I am baack! (Also using a German computer and constantly struggling with the keypad).
Vacation was great. I went home to Chapel Hill to see my parents and my sister Christine for 10 days. During that time I slept in (greatest feeling ever), ate, saw a few friends, and played in the lovely fluffy snow of North Carolina. I miss fat,slow flakes and it melting and still looking pretty. Not only has snow meant immense fun in my childhood, but even a few days off of school or early dismissals. And early dismissals meant one thing - getting to watch Garfield, which always annoyingly played the 30 minutes before I normally got back from school. During the vacation, we also looked for some bridesmaid dress potentials (my oldest sister is getting married in June in the Redwood forest of CA), went swimming in a pool, saw a musical version of the "Christmas Carol" (filled with "hahaha"s and "ho ho ho"s!) and went to a slightly awkward and half-entertaining German party (some of them my parents knew). Who knew you could gather so many Germans in one house in Chapel Hill.
Christmas Eve was nice. We went to a Moravian Lovefeast at our Church and caught up with some youth leaders and Christians I hadn't spoken to in years. We drank a warm German wine concoction (pronounced glue-vine), sang, and opened a few presents. Christine promised to either help me visit her in MN or come visit here, the best present she could've given me. If you're reading this Christine, now it's online so that means it's official.
For New Years I took a 9hour megabus ride down to DC to visit my college friend MaryBeth and see another college friend Sara. MaryBeth lives in a 7-person LVC (Lutheran Volunteer Corps) house and we bond over the pros and cons of communal living. New Years Eve we had plenty of wine before heading out to a dance club where we danced the whole night and met guys from Swaziland who had Macalester connections. The rest of the weekend was resting, watching the intense movie of "The Last King of Scotland" (very good), and walking around monuments and other DC neighborhoods. I had a really good time and I was a little scared of coming back to Plowshare.
But now I'm here and things are looking up. It was exciting to see everyone and catch up with the volunteers. I have officially moved into the Red House and though I'm still transitioning (new responsibilities, no longer involved with the Hill House which I miss, and very creepy and loud noises from my walls and the heater in my room) I think this will help me feel more involved in the communal living thing. My room is almost always a sunny golden (when it's light out, of course) because of the windows and direction it faces, which I love.
Last night we celebrated Epiphany. The whole community ate warm rice pudding, three people found an almond that made them one of the wise kings for the night. I and two others sang solos for the "we three kings" song and the Christmas tree was lit (REAL candles, ahh) for the last time. It's moments like these that fill me with peace and content - it all feels right.
I was talking to my volunteer friend, Natalie, about her vacation. She spent it on the farm and two of her friends visited her for a short time. She described the situation as these people from the outside popping her balloon, shocking her with the reality of the world that goes on outside of Plowshare. I feel this way when I visit my brother, Boston, or home, when I read the newspaper and remember that horrendous things, exciting political decisions, war, all of that is still going on. I use the internet only a few times a week, watch a TV show once a week, and when I have time and spot a newspaper on the farm, soak that up maybe once a week. In a way, it is nice. I can focus more on myself, on how to deal with people and social challenges, and on nature. And it's not like that this experience on the farm doesn't expose me to diversity - I have never worked with people with special needs before, nor known anything about anthroposophy, eurythmy, social therapy, certain crafts, etc., so my eyes are definitely being opened. Still, I sometimes crave a more consistent connection with the bigger world. It is hard to, in the time and energy that I have left in the day, choose running to a computer to look up news over hanging out with the volunteers. At Macalester, that type of thing was much easier to be exposed to. But then again, Macalester is also a bubble. So when will I not be in a bubble? Maybe I need to love my bubble just a little bit more.
P.S. My sister, Heide, is working on this project and needs to collect $1700 more to make it happen. Check out the website if you're interested or think you can help: https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=522-244
Friday, January 7, 2011
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
chestnuts roasting on an open flame
Partly the cold grey weather, partly the "pre-vacation" jitters, partly other things, things feel strange on the farm. People are ready for a vacation.
