The case of the butch who was reluctant to bake.

I limped back into the city under the cover of darkness one night in early November and retreated to the sanctuary of my apartment. For the first 3 weeks I didn’t want to talk to anyone, I didn’t want to do anything, and I didn’t want to think.

In a city of 9 million people it’s hard to not talk to anyone. I did a pretty good job of not doing anything and not thinking for about a week. Then it was time to head back into the workforce and sadly, thinking became a large part of waking life.

As I emerged from my stupor (brought on by 8 months of organic vegetable farming) it seemed that time was moving faster than it had been in the past and that I wasn’t living a full-enough life. I started to look at my weaknesses and decided to challenge myself. There were 2 areas that needed to be addressed: my heart and my stomach.

To strengthen my heart I started to look at where I was being hard on myself or other people and then I made myself back off.

When it came time to strengthen my stomach I realized that there were skills in the kitchen that I had been purposefully neglecting for decades. As a young butch, way back in junior high school, when faced with the choice between taking Shop or Home Ec – you guessed it -- I took shop. Making spice racks and turning brass on a lathe to make a replica canon was much preferred to sewing and baking.

For me Home Ec was way too girly. What’s odd is that in my household if there was any baking or serious cooking to be done, it was done by my father. He baked everything from whole wheat bread and granola to Christmas cookies and puddings. When we lived in New Mexico he became an amazing cook of Tex Mex dishes. But as I’ve got this lily white palette (more on that later) I refused to eat most of this food, especially his enchiladas which were the equivalent of a three alarm blaze inside my body.

My mother had my brother and I cooking at very early ages. When I was 7 I checked a cookbook for kids out of the Los Alamos Public Library and begged my parents to let me cook Sunday night dinner which consisted of hamburgers and baked potatoes. At the time I wanted to cook because I’ve always been very independent and had a hankering to leave home from as early as I could remember and knew that I had to be able to cook dinner if I left home and planned to survive. Later when cooking dinner meant that I couldn’t stay out until dark and play in the canyons I began to resent cooking.

Fast forward four decades later and I found myself thinking that it was time to start baking. What’s a bit odd is that I’m usually on a wheat-fast and yet I wanted to learn the classics. I don’t want to make gluten free vegan cupcakes. Not that I have anything against them, but I wanted to go in search of some part of yesterday that I’d never bothered to include in my personal development. As with all things Ilsa I didn’t decide to read anything or do any study I just decided to do.

Last Friday I went to the Food Emporium on 60^th and 2^nd Ave, the first neighborhood I moved to when Donzie and I were together way back when. I bought all the necessary ingredients to make a chocolate cake, 2 cake pans, and headed home. When I got home I found a classic rock station (I’m not sure why but I like to cook and bake to classic rock) and set myself to the task of making my first cake.

I don’t now if I’ve got a serious case of beginner’s luck but this cake came out frighteningly good. Carly who never addresses me by full name, after her first bite said in a solemn tone, “Ilsa this is delicious.”

Then on Sunday I ended up making short-bread walnut crescents. This was the first time I baked cookies and I baked them as a trial run for the batch I plan to bring into the office for the Holiday Cookie Exchange. A lot of people liked them but they didn’t rock my world and I’m hoping to improve upon them this weekend.

My next stop on the cookie trail was chocolate chunk cookies.

It was during the mixing and baking of the chocolate chip cookies that I started to learn about myself even more. Baking requires patience. I am usually in very short supply of that substance and so it’s interesting to re-wire my brain. But when I come up with the equation “patience = cookies”, this reward system begins to work. Over the past couple of years I’ve hammered away at myself to acquire more patience and I’ve made small steps in the right direction. But it’s in my nature to rev the throttle and hit mach 2. Mach 2 is not the speed at which cookies are baked.

But what I like about baking is that it’s a process. And it’s a lot like solving a problem. And in the future I will strive for consistency and perhaps one day the first batch will resemble the next. All of this is worth looking forward to. And someday I might actually bake in the presence in someone’s company. Right now it’s all about being by myself in the kitchen and pushing myself to hit a certain mark. I like the physicality of chopping, mixing, blending. I like the precision. In making chocolate chunk cookies I realized that it was better to rely on my nose than the timer to sense, rather than know, when the cookies were done. Baking is a sensual experience and there’s not a lot of pleasure to be derived in rushing sensual experiences.

I’m still not sure if baking cookies is girly and I’m glad that there’s a straight man at work who’s going to contribute cookies to the cookie exchange. In some way all this baking is almost like a course in queer studies at the undergraduate level. My butchness couldn’t handle baking which meant that I’d found a chink in my masculinity which is actually kind of cool because I love to call myself out on my shortcomings even if it is in the privacy of my own mind.

my beginner's luck continues

test cookie

The pasture after the improvement cutting

wild oyster mushrooms harvested at Anahata

Honesty

Lately I've become obsessed with honesty. I want to be immersed in honesty. I fear this is one of those instances where I've set the bar high, possibly too high, but as a Sag I don't have much choice in the matter.

I understand this obsession perfectly.

