Posts from the ‘Musings’ Category
Report card
So … you’re driving in the car … you turn on the radio and hear an intriguing story only to blank on the primary source for the report. Has that ever happened to you? I was on my way home from town this morning and one of the news items on NPR concerned a report on the current status of global sustainability. Because I did not catch the original source I did a quick search for it when I got home. Although I am not absolutely convinced that the following is the source for the NPR story, the conclusions are the same. Visit the Global Footprint Network (the figure below is from there, World Footprint). Similar findings are at the 2012 Living Planet Report. The bottom line to each of these sources is, at current rates of consumption, Homo sapiens is using the resources of the planet at a rate of 1.5 Earths each year. Remember that a sustainable rate of consumption is one at which the Earth is able to replace resources as rapidly as they are used (1.0 Earths per year) - like running on a treadmill and going nowhere. We have currently overshot this breakeven rate by 50%. The bad news is that, by all indications, this rate of consumption is increasing and is predicted to reach 2.0 Earths by 2030, and 3.0 Earths by mid-century. The big players in this unbridled and selfish consumption are Qatar, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Denmark, and the United States. The most depressing aspect of this is, given all that we have been doing in support of global sustainability, we still can’t get the train to stop or even slow down – at all. It’s like a bad dream … you’re driving and see something in the road ahead of you … you hit the brakes … they don’t work … you push again, harder this time … to no effect. We must redouble our efforts to reverse this phenomenon … wake up, recycle, get by with less stuff, and tread lightly … these are all investments each of us are going to have to make in support of our not-so-distant futures. Let us agree to start today.
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Sustainability
The other day I became involved in a conversation which concerned the unlikely, and unpredictable, rise of human intelligence. Given the fact of this capacity, my interlocutor and I considered whether this quirky gift came with strings attached? Does intelligence have concomitant obligations? In particular, we asked about obligations which relate to the environment.
It turns out that opinions on this question fall on two sides of a natural divide; one of these arguments is that because human intelligence is unique, we, as the preeminently thoughtful organisms on Earth, are the only ones capable of managing the Earth and its resources, and that is the sole justification needed for doing so. We should make selfish use of the Earth in support of our better ends. Those on the other side of the divide argue that because human intelligence is unique, we, as the preeminently thoughtful organisms on Earth, are the only ones capable of managing the Earth and its resources, and that is the sole justification needed for doing so. We should exercise these powers for acts of stewardship – we should use our quirky, unpredicted, intelligence to care for the Earth.
This lofty conversation then turned to a consideration of the term sustainability. I argued that the term was misused in the vernacular and had often been conflated to represent positive acts on behalf of the Earth, acts which would make the Earth a better place than it had been before. We have come to believe that eating lower on the food chain, wearing hemp sandals, and driving a hybrid vehicle are somehow ways in which we go about healing the Earth of the environmental damages we have wrought. Think of the definition of the word; sustainable practices utilize natural resources such that they are not depleted or damaged. And that’s just it. Sustainable practice, by definition, maintains the status quo, it doesn’t make the Earth any better. Sure, you could argue, that sustainable practice makes the Earth better by not making it any worse (that is, it does so in a relative sense) … but the realization that we’re not making the Earth any better in an absolute sense is a sobering point – and an important one. It should provide strong motivation to do all that we can to maintain this delicate status quo.
And why is there no talk of reversing environmental damage? Why are we resigned to only acting sustainably? Because we cannot reverse the damage done … not in one or in many human lifetimes. The most we can hope for is that we don’t make the situation a whole lot worse. What we can work toward and hope for is to slow the rate of environmental decline, and to do what we can to loosen the relentless grip of entropy. We need to somehow get the calculus which relates our needs and the pool of sustainable resources to break even. If we slow the rate of environmental decline to near zero we will have reached the ecological Nirvana of a truly sustainable system.