Helene, the volunteer who also lives in the garden room with me (two rooms in the "garden room") is leaving to go to school in Germany at the end of the month. She had a 6-month contract and unfortunately she is very cool, so we will all miss her.
Last week the whole farm had lice. Ahh, childhood memories. I can't wait to take my teddy bear out of its plastic bag in a week.
Things will also change come January after our break. The two farmers who were hired in April are now fired. I wonder about the responsibility shifts. I requested having even one of my farm workshops change to an indoor craft workshop where I could have time to be creative once a week, but the boss didn't sound super receptive to that. I would also like to stay in my current room and continue the "floater" position, but despite my request may be moved in January anyway. I will stick to expressing my opinion and continue to lay out the pros and cons I see, and we'll see if that works.
Sometimes I have doubts about this place. Blogs are not the best medium to express them, but a decent way to show my mood.
Helene, the volunteer who also lives in the garden room with me (two rooms in the "garden room") is leaving to go to school in Germany at the end of the month. She had a 6-month contract and unfortunately she is very cool, so we will all miss her.
Last week the whole farm had lice. Ahh, childhood memories. I can't wait to take my teddy bear out of its plastic bag in a week.
Things will also change come January after our break. The two farmers who were hired in April are now fired. I wonder about the responsibility shifts. I requested having even one of my farm workshops change to an indoor craft workshop where I could have time to be creative once a week, but the boss didn't sound super receptive to that. I would also like to stay in my current room and continue the "floater" position, but despite my request may be moved in January anyway. I will stick to expressing my opinion and continue to lay out the pros and cons I see, and we'll see if that works.
Sometimes I have doubts about this place. Blogs are not the best medium to express them, but a decent way to show my mood.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
(in)sane in the membrane
What unusual weather lately - this morning I took a long walk in a t-shirt to dim sunlight and 4 days earlier it was snowing tiny little balls (you could hardly call 'em snowflakes at how round and compact they were!) on a crisp and very windy day. That crisp and windy day I was helping to build a garden coop (like a greenhouse), standing on the very top edge of the tractor scooper, holding on to the plastic cover for dear life while the workers down below wired the plastic on. I would say staple gunning the coop for a few hours was the highlight of that day...felt like a real farmer woman.
So it's been a while since my last entry, guess I have been choosing sleep and socializing over publicity. But I'll try to remember what's happened since...
-had a really fun weekend with volunteer Natalie and Macalester friends (Jen Agans, Emily Heckel, Sara Gottlieb, Kate Ganong) dancing in Boston. It was a little strange having a Mac crew in such a different part of the country, but just as good as the old times :) We even ran into Emily the next day at a Lush store and I got to talk with my sister Heide from Honduras for her 15 min free phone call! We stayed late enough to see white christmas lights brighten up the night streets. This made me crave a Christmas tree lighting service, like in Chapel Hill where people would sing, eat free cookies and hot cider and see an enormous tree get lit. I'm excited to go home for winter break and maybe see the Nutcracker with my small family crew of 4 this year.
-Marc visited me at the farm and stayed over Sunday night. He got to eat a delicious home-cooked meal, meet some of the characters here (including the volunteers), go for a walk in the woods/get a tour of the place, and eat at the Peterborough diner. He also gifted me a "sudoku for dummies" book which has already commenced to drive me crazy, but nonetheless keep me busier :)
-i'm learning how to knit, learning being the key word
-i've started singing Christmas carols with three other people (a couple and another volunteer, Helene) Monday nights. The idea is that we'll walk around from house to house with a recorder/pitch pipe and sing them for people before vacation starts Dec 18. We're practicing "In the Bleak Midwinter," "Lo, How a Rose 'Er Blooming" (in German), "Noel Nouvelet," and "Gloria" (or is it called hark how the angels sing? I mostly recognize it as Gloooooooo-ooooooooooooooo-oooooooooooooo-ooooooooooooooooooriia!).
-a while ago I saw this cool movie, I think it's just called Temple Grandin, about Temple Grandin, a woman who has her phD in Animal Behavior and was the first Autistic person to really explain what it meant to be Autistic. Because of her, the majority of American slaughterhouses have been redesigned to fit her more calming and logical model of how to move and kill cows. I highly recommend seeing the movie.