1. I've worn out a few other obsessions (They're threadbare and deserve a rest)

2. I've got a lot of time on my hands

3. I tend to be a bit "finely ground" when it comes to processing my inner workings

4. Life remains short and but I still have time to make up for past mistakes

Mind you, I'm not a particularly virtuous person but this thing around honesty just won't let go of me.

What's really going on is that a new-version of me is trying to be born. 

As a young man I was a complete ass. I cheated on every girlfriend I ever had. As I got older I realized that I'd left in my wake a lot of broken hearts and that was nothing to be proud of. There was something in me, something that was rooted in fear and infidelity was based on that. Promiscuity wasn't about lust. It was about cowardice.

It's never enough to have awareness -- I had to do some work on this. So I did.

And now I'm at a place where I've just got to be honest through and through. I'm willing to own all my mistakes. 

When I was taking the course at IIN one or two people said things that stuck in my mind for a really long time. One guest-speaker talked about love. But she was talking about feeling love on the cellular level. I'd never thought about that. It was possible for each and every one of my cells to be encoded with love. (That meant I had a lot of work to do in order to re-encode ALL my cells.)

One of the first things I did after hearing this was detox my liver and spleen. Then I set about visualizing and meditating on love. I saw all my cells as tiny bright, shiny lights. All silvery white and shimmering with love. I started that work 2 years ago and just now it's starting to pay dividends.

I mentioned that I wasn't going to go into detail about Steve Hermann's reading until the New Year but I've changed my mind on that. One of the ancestors who came through was my Scottish great-grandmother. I was a bit surprised that she came through as I rarely think of that side of the family. (Conversely, I'm always dreaming about my Italian ancestors.) For the purposes of this discourse I'll refer to her as Peg. 

Peg came through first. She was making a strong case for herself and rather insistent about a couple of things. One of the things she talked about was music. She said I wasn't supposed to listen to "80s pop music" and "no Joy Division." She wanted me to listen to classical music. She wanted me to surround myself with culture. (BTW: it was the reference to Joy Division that made me realize Steve was legit.)

And since I had a lot of free time this week and as I live in the World's Greatest City and as I'm on a budget -- I went in search of free culture. And I struck gold. Today I headed to Trinity Church for Concerts at One, featuring the Moscow String Quartet. I went to hear Shostakovich but came away a fan of Borodin.

Have I appeased one of my guides? I don't know. Maybe she'll appear in a dream and let me know that I did good.

But the point here is this: I was listening to Borodin String Quartet No. 2 in D Major, part III Notturno, Andante and all the light in my being was glowing silvery and I had my eyes closed, soaking up the vibes and I thought, "This is love." I suppose I should make the distinction between romantic love and Love. I think Love is sometimes found in romantic love, but Love is not something that I find in 80s pop music. I can go out and have a couple beers and dance for a few hours to 80s music and be super-happy but that won't bring me Love. The Moscow String Quartet, performing live is another story. They "bring it."

While I was listening to Shostakovich, String Quartet No. 4 in D Major, pt. IV Allegretto: I thought, "Damn, these women are rockin' this."

Really, I should be thanking Peg for this insistence that I stop being a chicken going for the cheap thrill and suck it up and go for the real thing.

Live performances of classical music fit in with slow cooked food, organic farming, and knowing that nothing matters but doing right by others anyway.

And this brings me back to honesty. It's not that I want to make up for past mistakes mainly because I'm not sure that can be done. Rather, honesty right now means that I can have a deeper, more complete life experience. Honesty is heartfelt, and highly portable and I can take that goodness all the way to my core and not suffer any nasty side-effects or contraindications.

And if I remain at this vibration, who knows what sort of deliciousness will head my way.

Medium rare.

This past year I’ve been working on my boundaries and value system. Strengthening my boundaries and re-defining my values. 

I’ve also let my intuition play a larger role in how I make decisions.

In the end, it’s all worked out and I faired better than I would have had I tried to remain in control. 

Once I entered into an agricultural life it was interesting to observe my life as I did my best to remain in the flow of the seasons. Once the veggies were done, I moved onto apple picking, once the apple picking came to an end I moved onto cooking. And it was cooking that dominated my last weekend in Massachusetts.

I was at a loss as to how to occupy myself during the final week of October and then I got a call on Monday afternoon asking me if I’d like to cook at a retreat that was being held nearby. I said, “Sure.”

In the past my favorite question used to be, “Why?” My new favorite question is, “What have I got to lose?” The answer thus far, has been, “Nothing.” This fits nicely into my Zen-nihilist belief system -- nothing matters so you should do the best you can and go as far and as high as possible.

When I finally got in touch with Steve Hermann I was honest. I don’t remember exactly how the conversation went but I recall saying, “I’m not a cook.” He paused and said, “But you can cook?” I said, “Yeah.” He, and I, didn’t have a choice in the matter. He needed a cook and I needed something to do. He said that I should come up with a vegetarian menu and he’d do the shopping. I said, “Sounds good.” He also mentioned veggie burgers and Lukas came to mind immediately.

