Month: May 2016

We are three weeks away from the June 25-26 Open House at Bedlam Farm, “The Art Of Rural Life.”  This year, a celebration of the art of rural life, aesthetic and agricultural. Original art from gifted artists, shearing, farrier work, a milking cow, our own pony, sheep, donkeys. There will be sheepherding just about on the hour and you can see Red and Fate show off their very different notions of work. Poets will read from poems, visitors can come and meet the donkeys, there will be talks about writing and our creative lives. Saturday and Sunday 11-4. No dogs please, the donkeys do not care for visiting dogs, they try and stomp them.

The art is exciting and affordable, the animals love attention and carrots and apples. Come if you can. Details here.

You don’t appreciate something like water until you lose it. The water stopped flowing here this morning, and on a farm with animals, water has a lot of special meaning. I have a list of good people to call in emergencies, and our list usually starts with our neighbor and friend Jack Macmillan, who knows how almost everything works.

He came over and is working in basement now. (I rarely set foot in the basement but I admire our amazing foundation work, sturdy as a fortress and dry all year. Jack is messing with the points on the pump, we have a point well, not a deep well. We called the town’s plumber, but everyone says he list a relative this weekend, best not to call him for a few days.

I called Vince Vecchio, a big and smart man in a truck, he said on the phone it was probably the points on the pump and he was sure Jack could fix it. I called Jay Bridge, our friend and carpenter (an engineer) and he said he could come help if Jack couldn’t fix it

We are cooking up some alternate plans for getting water to the animals, we hope it’s not more serious. Jack is on the case.

Ashley is a social worker who works weekends at the Round House Cafe and has been an anchor there for the past couple of years. She is moving into her work career outside of the cafe, still working on Saturdays an pizza night. Maria and I became close to her over the past year or two, she feels like family to us.

I am impressed with her boyfriend Gordon, a musician also working on a farm at the moment. I don’t know any of the details of their relationship, but I do know love when I see it and I love to photograph it when I can. It is a joy to take a photo about love.  They radiate good feeling. They showed up at Pompanuck today and agreed to a photo, not that I gave them a ton of choice. I thank them for sharing their good hearts.

Maria and I each got a henna tattoo ($5 apiece) at the Pompanuck Memorial Day Festival today. Henna tattoos are tattoos popular in India,  used for many things but most often applied to calm nervous brides before weddings. They dry in about 15 minutes, they last about a week. (Mine is on the right, below one of my “Maria” tattoos and some bracelets made out of discarded rubber I am wearing.

We planted two more gardens this weekend. Actually three. The Dahlia garden was planted yesterday, today Maria dug out a new wildflower garden by the side of the house, this will enclose the farmhouse in a ring of color and light that will eventually encircle the entire house. Our new Three Sisters garden has started to sprout corn, cucumber and squash. We also weed-whacked an overgrown corner of the back yard and covered it with a plastic sheet held down by rocks and wood. This will kill the weeds and enable us to plant a new garden there next year.

This is the year of garden, beauty, color and light everywhere. Garden is fascinating work, and difficult. Maria is exhausted but also exhilarated, we love plotting the gardens, and watching them bloom and blossom.