This week is Thanksgiving week so we have 7 new residents taking holiday here, but it's not overwhelming because about that many of our residents are spending Thanksgiving with their former caretakers or friends. We have no workshops that day (just helping to cook) and we each eat in a house instead of in the main building as they did last year (which WAS overwhelming, trying to arrange for 70+ people). We hope to play a couple rounds of (tag?) football to bring in a taste of America. And I hope to jump on into the giant hot tub right outside of the farm's founder's house to finish the day off. At the end of the week, I get to go to Trish and Owen's (Owen went to the peace corps with my mom, and they've been family friends since) in Hartford, Connecticut. No specific plans on my end - the refreshment of just being somewhere new, even if I'm just relaxing at their house, is plenty satisfying for me :)
Reading a blog entry like this makes it sound like I'm always busy and always doing something. It is true that I'm lucky to have access to a car (though it's dying by the day, with every new fix it needs) and live only a state or two apart from my brother and friends. That said, there is a lot of down time, time to be by yourself, time to try to come up with a motivational activity, time to think, time to feel lazy. At school, at least half of that time was taken up by homework and studying, or planning the social moments when you weren't doing that. I would feel like I needed more time to myself, more time to reflect. Now I feel like I could go crazy with my thoughts and being by myself. I think about rituals that I can do by myself to keep me focused, like reading or sudoku. I never thought I would say this, but I miss having to do some homework to keep my mind a little straight.
The nice thing is that a lot of the volunteers feel that way and we talk about it. They're a good group of people. Between them and the woods, I remain more sane.
***If you'd like to check out some photos of the farm and us, go to this site: http://www.fredgoldsmithphotography.com/gallery/PlowshareFarmAutumn2010/
So it's been a while since my last entry, guess I have been choosing sleep and socializing over publicity. But I'll try to remember what's happened since...
-had a really fun weekend with volunteer Natalie and Macalester friends (Jen Agans, Emily Heckel, Sara Gottlieb, Kate Ganong) dancing in Boston. It was a little strange having a Mac crew in such a different part of the country, but just as good as the old times :) We even ran into Emily the next day at a Lush store and I got to talk with my sister Heide from Honduras for her 15 min free phone call! We stayed late enough to see white christmas lights brighten up the night streets. This made me crave a Christmas tree lighting service, like in Chapel Hill where people would sing, eat free cookies and hot cider and see an enormous tree get lit. I'm excited to go home for winter break and maybe see the Nutcracker with my small family crew of 4 this year.
-Marc visited me at the farm and stayed over Sunday night. He got to eat a delicious home-cooked meal, meet some of the characters here (including the volunteers), go for a walk in the woods/get a tour of the place, and eat at the Peterborough diner. He also gifted me a "sudoku for dummies" book which has already commenced to drive me crazy, but nonetheless keep me busier :)
-i'm learning how to knit, learning being the key word
-i've started singing Christmas carols with three other people (a couple and another volunteer, Helene) Monday nights. The idea is that we'll walk around from house to house with a recorder/pitch pipe and sing them for people before vacation starts Dec 18. We're practicing "In the Bleak Midwinter," "Lo, How a Rose 'Er Blooming" (in German), "Noel Nouvelet," and "Gloria" (or is it called hark how the angels sing? I mostly recognize it as Gloooooooo-ooooooooooooooo-oooooooooooooo-ooooooooooooooooooriia!).
-a while ago I saw this cool movie, I think it's just called Temple Grandin, about Temple Grandin, a woman who has her phD in Animal Behavior and was the first Autistic person to really explain what it meant to be Autistic. Because of her, the majority of American slaughterhouses have been redesigned to fit her more calming and logical model of how to move and kill cows. I highly recommend seeing the movie.