If we act intelligently, as a species, we might very well be around when Gaia finally arrives at the equilibrium state she will most assuredly regain, in time (lots and lots of time). The premise of my argument is that it will be the Earth herself which will drive the restoration. Our contribution must be to act responsibly by not making matters worse, and to simply stay out of the way. At the moment, it is my belief that the majority of us act individually, selfishly, and this strategy will guarantee that equilibrium will finally be reached only long after we are gone. Let it be our mission then, as a species, to hope fervently for and work tirelessly toward this lofty and laudable goal of sustainable, global, equilibrium. [The beautiful image above appears, along with its original content, at the website of NASA's Visible Earth program, here is the link to that site.]
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Happy (belated) Earth day
Because the weekend forecast indicated that Earth Day would be rainy, we spent Friday and Saturday doing things like laundry, cleaning the pig pen, mowing and trimming the lawn, and checking on the bee hives. At day’s end, I took a walk with camera in hand – thus the image of goat kids and the dandelion. It has always impressed me (quite literally – the fact has always made an impression upon me) that one can predict the date by the timing of seed set in this ubiquitous weed. When dandelions are in flower it is the end of April. This is just one of many annual events that I am very much aware of. A contemplation of nature’s many cycles will be a topic for an extended post, another time. We all know that the Earth rotates on its axis once in 24 hours – and that a year represents its 365 day passage about the Sun. Many of us learned about the hydrologic cycle and perhaps the carbon and nitrogen cycles when we were in high school. But what of these Earthly cycles? Are they disconnected natural phenomena? Did you know that the Gaia Hypothesis argues that Earth itself is a living organism? If you will allow analogy with the human body, the interactions between and among the human immune, digestive, reproductive, and neuromuscular systems are paralleled, in the argument made by the Gaia Hypothesis, by interactions between and among the biosphere (the living part of the Earth (including you and me)), the hydrosphere (the Earth’s water), the atmosphere (the Earth’s gaseous envelope), and the pedosphere (the Earth’s soil layer). Although Earth Day will have come and gone by the time you read this post, why don’t you stop and take a minute to consider that you may, in fact, be a very small part of a much larger organism – Earth. What a thing to contemplate. If you are indeed a commensal or mutualistic symbiont (and, let us hope, not a parasite) consider that it is your responsibility, as an integral part of this super-organism (as integral a part as, for example, an individual cell would be to the proper function of your body), to work to ensure its health and sustainability. Happy Earth Day.
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Learning curve
Is it paradoxical to say that raising livestock has taught us most everything we know about raising livestock? If so, no matter. It is true.
We believe in the value of education. We believe this so strongly that it is fair to say we are convinced that our future depends upon the strength of our academic institutions, and their ability to instruct and to empower us all. At a time when, for many, a facility with Wikipedia and the internet not only symbolizes but embodies what it is to be learned and knowledgeable, the two of us live at the margin in our belief that there is much to be learned from books, libraries, and from groups of very learned people. Having said all of this however, we would also be the first to recognize that there is absolutely nothing quite like experience when it comes to a certain kind of learning. Coming to know about livestock husbandry has, for us, been a mix of learning from books, talking to people who know more than we do, and from taking false steps and making mistakes. Overall, it is the animals themselves which have taught us the most. Over the years this recipe has allowed us to develop lots and lots of skills that Napoleon Dynamite might envy.
Take for example this image of Winifred. It looks as though she’s swallowed a beach ball. Would it surprise you to know that she was neither pregnant nor fat when the photo was taken? Winifred recently kidded twins and has also been nursing an orphaned kid. Winifred is milk machine and, as such, is eating like a horse (if that’s possible for a goat). What you see in the picture is her distended rumen packed full of fodder … like yourself, perhaps, after a Thanksgiving dinner. [If you’re interested in the structure and function of the rumen check out this link.] And that is all. I do not mean to suggest that the real possibility of bloat is something to be ignored, because it most definitely is not, and we recognize that. What we have learned, however, is to distinguish a happy goat that happens to be eating like a horse from one which is suffering from bloat and risks death from suffocation. When we first observed this condition (that of a full-to-bursting rumen) we assumed the worst and dosed the poor doe with vegetable oil, repeatedly. Live and learn. Watch your animals carefully; if you do, you will soon know to differentiate the animals that are feeling fine from those that are ill.
