Posts filed under 'writing'
The Circle Game…CSA Newsletter for October 28
How can this time of year not be the best, most wonderful time of the year? I know my heart is biased to whatever season is just beginning…I always have a little love affair with each season when it starts, its newness, its difference from the season before…my senses reel, I get giddy in the midst of such magic. I forget for the moment that three moons down the road I will call winter the best as I embrace that deep, deep stillness, the wet and the gray as beautiful when they come as these multi-hued golds exploding in crisp but still warm air are today. I know that I can’t stop talking about this, but perhaps this farm life has simplified me to a more constant state of grace. How can one of the more consuming thoughts I have on these days be about how absolutely beautiful it is, when there are so many other things trying to press into these simple thoughts, things more weighty and consequently more sombering and subdued? I feel like a child a bit, but when I look around and see the changing colors against the evergreens in the hills, linger over a calm rather than rushed picnic lunch in the midst of calm rather than bustling field work, basking in the warm sun so intently, I can’t help but be overwhelmed by these thoughts. When I comment to everyone about how wonderful the weather has been, and how gorgeous these days are, it is not for me just small talk but rather a real sense of joy that keeps running through my veins, in spite of the weight of the world.
Besides, this is an exciting time of year for us as farmers, because as things do slow down, we begin the fall and early winter tasks of planning for next year. We have spent a lot of time these last few weeks using the good weather and relaxed field schedule to take more time walking the rest of the property. During these walks, we check on fencing and plan repairs or improvements, talk about and look towards the grand picture for all of these areas, then think about the next step towards this. Although during these strolls we aren’t in the vegetable field, we talk a lot about our plans there as well, all while the kids collect acorns and mushrooms and oak galls to bring the outside into our home, a tried and true decorating approach!
Our first year growing food on this farm–our first year growing food for a CSA–was wildly overwhelming, a result of our being overly ambitious, whole-heartedly idealistic, and surprisingly (to us) under educated in growing this way, all on top of finding out our topsoil had been sold to the dump and our first year soil amendments were not enough to loosen the heavy clay subsoil we found ourselves in. For my part, I went into last winter needing to not think about the next year. I re-focused on my home, the children, and tried to unclench the tightening of muscles and queasy stomach reflex I had every time we tried to make plans for the next year. Thankfully, our plan for this second year was to step back, to proceed more slowly, with a clearer understanding and with caution rather than abandon; an approach that brought success both in the fields and in our home.
As we find ourselves around the circle again moving past the big push of our second year, it is so wonderful to have had a good year, to have reached most of our goals, and to be able to move forward with excitement instead of stress. Our children are all a year older, all (mostly) wonderful little field helpers, our soil is rapidly improving, and the real life experience of working a small farm for the last two years has made our planning skills far better. We feel that our CSA goals were met this year, which was our top priority, and because we planned this year for just what one field worker could do and still only had 50% yields on most things, we are excited to look towards next year. Where we were conservative with multiple varieties this year to keep our expenses low, we plan on expanding this a lot for next year, fun for us and for all of you! With our continued plan for soil improvement and as we see topsoil returning to this place, we feel confident that next year our yields will increase at least 25%. And as the soil health improves, we anticipate pest issues will lessen, although we are brainstorming for effective controls on some of our worst problems.
The root maggots that plague the bottoms of most of our radishes, turnips, and rutabagas, as well as the rust fly that damaged all but our first crop of carrots this year, are at the front of this list. Things like flea beetles we have decided to combat by more seasonality. Although kale may sell all year long, it becomes bitter and is usually riddled with flea beetles in the heat of the summer while it is sweet and pest free in the fall and winter. All in all we are happy with the results of our switch to all open-pollinated varieties this year, although the non hybrid broccoli do not perform very uniformly, so we may need to succession plant these more often to make better use of their staggered maturity. With 100s of broccoli plants in the field this year, we still were never able to harvest 20 at the same time, not a good thing for a CSA! Still, as one of our market customers repeatedly expressed, the many florets we harvest from these plants who put out such small heads when compared to their hybrid cousins are more delicious and easier to cook with anyways. I suppose as with most things, there is always a balance between benefits and costs. We move forward through this balancing act based on our priorities and personalities. Although we abandoned our no-till ideas for this large (and getting larger!) of a growing space after our first year and now happily work the tiller and hire out tractor work, we will stick with the extra labor and loss of efficiency and predictability open pollination lends itself too because these choices still seem to leave the scales balanced for us and our members.
Now when I set out to write this week’s newsletter, I had planned a quick blurb and a copy of a poem because I am fighting a cold and have invoices to do on top of this. I guess sometimes the words find their way even when I don’t ask them to. Still, I wanted to share a poem, a different one than I had intended but by the same author, just more related to the thoughts that came out instead. It is by Wendell Berry, and I was reading his words because of a post by Rich at Mossback Farm linking to an article about Berry and one by Berry. I have been reading Berry since I was 19. After all these years, I never tire of his words.
As soon as I felt a necessity to learn about the non-human world,
I wished to learn about it in a hurry.
And then I began to learn perhaps
the most important lesson that nature had to teach me:
that I could not learn about her in a hurry.
The most important learning, that of experience,
can be neither summoned nor sought out.
The most worthy knowledge
cannot be acquired by what is known as study–
though that is necessary, and has its use.
It comes in its own good time
and in its own way to the man who will go where it lives,
and wait, and be ready,
and watch.
Hurry is beside the point, useless, an obstruction.
The thing is to be attentively present.