This week is Thanksgiving week so we have 7 new residents taking holiday here, but it's not overwhelming because about that many of our residents are spending Thanksgiving with their former caretakers or friends. We have no workshops that day (just helping to cook) and we each eat in a house instead of in the main building as they did last year (which WAS overwhelming, trying to arrange for 70+ people). We hope to play a couple rounds of (tag?) football to bring in a taste of America. And I hope to jump on into the giant hot tub right outside of the farm's founder's house to finish the day off. At the end of the week, I get to go to Trish and Owen's (Owen went to the peace corps with my mom, and they've been family friends since) in Hartford, Connecticut. No specific plans on my end - the refreshment of just being somewhere new, even if I'm just relaxing at their house, is plenty satisfying for me :)
Reading a blog entry like this makes it sound like I'm always busy and always doing something. It is true that I'm lucky to have access to a car (though it's dying by the day, with every new fix it needs) and live only a state or two apart from my brother and friends. That said, there is a lot of down time, time to be by yourself, time to try to come up with a motivational activity, time to think, time to feel lazy. At school, at least half of that time was taken up by homework and studying, or planning the social moments when you weren't doing that. I would feel like I needed more time to myself, more time to reflect. Now I feel like I could go crazy with my thoughts and being by myself. I think about rituals that I can do by myself to keep me focused, like reading or sudoku. I never thought I would say this, but I miss having to do some homework to keep my mind a little straight.
The nice thing is that a lot of the volunteers feel that way and we talk about it. They're a good group of people. Between them and the woods, I remain more sane.
***If you'd like to check out some photos of the farm and us, go to this site: http://www.fredgoldsmithphotography.com/gallery/PlowshareFarmAutumn2010/
Monday, November 1, 2010
hee hee ee ee eee...
That's the closest impersonation I can do of one of the resident's witch cackles. She has short grey hair and is nearing her 50s, is a witch every year for Halloween, and does the cutest witch cackle. She'll be mid- "blahblah" (repeating sentences), I'll start to do Halloween noises and for 5 seconds she'll break out into them with me. I also love chasing her with these small felted ghosts around the house, particularly the night before Halloween when our power went out :)
Halloween was fun - on Friday the whole community went to a Halloween party at Lucas community (similar to ours, but with less capable residents). It was great to see everyone in the outfits - Elvis, the costumes where it looks like you're piggy back riding on an ostrich or person, cleopatra, Groucho Marx's (I was one of them), etc. I was a little creeped out by two residents who were completely covered in masks and robes and would stand very close and still to you. heh. There were first a couple games (tie a balloon around your leg and pop everyone else's before yours gets popped, musical chairs), then good dance music, and lastly desert and a play of the children's book about "the little old lady" who wasn't scared of anything.
On Saturday the volunteers went to a house party in Peterborough that was like a small college party. We had considered driving to Keene to crash frat parties afterwards (putting the Germans in the front line so their accents and foreign appeal would get us in), but decided we would do that another weekend.
This week seemed pretty busy since on Thursday night the whole community also went to a professional Eurythmy performance in Keene. At first I had to mentally calm down to try to take it seriously - all the women were completely straight-faced, but their bodies were SOO expreSSIVE and Rudolf STEIner, mOOOVing to the poems that were being read, that it was hard for me to access it. But as the performance went on, there was a little more music and a few humorous pieces that I ended up really enjoying it. I remembered how much I miss being a part of and seeing musical/dance performance and how easy school has made it for me to access that. I occasionally drum in one of the houses when people aren't around to make it a private performance, and I often dance in my room, but I could always use more music.
In other news, my brother Niels' family is expecting a baby boy in March!! I'm so excited for a new cute nephew :)
That's all for now, I don't have Thanksgiving off but I might see Marc a few days later. Time is going by pretty fast here, and before I know it I'll be back home for Christmas (which I am already looking forward to). Stay healthy as the weather turns cold and VOTE tomorrow!