The following story of another time when we learned by mistake is perhaps one that more sensitive readers should skip. It concerns the manure of ruminants and, in particular, the consistency of cow manure (or the manure of any ruminant for that matter) and what it can tell you about the health status of the individual. I think most folks know (or can, perhaps, imagine) what a well formed cow pie looks like when neatly piled upon the ground. Furthermore most folks can push the process of pie production back, in time, to imagine the consistency of said material at the moment it was being presented by the cow; normally something with a consistency ranging between mashed potatoes and loose bread dough. Shortly after obtaining our first Jersey cow, Bonnie, we thought she had taken a dramatic and perhaps deadly turn for the worse. Her manure was liquid. Let me be plain, there was absolutely nothing solid about it. It comprised a nearly perfect stream of flourescent green liquid with the consistency of motor oil. We called our veterinarian only to be asked whether we were aware it was early spring. The dry grass hay Bonnie had been consuming all winter was perhaps 7-8% protein, while the fresh, green, grasses of early spring might have ranged as high as nearly 25% protein. Imagine what a similarly precipitous sort of change would do to your gut. As in the case of bloat, we are well aware of the risk of grass tetany; but equal to the importance of being knowledgeable about grass tetany is knowing when your cow is simply eating well.
And then there was the time I observed green rivulets streaming from the nostrils of a Devon steer. My immediate response was to give oxytetracycline (it is a significant challenge to administer anything to a full-grown steer in an open pasture) to treat an upper respiratory infection this steer probably did not have. Nasal discharges of this sort are fairly common and may be due to a number of causes, only one of which is an upper respiratory infection.
The lesson I’m working around to is that many aspects of livestock husbandry just have to be learned by raising livestock. Reading books is good, it’s very good – seek them out and read many of them. Talking to folks who can say Been there, done that, and mean it, is good – seek them out and talk to many of them. Once that’s done however you have to jump in … all the way (no wading up to your knees). There really is nothing like experience when it comes to learning the ropes. You have try your hand at it all. You’ll make lots of mistakes – guaranteed. Over the years however you will find that you make fewer and fewer. At some point you will realize that you know a whole lot about things that you didn’t before – and that’s quite an accomplishment.
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Foundation (2)
As promised, I drove by the relic foundation of a bank barn situated along the banks of the Susquehanna. I did so as the sun cleared the top of Bald Eagle mountain. Although the light wasn’t quite right I stopped to walkabout and to take a few photos. I like the image below. I imagine the expanse of adjacent tree canopy mirrors the gambrel roof that, perhaps, once was. A tangle of vines now frames and ties windows together as a sill once did. Although a small bit of mortar is missing from between the aged field stones, the foundation seems sound enough, plumb and true – a genuine testament to the skill and workmanship of more than a century ago. I will continue to visit this place, perhaps the color and subtle brilliance of an early spring sunset will better illuminate stonework, reveal hidden detail, or more dramatically highlight this graceful structure.
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Rorschach test
I have thought often about the motivation and intent of this blog. Sometimes I think it’s about pretty pictures; sometimes about tips and techniques of livestock husbandry; sometimes about sustainable living in a rural setting; and sometimes about metaphysical ramblings. Oftentimes I think that a post of pretty pictures, without accompanying text of substance, is of less value (when compared to the other sorts of content which appear here). Anyway, we took a walk along a favorite section of the Pine Creek Rail Trail today and I had my camera with me. My favorite photo of the day is the second one below. The reason I included the first image was to provide some sort of evidence that the second actually depicts patterns produced by light on water. There are several steel truss railroad bridges that cross the creek along the Rail Trail; the first photo shows the shadow cast by the truss onto the surface of the water below. As I was bracketing exposure to make the shadow stand out a bit more I noticed the sunlight sparkling off the rapidly moving water - the wind was blowing a bit as well, adding yet another variable to the equation which resulted in the flashes of light. The second photo shows the result of this interplay between light, water, and wind. I have commented, elsewhere, on the equipment used to capture the images which accompany these blog posts. I use two point-n-shoot cameras, a Nikon CoolPix P7000 and a Sony DSC-HX9V. Concerning post processing I use GIMP v2.6.2 and try to limit myself to simple adjustments of brightness and contrast. Although it may look as though the colors of the second photo were manipulated – they were not – the effect was generated entirely by an increase in image contrast.
