UPDATES: THE FALL SHARE & THE CAT.
Sorry for the lack of farm or garden related updates lately....but that is pretty much how it goes around here. Aside from being in limbo - this time of year simply doesn't require as much work up in the field. So, you will just have to make do with an update on the Gladdie cattie. She is still a tiny, sickly thing, but it has all been worth it because she has turned out to be an excellent mouser.
Speaking of the neglected garden, our very last main-season CSA delivery is this week! Hard to believe it has been 15 weeks already! We still have garden full of food...but as much as we would love to announce our FALL SHARE, we just don't feel confident enough in our situation. It is still unclear when we will have to be gone from our house/garden, so until we do know for sure - we are going to be selling food week-to-week. If you think you will be interested in getting a CSA basket of food in the near future and live in the Versailles/Danville/Lexington-ish area, make sure you are part of the mailing list! (You can sign up using the link at the bottom of this post or email us at roughdraftfarmstead@gmail.com) We will send out a message each week with the harvest and deliver on a first-come-first-serve basis. It is not ideal, but we are hoping this allows us to continue to feed our friends and family and make the most out of our beloved garden.- Hannah.
LE SIGH.
Unfortunately, our crazy relative Aunt Drought is back in town, staying in our garden and being a general annoyance: yesterday marks three weeks dry. Last night, since no rain randomly graced us, we found ourselves once again hauling water from the pond up to the garden to keep the fall share going which, at this moment, we're not even entirely sure if we'll be able to offer.A sigh doesn't quite explain this year entirely, but it comes close.We're not trying to unload another negative post, though! We just want to update our readers with what's going on and, unfortunately, what's going on sorta sucks. Besides the return of the dryness and the whole losing-our-garden thing, there are many positive possibilities revealing themselves, they are just too young to really talk about yet. So we try to simply focus on the small joys of our days...constant fresh bouquets of zinnias, a happy little wooden painting, a tree outside our window heavy with pears, bushels of garlic ready to be planted - location to be determined!Since we were asked to leave, our inbox has been flooded with kind notes and advice from many friends, family and strangers. It has all been very inspiring, and it will likely be out of this support that we find the setting for the next chapter––one you're helping to write. We haven't made a decision as to what to do next just yet, but we have been moved by how many options have presented themselves, and how many keep coming.We promise to keep everybody updated, and to keep keepin' on. We're sorry the blog has been such a downer lately, but we also hope one day we can be apologizing for being too cheery, too upbeat from a glut of wonderful happenings. This year might have been a sigh so far, but there's still plenty of time to turn it into a smile, and with all your love and support, plenty of reason to.- Jesse.
STRANGE DAYS.
The garden is a strange place right now. We stand in it and feel a bit lost, still unsure of when we will have to leave. We continue to work - but our labors are no longer filled with hope and excitement and satisfaction. Planting our fall seedlings feels a little sad, each of us working in silence as we transplant, neither of us saying what we are thinking - "what is the point?" Our ambitious weeding and mulching program has fallen out of the picture completely, our cover crops neglected, the deer fence taken down. Our main focus has been the fall garden, hoping for a change to at least stay til November, and so we place our enthusiasm in that - tending to our little cauliflowers and broccoli and cabbages and hoping for a rain, for a little more time.
The garden also looks like a strange place these days, wild and full of life. Like I said, the weeds are a bit out of control. Our pole beans have overwhelmed their trellis, sending a massive tangle of vines toppling into the sorghum row. Watermelons are growing throughout the sweet potato patch. The vines of the pumpkins have died back, leaving them peculiarly arranged, inttermintantly placed alongside the tomatoes. We were letting our future garlic patch sit under a heavy planting of buckwheat, whose flowers have brought a consstant, throbbing hum of honeybees. One of my favorite examples of garden neglect is the old lettuce row. Lettuce, when left alone, will grow to an extreme height, getting taller and taller until it resembles some sort of Dr. Seuss-like flower. It is like a little alien garden of purple and green and yellow algae. On the plus side, besides lookingkind of amazing, letting your lettuce go to flower also allows you to collect and save seed!
We are hoping tonight to be able to sit down and determine our exact timeline – when we have to be out of the house, and what is going to happen with the garden. This will definitely help us to have a better idea about what comes next, the possibility of a Fall CSA share, and allow us to make some big decisions. As always, we will keep you updated!- Hannah
MOVING FORWARD.
First of all, I know a lot of people are waiting anxiously to hear some news. But basically...I've got nothing. Although many more opportunities, offers, and suggestions have come up, we haven't yet made a decision. We have spent the past few days keeping up with the farm chores, researching, and making a big ol' list of PROS and CONS.But on another note: Jesse is currently reading The Dirty Life by Kristin Kimball (I just finished it: it is wonderful). This morning, he was reading the chapter where Kristin is starting to get the impression that no one in her new community thinks her and her husband, who have just started an organic farm in upstate New York, are going to succeed. When her doubts begin to get the best of her, she asks her husband about it: "Of course we had a chance, he'd say, and anyway, it didn't matter if this venture failed. In his view, we were already a success, because we were doing something hard and it was something that mattered to us. You don't measure things like that with words like success or failure, he said. Satisfaction comes from trying hard things and then going on to the next hard thing, regardless of the outcome. What mattered was whether or not you were moving in a direction you thought was right."As Jesse and I ate our lunch today - juicy, purple slices of heirloom tomato on warm bread with our own butter and slivers of spicy garlic - I was stunned with the simplicity of it, the perfection of its smallness. And I reflected on these last 5 months - what all we have accomplished. We have eaten so many meals like these, beautiful meals with the food we grew. We have fed others, many loved ones and friends. We have slept most nights with the tiredness and true rest that can only come from devastatingly hard work. And so, as I feel words like "failure" start to creep in...I try to focus on this: On a tomato sandwich, on the positive words and support from our friends, and on the excitement and possibility that lies ahead as we continue to move forward. And that feels pretty successful.- Hannah.
