Day: September 21, 2013

For most of my life, I did not take responsibility for it. Someone handled all of the money, balanced the checkbook, worried about bills. Someone else handled my publicity and marketing, someone else did the editing on my books, various people held my hand, soothed me, told me I was brave and good and wonderful to live my life and avoid responsibility for it – I was noble, adventurous, creative, even Christic. How easy it was for me to rationalize the life I wanted and get other people to pay for it and hold my hand. And I loved these people, this army of enablers, I collected them like chess pieces on the board of life, I praised them and thanked them and believed they were responsible for every good thing in my world. I couldn’t live without them,  animals and people, they made my life possible I told myself, I couldn’t possibly be responsible for my life on my own.

This happens to beat-up children, their egos are shattered and shame, they live in panic and fear and look to the world for soothing and rescue. They live in shame and worry.  It is not their fault, it is always the symptom of great wounds, there are always people happy to try and save other people and their lives.

They are all gone now, those people, every single one of them, out of my life, beyond my consciousness, no longer interested in me and my yearnings. A therapist told me you cannot have a healthy relationship with unhealthy people, I have learned this is true.  These people are prophets to me, symbols, ghosts of the past, present and future, my Joseph Marley’s, my spirits of warning and caution, reminders to be responsible for my own life. As Joseph Campbell wrote, when the mask comes off, you better be prepared, and I was not, and when the mask came off, I went to pieces and then, with real help and support, I began the climb back, began taking responsibility for my life.

I think of this every day, as Maria and I build and rebuild our shattered lives together, and work so hard to do it the right way. It is hard, every day, the part of my life I do not really write about as much I should, being honest is being honest, there is no substitute for it. Our new farm is a symbol of my taking responsibility for my life, we have worked very hard, mostly by ourselves to fix it up, make it habitable, it has taught me so much about what it means to love a house. My subscription program – getting paid for my work – is another very significant step in my taking responsibility, I am learning to face up to money and to the importance of managing it well.

One of the many wonderful things about living on a farm are the endless round of chores involved in caring for acres of land, pastures, and very dependent animals like donkeys, sheep, dogs and chickens. Our barn cats are perhaps the only animals here that can take care of themselves, the rest are an enormous and joyous responsibility. A farm is structured around chores, chores are the foundations of life, it’s defining elements. And the fall is perhaps the most significant time in terms of chores, it is the time to prepare for winter, when the land is often covered in snow and ice and the animals are more dependent than ever.

Spring is a time for liberation – no hay, no frozen water buckets, no hauling of food and water each day. Fall is different, a time of preparation and foresight. I have completed the checklist that I love and which has taught me so much about being responsible for my life. The pasture has been brushhogged so that the grass can compete fairly with the weeds and brush next year. Our 150 square bales are in the barn and stalls. Today, Maria and I spent several hours stacking the last cord of firewood that we ordered in the Spring and which has been coming all summer. The woodshed – Flo’s hideaway – is filled with wood, we have two wood stoves this winter and both will be going most days and nights.

Instead of paying $60 for a heated water bowl for the chickens, I ordered a heated dog bowl on Amazon for $10 (I wonder why heated dog bowls cost so much less than heated poultry bowls), it arrived today and is the last of our winter preparations. In the coming weeks, a hard frost will descend and we will start bringing hay out the feeder, which stands firm and dry on new gravel. We dumped a truckload of sand in the Pole Barn to keep it dry and draining well so the animals can lie down in health and comfort.

It is a meaningful feeling for me, a big step along the way to be so responsible for this farm along with Maria, to be taking responsibility for my life. As I have done this, my panic and confusion has diminished, I am getting stronger every day. The people in my life are not saving me or holding my hand in drama, they are simply my good and valued friends.

Maria and I are thinking of lambing early next year. I called our friend Darryl Kuehne, the Vermont farmer who brought us Zelda and our other sheep and he has a Border Leicester ram who is available for breeding. If we brought the ram here to Bedlam Farm in late November and kept him here for six to eight weeks, that would give him two breeding cycles to impregnate our ewes. The lambs would be born in April or early May, depending on when the ram comes. We would keep one or two and Darryl would keep the rest for his flock.

I lambed four different times at Bedlam Farm and am comfortable with it, Red would be very helpful, we’d have to convert the donkey’s stall into some lambing pens which would be easy, Maria would love to have some more wool to sell, Red would love to have another sheep to herd, I loved lambing, it would be a shame to waste what I learned about it, it is very satisfying and meaningful, especially if you are set up for it, as we are.

Rose and I had some wild times lambing in the middle of winter and much snow and ice, but there are few feelings comparable to pulling a lamb out of a struggling ewe at 3 a.m. in a howling blizzard. I will never forget it and will do it in a much more orderly – and warmer – way. Might be some lambs running around for the June Open House at Bedlam Farm.

I suspect Maria would love to have a lamb or two to bring into the world – I think it would be a wonderful experience for her as it was for me –  my camera wouldn’t mind it either. We’ll talk to Darryl over the next few weeks and decide, I’ll keep you posted.

Every evening, before or after dusk, I go out to the barn to the old cow stall that the donkeys have co-opted as their private clubhouse – they don’t let the sheep in and even chase the chickens out. They never eliminate in Rocky’s old stall, it is always clean, nor do they chew on the wood or the walls, as they sometimes do when they are bored. When I come in, they are always there, sometimes escaping the flies, who do not go there,

It has become a spiritual place for me, when I enter, all three of them are usually there, braying softly to me (Simon does not know how to bray softly, he always brays loudly). We had closed off this stall after Rocky died, we thought the donkeys would wreck it, but it is almost spotless, a curious thing for three donkeys who spent a lot of time there. On windy or snowy days, the donkeys retreat there and leave the pole barn to the sheep. They leave the stall to graze but always return to it at different times of the day. I think of it as their sanctuary, their church, their spiritual place, a kind of donkey chapel.

For me, this makes sense, donkeys are the most spiritual animals I know, they understand the idea of the chapel, instinctively if not literally,  I am sure.

At Lulu’s crossing a strong wind blew, Red was holding the sheep, the donkeys were grazing at the bottom of the hill, our farm rolled out in the light, a beautiful place, the right place for us. Tomorrow we will bring some chairs out there and sit there with the donkey’s and the sheep while they graze. It looks like we will need this pasture after all, the grass is not growing much now, and I suspect is less nutritious, the animals seem to be working harder for their food. I suspect we will be on hay in two weeks or so.