When I woke up Tuesday it was so typically autumn in New England – gray, rainy, damp, cold. I thought, “It might as well be November.” I lugged myself to the library and started to create a menu. Breakfasts were going to be simple: fruit, cereal, yogurt, granola, juice, and tea. Lunch and dinner? Now there was the rub.

Since I was only cooking for ten people and only cooking for a few of days I did a couple of things in preparation. First I used a technique that Olympic athletes use where they visualize themselves running through a race. They picture every last detail. So I relaxed and placed myself in the kitchen and saw myself prepping and cooking and serving the food. Then I said, “I can do this.” Next, I decided that I would cook things I’d want to eat. Since I’m not a vegetarian it made it a bit of a challenge.

In the end I settled on the following:

Friday Dinner

Nadine’s Vegetarian Chili (named, by me, after Cara’s Aunt)

Corn bread

Brown rice

Sauteed bok choi

Sauteed beet greens

 

Saturday Breakfast

Fresh-baked lemon poppy seed muffins

 

Saturday Lunch

Quinoa salad (quinoa, green beans, dried cranberries, walnuts, garlic vinaigrette)

Side salad: lettuce and carrots

 

Saturday Dinner

Veggie burgers (black beans, brown rice, beets, red onion, red wine vinegar)

Sautéed kale

Sauteed beet greens

Apple crisp

 

Sunday Lunch

Roasted root vegetables (potato, sweet potato, onion)

Brown rice

Potato salad (red potato, fresh chopped scallion, olive oil, salt)

 

Since I knew that Steve’s group was going to be working to strengthen their Medium skills I wanted them to eat really well and I wanted it to taste good. That kind of work can be very taxing.

Saturday night Carly joined me in prepping and hanging out. She’d never been to Earthlands and wanted to check it out. We had a ton of fun. One of the retreatants told us her life story, going so far as to illustrate and highlight certain chapters by showing us photos on her iphone. And my apple crisp, which has received rave reviews at home, pushed everyone into a happy-food silence and once the power of speech returned, it was unanimously declared, “Delicious!” Sunday after lunch, the woman from India approached me and said, “I’ve been living in this country for 8 years and this was the best vegetarian food I’ve eaten.” The man from Mexico gave me a bear hug and said, “Thank you for the great food!”

And this brings me to one of the most interesting aspects that I have to spend time mulling over -- I didn’t feel connected to making people happy with good food. I thought I would feel something.

How interesting is that?

It was weird. It’s almost like how comedians are usually the saddest people around. Perhaps cooks are the most removed from the effect their cooking has on people. And yet comedians continue to go for laughs and cooks continue to make great tasting food. (The lack of affect might also be the result of the fact that I'm exhausted on every level, so I'll give myself a couple of weeks rest and then see how I feel about all of this.)

I realized that I don’t want to work in a restaurant kitchen. I want to work on food recipes. It was great fun making the food but I want to get into food products.

And perhaps it’s a good thing that I didn’t feel attached to the way people responded to my cooking. It’s not that I’m jaded. Rather I don’t have to go in search of feeling validated. I’m not seeking approval. Although, when it comes down to it -- I do want to create great food and attract a lot of customers. I can feel the competitive part of me kick into high gear on this. But I don’t need to hear each and every person say, “That was great.” I’ll know they’re happy because they’ll keep buying my product.

When Steve and I discussed payment I’d been toying with the idea of charging 20 per hour, then I decided I didn’t really want the money. I wanted a session with Steve and I wanted the cooking experience.

Sunday afternoon, once all the retreatants had departed, Steve gave me an hour-long session. I’ve had several psychic readings in the past (and attended Nancy Weber's workshops) but I’ve never consulted a medium before. And the approaches are really different. It was interesting to watch Steve during the session. He gets very animated and his body language changes when the different people come through. I won’t get into detail on the session because when it comes to this sort of thing, I never kiss and tell. However, should any of what the guides relayed come to pass in the waking state, I will post something about that in the New Year. 

Oh yeah.

Deere John.

Ever since I set foot on Sholan Farms I wanted to drive the tractor. After about a month of working there I asked Bob, "Will you teach me to drive the tractor?" I feared he'd want a sexual favor in return but luckily he just said, "What are you doing tomorrow?" I said, "Nothing."

Tomorrow came and went. We repeated this scenario many times.

Well. Today. Tomorrow finally arrived.

I was saying my "good-byes" to Courtney and Bob and I aked Bob, "Will you finally teach me how to drive this?" He replied, "What are you doing tomorrow?"

I said, "Bob. Today is my last day."

He smiled and said, "Get in."

I climbed into the cab.

Within 5 minutes he'd parked on a flat part of the orchard, the road between blocks 5 and 7. I hopped into the drivers seat. I asked a ton of questions. All the knobs and instrumentation were unfamiliar. "What's that I asked?" pointing to a knob. "The windshield wipers." (Duh.)

I put her in gear and soon we were crawling through the orchard. This tractor will hit a top speed of somewhere near 25 miles per hour. We cruised 5 MPH. When I stepped on the gas, just to get a feel for it, he said, "Slow down. There are people in the orchard." I don't think I'd even reached 8 MPH and had no idea I was pushing the speed envelope. There was something in Bob's tone when he cautioned me, he tends to joke around and has a great laugh, that made me think he might actually care about things.

