Epic natural beauty in northern Italy

Cazzano do Brentonico, a small village in the mountains of northern Italy; Vineyards perched on mountain slopes; Narrow cobblestone streets; Medieval castles; Blue skies: I am so grateful to be here, able to see all of this.

View from our room

Avio castle

Breakfast with an awesome view

We're off

Aiyana's birthday party and other stuff

We had an early birthday party for Aiyana with her grandparents and cousins Julia, Stella and Lucy (my sister's daughters). Aiyana will be 11 on October 5th. The cake is home-made by Sena and Aiyana. Icing too.

Some fun stuff

 Solace

Peace

Most common regrets

"There was no mention of more sex or bungee jumps. A palliative nurse who has counselled the dying in their last days has revealed the most common regrets we have at the end of our lives."
You can read the rest of the article here.

1. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
2. I wish I hadn't worked so hard.
3. I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.
4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.   

I think this is worth pondering, and I hope that it is helpful to you in one way or another.
Peace 

It's a beautiful day

Today feels like the most beautiful day. The air is crisp and cool, the sun is out, and I feel exuberant. That Rumi quote about the thousand ways to kneel and kiss the ground really feels appropriate today. There are a million ways I want to kiss the ground.

My day started with coffee and a wonderful time with the cows, milking them and being with them in the pasture. I saw 15 wild turkeys that have been hanging out in the orchard lately, and then a hawk up in a tree on the edge of the pasture flew slowly over me. Quite a start for the day.

Then I went over plans for our Europe trip, which is coming up soon. I called Nicu, our farm mentor, who's in his 70s now, and who we'll be visiting in Romania. He is an amazing man, who happened to come to our farm when we just started, and ended up staying for 2 years, during which he helped and taught us so much. He has been farming all his life and he also forages and makes his own everything - jams, alcoholic drinks, all kinds of preserves and ferments. Since he left us in 2011, he really wanted us to visit him and now we're going. He gave me full details of what he's planning to cook for us, and he also said that he's having a chicken butchered for us. Nobody ever invited me to visit them with that kind of offer.

During my preparations for this trip, I've also been swooning over the Alps in Austria, and the Dolomites in northern Italy, actually the whole Tirol region, which we will be visiting.

I feel so good and free today, that I spontaneously made a bouquet of wild flowers and weeds. I hope that you too are enjoying the beautiful day and the good things around you.

 Peace

Autumn

I love autumn so much.
My little treasures: a little sowing project the girls did for me years ago, and things I picked up in the woods

Weeds  - I know I'm supposed to fight them, but I still think they're beautiful

Chives in flower with a little bee foraging on them

Autumn sun

 Made the first fire of the fall this morning

Peace

Acorns

I love acorns. They are so cute and they inspire me

Hold on to that seed in your heart,
The seed that inspires you,
lights you up,
and feels true.
Nurture it, tend it as best as you can,
and don't worry about what it will or will not become.
Just be with it - that is enough.
You are enough.

Autumn Equinox!

Happy fall equinox!
Autumn begins today and the days grow noticeably shorter as we enter the time of slowing down and getting cozy for the winter. I hope that we can all take some time out of our busy days to enjoy this beautiful time of the year, when nature puts on her stunning display.

Nasturtiums seem to be at their most beautiful these days

Time for hot cocoa again. Opal and Jasmine's milk, raw cacao, maple syrup, dash of vanilla and nutmeg. Yum!

Some evenings, after the days' work is done, I can steal a few moments for myself and sit outside. The house looks so cozy when it's time to go back in.

Goldenrod puts on its amazing display at this time of year.

Peace

Blend

Misty morning, early autumn.

I sit on the soft, damp earth,

with a colorful leafy blanket at my feet.

Smell of wood smoke in the air,

And the little animals so busy -

Acorn gathering,

Burrow readying,

All preparing for their winter rest.

Life,

You fill my heart with joy and yearning,

I long to blend into you.

This little poem came into my head this morning while I was milking the cows:

I’ve tried the paths you’ve laid before me -

None of them is my own.

I’ve outgrown my mentors,

Those put before me to show me the way -

I thank them all.

I am alone, lost in this wilderness

Of life,

With only this faint knowing as my guide.

At times cautiously, at times rashly,

I walk through the tangle, leaving my own path.

There’s fear,

and also,

Reverence

Arne Garborg quote

Our friend Becky shared this little quote which very much resonates with me.

Have a great weekend and enjoy this beautiful weather!

Rest

I decided to take a better care of myself, with the Lyme and everything going on around here. So I've been spending time resting on the ground whenever I can. I love the contact - it always feels so good, and a day later I feel energized. I am grateful that I can do that, just go outside and lie on the earth undisturbed.
Aiyana came out with me once and took this picture.