Halloween was fun - on Friday the whole community went to a Halloween party at Lucas community (similar to ours, but with less capable residents). It was great to see everyone in the outfits - Elvis, the costumes where it looks like you're piggy back riding on an ostrich or person, cleopatra, Groucho Marx's (I was one of them), etc. I was a little creeped out by two residents who were completely covered in masks and robes and would stand very close and still to you. heh. There were first a couple games (tie a balloon around your leg and pop everyone else's before yours gets popped, musical chairs), then good dance music, and lastly desert and a play of the children's book about "the little old lady" who wasn't scared of anything.
On Saturday the volunteers went to a house party in Peterborough that was like a small college party. We had considered driving to Keene to crash frat parties afterwards (putting the Germans in the front line so their accents and foreign appeal would get us in), but decided we would do that another weekend.
This week seemed pretty busy since on Thursday night the whole community also went to a professional Eurythmy performance in Keene. At first I had to mentally calm down to try to take it seriously - all the women were completely straight-faced, but their bodies were SOO expreSSIVE and Rudolf STEIner, mOOOVing to the poems that were being read, that it was hard for me to access it. But as the performance went on, there was a little more music and a few humorous pieces that I ended up really enjoying it. I remembered how much I miss being a part of and seeing musical/dance performance and how easy school has made it for me to access that. I occasionally drum in one of the houses when people aren't around to make it a private performance, and I often dance in my room, but I could always use more music.
In other news, my brother Niels' family is expecting a baby boy in March!! I'm so excited for a new cute nephew :)
That's all for now, I don't have Thanksgiving off but I might see Marc a few days later. Time is going by pretty fast here, and before I know it I'll be back home for Christmas (which I am already looking forward to). Stay healthy as the weather turns cold and VOTE tomorrow!
Saturday, October 16, 2010
¡arriba!
Having fun with other people is always nice of course, but this alone party I´m having right now is highly satisfying. My brother, Marc, is on dorm duty right now and I decided to arrive at his mansion apartment before he got back home tonight. (Marc is a Spanish teacher and assistant soccer coach for Tilton High, a boarding school whose dorm halls look 5x nicer than any Macalester one). After having dropped my things off at the apartment, I took a crisp fall walk around the campus (seriously, Marc, how did you land this one again?). Now I am listening to his latin pop, sipping on Newcastles, and excitedly using technology. What a party! Seriously.
Ok, it´s not like I don´t see computers or TVs on the farm. In fact, I started watching Glee last Tuesday and go online every few days. I´m just saying that they have become a little more exciting since I´ve been here.
News from the farm:
-my favorite dog on the farm, and one of three total (a 1-yr old black and white mutt cutie pie) bit the finger of the resident who occasionally hits people and curses like it´s tourettes...though the dog has never bit anyone else, she had to be taken away, by law, immediately. I´ll miss you, Bailey :(
-I went out last night with two volunteers and a house mother (she´s the hip one). She was probably the loudest hollerer for the cover band and did not hold back dancing one bit. After a fun-filled night at the bar (mysterious butt-grabbings and all), we pulled a classic move and ate fried food at the diner. Good times.
-I got my hair chopped off one night when the volunteers and I were particularly inspired. I essentially got a bob cut and my neck even had to be shaved! It´s the shortest I´ve ever had it, and I think it´s growing on me...ha, literally AND figuratively.
-I´m still excited for Halloween but don´t know what to dress up as...any ideas?
Sending my love,
Lisa
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
crunchy:
The leaves, the granola, and many of the people here are that.
I'm already getting excited about Halloween. I hear that we go to Lucas community (a similar one to Plowshare but in Temple, NH) for a Halloween party and it's really fun to see everyone in costume and getting excited about candy and spooky things. I really enjoy being silly with the residents but have to control myself in the work place (occasionally), so I'm looking forward to that not mattering at all. I also look forward to playing more jokes on the volunteers, considering I went to bed last night with rocks from Portsmouth stuck under my pillow. Vengeance is mine.
Four of us went to Portsmouth yesterday and it was ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS. The town is cute and has a lot of nice shops with samples (tribute to Mom and Dad). It was so freeing to smell salty air, walk along the beach and nearly jump into the water. I started thinking of my grandpa (Opa) and how he (and mom) grew up with the sea and delicious fresh sea food. As much of a mountain girl as I am, I can imagine loving spending more time by the ocean.