Sometimes the people who seem the most casual are the folks who have the greatest concern.

We went through the orchard and I was surprised he let me drive for a long as he did. I marveled at how few apples were left on the trees. The leaves have started to turn yellow. Less than 8 weeks ago the foliage was deep green and enormous cortlands hung in Block 5. Today. No more.

Bob said, "I'm stripping the orchard clean."

Even though I want to go back to the orchard next week to work, stripping trees is just about the easiest way to earn a few bucks since you only have to make sure the apples aren't rotten otherwise it's anything goes. I've been pretty particular about picking and Bob once told me, "You've got good hands." I've never told him that I can gently pick 2 apples at a time. Not only do I have good hands, I've got big hands.

I'm not melancholy about leaving the country and the orchard. I know I'm supposed to head to the City. It's, "Adios," to tractors, and bushel baskets, and spending 8 hours a day outdoors. And it's, "Hello," to I-don't-know-what.

Nonni

At any given time I've always got 5 or 6 dreams that I just can't figure out rolling around in my head. I ruminate over them all the time. In the middle of the night. "What does it mean?" In the middle of traffic. "What does it mean?" In the middle of lunch. "What does it mean?" In the middle of converstaions with other people. "What does that dream mean?" This subroutine: figure out these damn dreams, is almost always in gear.

This past weekend when I visited my Aunt T. I did something I rarely do, I described one of the dreams on the "hot list" in great detail and then asked her what she thought it meant.

I asked her because this dream concerned some of our family members. My Aunt also happens to be incredibly perspicacious. I've always wished I could be as keen and insightful as she is.

Keep in mind that the dreams I can't figure out are the best/worst puzzles in my head. It's usually the most simple and straight forward dreams that I cannot figure out. The reson: there is no such thing as a simple, straightforward dream. If you don' t believe me about that, ask Freud or Jung.

One of the people in this particular dream was Nonni, my great-grandmother, who's been dead since 1977.

My Aunt T. asked me about Nonni and I told her the very basic facts that I knew but that my impression of Nonni was that she was a victim. Where I got that impression I don't know. I think it's because I knew my great-grandmother when she was very old and all she did was sit around talking to my grandmother in Italian and I thought, There's the really old Italian lady who likes to eat vanilla ice cream melted, from a bowl.

It turns out Nonni was much cooler than that. She was the youngest of 5. Her mother died when she was very young. Her father was of high standing in the village. She was told by someone not to marry a farmer's son. Then when she was a teenager her father told her that she had to marry a rich farmer's son. She said no. (She refused an arranged marriage? Hot damn!) She moved to a city where she fell in love with an older man who was a painter. They got married. He got sick and died. She was 23 and a widow. Her brother and sister lived in the US and her brother sent her the money to come to the United States. She moved here and soon was working in a corset factory. She hated it and cried everyday. When my Aunt T. asked her why she didn't leave she said she had to come up with the money to pay her brother for passage to the U.S. and then she had to earn enough to go back to Italy. By the time she'd accomplished both, she was more or less a part of the fabric of the community in which she lived.

She met her second husband, Romeo. They got married. His father owned a produce delivery business and soon Nonni and Nonno opened a store. The had 2 children. They sold the store, moved to Italy for a bit, returned to the US and opened a second store. They sold that store and I believe Nonno died when they owned the third store.

They worked their asses off. They raised their children. They were very successful. As far as I know, when Nonno died in 1965, they had USD$250,000.00 in savings. And in 1965, $250,000.00 was a lot of money.

Even though I've always felt bad for my great-grandmother, because her second husband said and did unkind things to her, in the end she was someone who I might want to emulate. I've yet to determine if I'm the marrying kind, but owning and selling businesses and turning a nice profit -- that's worth copying.

Life continues to move at a fast clip. I'm hoping I can keep up.

I won't get into all the gorey details, but last night's power outage re-affirmed my belief that we have to shut down the house for the winter season. The short story goes like this... at 12:54 a.m. I woke up from a dream, noted the time (blazing red numerals on the electric clock), turned over and fell back asleep. Then as I was asleep I thought, "Something's not right." I woke up looked at the clock and well, there was no clock. I couldn't figure out how much time had past since I last checked the time. "Damn it, we've lost power." I stumbled around in the dark looking for my cell phone. When I located it, I noted the time, "1:00." I'd been asleep for 6 minutes. Then I went through a bit of an ordeal trying to figure out what the heck happened. Around 1:45 I got the recorded message at the phone company letting me know what I already knew, there was a power outage but the good news was: estimated time power would be restored -- 4 a.m.

Then I climbed into bed and started thinking (of course). My first thoughts were that if the power didn't come back on I had to be up at 5:30 to go pick apples and that I would not be having a shower or breakfast but since it was my last day picking apples I planned on showing up on-time, dirty and hungry.

