Maria stole one of my Tilley hats (she routinely steals my clothes which show up in quilts hanging pieces, or on her) and when she stepped out into the bright morning sunshine, I thought she had a sophisticated, French style look, like Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca.
It is the season of color and light, it wakes me up and brings me to life.
The Bumper Sticker Revolution begins today, I went to the U.S. Post Office in Cambridge, N.Y., and handed Martha 120 envelopes with bumper stickers tucked inside, Maria and I spent happy hours labeling and stuffing them. This was the first batch of pre-orders that came in last week.
I ordered 500 bumper stickers that say “The Army Of Good” and I mean to sell all of them. I can’t wait to see driving ahead of me on the road, or on a trip somewhere.
Every morning, I go to my post office box – P.O. Box 205 to pick up the pre-orders from all over the country and bring them home.
I hope people will send me photos of the stickers on their cars. I’ll try to post them on my blog. I am surprised, as I always am, by how well the blog is read all over the country. Thank you.
Perhaps this will spark a revolution, and doing good will spread and gently overwhelm the arguments. I think they might be infectious. As of this weekend, you can order the bumper stickers – they are $10, no charge for shipping – on Maria’s Etsy page. It takes a couple of seconds.
(Thanks to the people who send some extra money along, an additional $10 or $20 or more for the refugees and Mansion residents. It adds up. One very wonderful person sent a check for $300 this morning so Omranaso can pay off all of her remaining debts – I wrote her a check for $400 last week.
Once we get her into her new apartment, she will get a subsidy from New York State and between that and her new job, she will be independent and debt-free. Thank you, Carol.
She has suffered quite enough and thanks to many of you for the support of her and Hawah. (First, we have to get her that apartment.)
For those of you who don’t know, The Army Of Good is scattered all over America, come to together to keep good alive and to do good rather than argue about it. We are not a political group, we are equal opportunity do gooders, we do not belong to the left or the right. We are ordinary Americans trying to help fellow ordinary Americas who are vulnerable now, especially new refugees to America and Americans living in elderly care.
These two groups are in urgent need of support and attention. We are helping.
We are working to keep good alive here, and are succeeding.
It feels good to do good, it is an antidote to the poisonous clamor outside.
If you don’t care to have a sticker on your car, you can put it anywhere inside the house, or on a briefcase or bag. I love the letters I am reading along with the $10 checks and crumpled bills. You are an Army Of Love, and I am proud to be associated with you. This is perhaps the most joyous and meaningful task I have ever undertaken.
You make this work possible. Check out the bumper stickers on Etsy, and thanks. They are starting to fly out of her and do their work.
If you prefer mail, you can send a check or cash for $10 to me at The Gus Fund, c/o Jon Katz, P.O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816. I’m shooting for another hundred today. Blessings. Take a peek here.
We’ve lived on this Bedlam Farm for five years and it was a good and wise choice for us. One focal point of activity for us is the space between the farmhouse and the pasture. Sooner or later, almost every creature on the farm pops up there. Fate tries to lure me out to work with the sheep, the chickens march imperiously back and forth and Ed Gulley’s Tin Man watches over the enterprise.
I never set foot on a farm until I moved up here, and now I can hardly imagine life off of one. I can’t quite explain this, other than to say the farm has taught me so much about love and life. I am not a farmer but a writer with a farm, and there is an enormous difference.
But the farm is a great teacher and it has transformed me into a learner. For me, Spring is the beginning of winter. I’m waiting for 100 square bales of hay from the first cutting and we already have three cords of wood out of seven for next winter.
The first lesson I ever learned on my first farm in Hebron was to start thinking about winter in May, or when it comes, you will not be ready but sorry. I learned to think again and plan.
Lulu and Fanny have been guilt tripping me into giving them treats for more than a decade. They can hear me in the house, or even the bathroom in the morning, and know when I get up to stretch or get a drink in my study. They bray softly and pleadingly and it is somewhat hypnotic, and I usually succumb. Tonight I went out to bring the each an alfalfa treat – we keep them in the barn in a trash can.
I love the sound of donkeys crunching on their treats, it is a healing and soothing sound, the donkeys know how to eat – thoroughly and patiently and loudly. i often stand to listen to them crunch. Come and listen. Lulu is the donkey with the whiter snout.