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Rear view
Earlier this week I loaded five Shetland wethers (castrated male sheep) into the truck for slaughter. I knew I wanted to blog about this because the production of freezer lamb is an important part of the yearly cycle of events at the farm. As I viewed the photos I had taken to illustrate the post I got the feeling that bloggers might view them negatively and it was important for me to think about why that might be.
A large number of folks, save of course the vegetarians and vegans among us (for whom, by the way, I have genuine respect), consume meat as beef, pork, lamb, or poultry. Whether or not this omnivorous population includes you, consider that the animals we consume are farmed and that someone had to kill them as part of the process of getting them to table. This post recognizes the fact of omnivory and is a comment on what must be a humane approach to livestock husbandry. It is a statement about the quality of life those of us who raise livestock in a responsible way can provide for the animals we raise and respect. This is not an apology for behavior that some may find offensive.
The wethers taken to slaughter this week were born in the spring of 2011. They were castrated 8-10 weeks after that and have, since then, lived on green grass, fresh air, and sunshine. None had ever been in a barn. Although all had been wormed, none had been vaccinated for disease. None had been administered feed supplementation or received prophylactic doses of antibiotics. None had ever been herded or run and none had experienced fear or pain. They lived as good a life as I was able to provide and I challenge anyone to argue to the contrary. I did my part – and then some. A few days ago it was their turn to close the loop and to do for me what they had been brought into this world to do. I raised sire and dam for the purpose of breeding to produce offspring for harvest. I did so for the same reason and with the same intent and motivation that a crop farmer plants seed to soil. As one would harvest a grain crop so may an animal crop be harvested at the appropriate time.
Words matter and perhaps this issue is simply a matter of the words used to describe the process – slaughter, kill, butcher, sacrifice, harvest, process. Which is best? Which makes the process easier to understand or perhaps less distasteful if it is indeed distasteful to you? Perhaps the first three have a negative or diabolical connotation? Perhaps we should talk about harvesting or processing? So be it. And in the light of recent stories in the popular press concerning charges and revelations of animal cruelty in the animal slaughter industry allow me to point out that we take very seriously the issue of humane slaughter (see the Humane Slaughter Act of 1958). There are many custom butchers in and around the area in which we live. Some of these are federally inspected and have adopted nationally codified standards and techniques – others are not inspected and have not adopted these standards. Our animals are processed at an abattoir which meets our high standard of humane and ethical treatment.
Farm life is both bitter and sweet. The ways in which we go about administration and acceptance of the former defines us as farmers and as individuals.
Like magic
In preparation for putting together this post I searched the internet for notable quotes about the wonder of new life - and could find nothing that lived up to my expectation or to the true wonder of the processes of reproduction and birth. Although I consider myself a part-time farmer, my real job is that of teacher. I am always quick to tell my students that among all of the topics we discuss in class, reproduction is perhaps the most awesome (in the true, rather than vernacular, sense). Surely I can describe the structures of DNA and of RNA, and talk about the mechanisms of replication, transcription, and of translation. I can wax eloquent about fertilization, gastrulation, organogenesis, and the hormonal control of reproduction – leaving very little room for wonder and for mystery. But the truth is .. it still amazes me that it all really works. Do not misunderstand – I am a strict materialist - I am simply saying that the processes are amazing. It is remarkable that billions upon billions of highly coordinated events can have, as their essence, something as perfectly alive as the kid shown here; every hair perfectly formed and in place. Truly wonderous indeed.