Then I turned to other thoughts. I was glad it was 44 degrees outside so that the pipes wouldn't freeze. I thought about 9/11 and this small power outage reminded me that I'm not prepared and that folks in general are not prepared. (I almost feel like taking "prepared to another level -- Prepared to accept the Host? Prepared to receive Salvation? But let's save that for another day. Shall we?) I do not have my disaster kit in order. Which means that next season I will have it ready. Although if the temp gets too low, won't the water that I've set aside freeze? It's also time to get the wood stove and the outhouse in working order. Life in the country...

But more than anything -- and I think that this speaks volumes about who I am and where my head is at -- I was really frustrated by my current relationships. I feel that they're not where they should be and this ticks me off. Mind you I wasn't kicking myself so much as prodding myself to wonder about what I can do to improve things. As far as I'm concerned, paying the bills and having enough food and drinking water to get through 3 days of no-power is all well and good but do I really want to die (or live) without having my emotional life and my close personal relationships in good order?

The answer is, No.

Luckily Cara called at 2 am, just as the power was restored and as I was fully awake and wearing all my clothes and down jacket, lying on the comforter on my bed and we ended up having a very long chat about all my swirling thoughts.

As I return to NYC I've got enough money to get me through a couple of months. (Thank you Bob, Sholan Farms, and Johnny Applesed!) And as I return, top on my list is what can I do to strengthen my relationships? Of course, relationships tend to require that both parties want to engage in strengthening, so I'll be strengthening the relationships I can with those who want to join me in emotional fitness workouts.

There seems to be clutter in my head. (Actually this morning, as I was picking apples I decided, "You're full of shit.") I have some really bad habits but they roll at a very deep level. I'm going to grab my headlamp and descend into the caverns of my mind and I'll bring some trial mix and my stainless steel canteen (filled with water) and I'm going to find those annoy traits and I'm going to alter them. Actually, I think it's better to bargain with them and perhaps find a working compromise. I don't think that we're supposed to get rid of stuff. I've always noticed that when I go to get rid of bad habits they have a way of re-appearing in an even stronger, more destructive, form than when I just let them wreak havoc.

I've decided that life is a journey and an adventure. In one month's time I'll turn 43 and I think I've got another 50 years to go (I'm basing this on the fact that Nana (my father's mother) died this year at age 97). Even if I only have another 40 years to go, that's still a long time and I cannot and will not abide by having this junk f*cking up my relationships.

Of course, the monkey wrench in the works -- karma. Perhaps some people have come and gone because that was all they were supposed to do. No matter how deeply I loved, or hated them, they're gone and that's that. So I guess it's more the folks who have stuck around that I've got to consider.

I feel pretty good about returning to New York City. I'm still curious if I can maintain my hearfelt peace or if the smog, crowded subways, and alternate side street parking will jam me up and I'll revert to the cranky person I was in days of yore.

We shall see. Won't we?

Nonni and Nonno in their store

Nonni and Nonno behind the soldier

N.

There's a woman who works at the orchard who told me her life story and since I haven't asked her permission to relay this story, I'll refer to her as N.

One of the things that strikes anyone on first meeting N. is her personality. She smiles a lot, she has a great laugh, and she's got a great sense of humor, really sarcastic. I'm always super-happy to pick alongside N. because the time flies when she's around.

A week ago N. and I were picking and I asked her what she was thinking of doing for her next job once apple picking ended. She replied, "I don't know." Mind you she bakes at a bakery 2 days per week, takes care of a young boy with cerebral palsy 5 nights per week, picks apples 2 days per week and then...who knows?

She reminds me of "Hey Mon" from Living Color.

I suggested she get a paper delivery route, and that ripped things wide open.

Before I knew it she launched into the story of her life. She was 14 when she met her future husband. He was 15 at the time and an alcoholic. They got married and ended up having 3 kids. He continued to drink and drug and cheated on N. all the time. People would come up to her to tell her about it and she'd say, "I don't want to know." She said it made her sick to her stomach. She also mentioned that when her husband was sober he was a complete ass because all he wanted to do was get high.

He eventually left her after they'd been married for 24 year and she had an 8-, 13-, and 15-year old to take care of. She'd never had a job and didn't know what she was going to do. She took a paper route and as it turns out she made good money and was able to be home to spend time with her kids and shuttle them around to all their after school activities. Basically she'd get up at 3 in the morning deliver the papers, come home, get the kids ready for school and then once they went to school she'd go back to bed for a nap.

The husband's girlfriend lived above a bar and when N. drove the family to church on Sunday morning they'd "see Daddy's truck parked outside the bar."

Eventually N. and her husband got divorced.

She says that the experience gave her breast cancer.

After a mastectomy and reconstructive surgery she said, "I didn't want to ever be stressed out agin."

I'm not telling this story nearly as well as N. tells it but once she was done talking -- I was atop a ladder filling my bucket with apples -- and even though I've been through quite a bit myself I went quiet and was at a loss for words. Maybe I haven't been through that much after all. (Nice bit of reality check on a gorgeous fall afternoon in an apple orchard.)

I've heard a lot of people who've been sick and had cancer and other troubles and N. didn't employ any of the much-used jargon. "It was a gift." "I live for the present." "Life is precious." She said, "I didn't want to be stressed ever again."

