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 “…All we can do is keep telling the stories, hoping that someone will hear. Hoping that in the noisy echoing nightmare of endlessly breaking news and celebrity gossip, other voices might be heard, speaking of the life of the mind and the soul’s journey.”Jeannette Winterson, Weight. 

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“There is a dragging creature on the farm.” This was one of the first things Andrea said when we arrived at Lower Shaw Farm, our first wwoofing adventure. “It pulls things along the ground at night and leaves them several yards away.” They’ve tested several theories and believe that it is a short, perhaps playful or even lazy creature. It doesn’t drag things very far and can’t seem to carry big or heavy things. Matt called it a monster and showed us the book he had on hunting monsters, but Andrea corrected him and said that she preferred to call it a creature.

 

The dragging creature has been the preferred topic of conversation during most meals, especially at breakfast. This kind of inquisitive, vocabulary-rich, intelligent, and playful kind of conversation is displayed continuously throughout the day, on nearly any topic of conversation. Literature, compost, chickens, music, juggling, and even nipple tassels have been topics of lovely discussion over the last week and a half.

 David and I are at home here.

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 “…You made this world, and it’s lovely, every inch of it. When I think of the things I’ve loved I find myself choking with happiness, or maybe sorrow, I don’t know; and every one of them has been something in this world that you made.” ~Phillip Pullman, The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ. 

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Hello! Greetings from across the pond. How are you? So much has happened in the last few weeks. I would love to sit down and have a chat with each one of you…but this imperfect vessel of the blog will have to do. I want to talk about home for a little bit. If you’d like, feel free to read this aloud in a soft, lyrical British accent. I seem to be picking up a bit of my native tongue here on this island nation. My thoughts are in a British accent, especially when I’m writing in my journal.

 

But it’s not just the British accent that surrounds us. One of the residents on the farm is Canadian, eh, and we’ve been living with wwoofers from Italy, Spain, and Germany. We love our ever-expanding international family.

 

So, what is home? We’ve been away from home, the heartland, the good ol’ U. S. of A. (in fact, we spent the Fourth of July in England of all places!) since the first of April. Left the safety and security of good jobs and, like fools, followed our heart and the wind to foreign lands. We spent a month in Belgium, a month and a half in France, and now we’re spending almost two months in the UK.

 

(Since we weren’t able to come to an agreement with the gallery in Prague, where we had expected to reside until the end of October, we did some thinking and praying and decided to wwoof for the last six weeks on our trip before returning to the States. WWOOF is a network of organic farms worldwide that allows volunteers to learn about organic living, gardening, animal caretaking, etc. on their farms.)

 

If you’ve been following this blog, you know that I recently celebrated my thirtieth birthday in Paris, attending Shakespeare and Co’s literary festival. We couchsurfed with a Parisian artist named Julien. It was a thrilling three days as we listened attentively to speeches, readings, and interviews with international writers, reporters, and poets.

 

For me, listening to writers feels like home. I sunk easily into their world like a worn-in, cushy chair as I listened. My heart connected with theirs as they spoke about their passion for story and poetry, for social justice and compassion, for unity and relationship. The poet Tjawangwa Dema from Botswana created the heart of this literary home in the park, just across the street from the mystical Notre Dame. Philip Pulman, author of The Golden Compass, formed the brain through his scholarly musings. Nam Le from Australia generated the joyous laughter from the belly, while Jeanette Winterson, author of The Stone Gods, fashioned the feet and hands, as she urged us to go out into the world and write.

 

 When we left the artist’s home, I wondered if I would find home in the nation that my ancestors had left behind. I watched the Cliffs of Dover grow larger as we rode the ferry across the English Channel. The Decemberists’ song played softly in my head. Was I almost home? I have some German and French blood in me, but most of my ancestors came from England, Scotland, and Wales. 

London, although at once stunning and overwhelming with its concoction of urban architecture and historical building, did not feel like home. Riding the infamous London Tube tested my newly acquired inner peace. We were couchsurfing at a friend’s flat and, although we were very grateful for its comfort, it didn’t feel like home.  