To sit and wait is as important as to move.
Patience is as valuable as industry.
What is to be known is
always there.
When it reveals itself to you, or when you come upon it,
it is by chance.
The only condition is your being there and being
watchful.
3 comments October 30, 2008
the music of the night and the blanket of stars
Although much of our attention as of late has been focused on the time to come-the gray skies, the wet ground, the cool and the cold–we‘ve also been taking the time to enjoy this warm weather we‘ve been having. Whether it is because of the time we had to devote to some unexpected side projects right in the thick of summer’s madness, or simply because we are now coming down the backside of the warm season’s growing hill towards shorter days and se
ttled veggies just waiting for harvest..whatever the reason, we are now enjoying the fact that there is still some beautiful weather around while we have the time and the frame of mind to relish it. Our fire pit had seen but one fire this summer, at our eldest’s birthday party, until this past week. Now it has been lit every night, and after dinner cooked over the fire and eaten out of doors, we are found sitting around the fire either mesmerized in that way only the dance of flames will do or making music as a family in a way that warms my heart even more than the end of summer air and blazing fire. We made a point to have fun this summer, to make this special time in an otherwise wet clime about more than just working hard on the farm. We did get to the beach more than once, we had many a breaking of bread with friends and family…it was a wonderful summer and a great growing season with only minor stumbles in the field. Still, to know that any of these last warm days could be just that, the last warm day before the chill sets in–this makes our nights by the fire even more delightful.
Still, farm business is never locked too tightly away in the folds of our minds, and we have had a lot to hash out and work on as we get ready for the changing season. Farmer’s market will end in just five short weeks. This will mark the beginning of the changes we wrote to you all about, and we know that it will bring changes to some of the faces we see each week. It has been difficult for us to find a balance between finding what will work best for the farm in order to provide vegetables year round and what will be considered reasonable or doable to all of you who have been nourished by the bounties of summer and wish to continue to enjoy the freshness, health, and taste of local food through the fall and winter. These worries, as well as the planning of a new season, of harvests all the way into March and April, these thoughts are always close at hand. We are really, really excited to be making the switch to a year round CSA, and now that we have been through these Oregon seasons almost four times round, we are still thrilled at the ease of eating seasonally in this temperate climate. As much as I will always have the season’s of the Midwest to call to me with memories of a certain air at the onset off fall, of a thick blanket of snow, of hoar frosts in the morning, of nights hot enough for swimming and firefly light shows….as much as those memories of place are what I was raised with, I look forward to the time when years here bring me the memories of these seasons and with them a much more distinct association of foods. Here, we don’t even get too carried away with putting summer’s treats by for later, because there is so much that will still be growing in the winter it is not as necessary. We still do some, and the pickles, the salsas and sauces are a good way to round out an eating style that differs so greatly from what we were raised on. We have 7 gallons of pickles fermenting now, and will probably need to do some more before the cucumbers fade away. We are finally getting into heavier tomato production, and we planted a lot of heirloom paste tomatoes because they make the best sauces and dried tomatoes, things we are sure to enjoy on a cold winter night.
The passing of time, of seasons, is something that can happen very quickly. Quicker, it seems, once
you have children or get older (I am not sure which was the direct cause, so I will credit both!). We are blessed to have the opportunity to slow things down if we make a concerted effort to do so. Farm life can either be very hectic, or by will, made very calming and centering–a simple routine of living that we share with our community. Right now, we have seen that difference. Maybe it was a little out of 
our hands when we were thrown extra work, but these nights by the fire are all a pleasure we have simply made the time for. Last night, as we pulled out the blankets and made a bed in the grass, the music of the night and the blanket of stars slowed time down as we let the warmth linger a little longer. When the rain comes again, and the warmth on our skins or the thought of sleeping outside is just a memory of a different season, we will be just as tickled with the change, we always are. But for the moment, we’ll stash away some of this summer in both its physical outpourings as we make our sauces and in its intangible joys as we make memories on this farm.
Add comment September 11, 2008
Better late than never (An introduction)
This has been haunting the back of my mind ever since Andre took the initiative and began cutting and pasting the musings from our weekly CSA newsletters on this blog. It wasn’t that we hadn’t agreed to this…the link to the blog was added to our web site as we pieced it together earlier this spring. He had set it all up, and let me know that it was waiting for me to grace it with these words. Well…the CSA season started, and from that point on this summer it felt like I was two steps behind on everything that needed to be done. Needless to say, the blog wasn’t a priority when just keeping up with the kids and the weeds took up most of my time.
Now that it has started, I am glad to have another place to put what is written for our farm members each week, as well as any other time I feel inspired to speak about this farm and this family. But it just hasn’t felt right, hasn’t appeased my need to lay things out in order, to have some control over how this presents itself. Andre just began with a post, a late season excerpt from our newsletter, and there was no introduction to the blog, no telling of the who, what, why, where, and how.
So, better late than never! I will sleep so much better having gotten this off of my chest-the introduction to what is going on with this blog. Us, the Jaillet family (mom Sheila, dad Andre, boy Olorin (6), boy Luca (3 1/2), and baby girl Acacia (1)), and the beginning of our lives as farmers of sorts. Unfortunately, I can’t go back and start from the beginning and have it all laid out in order, all that was our first year of farm business and pleasure, but I can post some of the juicier nuggets from this season’s newsletters with their dates to make the picture clearer. And as we have come to look at the farm itself, we will work towards a better tomorrow from there!
2 comments October 1, 2007
