Home is in a Garden
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Not the Usual Light Fare
Ok, so I’m just going to put this out there. I own a handgun. A Smith & Wesson M&P 9mm. I’ve had it for a few years now. Let me tell you why.
I’m what they call a “plinker” – a target shooter. I went to a class at Smith & Wesson years ago called First Shots. Their description is as follows – “First Shots has helped ranges across the country introduce thousands of individuals to shooting and firearm safety. Developed by the National Shooting Sports Foundation and hosted by independent shooting facilities, the program provides participants with a comprehensive introduction to shooting by qualified range operators and instructors that includes firearm safety, local ownership requirements, shooting fundamentals, hands-on instruction and how and where to continue.” At that class we spent a little over 2 hours in a class room and took 10 shots from a 22 revolver. I took it because shooting a gun was on my bucket list. I am a very good shot. I was hooked.
Maybe 2 months later I took the CT pistol permit course and then applied for a permit. That took another 2 months. I have to tell you that Bill and I did think twice about all of the information that was required – background checks, fingerprinting but most intrusive an interview with town policeman who also had the contact information for at least 3 of our neighbors.
After we purchased our handguns we began target shooting on a semi regular basis. We are both very competitive and have fun seeing who’s the best shot.
There is so much going on with the debate about guns I just wanted to add my two cents worth. I don’t think I ever thought of owning a gun for any other reason than to shoot targets. For me, having a weapon in my possession I see as an awesome responsibility. Awesome as in a little scary, not in awesome that’s cool. Guns are dangerous, life threatening dangerous. I don’t believe in killing anything so using it for that purpose has never really entered my mind. But knowing that also builds a hefty amount of respect. I like target shooting because I know it’s something I am really pretty good at, something that I can continue to improve upon. Years of photography gave me a very steady hand and I understand how to breathe to get the best result. I also know that one bad move and someone (or myself) is hurt or dead.
Something happened last week that made the hair stand up on the back of my neck though. Since the Newtown shooting the rhetoric about gun control has been off of the charts. There are so many “plans” out there for what to do about it. Since the shooting Bill and I both said we should probably go get more ammunition because word had it there were places that were just out of it. I’d read on websites about it being difficult to get and I hadn’t been shooting that much recently anyway. Friday night we took a trip to our local gun shop. Let me preface this all by saying this is not a small gun shop – they had guns, a lot of guns. Many handguns but hundreds of long arms. When we got out of the truck in the parking lot my heart sank – there wasn’t a single long gun in the entire store. There were very few pistols and almost all of the ammunition was gone. We’re talking a place that had aisles of ammunition. Everything that had been in that shop had been sold – everything – bare walls, racks, display cases.
At that moment I realized just how scary this whole gun thing is. These are all firearms that were purchased legally. In the state of CT you don’t need a permit to buy a rifle or a shotgun (I’m pretty sure that’s the way it is in most states).The real question that comes to mind is what can we do about all of the illegal firearms that are floating around all over the country? The time for gun control was probably 30 years ago before manufacturing geared up to make available multiple guns for every member of society. Everything’s a business model. The one thing the U.S. knows how to do is manufacture arms – we always have.
I have to say that I blame some the current situation on the media. There is such a culture of fear now. I listened to Lindsey Graham make a comment during the recent hearing in D.C. about an AR-15 being a better choice for those who wanted to protect themselves from the post-apocalyptic ‘marauding horde.’ Joe Biden thinks a shotgun would be a better bet. WHAAATT?!?!?!? Now I like post-apocalyptic dystopian literature as much as the next person but I see it as FICTION. The CDC has been using Zombie Apocalypse as a catalyst for preparation – they have a poster that reads “If you’re ready for a zombie apocalypse then you’re ready for any emergency.”
So there it is. We are living on a smaller and smaller planet with more and more guns while whipping the population into a frenzy about zombies and social collapse. Brilliant, simply brilliant. . . . not.