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The view from Sisyphus’s hill
Whether raising crops or livestock, farmers spend a great deal of time negotiating the proverbial Sisyphean hill. I know that all work is work but farming is particularly difficult work. It can be emotionally draining (some of the time), physically demanding (most of the time), and requires self-motivation and self-sacrifice (all of the time). Although we are not fulltime farmers, we know something about the hardships and rare rewards of working the land. In particular we have come to experience the ecological and economic challenges of sustainable livestock husbandry.
Not wanting to make this post overly negative let me point out that there are times on the farm when one can indeed pause atop Sisyphus’s hill to take in its steep, precipitous, cliffs and appreciate the green valley floor below. One of those times is afforded by an appreciation of harvest; a hay mow overflowing, a silo filled, or (as in the case of the current photo) a full crib of ear corn. Such times are also afforded by views of cows with healthy calves, ewes with lambs, and by geese with following goslings. Finally, they occur when one’s table is replete with farm-raised product. Eating what you have produced is eating locally in the extreme and allows one to minimize their carbon footprint.
I have always described life on the farm as an oscillator. If you expect farm life to unfold as one is lead to believe it will by so many printed periodicals it will surely disappoint. On balance farm life is, at its best, a break-even proposition. This life is difficult to be sure, it also has immense rewards. One must grab these as they present themselves and savor them as one would make a hard candy last a very long time.
Of fractals and Fibonacci
We negotiated a bridge spanning the spillway of one of our local reservoirs yesterday and captured a few photos of the water as it flowed beneath. It wasn’t until we looked over the images that it occurred to us that the water, frozen (as it were), mirrored the graceful reticulations of intricately knitted lace.
Fractals and Fibonacci sequences are just two ways in which science may explain what nature has known since before the dawn of time. We refer to the patterned beauty of nature as Art. Nature’s art is ineffable, not to be chased, harnessed, understood, and then copied. We try and fail to dissect and to understand what is, in fact, the summation of individually simple side consequences of millions upon millions of regular and ultimately unknowable events which have taken place over the very smallest and the very largest of time scales.
Double take
I have passed this facility at our local market several hundred times, yet only yesterday, noticed a phrase in the advertisement which accompanies it. Please do not misunderstand, it is a wonderful thing that purified water can be so readily available to consumers in this way. To be clear, the motivation for this post came from the surprise that I registered when I read the phrase … “Like Water Used to be!” My first thought was, Does water not taste like it used to? And, if so, When did this happen?
I am aware that there are global concerns about water; and, in particular, the availability of clean drinking water to nourish an ever-growing population (human and otherwise). A quick gathering of statistics brought the many problems into clear relief; 884 million people do not have access to safe water and 1.4 million children die each year as a result of diseases caused by organisms which are found in unclean water. I am also aware, in some general sense at least, that there are significant water issues in the U.S. as well. What took me up short however was the realization (made so clear by the statement which is the focus of this post) that a number of folks apparently do not have access to water that is both delicious and pure … like [it] used to be.
I suppose I had thought that the real issues of water supply and quality were somehow concerns of countries in the developing world. What shocked me was the uncomfortable realization that these issues affect my world too. Sure, I know that there are worries about U.S. water supplies and that one in three counties here will experience greater risks of water shortage due to global climate change in the near future. Perhaps the fact that fifty billion units of bottled water are consumed by Americans each year should have given me a hint. The fact, which I was able to ignore in my little clean-water corner of the world I call home, is that water quality is enough of a local issue that facilities like the one shown above are here and they are here to stay. This negative realization is made more worrisome, for us, by the encroachment of the Marcellus gas shale industry. We wrote, in an earlier post, about the potential impact of hydraulic fracturing on our own domestic and agricultural water supplies. Let us hope that the situation never, ever, mirrors that reflected upon by Coleridge in verse: Water, water, every where … Nor any drop to drink.
