The photo has no meaning--it's just pretty

Greetings, my avid and patient readers. I apologize that it has been a whole month since I have posted. This is not, as you may think, because I have done nothing and have nothing to say, but rather that I have done too much and think of too many things I want to say to be able to sit down and get any of them out.

The CSA season has begun! The first week of June we gave out our first box, which contained spinach, lettuce, garlic scallions, radishes, rhubarb, asparagus, carrots, cilantro, blossoming chives, and lemonbalm. The second week I don’t remember, because I lost my newsletter. The third week we gave out spinach, lettuce, frisee, fennel, dandelion greens, carrots, sugar snap peas, scallions, kale, dill and apple mint. This past week we gave out scallions, Chinese cabbage, turnips, Swiss chard, kohlrabi, lettuce, radicchio (for some strange reason,) peas, carrots, dill, cilantro, and garlic scapes.

Harvesting vegetables for CSA and market has completely changed the rhythm of the work week. We now have more of a goal and a purpose when we work, and the week is nicely broken up by the change of pace on harvest mornings. We have quite a few worker shares come out every week (members who work a morning each week in return for a weekly share), and I’ve really enjoyed having them around, partly because it’s nice to be faster than somebody. I do admit, though, it gets tedious having to answer their questions every week, questions that are inevitably some form of “so what made you want to work here?”

But it’s a hard question to answer in worthy depth while hunched over harvesting chard. I guess for me farming is becoming such a natural want in my life that I forget that everyone doesn’t feel like I do, and that they want to know what drew me to this life. I have to explain that my parents have land and I had worked some with them, and then that I was unhappy with what I was studying, which leads to the questions—“what were you studying?”—“where did you go to college?”—“what drew you there?”—“oh, are you a Mennonite?” and finally, “what’s a Mennonite?”

I’ve been really surprised by how often my religion comes up among the chard. I don’t feel like I am ever the one to bring it up; it just seems to happen. But when these Midwesterners who all went to state schools ask me why I went to a tiny college no one has ever heard of, I have to give an honest answer: well, it’s a Mennonite college, and half my church went there, which is how I knew about it, and it had everything I was looking for at the time. From there they admit that they have no idea what a Mennonite is, and ask if they are like Quakers. At this point I am very glad I took Mennonite History with John Roth. I’ve been doing a lot of educating in a field in which I do not feel qualified, but at least I can give them a basic overview of the history and belief system of Mennonites.

Occasionally the fact that I am a Mennonite and my family is not pops up, and that digs up a whole other can of worms, and I have to go all the way back to the Seventh Day Adventists and the United Church of Christ. Sometimes I wish I didn’t feel obligated to give everyone a complete answer.

In other news, Farmers’ Markets have started! (Along with many arguments over whether the proper spelling is “Farmers Market,” “Farmer’s Market,” or, my personal preference “Farmers’ Market.”) I really enjoy markets, and adding numbers in my head and making change has not been nearly as scary as I thought it would be. We are going to two markets, one in West Bend and one in Wauwautosa. Although markets are fun, we sell out of nearly everything we take and it’s good to get the Wellspring name out there, honestly, we make very little money. It makes me wonder how farmers can make it in small towns, if they are depending on money from markets. I know that a lot of famers drive long distances to better markets just for this reason, but this is not a very sustainable way to do business. It’s a conundrum.

In non-vegetable news, Heath and I have still been playing at the open mic in West Bend pretty much every week, and it’s been a lot of fun. However, we are running out of songs that we both already know, and it’s hard to find time to work up new ones. Add to that the fact that I have no idea how to go about writing a violin part for a song that doesn’t have one I can just listen to and learn. All the advice I’ve gotten from musician friends—just play around with the melody—draws a big scary blank in my mind. This is not intuitive for me, and I find it extremely frustrating. This past Friday night I was invited to play with a band in West Bend—one of the bands that heard me play the first time we played. I went to their rehearsal before the show and we worked up some of the songs I already knew, and then I played the show with them later that night. They were all really good, and very nice. Their fiddler is quite a player, and she seemed willing to help me learn how to do more fiddle-like playing. I hope that I can hook up with them some more, just to jam and learn.

I’m becoming a fan of folk/country music. Never thought that would happen.

Reading:
~Finished “The One Straw Revolution.” I thought it was very interesting, and he really has done a lot of great work in revolutionizing agriculture without chemicals. However, I was not so sure what I thought about his philosophy. He came to farming from the idea that “nothing means anything” and that humans cannot, or perhaps ought not, make any difference in the world. Maybe because I am coming from the idea that everything that we do means so much and is so important, I found this to be rather depressing. I am also skeptical of people who eat out of warm climates who claim that it is “easy” to eat locally year round. Coming from a land with months of winter snow, I know that it is a bit harder than that for a lot of people in the world.
~Started reading “Walden.” That man does tend to go off on tangents. He hasn’t even gone off to the woods to live intentionally yet. He’s just ranting about fashion. So far I am seeing no connection to “Walden II.”
~I happened to stumble across this book in the library, “The Barn at the End of the World: the apprenticeship of a Quaker, Buddhist, shepherd.” So far I love it. She is an English professor by education, and she mixes deep thoughts about life, the universe and everything with mucking about in sheep poo. There is a part of the book that sent me into fits of hysterical giggles, which I will recount here. She sees a ram acting strangely and asks,
Author: “Ben! Is that ram sick!”
Farmer: “He’s ejaculating, Mary.”
I think I spent too much time in graduate school.

This hit me in just the right spot today.

Cooking:
Soooo little of this happening lately. All I ever want to eat for dinner is bread with mayonnaise and cheese. I have been continuing to bake my daily bread and my morning granola, but that’s all the regular food making that has been going on.

Create:
I started, ripped out, started, ripped out, and have started a sock. I try to remember the words of knitting philosopher The Yarn Harlot, “I am a process knitter. I should be thrilled and honored to get to knit the yarn more than once.” (paraphrased.)
I have been doing a bit of spinning, once in a while, and that’s just one of the many things I really want to do more of and get better at.
I’ve worked a lot on my garden, and I have now planted basil, dyer’s chamomile, amaranth, watermelons, peppers, huckleberries, and tomatoes. As soon as I finish this entry I am heading out to plant the rest of my tomatoes. Maybe.