long) Lyme, we had to focus on healing and slowing down our life. And rarely picked the 1/2 acre of blackberries we had so lovingly cared for and processed (J cut paths and trimmed back canes, you can barely see the work he put in for years. We made soda and jam, cakes and pies, so many delicious things). Even my Bee Balm is swallowed this year by goldenrod and jewelweed in the front drive bed.

Though all is not lost — our peaches and pears, still some apples and grapes are available for us. We picked 3 bushels of peaches and are turning much of it into Peach Butter (we love fruit butters), some in the freezer for cakes and crisps, and a crisp in the oven as we speak (want to process some peaches? we’ve got a free bushel waiting for you!). We picked 2 bushels of white Itasca grapes, too, which we made some nice wine with last year and we’ll set up a new batch this year. We’ll probably pick some Wolf River apples next week — though if anyone wants to come collect cider apples, we have plenty (and you can borrow our press, too!), and store the pears. We were able to get a nice little batch of Hawthorn berries for medicinal purposes, too — we dried many and will tincture a batch. All in all, not bad for letting so much go.

It’s our focus on food that keeps us going: that what we put into our bodies matters, how we treat where it comes from matters, how we share and offer it to the world matters. It’s a beautiful thing, this connection we have to the cycle of living and dying, we hope we honor it well.

Mid-week Check-In: (r)evolutions

There are all kinds of revolutions — astrological/cosmological/seasonal (all connected, of course, as similar engagements), political, personal, and ecological, as a few in mind. Our wytchy selves here focus on all of these as a piece — to be connected to ourselves, we have to be connected in nature (or aware of this nature, we’re connected either way) and work towards safety, health, and for the future of all. Teleological directives (those with a specified ‘end’) are not useful tools to foster diversity, care, and foresight. That’s where response-ability comes into play.

We can only respond appropriately when we pay attention; when we listen. Listening takes a selflessness (or a universal self) to be able to engage with the openness to someone else’s needs — this plant’s need, this family’s need, this community’s need, the world need. And we do what we can when we can. The world (especially the political one) demands compromise but rarely consensus and it is this place we need to find. Systems built on heirarchies only have teleological ends; they require that someone be on the bottom, and that there IS always a bottom. There is a bit of a kerfluffle about how democracy works but in a majority rules situation, there is always a minority — and generally one that is exploited, subjected, and their needs pushed aside. The Western world has been doing it this way for a long long time building an anthropocentric (human-centered) impact which disregards relational thinking and being. We have been taught/guided/misguided in the ability to respond to each other and the world we live in.

How can we get out of this trap and abide by a more consensus directive where everyone has a voice that matters? It is going to take a slow and careful consideration of how we do things — everything…because our foundations are flawed (all of them). I love how permaculture-warrior Looby Macnamara approaches the living well concept. I love how folks come together to find solutions in direct community action (and remember, community is not your neighborhood or town, it’s the people that show up for each other). I love how the baker spent the day fixing the kid’s sewing machine. I love the projects I hear about from other brilliant like-minds and care-full thinkers. I love a quiet pond with bobbing loons. I love the Ruby-Throated Hummingbirds who live in our Weeping Willow tree across the drive from the exploding Scarlet Bee Balm. I love the medicines and food, a real bounty, available at our little patch.

(R)evolutions abound.

Summer Solstice

This Summer starts with a healthy dose of heat and humidity. And though we’ve had rain every week, it still feels a little dry in the garden (the corn are really calling to me to carry water up to them — days past we had a watering system in the garden but between changing up how we do things and just not being able to be there, we’ve reverted back to basics — heavy basics). The artichokes are growing nicely though, and cukes, melons, peppers, beans, ground cherry, herbs and flowers (sage, feverfew, hyssop, echinacea, wild bee balm, blue vervain, basils, parsley, viola/pansy, calendula, marigold, cornflower, poppy, baloon flower, cosmos, zinnia, and sweet pea), along with other perennials like rhubarb, asparagus, nettle, hops, and visitors such as mullein, primrose, and red clover. We’ve got a lot of fruit now in and around the garden such as Itasca grapes, and now a lovely red grape I can’t remember the name of, Black Haw, Huckleberry, Bear Berry, late raspberries, a couple of apple trees, a new line of plum trees.

The kid has a birthday in a week (15!) and is hoping to find some time for mini golf, a visit with friends, dinner out, and maybe a day in Portland — we’ll see if we have time for that. We had big plans awhile back to travel but that cannot come to pass — it’s hard leaving a business, especially when business is slow due to economic concerns and misunderstandings (depending on small & local — not corporate and crappy — is the way to succeed, but you have to show up to it). It was easier leaving chickens! So, we will do our best to make her celebrations special. Next month we have another Renaissance Faire so that will be fun (Acton, ME).

We went up to The Good Life Center to welcome international climate activist guests and meet the stewards. It was a lovely day full of cape views and lupines. A good day was had by all. It is so nice and fulfilling to go up and be in that space — reinvigorates me every time.

Until then, we will keep on keepin’ on. We’ve got great things happening at the shop as the homestead grows wild and verdant. Right now the multiflora rose hedge is in bloom (my beautiful Maleficent hedge!), the Mock Orange (mine and the swallowtail favorite) is flowering, the Concord grapes are taking over their arbor and the Forsythia next to it, the tea roses are resplendent with flower heads, and we put in a great vertical flowerbox garden wall around the heat pump with thyme, petunias, lemon balm, pansies, chamomile, strawberries, gifted ginseng, and a couple other cute flowery things.

Happy Summer Solstice!