Waste not
Purchasing weaving yarns by the cone is usually more economical than buying smaller quantities, and having lots of leftovers in the fiber stash increases the chances that what is needed for the next project will already be on hand. However, eventually, one ends up conceiving a project that requires something beyond the contents of the current stash. For those living out in the middle of nowhere, this means mail-order, and a wait. Another inevitable consequence of planning for leftovers, is that you accumulate a lot of odds and ends that don’t want to gel into anything in particular. The combination of an enforced wait and an accumulation of odds-and-ends presents a good opportunity to embark on a project to make something small and quick and utilitarian, like dishcloths. Handweaving something so every-day, that will be repeatedly soiled and laundered until it wears out, may seem to some like a waste of time, effort, and materials. However it is a great way to experiment with a new technique, while producing a useful item (that will almost certainly be more absorbent than most commercial versions), and saving some scraps and bits from going to waste. Besides, there is something particularly satisfying in making an item that will be used daily. It forges a connection with our ancestors who made many of their own clothes and household items. Included in the fiber mail order were several cones of cotton flake, a slubby cotton that makes an excellent addition to dishcloths and dishtowels. Some of the current dishtowels are getting a bit threadbare. The next project?
The dishcloths started today have as warp several colors of unmercerized 8/2 cotton, with a weft of natural-colored cotton flake, in a honeycomb treadling of Bolton Cord (Marguerite Davison threading #17). Treadled as written, the honeycomb pattern wasn’t turning out to be very uniform; alternate pairs of pattern repeats were failing to close together into “cells”, leaving conspicuous bands. Adding an extra pick to each repeat solved the problem, and because it was only a dishcloth, the various trials to find a solution don’t have to be ripped out, they just add a little character.
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On beginning
Now that the wedding shawl project is finished, it is time to start something new. Sometimes this requires encouraging some creative inspiration; by leafing through pattern books and back issues of Spin-Off and Handwoven, or digging through the yarn stash and piling skeins and cones in different combinations, waiting for colors and textures to come together and suggest something. Usually, however, it is simply a matter of turning to the next item in the “things I have been trying to find time to make” list.
In The View From Saturday, by E. L. Konigsburg, a boy named Noah is being taught how to do calligraphic writing by an elderly woman named Tillie. She teaches him that filling the pen with ink properly involves six separate steps. Noah objects that six steps is a lot to do before you can begin writing. Tillie responds that the six steps to fill the pen ARE the beginning of writing.
It is easy to get impatient with, or bogged down in the preparation, when you are anxious to see a woven or knitted project begin to take shape. It helps to regard the preparatory steps as the actual beginning. Getting a warp measured out, threaded on, and tied up could be considered preparation for weaving. However if you regard it as part of the weaving process, your project is half finished by the time you throw the first shuttle. Knitting a test swatch to check the gauge is a tedious step that it is always tempting to omit, but it is faster and less frustrating than ripping out the first four inches of a sweater because it is turning out to be much larger or smaller than expected. Knitting a swatch and checking the gauge should really be a step in the process, as necessary as assembling the yarn and needles.
Several projects are begging to be undertaken, and surfaces are littered with skeins of wool or colorful clusters of cones of cotton warp, bits of paper with scribbled calculations, and pattern books sprouting clumps of page markers. Rifling through the various caches of “UFOs” (unfinished objects) has yielded one or two that are ripe for finishing and not yet gone by into “what was I thinking when I started that?” (or worse, “what was that supposed to be?”). One or two of the resulting projects may end up as false starts, but there is no doubt that something has begun …
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Moody waters
We took a walk this morning. The sky was overcast and the river seemed moody … cold, dark, and quiet even where it was moving quickly. Living the way we do has made us come to look at and to appreciate water in ways which we used not to. Water which supports our livestock is drawn from a drilled well near the barns; that which we drink flows from a surface spring which emerges just outside the house. Our supply of domestic water fluctuates with the mostly seasonal vagaries of the surrounding water-table, one of many constant preoccupations. Although we have always had water, there have been times when its flow rate has been very low. Just two summers ago we needed to dramatically limit consumption, and showers and laundry were very carefully scheduled. Luckily there have also been times when we have not had to worry about such limitations.
