Day: June 19, 2015

I love dusk at the farm, I love the way the soft afternoon light hits the old red barn. Red is always around me, waiting patiently, quiet and present. He is like another arm or leg to me, he is a part of me now, always near me, always watching, never causing worry or trouble. I am lucky to have such love from another living thing. There is a lot of love around me at the farm. Maria, of course, the donkeys, now Fate.

She and I connect to the hellion in one another, the mad parts of one another.

Maria was off walking in the woods. I love to walk with her, but I spent several hours mowing the lawn. Florence’s old riding mower finally gave out and I got a push mower that is self-propelled. It took me several  hours but I got most of the yard done, I was tired and sore. There is something quite satisfying, though, about doing that kind of work and finishing it. I sat down in the Adirondack chairs for a few minutes, held my camera, drank from a bottle of cold water.

I got up early this morning – 5 a.m. – to write about the New York Carriage Horses – and then a friend came and we met about the October Open House. Lisa Dingle and I had lunch with Maria and sat and talked.  Earlier, we went to Pompanuck Farm and talked about our hopes to host a day of creative workshops in October for members of the Creative Group At Bedlam Farm. We seem to be reviving our ideas about hosting and sponsoring a bunch of workshops to encourage creative people and remind them that creativity is open to anyone who wishes it, you don’t need anything but your own creative spark.  a It was a good day, a long day.

This is the most peaceful time of day at the farm, I am grateful I came up to the country, bought one farm, then another. Farms are not simple things, not easy things, they are certainly not for everyone. They are for me. Tomorrow, the last day of my short story class, there is no place for us to meet after tomorrow. I think I need to keep teaching, maybe find a place on the farm or some other farm to do it.

A new thing in our town, every Friday night Scott Carrino sets up a tent by a big brick oven and makes wood-fired pizza for dinner. Tonight, we had the Nonna, a white pie with roasted asparagus, roasted tomatoes, chevre (goat cheese) and garlic. We have become very fond of Friday nights at the Round House.

I worry about Scott, he works all the time, and I have really never met another person who does so many different things so well. Scott never seems to rest, and he has a remarkable power to rejuvenate himself, even though he often works through considerable pain – be broke his back in a construction accident some years ago.

Most days, he is in the cafe cooking or dealing with the thousands of things you have to do in a cafe – food, kitchen, cooking, staff, customers, fresh flowers, dish-washing – I can hardly keep track of them. Scott also builds things – like buildings – writes songs and plays the guitar, is a Tai Chi instructor, works in the huge Pompanuck Garden, and is often in the Round House Bakery making his beloved bread with his wife Lisa, the co-director of the farm, the bakery and the cafe.

He and Lisa are food artists, they make beautiful fresh food and present all of it like colorful works of art. I suppose they are. I can how brutally challenging it is to run a restaurant, deal with the public, order food and keep it fresh, cook a dozen orders at once, keep a lot of people happy, pay all kinds of taxes, worry about all kinds of equipment.

I stopped by his farm today and he was feeding the gold fish and cat fish in his environmentally-engineered pond. Monday he and Lisa were out gardening, many of the vegetables in the Round House come from their garden.  Scott is a compassionate person, he loves to do good. I admit I wish he would get more rest, I also understand that this is his nature, to do a thousand things at once, to be all over the place, doing all kinds of things, most of them creative and interesting. He is a good friend to me, we talk often and are always there for one another, if it is possible. Once a week or so,  Scott stops by the farm to see the donkeys or visit Red, who he loves very much.ScoI am a restless soul, but I feel I am standing still around Scott sometimes. The pizza was delicious, so were the new veggie burgers he unveiled today, ten different kinds of vegetables. I am grateful for Scott, he is an unusual kind of man, open loving and generous.

We planted some grass in our garden head this week in preparation for the Spring Bedlam Farm Art Show, Poetry Celebration and Open House next weekend, June 27-28. Maria and about a half-dozen artists will be showing and selling their art, Chloe and the donkeys will be eating carrots and apples, George Forss will be shooting portraits,  I’ll be doing herding demos with the sheep, Red and Fate and some wonderful poets will be reading from their works. The Fall Open House will be held in October on Columbus Day Weekend. We won’t have any food for people, but the wonderful Round House Cafe is just down the road.

We got our head in Provincetown, I think he’s strange but perfect for our porch.

Border collies are not supposed to take their eyes off of the sheep, and Fate rarely does but when she rounded up all the sheep this morning and backed them up against the fence, she wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do  next, so she turned around and looked for Red. He sat watching her, so she turned back and gave the sheep the eye. Eventually, they backed up.

On Blue Star Equiculture’s Facebook Page today, Pamela Moshimer  Rickenbach posted a video celebrating the life of her husband Paul Moshimer, who took his own life a few weeks ago. He was a good friend to me and to many others. Maria could only bear to watch a few minutes of it, she began to cry and had to stop. I took it into my study and watched it three or four times, and I cried as well, it felt like my newly refurbished heart would break again, and I thought of the broken heart of wonderful Pamela, and her strength and courage and love.

And I wished her peace and compassion and love and healing. We are close, she will hear the message.

The video had music in the background, I think it was Bob Marley, and I heard him sing “Don’t Give Up The Fight.” I sat in my office trying to get up the strength to go back to work, and then I thought of a message I received from Paul after I had wondered aloud to  him why I was permitted to live, to recover from my open heart surgery. He thought about it for awhile, and then he messaged and said “you lived because you were not finished, you had work to do, you have a purpose. You never give up the fight.”

I’ve thought about this message more than once since Paul hung himself from a tree near his farm. Didn’t you have work to to do, also, Paul? Did you know, I wonder, how many people loved you and were inspired by you and leaned on you? Did you know how many people you touched, how many there are who remain and in great need of being touched?

I did not know  you for long, and not as well as so many others in your life. I am not a sorrow or tragedy thief, this is not my tragedy, my life is rich and full and goes on, but I think a lot about the sea of sorrow you left behind, and I wonder if you knew what you meant to so many people, to the farm, to the horses, to Pamela? To me.

It is not my tragedy, but it is a tragedy still.

I will be listening to this video one more time, and thank Pamela so much for putting it together at this dark and difficult time of your life. It is beautiful and heartbreaking, and I know, my heart was broken just a year ago, and then put together again.

in his beautiful encyclical, Pope Francis reminded us this week that we must regain the conviction that we have a shared responsibility for others and for the animals of the world, and that being good and decent are worth it.

You knew this, Paul, this is the way you lived your life, this is what you reminded me I have been allowed to live and do. This is what you taught to many other people to do, what you did every day of your life.

You may take comfort in knowing that Pamela has great work to do, she has taken responsibility for the others and the animals in this world, and she embodies the notion that being good and decent are worth it. She will not be alone in that. There is so much suffering and pain in the world, Paul, I am just beginning to grasp how much of it you had to bear.

I have been saying goodbye to you Paul for a some days now, and I think we have been messaging one another, so I hope you know I am not judging you when I ask: Did you not know, Paul, that you had work to do? Should I have told you? I have work to do. I promise you that I will never give up the fight.