And this has become my new mantra.

If you could see N. smile, it would probably become your mantra.

Give it up to G*d.

Life has been something of a blur lately. A nice, natural blur, but a blur nonetheless.

For a while I was contemplating the notion that life prepares you for the next step. They way things were going I feared I was being prepped for a polar expedition. I spent a week picking apples in the 30s and low-40s. Then I headed to Yestermorrow and slept in an unheated, uninsulated cabin that had only screens in the windows. When I woke up on Saturday morning the pond was frozen and there was a layer of ice on the grounds.

But I've finally learned how to pack to make life more comfortable. To Yestermorrow I brought: hiking boots, work boots, and snow boots. And I'm mighty glad I brought the snow boots otherwise Stump to Sticker (which was held outdoors) would have been an extremely uncomfortable experience.

Saturday night the outdoor temp was probably somewhere in the 20s and I realized that the farming made the apple picking possible and the apple picking made the sleeping outdoors possible.

And what is all of that making possible? I haven't got a clue.

The last recipe for sanity I used was one part 2666 and one part dessert. I had to stop reading 2666 when I got to, "The Part About the Killings." Roberto Bolano was creeping me out in the last 60 pages of the first part. I mean seriously creeping me out and I felt that to continue was to invite nightmares into my state of being. And even though I stopped reading the book I've had a couple of nightmares but I attribute them more to the fact that I'm in transition than to 2666.

I noticed that I was using apple picking as way to avoid dealing with life. I was pushing myself really hard in the orchard. Climbing ladders, filling bins, outpicking the other pickers by a mile. I was being really competitive. What's interesting is that about 5 weeks ago I wanted to do carpentry work because I could make good money per day. I'm now earning in half a day what a full day of carpentry paid. But it was starting to take its toll on my body. But I kind of liked that. I also knew that once I took my foot off the gas, I'd rest for a week and be in a better place.

Yesterday I was told there was no picking today. I was a bit miffed. But I knew it wasn't not-earning money that bugged me. It was Bob telling me I couldn't do something. It was someone else being in control of my life. I had been gathering leaves to make a ginormous compost pile in the backyard and literally sat down and went thorugh a little process. I think that what bugs me the most lately is loneliness. Last year I vowed to leave the lone-wolf lifestyle and then I find myself more deeper into that than I was before. At some point during the past summer I was stunned when I realized that I could feel so lonely living on a farm with someone else. But I wasn't connected to my farm partner in a way that worked. We weren't able to communicate about anything. He likes to procrastinate and I like to get things done. Just 2 weeks ago I said, "Let's include scallion in this weeks share." He said, "I'd rather wait." I said, "Suit yourslef."

Can I tell you? There was no reason to wait. The food was in the field ready to be harvested and distributed.

Anyway. Yesterday while I was in process, on the front lawn, rake to my left, piles of leaves to my right. My thoughts turned to the Dude (the Big Lebowski). Many times this past year I've thought about this one scene towards the end of the movie when the Dude realizes that his thinking is uptight. I have had to remind myself to not be uptight on at least a thousand occasions this past year. I'm naturally a high-strung person but that doesn't get me very far. And since I'm equally ambitious -- if greater gains are to be achieved by chilling out, then it's chilling out I mean to do.

After about ten minutes of process I stood up and resumed raking leaves. I left the uptight thinking to others. There's a lot to enjoy out here. And while it would be nice to share it with someone, if I've got to go it solo a bit longer, than so be it.

This morning I cleaned up a small dump that was unearthed during the improvement cutting. Nothing like starting up the day pulling up old tools and broken tv sets, and assorted other junk left by someone else on your property. (Dumping is rude, country-laziness.)

But I want to get back to my recipe for sanity: 2666 and dessert. I made a kick-ass pumpkin flan. When I decided to cure my ills with dessert I decided that I had to make desserts that I'd never made before. I also made something called a "cottage pudding." It was very English, sort of a cakey-thing with a lemon sauce. THe lemon sauce rocked but the cake was a bit heavy. The cottage pudding had nothing on the flan.

And this brings me to Yestermorrow and diet. This time when I took a class at Yestermorrow I wanted to sleep in a cabin and signed up for the meal plan. (There was no way I was going to be able to cook for myself as well as take a class.) The meal plan allowed me the opportunity to say good-bye to the wheat-fast but quick. I ate my face off. Breakfast Saturday morning featured eggs and bacon. Yum.

Lunches featured sandwiches and pizza and I knew that a couple of days of eating crap (wheat) wouldn't kill me but I also observed myself to see what I craved. Coca cola. I've eaten so many different types of foods and a conventional diet begets conventional eating. Slow-cooked whole foods tend to let me feel more balanced and I never crave sugar. I want sweet things but I don't want refined sugar. (Unless you are in the beginning of transitioning from conventional eating to whole food eating, one you make the switch you will almost never crave the garbage that's out there.) And what's more interesting once you eat slow-cooked, whole foods, when you go back to eating a candy bar or drinking soda, you can really sense how empty and lacking those foods are. I always feel that factory foods are spiritually bankrupt.