We recently commented on the local development of Marcellus shale gas deposits. One of the techniques used by this industry to extract previously untapped reservoirs is called hydraulic fracturing (or fracking). Fracking involves injecting water, sand, and chemicals at high pressure into rock formations deep within the earth; this fractures and expands existing fissures in the rock and allows natural gas to rise to the surface. Our fear is for the potential for methane gas and, more insidiously, dangerous chemicals to migrate along these fissures and to pollute our water. Many of the chemicals used by the fracking industry are known to be toxic to humans and other animals, and several are known carcinogens. Potentially toxic substances include petroleum distillates such as kerosene and diesel fuel (which contain benzene, ethylbenzene, toluene, xylene, and naphthalene); polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons; methanol; formaldehyde; ethylene glycol; glycol ethers; hydrochloric acid; and sodium hydroxide.
Our concern for water is genuine. It is not hyperbole to argue that without it … this place ceases to exist.
Summer kitchen
We traveled to visit friends this weekend to talk over the recent performance of our Sheep-to-Shawl team at the Pennsylvania Farm Show. As discussion waned I took a walk around some out-buildings. One particular structure there has always intrigued me, an old summer kitchen. In the days when cooking was done over a wood-fired cookstove the summer kitchen was used to avoid over-heating the main house. All warm-weather cooking, canning, and perhaps laundry was done there. I once wrote the following about an old barn which lies on the Susquehanna flood plain within a few miles of Pairodox, ”Each year, after harvest, this solitary structure emerges from the crops which shielded it from view. I delight in watching how the lights of sunrise and sunset illuminate and reveal its character. I enjoy imagining the animals it may have housed, the feed it may have protected from the elements, and the machinery it perhaps harbored from the snows of winter and the flood waters of spring time. The structure, revealed, speaks of rest and rejuvenation after a long season of hard, productive, work. This rest is important and every bit as much a part of the yearly cycle of events as spring rains and summer sunshine.” Every time I see this summer kitchen the same sorts of thoughts run through my mind. How many meals has its now sagging walls surrounded? How much history, expressed in human generations, has it weathered? What did it observe of the lives of so many that worked the surrounding fields? The building now sits and is subject to the inexorable pull of entropy, if you look closely it lists to the east. Its siding is weathered and some of its windows are long absent. If it could speak it might recount stories only known as fragments by those still with us who have heard them.
There was a summer kitchen on our place when we first arrived. It was to the north-east, only a few feet from the house. It was quite old and deep with the sediment of birds, rodents, and other transitory inhabitants for which the aging structure provided shelter from summer heat and winter wind. We thought it would do nicely as a chicken house and tried to move it (closer to a source of water) at a time when we were not yet fully schooled in such things. The structure collapsed, in transit, as we tried to negotiate a small gully. It was beyond repair so we burned it in place. I’ve always regretted its loss. It would have been nice to have been able to resurrect the structure and to wonder about its history, meals prepared, lives lived and lost, and lessons we have yet to learn. Old buildings intrigue me and I wonder whether they have anything akin to a soul. I believe that they do and that this is something we all have felt when within the confines of these structures. If it can be said that structures have character, then perhaps is it this that we wish to rekindle and come to know when we renovate? There has been much reward in renovation for us. We have done so for our home and for a number of pieces of farm machinery. On a practical level, renovation has often been our only option when funds were unavailable to do otherwise. On another level, however, we have always been pleased to have been able to make like-new. There is a very old saying in the family which shows how it is that we have adopted this attitude: Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without. Next time you think about throwing something out and buying a new one, do yourself and the earth a favor and consider making like-new.
