Bittersweet Symphony

That's the song, from the Verve, running through my head right now. In fact, here is the video on youtube. The point being that everything is changing from one day to the next but I'm still my self, if but a little different day to day.

I have a little black leather book. One of those modeled after that one author. You know, the guy who only wrote in specially made moleskin pocket notebooks. Mine is full of notes from the farm, poems from the web, and random thoughts. Since a sizable collection of words have grown inside the pages, I thought it best to write the next few journal entries as stories of the past. Much has been missed over the past few weeks. I will do my best in the recreation of past shenanigans!

Thoughts from the field:
The early days. Thoreau was never an organic farmer. For a while there, when I was a reclusive youth (yes, I indeed was), Thoreau was one of my idols. Run out into the bush, forget humanity, and become closer to nature. But I don't think Thoreau ever tried his literate hands at organic farming.

Organic farming, unlike other methods of farming, does not use pesticides, herbicides, or inorganic fertilizers. And as such there are weeds, weeds, weeds, and bugs, bugs, bugs abounding. For three days straight we workers were in the field weeding carrots.

Here is what a carrot looks like:



And here is where we have to find them:




The sad thing is that I can see one; even as I look at the photograph I want to pick it.

Difficult? Yes. Mind numbing? Only if you let it become so. See, the thing about weeding or any duty on the farm is the annoying tenacity it must maintain over the alert and attentive portion of the brain. Relax a little too far, get too deep into 'the groove', and you're accidentally yanking carrots or hoeing the heads off of cabbages instead of just the weeds.

I digress. The nature of the farm was a series of changing projects. We weeded carrots for three days. Worked on tomato plants for another three days. And started hoeing cabbages before returning to further weeding. All of the tasks, besides the tomato plants, demand the body to be in a bent position reminiscent of the pious monk. There was an ever present feeling between my shoulder blades as if someone had kicked me and left a sizable bruise. The weeding never stops. Cabbages that were planted the first night I was on the farm were already skirted with a soft green of weeds by the time I was leaving.

During the weeding I came to develop a healthy respect for the common weed. It grows quickly and often has a complex root structure or back-up plan in case it is pulled, along with prickly protection. Seriously, weeds don't want to go away. Too bad we can't eat weeds. That is my grand note.

I've added a bunch of photos! Feel free to look through. The green shack house is where I slept. It has two rooms and the other one became full of a Swede and a Frenchman later.