I don't want to knock the meal plan at Yestermorrow. There were a lot of great veggies (oddly -- prepared by the women; the dude who cooks there doesn't seem too keen on veggies). I could have eaten a slightly modified diet while I was on the meal plan but I need a lot of protein and it was only coming to me in the form of ham, beef, eggs, chicken. I made sure to eat a ton of veggies (some of which came from the garden at Yestermorrow).

I also noticed that I felt a feeling that's hard to describe. I just knew that the entire time I was eating the food at Yestermorrow I was thinking, "I'm going to need to do a cleanse next week."

My cleanse consisted of lots of water and steel-cut oatmeal, fruits, and vegetables.

Today is going to be day when I start to put my head back on my shoulders. I'm going to chill the f*ck out and let the Universe guide me. I'm going to give in to the Wisdom of a Force that is greater than I am. I'm also goign to take a nap.

Go deeper into your faith.

Before I get to the good news, let me contextualize life these days.

Yesterday morning at 6:15 a.m. I was harvesting, with a flashlight, for CSA shares. I pulled shares of the winterbor kale which was spritely. When I turned the light onto the bok choi, I was surprised to find it frozen, solid. Yup, we had our first killing frost. I'd agreed to pull kale and bok choi but felt that harvesting frozen bok choi wasn't a good idea so I left a note for Ben and headed to the orchard.

On my way to the orchard I watched the temperature guage on the dash board. 29. 30. 34.

What were these numbers? Oh right. The outside temperature.

By the time I got to the orchard it was 40 degrees. And the sun was coming up so I knew that I'd be warmed up by 8:30.

This morning I woke up and it was a balmy 44 degrees out. But it was raining.

People pick apples with a much different attitude when it's raining and gray and cold outside. This morning there was a deep quiet. Only the sound of rain falling on the hood of my rain coat. The sound of my breath. The sight of my breath.

Kyle rushed through his bin. He left with an, "I'm done."

Laura, who approached me, looking all kinds of dejected and miserable, departed by saying, "I'm not dressed for this weather."

Wil and I remained. I finished Laura's bin and then sat in the Dodge waiting for Wil to complete his bin.

The Dodge has no traction whatsoever in the slightest amount of precipitation. It was an adventure as I zig-zagged the Dodge across many rows, sometimes driving in reverse, and just as we were almost in the clear -- ropes blocked our path. Wil held the rope up and I drove the truck under.

Wil asked me how my hands were. I told him that I'd alternated using them. Letting one thaw while the other froze. He said, "My thumb got numb and cramped and I couldn't hold onto an apple."

I remarked, "For a little bit there you weren't even a primate."

This year I lived "the Summer that never appeared," and now I fear that Fall is over and Winter is here. But what is Winter? Most of the leaves have fallen from the trees. The nighttime temp has hovered in the low-40s, dipping into the 30s. I don't think that Winter is snowfall. I think Winter is when it's so effing cold outside that neither man nor beast should be out of doors.

And yet... I finally had an insight. Yesterday morning as the lines from the Beatles song -- "Sun. Sun. Sun. Here it comes," were in my head and I thanked Goddess for the warmth, I discovered another piece of the puzzle.

I've realized that no matter what -- I'm delving deeper into my faith. As an athiest I often wonder what it means to have faith. I'm not sitting around imploring Jesus or God for Guidance. I'm usually puzzling things out in my head.

Several years ago my friend Eri and I were talking. We only came to be friends after September 11, 2001. Somthing about that event threw us into a friendship. (She was the person who got me the reference for my Jungian Dream analyst.) So. Eri and I were talking and she said, "I want someone to tell me that everything will be ok."

I paused and dearly wished that I could tell her that. For the next couple of years Eri and I continued to be freinds and then the friednship waned. During that time I worked on being able to say to her, "Eri. Everything will be ok." I could only say that to her if I meant it. She and I both knew that to say those words with a hollow ring was a waste of breath. I never spoke those words to her.

About 2 years ago I was able to own that sentence. And I've been living with that sentiment at my core for a while. Now I find that I want to go further. Beyond my gratitude. Beyond being able to rely on myself. Beyond my belief that things will be ok.

There is something else. There is more.

I'm starting to think this is tied up in love. A new kind of love. (A new kind of love for me.)

So this is where I'm at. Another piece of the puzzle found in the orchard.

"Go deeper into your faith."

What to do with the next 40 years?

My internal clock is all messed up. I’m writing this at 7:08 pm. In days gone by 7:08 pm was considered early. A few months ago 7:08 pm was considered early. In my drug, addled, days as a homeless youth 7:08 pm was the crack of dawn. Now that I’m up at 5:45 am to go pick apples, 7:08 feels more like 11:30 pm. It’s time to go to bed. My eyelids are starting to become heavy with sleep. I’d rather be curled up with a pamphlet on how to “Feed the Soil” and drift off to dream but instead I’m going to stare into this blue screen for a bit, share a few thoughts on the “post-season,” then pass out fully clothed

I’ve transitioned from organic farmer to seasonal laborer. That’s right. Now I pick apples for a living. And it’s about time I earned a living.