Thinking Local
A couple of days ago I received an order for yarn from Green Mountain Spinnery. Until I read the tag I had no idea that they were in Putney, VT which is about 45 miles from Rowe. They are a co-op and spin the majority of their yarn from New England fleeces. This is for a project I will be doing in a knit-along with Ruth Fischer-Ticknor. You can read about it on her Counting Sheep blog. It is a beautiful yarn.
As I was winding the skeins into balls I started thinking about having a garment made from wool that was processed so close to home. I’ve gradually become more of a locavore in the past few years and have begun to see that mindset seep into everything I do. I grow and preserve a lot of food from my garden every year. I get all of my dairy from Smyth’s Trinity Farm in Enfield, CT where I can talk cheese making with someone who works with dairy on a larger scale. We buy a side of beef from Russell in Heath once a year – grass, sunshine, fresh water, nothing else goes into these cows. We also make our own maple syrup with him. My eggs come from my sister next door where I’ve watched those hens from hatchlings. Our sausages, bacon and other assorted smoked meats come from Pekarski’s in South Deerfield. Mike Pekarski is a very generous man and rightfully proud of his smokehouse – he will tell or show me how things are made, right there, with the help of his family. In the summer there are a few farms that I frequent for pick your own produce that augments what I am putting up at the time. Although the farmers there don’t know me by name they instantly recognize me when I arrive. I thought, until I started writing this, that it was more important to know how far my food had travelled but I now realize that I have friendships that have been built over time with all of the people who are raising much of my food.
Preparing and eating food that you trust gives you a peace of mind that is difficult to really describe. There is nothing that makes me feel better than to prepare a meal where I know where everything came from, I’ve visited its source, I know who’s hands have been on it. I know that if I didn’t grow it myself I have contributed to the livelihood of people that have become my friends or have been for a long time. By doing that I am contributing to my local economy. So I try to get what I need within the 100 mile radius that is often talked about. Purchasing fiber that I needed for a project from less than 100 miles away made me feel that there are so many other ways I can think about being local. I personally know at least 3 people that are raising fiber animals. Although I didn’t buy their fiber I know that I am still contributing to their type of local economy as well. Yes, things cost a little more but doesn’t it feel better when you know that the money you are spending is going directly into the pockets of people you know rather than some huge corporation with the farmer essentially getting paid just enough to keep going? It’s worth thinking about.
This is my 100th post! Thank you so much to all who read, follow and comment on it.
Red Sky at Dawning …
I’m not sure there is any weather on the way but the sunrise this morning was beyond compare. Sometimes a photo can’t do justice to the scene. It is COLD. The kind of cold that makes your face hurt as soon as you open the door. The dogs stay out just long enough to do what they have to do. It is so still the only thing you can hear is you electric meter running. When you walk the snow crunches beneath your feet. This is winter, it seems like I haven’t seen it for sometime. It feels restorative to me this year – quiet, restful. In another month we will be gearing up for spring and be thankful for this time of rest.
Change
We cling to our own point of view, as though everything depended on it. Yet our opinions have no permanence; like autumn and winter, they gradually pass away.
Zhuangzi
There is a special town meeting tonight in Rowe about plans moving forward regarding the school. I am going. I need to be surrounded by townspeople to understand how they are feeling about the whole thing. I will be living there soon enough so any decisions that are made will effect me.
Change is always difficult for everyone, especially when it is sudden. The loss of the elementary school was a shock and a blow to the people of Rowe. The remains of the building are still there 7 months after the fire. Every time I drive by it I just wish it was gone. There is something to be said for it still being there though. It means that everyone has had time to go through their stages of grief if they needed to. The wound isn’t so raw. I think it has given us all more time to think about what the town needs as opposed to a knee jerk reaction to the loss.
I think that is something we are seeing far too much of these days, that knee jerk reaction to our problems. There is no foresight. No one thinks about how anything is going to affect us 15 to 20 years down the line. You see it with gun control, energy policy, climate change. Events are reacted to rather than analyzed. Do something to fix it right now without thought about what that means in the future. Just look like you’re getting something done.
