I Believe in Everything

We lured friends from three northeastern cities to our land with promises of ease and relaxation and then put them to work on our land.

Pt 2 is a riveting piece on digging, rubble trenches, tamping, gravel and casual conversaion.

Please enjoy, it took a second to edit. More on the way in future. Perhaps as it gets so cold in Ithaca that I can’t go outside, I will pump these out faster. For now we are still building, taking classes, making friends and being mad busy. This week we’re putting up the roof. Hoorah!

Love Lea

http://www.vimeo.com/1914918

Lily, Sharon and I recently visited a friend at D Acres, and I for one did not want to leave. In my short time there I learned a ton and had a hell of a time in the meanwhile.

I’ve been on farms before, but this experience was singular. The big difference is that this is not a farm only for the production of food for sale, but a non-profit aimed at educating the public on many different aspects of sustainable living. They only grow enough for themselves, their guests, and one farmer’s market a week (which they go to mostly to spread the word about their organization). (more…)

April 6, 2007 7:30 a.m Garden of Edith, LI, NY, USA
overcast, windy, rainy.

My first weekend here serendipitously corresponded with a health retreat entitled “Farming for Yourself,” and let me tell you about the unlikely group it drew- motley in their diversity. It was one of those rare congregations that couldn’t have happened otherwise.

Here sojourned a middle-aged couple, Rita and Ron, who as a hobby follow the farm season’s progress on weekends. So when Ron, a full-time employee of the NY State Lottery, is not out at stadiums dressed in the money suit shouting out this week’s jackpot, he is down in New Jersey for the first taste of strawberries. And when Nurse Rita is done checking all the blood pressures one woman can handle, she can be seen at a garlic festival in Long Island. Rita and Ron walking side by side, splitting cloves of Russian Salvation, German Red, Morado de Padronera and Asian Tempest, pondering the virtues of both hard-neck and soft-neck garlics. Incredible.

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