What a contrast to earlier in the week which was rainy, cold and a little dramatic. I switched one of my shifts to see my brother Marc help coach a soccer game at the high school nearby - despite the constant downpour, I was very happy to see him in his element. The other coach seems like a Marc-kinda guy, with Marc-kinda humor :) When I got back, though, it turns out I had upset someone because I hadn't told every step of the chain that someone else was covering my shift. While many of you are probably confused by my whole work situation and schedule, the gist of it is that there are many people involved and the chain of commands confuses me. I'm pretty sure miscommunications like this will happen the rest of the year, like they do in life, but here it starts to become the biggest newsflash of the day :)
Speaking of small-town/small-community things, I also went to Milford's Pumpkin Fest this past weekend (one is in Keene next weekend - yay!). Basically what that means is: 1 pumpkin per 30 min is shot out of a 20-ft long gun/tube to splatter half a mile down into a corn field (oo, ahh!), food like hot dogs that are "oh so gross" to Germans used to brats, music, a few booths, and 5 GIANT a** pumpkins that won "biggest pumpkin of the year" contest. I think the largest one weighed in at 1,800 lbs! A friend and I were fantacizing about carving one of them out for a jack-o-lantern, and then hanging out of the mouth pretending to writhe in pain when kids get their candy. Or, having two small children rest their heads poking out of the eye holes. I hope they do something good with those pumpkins.
I'm already getting excited about Halloween. I hear that we go to Lucas community (a similar one to Plowshare but in Temple, NH) for a Halloween party and it's really fun to see everyone in costume and getting excited about candy and spooky things. I really enjoy being silly with the residents but have to control myself in the work place (occasionally), so I'm looking forward to that not mattering at all. I also look forward to playing more jokes on the volunteers, considering I went to bed last night with rocks from Portsmouth stuck under my pillow. Vengeance is mine.
Four of us went to Portsmouth yesterday and it was ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS. The town is cute and has a lot of nice shops with samples (tribute to Mom and Dad). It was so freeing to smell salty air, walk along the beach and nearly jump into the water. I started thinking of my grandpa (Opa) and how he (and mom) grew up with the sea and delicious fresh sea food. As much of a mountain girl as I am, I can imagine loving spending more time by the ocean.
What a contrast to earlier in the week which was rainy, cold and a little dramatic. I switched one of my shifts to see my brother Marc help coach a soccer game at the high school nearby - despite the constant downpour, I was very happy to see him in his element. The other coach seems like a Marc-kinda guy, with Marc-kinda humor :) When I got back, though, it turns out I had upset someone because I hadn't told every step of the chain that someone else was covering my shift. While many of you are probably confused by my whole work situation and schedule, the gist of it is that there are many people involved and the chain of commands confuses me. I'm pretty sure miscommunications like this will happen the rest of the year, like they do in life, but here it starts to become the biggest newsflash of the day :)
Speaking of small-town/small-community things, I also went to Milford's Pumpkin Fest this past weekend (one is in Keene next weekend - yay!). Basically what that means is: 1 pumpkin per 30 min is shot out of a 20-ft long gun/tube to splatter half a mile down into a corn field (oo, ahh!), food like hot dogs that are "oh so gross" to Germans used to brats, music, a few booths, and 5 GIANT a** pumpkins that won "biggest pumpkin of the year" contest. I think the largest one weighed in at 1,800 lbs! A friend and I were fantacizing about carving one of them out for a jack-o-lantern, and then hanging out of the mouth pretending to writhe in pain when kids get their candy. Or, having two small children rest their heads poking out of the eye holes. I hope they do something good with those pumpkins.
Monday, October 4, 2010
Poopy horns
The title of this entry is an example of what makes this farm "unique," or nonconventional, or hippie, or integrative...at Plowshare, there's always something odd, funny, or quirky going on.