I’d like to see thoughtful consideration given to what the town needs. Put the needs before the wants. Look at it from the perspective of 5, 10, 30 years from now. Rowe is the kind of place where properties are handed down for generations so forethought is needed. It’s easy to feel like you have lost all control due to the actions of others when it comes to the future of our kids, I know I do a lot of the time. I just hope because this town is truly run as a democracy that every issue is taken into consideration and everyone will feel a need to vote on their future.
Brrrrrr . . .
This photograph was taken on July 19, 2012. It was a hot, humid day and I was spending it moving this pot of flowers around to keep it in the shade. It was too hot to plant it in the new perennial garden until the sun went down so I just kept moving it and watering. The bees loved it. They would follow it on its trips around the yard.
Don’t get me wrong I like winter. I love it when it is so cold out the snow crunches under your feet. I love the winter activities. I love having fires both inside and out (burn season started the 15th). What I don’t like is the temperature dropping to 8 degrees and the wind blowing that fine snow in 30 mph gusts. Not fun. You can’t even dress for that.
So today I’ll look through my photographs of gardens past and peruse the seed catalogs one more time and dream about it being May.
Outbuilding
out·build·ing – (out
b
l
dng)
n. A building separate from but associated with a main building.
There are a few outbuildings on Fort Pelham Farm. Some were there when we arrived in 1967, some were put up after we got there. The interesting part about some of these buildings is the reason they are there. The buildings in the photograph were built by my father to house a Chase Sawmill that he purchased in the early ’70’s from Gerald Truesdell.
My father has always been a tinkerer and collector of large machinery – especially if it could be run on steam. His big dream was to own a locomotive and have tracks running around the property – it didn’t happen. Along those lines though he amassed collection of very large machines. I remember it starting with the sawmill. He built the original building to house it and set it up to run with the diesel power unit that came with it. It took a while to work the bugs out of it. I remember on one of the first runs the carriage running off of its tracks and firing through the building wall – he kept it open for a while after that. He ran it quite often and did it all by himself.
Shortly after getting the mill he purchased a small steam engine to power it. I remember him buying a boiler that had once been in a laundry in Shelburne Falls. I was working at Lamson & Goodnow at the time and spent the better part of a morning upstairs in one of the buildings there watching the riggers pull it out of the roof of a building across the river. I think I was really wondering how he was going to get that huge thing into his mill. I can’t recall if this particular piece of equipment was put in by riggers or if he managed to get it in himself.
One of the amazing things about my Dad was his ability to move huge, heavy things by himself. He was a master of block and tackle. He worked on this project for a long time, fabricating the things he needed to get this steam engine running. This all was happening during the Carter years when there was a huge interest in renewable energy and he got a grant to help pay for some of the materials he needed. When he decided to do something there wasn’t anything that was going to get in his way. The mill was glorious to watch run on steam once he had it set up. The only real sound was the saw blade cutting through the wood.
He built the building that is currently there after snow collapsed the original one. The boards on the outside were ones he sawed himself as well as the ones on the garage. The mill currently sits idle but with a little effort it will be running again only with a diesel power unit this time. We look forward to cutting some of our own boards for use in other projects around the place. There is a lot to be said for having this capability. Just being able to replace siding on this outbuilding from your own woodlot is a win. Not to mention the satisfaction of knowing that everything you’ve used has come from your property.
1978 Running the Mill
It’s That Time of the Year
Many people are getting their seed catalogs out and pouring through them this time of year. It’s good to do a little planning and have your seeds ready to go whether you need to start your tomatoes in the house, are sowing some seed in your hot or cold frame or are just thinking about what will go where in the garden this year.
I’m a planner, it’s one of my favorite parts. I plan what I’m going to plant and where it’s going to go in the garden this year. I plan what plants will be next to the others keeping companion planting in mind. I plan different designs because I hate how boring it is to look at a garden with plants in rows. I pour over the charts I’ve kept in past years to make sure I don’t plant the tomatoes and potatoes in the same place year after year.
