Farm Friends
I understood after my first year at Bedlam Farm — which included cases of frostbite and cat-bite, pre-dawn lamb births in the snow, and the most brutal winter in decades — that you can’t run a farm by yourself.
I also came to learn that it’s never too late to make great friends, even when you haven’t had many in your previous life.
I don’t really yet know why this happened. My theory is that oddballs can be happy in cities or in the country, but not always in the suburbs in between. My wife Paula says I was ready to make friends here, when I wasn’t before.
All I know is that in some nearly unfathomable way, the farm and its animals made me feel as if I’d come home, to a place where people seemed happy to know me and vice versa..
Annie DiLeo, better known as the Bedlam Farm Goddess, is the helper who in many ways makes it possible for me to live here. She slogs over daily — through ice, mud or heat — to give my animals the best care animals ever get, and they adore her for it.
Becky MacLachlan does not have a website, but she is as good a friend as there is. Her love and faith inspire me and her friendship means the world to me, and she does good in the world every day of her life. She is also stubborn, as I am discovering many people of Scotch descent are.
My friends are wonderful people.
I love them and thought the people who read my books and share my love of dogs and other animals might like to know them, too.
Lesley Nase serves as Bedlam Farm’s animal shaman (it’s great to have an animal shaman). I’m generally skeptical about such matters, but you can’t spend time with Lesley and not see that she has remarkable intuitive gifts.
Mary Kellogg, the farm’s Poet Laureate, has been writing poems since she was a child during World War II. For years, she has lived on a farm near mine. After her husband Dick died, people suggested she move to a smaller place. She thought that a ridiculous idea. Her poetry graces “Dog Days” and the book after that, “Soul of A Dog,” scheduled for publication next spring.
Bill and Maria Heinrich are, like me, refugees from the other life who appreciate this one. Maria is an artist and Bill a former ad executive; together they restore old houses and barns with great care and skill. They rebuilt my pig barn and have moved on to restore the town’s Grange Hall, once the third oldest Methodist Church in America, just down the road. Maria is also helping me research the book I’m currently working on, “My Farm,” about this place and its history.They have a blog on their page, where they can showcase the work they’re doing and perhaps hear from other restorers.
In addition to being my photo instructor, my good friend
John Yost is a
filmmaker who just released his new film
"Every Good
Thing to Rust". Read John's
blog.
Alan Dunham and Keith Mann are
The
Widgets, an innovative mandolin/guitar acoustic rock duo.
My wife Paula is the closest friend I’ll ever have, but spouses deserve their own category. She says she doesn’t have time to keep up with a page on my website, and she’s far too cheap to launch her own. My daughter Emma has a blog called Eephus Pitch,
however, and writes great stuff there about baseball.
Anyway, welcome to my world. I hope you enjoy getting to know these folks as much as I have.
Friends of the Farm and Beyond
I've listed some of the friends who help me live on the farm, but I would be very remiss if I didn't mention some people who are just plain friends, and who are primarily responsible for my living on the farm and writing about it. That would include Bruce Tracy, my editor and friend, who has, more than any other person, shaped the stories about Bedlam Farm and saved me from my wretched excesses. And Brian McLendon, a senior publicist at Random House and one of my closest friends. He has fought long and hard for me, and I am grateful he is in my life. I also have to thank (is this sounding like an Oscar speech?) Richard Abate, my agent, who has represented me faithfully and well. I thank my sister Jane, for her loving and surviving nature and for her friendship. Writing this, I can't help but think of my wife Paula, who has done all of these things - support and edit my work, love and sustain me, try and manage what she calls "the runaway train" that is her husband. Thanks, thanks, thanks.
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