Day: January 11, 2012

I have a lot of cute animals and I tell a lot of cute animal stories. Simon’s bray. Lenore’s love. Fran’s marching around with Maria. It is important to remember – and to remind others – that animals are generally cute when we want and need them to be, but the real nature of real animals can be very different. I have often been reminded of that here on the farm, and was reminded it of it again when Simon went after Minnie the Barn Cat, who was rubbing herself against his legs, and he might well have killed her if she had not hissed, clawed at him and gotten away. It was his second attack on her – last week he tried to bite her in the back.

I don’t know Simon’s whole story, but he is very wary around dogs and he does not like it when the cats come around his legs, especially when he is eating. It might be that he is very protective of food, or even that his  wobbly legs hurt in the cold. Minnie is an affable creature, and she often rubs up against Lulu and Fanny. I do not blame Simon in any way for going after her. He’s a donkey, not a throw pillow, as cute as his bray is, and he doesn’t like animals besides the donkey’s around him. He could easily kill Minnie if she doesn’t get the idea, donkeys can go after dogs and cats if they are not used to them. Minnie is fine, Maria checked her closely. We will watch them and do what we can, but she is a barn cat and we are not out with them most of the time.

We thought about giving her away – she is affectionate – but she is a smart cat and independent cat, a skilled hunter, and has avoided coyotes, foxes, cars and other predators for some years. So for now, we’re just keeping an eye on it. It is important to be reminded that real animals do not live in a cute world without death and danger.

I met one of my closest friends today and I love him dearly and we are good friends to one another in the way men rarely are. He is, I think, my best friend. And he will be leaving shortly. He is a young man with a new baby considering what to do with his life. He wants to move to a different part of the country with his new child and wife. He is very much a writer, but has always been too shy to show his work or publish it. He told me he needs health care first, and then a pension plan and other benefits.

We talked, as the sun set on this suddenly wintry week, and then we talked about books we had been reading, as we often do, and I saw something in his eyes that was familiar to me. And I said, “you have a book in you, don’t you?” And he turned crimson red, and then looked away, and then, near tears, he turned back to me and said yes, he did have a book, and he wanted to write it more than anything on the earth, but he had a new baby, and had responsibilities and so he had to go find a job with benefits, it was what his family had told him. I asked him what the book was and he told me, in powerful and beautiful detail. He said his wish to do it was “fierce.” Then he asked me what I thought he should do.

I don’t offer advice about things like that, but if I’m asked I tell the truth, which some people don’t really like. Still, I do it, especially to friends.

Friend, I said, your responsibility to your child is to be happy and fulfilled, and not hide behind a baby to live someone else’s version of your life. Our society teaches us that we must have health care and retirement funds and own houses and cars, and we must live for that, but I said that was not my feeling. I told him that living your life on that basis was the first death for a creative person, the death of the soul,  and the rest was just filling out the paperwork and waiting for the body to catch up.

Yes, we need to care for our families and meet our responsibilities, but we did not exist to be slaves, in this culture or any other and we had a right to live our lives and tell our stories. No one ought frighten us into living a life we don’t want.  He could make it work, I said. I told him I could not count the times I have walked the plank,  blinked in terror at the fragility of my life, the lack of money, the failures and disappointments, the losses and small tragedies, the doubts and fears. There are worse things in life than not living the life they have proscribed for us. That is a life lived in fear and countless people in the world have given their lives not to live that way. Honor them, I said. Write your book. Find a way. Jump. Never give up on the notion that you can create the thing that sets your heart on fire. I will never give up on that, I said, not if my farm crumbles around me, my bank account finally drains for good, and my body gives out.

We both ended up crying. We are having dinner again in a few days. I can’t wait. I will pray that he does his book.

Farmlove is either a gift or a disease, depending on how you look at it and how you handle it. I see farms as dangerous places for mad obsessives, and they can be the most wonderful places on earth or they can suck you right in and keep you there. When the bug strikes, it’s a pretty big bite. In Washington County, we have a small and exclusive community of mad writer/bloggers with farms. Jenna is a writer and a farmer, and I am a writer with a farm.  We both have used our blogs to share the stories of our farms.

We have both brushed against the same thing and are both making a living writing about it.  Neither of us is sure how that happened.  Jenna used to make me nervous – she still makes me nervous sometimes – as she reminds me a lot of me a few years back, even though we are quite different. We are good friends now, and I am grateful for that.

Farms are not simple places, neither are the people who end up living on them. I am flattered to be introducing Jenna at her Celebration Party for “Barnheart,” her new book on her obsession with getting herself the increasingly famous “Cold Antler Farm.” I see Jenna as a testament to creativity, individuality and courage.

Many people dream of having a farm, few people under 30 – or over 30 – go out and buy one. “Barnheart” is getting wonderful reviews and people are loving it. It’s a wonderful book.  Jenna will read from it,  talk about it, take questions. Her publisher is also giving away 50 posters of the books’ cover. Free.

I admire Jenna greatly. She is generous and funny and  a very gifted writer (she got herself a hot New York City agent this year) and she will make a much bigger splash, I think, than she knows. She did something that is nearly impossible these days, got a mortgage for a farm, stocked it with useful and not-so-useful animals, crammed her day with chores and dramas,  poked her fingers in the eyes of much conventional wisdom. So many people wish for that, and so few people can or will do it.  Jenna is an individual creating her life, working hard to keep it and to live it and showing many of us how to understand and use Mother Earth again. It will be a very special afternoon. Come join our celebration of Jenna’s book “Barnheart” at the Battenkill Bookstore (518 677-2515), Main St. Cambridge, Sunday, January 22, 4 p.m. She is worth a trip.

Creativity is something of a religion to me, perhaps because my life and my work has depended on it. There are many different definitions of creativity. To me, creativity is the ability to create and change, to transcend traditional ideas, rules, patterns, relationships, and to create meaningful – to me and others – new ideas, forms, techniques, methods for work and life. Creativity involves being original, being progressive, living in one’s imagination.

There is some courage involved – putting your ideas and work out into the world, seeing some of them live, some of them die. For me, creativity is a willingness to think originally. As Beavis & Butthead used to say, because they didn’t know what they were supposed to think, they were free to think. We live in a world full of orthodoxies – politics, religion, health care, corporatism. Hell was invited by religions seeking to terrify people into submission, rather than approach God originally.  In politics, one would think different ideas would be celebrated, but they are not. There is rarely an exchange of ideas, mostly a declaration of dogma, usually “left” or “right.” Steve Jobs was creative because he defied the corporate culture, but most of his colleagues struggle with it and are subsumed by it. As corporations have taken over movies, publishing and media, those institutions have generally become less creative and less original.

Creative people evolve and find new forms of creation – this blog, other blogs. I find my creativity is centered on change and openness – embracing blogs, then photography and videos, soon e-books.  In our time, the Internet seems to spawn the most creativity and originality, because individual expression is not only tolerated, but celebrated. Even here, disagreement and individuality is considered sacrilege when it is, to me, sacred. I believe we all possess the creative spark, and I am grateful to have the tools and be part of a community that makes it possible.

Creativity is precious. It feeds on encouragement. Many of us are taught that are stories are not important or valuable. That is not so.