So this past Wednesday was St. Michaelmas Day, celebrating the coming Autumn season and representing courage in the face of change. St. Michael is an Aarchangel and is brought up in secular and Christian settings. There's a whole lot about Plowshare, anthroposophy and the spirituality here that I don't understand (yet?) but basically on Wednesday the Plowshare residents and a few neighbors paraded around the farm, following the beat of a drum, 4 guys in a dragon suit, someone dressed as a princess, a prince, St. Michael and the narrator. A play of the dragon being (gently) wounded and the princess being saved by St. Michael ensued, along with being (accidentally?) pelted with flower bulbs that we would later plant in front of our houses.We ate a big fall harvest feast, after having all shoveled a little bit of soil over horns filled with fresh cow poop.
I was in that morning workshop. It was hard for me not to chuckle the whole time as the residents sat down on buckets around freshly shoveled poo. Apparently it's a common biodynamic practice, to fill cow horns with manure and bury them in the soil until spring time when they've produced this (apparently wonderfully smelling) compost to be spread over the crops. One of the residents "Mike" is this hilarious, loud New Jerseyan who looks like he could be a pizza boy and DJ, and he kept asking "Lisa is this poop? Is this poop that you're spilling all over my hands??" as I would attempt to precisely scoop spoonfulls of it into the horn. There are pictures, don't worry.
In other news, I went to the White Mountains this weekend with two volunteers and had a lot of fun. We first struggled with the fire and slept in a freezing tent (thankfully I had a real sleeping bag). But, it was beautiful there. We hiked and sat along rivers to eat, though the trail we picked happened to be really confusing and we got lost, marching through marshy waters --> cold, wet feet all day. When things like that happen, I imagine all of the people who thru-hike and backpack for long periods of time, and I feel very comfortable :)
I think that's all for now. I'm going to try to visit my brother, Marc, either this weekend or soon (he works at a boarding school in Tilton, NH) which I'm really looking forward to.
Love,
Lisa
P.S. We've finally started making pizza! We made 20 (and a little heart-shaped bread dough, made by moi) last Thursday...can't wait to start getting fancy with 'em.
So this past Wednesday was St. Michaelmas Day, celebrating the coming Autumn season and representing courage in the face of change. St. Michael is an Aarchangel and is brought up in secular and Christian settings. There's a whole lot about Plowshare, anthroposophy and the spirituality here that I don't understand (yet?) but basically on Wednesday the Plowshare residents and a few neighbors paraded around the farm, following the beat of a drum, 4 guys in a dragon suit, someone dressed as a princess, a prince, St. Michael and the narrator. A play of the dragon being (gently) wounded and the princess being saved by St. Michael ensued, along with being (accidentally?) pelted with flower bulbs that we would later plant in front of our houses.We ate a big fall harvest feast, after having all shoveled a little bit of soil over horns filled with fresh cow poop.
I was in that morning workshop. It was hard for me not to chuckle the whole time as the residents sat down on buckets around freshly shoveled poo. Apparently it's a common biodynamic practice, to fill cow horns with manure and bury them in the soil until spring time when they've produced this (apparently wonderfully smelling) compost to be spread over the crops. One of the residents "Mike" is this hilarious, loud New Jerseyan who looks like he could be a pizza boy and DJ, and he kept asking "Lisa is this poop? Is this poop that you're spilling all over my hands??" as I would attempt to precisely scoop spoonfulls of it into the horn. There are pictures, don't worry.
In other news, I went to the White Mountains this weekend with two volunteers and had a lot of fun. We first struggled with the fire and slept in a freezing tent (thankfully I had a real sleeping bag). But, it was beautiful there. We hiked and sat along rivers to eat, though the trail we picked happened to be really confusing and we got lost, marching through marshy waters --> cold, wet feet all day. When things like that happen, I imagine all of the people who thru-hike and backpack for long periods of time, and I feel very comfortable :)
I think that's all for now. I'm going to try to visit my brother, Marc, either this weekend or soon (he works at a boarding school in Tilton, NH) which I'm really looking forward to.
Love,
Lisa
P.S. We've finally started making pizza! We made 20 (and a little heart-shaped bread dough, made by moi) last Thursday...can't wait to start getting fancy with 'em.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)