Today I am going to the butcher to cut up and package Olive's meat. I am ready.
Peace

Many faces

You go to school,
you get a job,
you have a family.
And your identity is set.

And yet:
You hear my voice - your voice

And so,
you come to lead,
a sort of double life.
You wonder what is true.

Truth can have many faces.

Hope Bourne

“For money, you sell the hours and the days of your life, which are the only true wealth you have,” she wrote. “You sell the sunshine, the dawn and the dusk, the moon and the stars, the wind and the rain, the green fields and the flowers, the rivers and the sweet fresh air. You sell health and joy and freedom.” Hope Bourne

You can read more about this woman here and her highly unusual lifestyle, which she changed into at 52.

Another Mary Oliver poem I love (thank you Becky for reminding me)

Praying

It doesn’t have to be
the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few
small stones; just
pay attention, then patch

a few words together and don’t try
to make them elaborate, this isn’t
a contest but the doorway

into thanks, and a silence in which
another voice may speak. 

(from Thirst)

Thank you so much, Olivie!

Another long post. This has been a difficult week. Lyme disease took me for an unpleasant ride, with a couple of days where I felt sick, but now am feeling much better. And then there was Olive. I wrote about her throughout the week, and am copying here some excerpts I want to share:

Today (Thursday), we killed Olive, our 2 year old heifer cow, and brought her to the butcher. It was fast, and she didn't know it was coming. Ed (who does not eat meat) and Tom, our friend, shot her in the head while she was contentedly eating her treats out in the pasture. Then Ed brought her to the butcher. I was the one who got her the treats, and got her into the stanchion out in the pasture, where she was eating when they killed her. She trusted me the most. We had done this many times before, always me giving her treats in the stanchion, but nothing bad ever happened. I feel sick about it even though I knew it was coming for some time. We cannot have milk without having the cows give birth each year, and we cannot have the herd go up past a certain number of animals that our land can support. So even though none of us eats beef, if we want to eat milk and cheese, we have to slaughter some of the animals, or sell them to someone else, who will also eventually slaughter. We chose to give them the best possible life right here on our farm until the very last day, and not send them in to slaughter, away from their family and from the place they know and feel comfortable in. I think Olive lived happily until the instant that bullet hit her, but still, it feels so hard, and I really feel like I betrayed her. I have never felt this way before, not even close with the chickens. Olive was the first calf born on our farm, and I’ve seen her every day of her life. I’ve been vegetarian for over 10 years, and throughout that time I did not realize, not until now that we have our own cows, that if you drink milk or eat any dairy products, that involves killing animals in order to get that milk

I tried to have a little ceremony for her, to thank her. I did it a couple of days ago, when she was still alive, and again today after she was dead.

What feels really weird, like I said before, is that we don't even eat red meat. But we do drink a lot of milk and eat cheese, and we want to keep that in our diet, especially for the kids. And since butchering Olive was part of getting our milk, now I’ll have to learn how to cook red meat.

I must say, it’s a lot easier buying milk and meat at the store, that's for sure.

A few days after the kill, Saturday, it is still very difficult with Olive. I went to the butcher to talk about how he's going to cut her up. Right now she's hanging in his cooler in order to age the meat a few days. I got her tail and took it home with me. I think I’ll make soup with it. I was talking to her tail in the car. I told her I loved her. I never spoke to my food like this before, never felt so connected, in such a painful way.

It's so strange, the disconnect: on one hand it feels so wrong and sickening, to take a life, especially one you've nurtured and been close with. But on the other hand, eating meat or dairy products, milk, cheese, yoghurt, does not feel nearly that bad even if you're against killing animals, which I was for over 10 years of being vegetarian. I did not realize back then that being vegetarian still very much involved slaughtering animals, just not direct meat consumption.

As I see it right now, we, and I, need to acknowledge the lives that are taken in order to feed us. We need to give thanks and respect to them, and come to terms with the fact that lives are taken in order to sustain our own. In retrospect, I think that as a vegetarian I should have spend more energy and time campaigning for the rights and humane treatment of animals while they're alive, instead of saying no meat, and leaving it at that. I suggest that we all do that. I don't know if we as humans, can survive without taking the lives of animals, directly or indirectly, and even if we can, I don’t know what the environmental and health implications of that scenario would be. But I do know that it’s in our power to demand that the animals raised to feed us be treated a lot better when they're alive than they currently are. What does that mean? It means let them live in an environment as close to their natural environment as possible. For cows, it means no feedlots, instead let them live on pasture, and treat them humanely, don’t yell or kick or drag them. Take the time to know then, and treat them according to their nature. Temple Grandin did amazing work on the humane treatment of animals raised for slaughter and milk production. She is an engineer, and very brilliant animal advocate who spent years researching and designing animal facilities.

So, after all these abstract thoughts and ideas, I still feel sick and grieving when I think of Olive.