I work on an order with High Mowing Organic Seeds that I continue to change week after week from October on, waiting until the last minute to place it. I read their website for all the info I can gather about the new seeds I want to try growing. There are always the tried and true to grow like last year’s Gold Rush yellow snap bean. I cannot say enough about this bean, it was prolific. I started picking beans in July and picked them until frost. They weren’t those tough, tasteless beans either. They were tender and tasty until the very end. I lost count of how many pints I canned but I know Sue and I complained towards the end of the season every time we picked enough beans to can once more. Of course now I’m glad I did.
The other plant I grew this year and introduced to everyone I knew was Joan Rutabagas. I grow them every year and was a little in awe at how few people had never tried rutabagas (probably because they are my favorite vegetable). They require a fairly long growing season but are very cold hardy so they weren’t dug until well into October. I fed them to everyone.
Every year I pick one or two new plants to try. Some work out very well like the Gold Rush beans. Some don’t
but I feel like I haven’t given it a real chance unless I plant it a couple of years in a row. Each growing season is so different. Here’s the problem, every year there are more and more things I want to plant but I don’t have the space to plant them all. I have to cut down my list of seeds.
Sad, sad.
There are currently 27 items in my cart. I probably should get rid of half.
What it really makes me do is plan a new garden in another spot on the property. It’s always some nice piece of lawn that Bill has worked on for years. He’s not going to like this.
The Story of Chester, Part One
Chester came to us in a rather round about way. Yes, we adopted him but we didn’t go to a shelter or read about him in the paper. We took him because Nadia ( in the photograph) couldn’t keep him anymore. I asked her to tell me about Chester so it could be the beginning of his story.
Nadia picked up Oreo (his name then) on June 24, 2011 after seeing his photograph in a Craigslist listing for northern VT. The people that had him were about to move and couldn’t take him with them. When Nadia called them they told her they were leaving that day and they were just going to leave him at the house they were moving out of.
They were abandoning him.
Nadia arrived at their house as they were leaving with their Uhaul. She brought him home to live with her and her then boyfriend. She loved him, he was her baby. How could you not?
I first heard about this puppy in July. Daughter Amanda and her boyfriend, Yusuf were wondering about the wisdom of getting a puppy when you’re starting college in the fall. Nadia is Yusuf’s sister. Towards the middle of August I got a text from Amanda telling me that Oreo needed a forever home and did I know anyone that would take him?
Nadia had had a falling out with her boyfriend and came to stay with Amanda and Yusuf with the pup in tow. At some point she decided she was going back but couldn’t bring the dog and wanted to make sure he went to a good home. She really didn’t want to let go but I think she was trying to protect him from an abusive situation, I don’t know, we haven’t talked about it.
Amanda sent me this photograph on her phone with the message, “Isn’t he cute?”.
Sigh.
On August 13 we went boating with Amanda and Nadia who brought Oreo so we could meet him. That night Bill and I talked about how much we like this dog. He was the perfect size and was very sweet but . . . we had two other dogs, did we really want to contribute to the madness we already had?
On August 19th we brought him home.
I’ve had dogs for over 30 years, only one other did I rescue and I lived to regret it. I believe that every animal comes to us for a reason, they have a job to do although we are never privy to what that is. Chester moved through two lives before he came to us. I honestly think he came to Nadia to force her onto another path.
He still loves Nadia. She came to dinner for Thanksgiving this year. Chester was pretty excited about all of the company in the house and all of the potential ball throwers that were gathered in one spot so he didn’t really notice Nadia right away. When he did he practically leaped into her lap wagging his tail in a frantic, crazy way and licked her face. He was soooooo happy to see her.
It always amazes me that they remember so much. I think we dismiss them too readily, we don’t give them credit for how deeply they feel things. People write them off as “just” a dog. I think in some respects they carry around as much baggage as we do but they are much more willing to move on and away from the ills that have befallen them in the past. In some respects they are quite simple, if you love them they will love you back. I have found that just loving a dog can help change a lot of bad things. I think we can all learn a lesson from this behavior. Live for right now, the past made you somewhat who you are but the present can be what you make of it – let the crap go.
Weekly Photo Challenge: Illunimation
Christmas Eve always mean fire of some sort to me. Set the table with candles, huge fire in the fireplace, warmth, family, friends, food, bliss.
Fort Pelham Farm 