But it sucks that picking fungicide-drenched apples pays way better than growing/selling organic vegetables did. This is not to say that apple picking pays all that great, but shit it pays.

To be fair, the orchard I work at has been in business for a very long time (there are trees that have been in this orchard for more than 250 years) and I’ve got one season as an organic farmer behind me.

Which reminds me… didn’t people used to grow fruits and vegetables WITHOUT applying poison – insecticide, fungicide?

Why? Why? Why? Must the petrochemical-paradigm persist?

I’ve been reading “One Straw Revolution” by Manobu Fukuoka. And what I’ve concluded (actually I’d already concluded this….I’ve confirmed what I’d concluded) is that people are willing to live in a state of willful ignorance. For real.

I wonder if modern life in America just makes it easy for people to live in a more unconscious way. If our ancestors had been as unconscious as we are, would we even be here? My ancestors boarded boats in Europe, sailed to the United States and once they got here, most of them worked. Hard. They persisted.

Where has persistence gone? Is it sitting in a Laz-Boy chair, with a cup of conventionally produced 1% milk and a few low-fat cookies, channel surfing after a day of: 8 hours at the office, an hour at the gym, an hour commute home, then an overly processed dinner, followed with a Zantac. Will persistence pop an anti-anxiety (or anti-depressant) pill and before going to bed pop a Tylenol PM?

Look, I am not in favor of suffering. I don’t advocate hard work for the sake of hard work. I don’t advocate that we go back in time. (Lord knows I like having the right to vote. I like living in a “free” society where I can be openly gay.) I’m perplexed at how out of balance things are. Can’t we keep our civil rights and eat correctly?

I don’t understand what will inspire people to head back to the kitchen? Is there a correlation between obesity and the number of food shows on the food network? Weren’t people thinner before there was food-television? Do people cook more after watching Emeril Live?

I wish Gordon Ramsay would go to people’s houses and berate the hell out of them until they could cook a great soufflé or the perfect steak. That would be productive. I’ve always kind of wanted him to yell at me for a while. I figure if I got good enough, he’d stop shouting then I’d be a great cook and I could enjoy my cooking/eating in relative quiet.

What would be really cool is if Gordon Ramsay did a cooking show where he got kids to cook. Imagine Gordon Ramsay as a Home Ec teacher? He’d have his patience tested, the kids would act like a bunch of twits and in the end, he’d create the next generation of people who could actually cook, one class at a time.

The fact that he creates thriving businesses is great – he makes consumers. But what about showing that he really cares about the way people eat by turning regular people into really great cooks? That would be cool.

Lately I keep having cartoon-like images pop into my head.

Scenario1. Patient complains of chest pains. The heart surgeon cuts open patient’s chest and where there should be a heart, there’s a change purse.

Scenario 2. Patient complains of blinding headaches. The brain surgeon opens patient’s the skull and where there should be a brain, there’s wallet.

I’m so over people doing things just to make money.

How phenomenally boring.


But I want to talk about apple picking for a moment. For the time being I like picking apples because it’s just about the most honest work I’ve ever done. I’m paid by the bushel. This means that if I don’t pick, I don’t get paid. That means that if I’m getting up at 5:45 in the morning so I can make it to the orchard by 7:30, then you’re going to find me picking apples.

I’ve noticed that not a lot of women pick apples. And thus far I haven’t encountered any other trans-folks picking either.

I don’t think I’d be able to pick at the rate I do if I hadn’t farmed for seven months. And there’s something about desire in all of this. I want to stay in an agricultural or food-related business. As corny as it might sound, I like knowing where the apples are headed. Cider apples pay the least per bushel but someone’s going to be drinking cider from the apples I picked. Peeling apples pay a little better and then I know someone might make an apple pie using these apples I picked. On days when the weather’s nice, the stand at the orchard is alive with activity and I’ve picked plenty of bushels of fresh-eating apples that go directly to the stand.

At first glance picking apples would appear to be hard work. It is and it isn’t. I tune out the fact that I’ve got a bag of apples that weighs about 20 pounds hanging from my neck. Once I get past that I’m free to ruminate and meditate. There are things to think about. Like: what the fuck am I gonna do for the next forty years?

As the season for apple-picking winds down I’ll be spending my mornings in picking/walking meditation.

I’m open to insight. Please pray for me that she shows up. Soon.

New Day. New Blog.

Greetings and welcome to my new blog. I may have set the bar a bit high on this one but what I'd like to do with this blog is write even closer to the bone. It's true. I'd like more truth in my blogging.

I've spent the past seven months growing vegetables in Massashusetts. That might not seem like much but when you consider that I spent the nineteen years prior to that living in New York City, you can begin to see how living an agricultural life after living a hyper-urban life, might have "done something to me."

In this blog I am going to explore what was done to me. I'm not all that keen on dwelling on the past but in the interest of putting things in perspective I figure one has to look back on occasion.

I'm in search of the words that will describe who I was and who it is I've become.

May the Good Lord help me in my quest.

Sholan Farms