The kids took it really hard too. They cried a lot, and Sena got sick for a day. Aiyana was very mad at us and held us responsible for killing Olive, which of course we are. Now they're feeling a bit better. I tried to console them, and let them know that I am hurting too, even though I am responsible for her death. I tried to explain that this is the full circle of life, even though I am having difficulty with that myself. Sena is adamant that if we sell any of Olive’s meat (we’re considering this, since we don’t even have enough freezer space for her, plus, like I said, it would take our family years to go through her meat at our rate of meat consumption), she is adamant that we only sell her to people who respect her and will not waste any of her. I feel that we must honor that demand. It is only right.

Here's Olive as a calf in 2014, standing next to her mama, when our herd was just Jasmine, Opal and Olive.

And in this picture, which was taken last month, the herd is numbering 7 now, and Olive is the brown cow without the halter, still standing close to her mama, Opal.

Peace

grounding

i was trained in science and i appreciate the scientific method of finding out about the world as a powerful tool. but, i don't think it's right that many times, common sense and indigenous knowledge are dismissed as anecdotal evidence or other such demeaning term, until certain people or organizations finally come around to "prove" it. then, it becomes a "scientific discovery". there are many examples of this, like this article on PubMed on the benefits of grounding, or being in contact with the earth, on health. to me it's obvious that it is healthy to be outside and in contact with nature, haven't we evolved that way? aren't animals living that way? but i guess over a few generations we've become more and more insulated, afraid of getting dirty and so on, and now it's a big discovery that being in contact with the ground is of great benefit to our health.

Abstract

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4378297/

Abstract

Multi-disciplinary research has revealed that electrically conductive contact of the human body with the surface of the Earth (grounding or earthing) produces intriguing effects on physiology and health. Such effects relate to inflammation, immune responses, wound healing, and prevention and treatment of chronic inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. The purpose of this report is two-fold: to 1) inform researchers about what appears to be a new perspective to the study of inflammation, and 2) alert researchers that the length of time and degree (resistance to ground) of grounding of experimental animals is an important but usually overlooked factor that can influence outcomes of studies of inflammation, wound healing, and tumorigenesis. Specifically, grounding an organism produces measurable differences in the concentrations of white blood cells, cytokines, and other molecules involved in the inflammatory response. We present several hypotheses to explain observed effects, based on current research results and our understanding of the electronic aspects of cell and tissue physiology, cell biology, biophysics, and biochemistry. An experimental injury to muscles, known as delayed onset muscle soreness, has been used to monitor the immune response under grounded versus ungrounded conditions. Grounding reduces pain and alters the numbers of circulating neutrophils and lymphocytes, and also affects various circulating chemical factors related to inflammation.

Keywords: chronic inflammation, immune system, wound repair, white blood cells, macrophages, autoimmune disorders

 

read the full article here

peace

moist stormy air this morning

the wind gently swept, all night, over my face through the open window, as i slept. like a whisperer, bringing messages from the unknown.

this morning, when i went out, it was still windy and very moist from the storm that blew in by he shore a couple of days ago, and i could smell the ocean in the air. first i smiled, thinking "this wind has brought the ocean to me". then, as usual, my mind went into "what can i do, how can i contribute? what is my part?". always thinking about this, looking for a way to give back....
i can say a lot, too much, in response to the problems we humans have created and are creating in the world, but i feel that my work should be more in the direction of nourishing a better alternative, healthier, more sustainable, more desirable than what we have now.

at the very least i know that i do not want to contribute to the system that is perpetuating the problems i see, this system of consumption, waste, exploitation of nature and unprivileged humans, etc.

but my work has to be more than that, and slowly, i am piecing it together in hope of creating something different.



also Mary Oliver

Bee stings

For the first 2 to 3 weeks, I did really well with Ed not being on the farm. With our workers, I felt like I could keep things going, and it was not nearly as hard as I had feared. I was pretty encouraged.

Then, last week, I started feeling very fatigued, which I thought was an accumulation,  the result of all the extra work I took on after Ed got his off-the-farm job. This week, the fatigue got worse to the point where all I wanted to do is sleep, and I started to get body aches and I knew that something else was going on, more than just the extra work. I had a test done, and it was positive for Lyme disease.

Going back about 5 weeks ago, I had a rash, which in retrospect was a Lyme rash, went to the doctor and they totally misdiagnosed it. I went to a different doctor this past week with the added symptoms, and fortunately he caught it. So I am now on antibiotics, and I have also been giving myself bee stings. I believe that bee venom can be effective, and anyway, I am not allergic, so I have nothing to lose by getting stung a little. I do feel bad for the bees, because they die after the sting. I thank them, and I am grateful for their help. Hopefully, between the bee stings and the antibiotics, I'll feel better soon.

For now, I think I'll spend the afternoon resting.

Peace