I felt a slight tugging on the heartstrings when I saw the Tower Bridge, its majestic presence crossing over the Thames River. I stood in awe of the Parliament Building, Big Ben, and Westminster Abbey. At the Southwark Cathedral, David and I marveled that we were staying in a place of worship, where some of the early Christians prayed in the 7th century.

 

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They say that home is where the heart is. I find my heart in writing—both poetry and fiction—and in lively discussion with lovely people. I find that my heart is with my husband, as we work and live and eat and sleep in different places and with different people all over this blue, round ball. I find my heart everywhere and at once deep within me.

 

I also find that my heart is calling me home, to the sleepy town in Ohio where I lived as a little girl until I was eleven. The town where we lived in a tiny, five room apartment and where I shared a bedroom with my younger brothers. The town where our family is waiting for us, with open hearts and hands to help us make a new life once again.

  

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  Please check out the photos that David has posted on facebook. He’s chronicled this trip quite well.http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=225667&id=537144362&l=1c4c1d863c   

WWOOF!

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During our two week stay at Lower Shaw Farm, we had the pleasure of learning alongside with two other wwoofers: Manuela from Germany and Sergio from Spain. Despite her small frame, Manuela kicks ass when it comes to destroying old cabinets. She enjoys watching the Big Bang Theory while drinking hard cider. Sergio is our ex-rock singer. His likes include reading about chickens doing yoga and organic gardening.  

Wwoofing is a network of farms, which allow people to volunteer and learn on their farms for predetermined periods of time. The farms vary from small, organic holdings like Lower Shaw (which has been taking wwoofers for thirty years) to large, diverse farms like Semeil in the highlands of Scotland. This 300 acre farm started taking wwoofers last year.   

How did you learn about wwoofing? Why did you start wwoofing? 

Sergio: I came across WWOOF on the Internet, searching for voluntary work in England. I felt like a change in my life and suddenly this idea offered me the perfect chance to learn new things, meet new people and travel, all without spending money, only offering my willingness to work.

 

Manuela: I read about it in a book about ways to make a sabbatical year. I wanted to escape real life (work).

 

What are some places that you have (or are going to) wwoof?

 

Sergio: Lower Shaw Farm is unique. And then I stayed at The HoBB, a beautiful site in the English-Welsh border, run by a couple of artists, where I learnt a lot about building things in a creative way. Also I have been to Tithe Farm, in Lincolnshire, a kind of Bed and Breakfast, where I practiced my bakery skills and slept in a gipsy caravan!!!

 

Manuela: Farms and Houses in Swindon and different places in Wales.

 

Tell us about some tasks you’ve had while wwoofing?

 

Sergio: I’m really proud of helping to build a straw bale house, a 100 per cent green house. I mixed sand, soil and water, and covered the walls of the hut with mud with my bare hands.

 

Manuela: Gardening, Household, catching pigs, harvesting, working with loads of horse- and sheep shit as fertilizer. Also I knew where the vegetables came from (the shit), I ate them and they tasted delicious.

 

 Tell us about an interesting thing that’s happened while you’ve been wwoofing? 

Sergio: While I was helping at Lower Shaw Farm, something strange happened. Some things, such as towels, shoes, tools, were being dragged during the night at the back porch of the farm and nobody knew the explanation. Eventually all the wwoofers stayed awake one night to solve the mystery. But the "dragging creature" didn’t come. We had to wait and install a camera and the mystery was solved. It was a young wolf!!!

 

Manuela: Nothing special has happened. I don't know if this is interesting, but last week I was attacked by a duck. It was so excited about me digging out all the good worms and snails of the soil that it had a mix up with a person and a worm! But the most interesting thing for me is meeting all these different people and hearing their stories.

 

What is the most rewarding thing, so far, about wwoofing?

 

Sergio: Wwoofing is a unique experience. To me, so far, the most rewarding thing has been the encounter with wonderful people -both hosts and other wwoofers- and sharing the time of our lifes working together toward a better world for our children.

 

Manuela: Meeting so many interesting and nice people, gaining new friends. Being outside most of the time. Getting a more grounded life. Harvesting and than eating delicious organic food from the garden. Last week I was sick (throwing up all night) and really everybody was lovely and tried to help me. Being free!!!!

  

 

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A Tale of Two Farms

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“Could be worse,” David said to me one afternoon as I shimmied off my Wellingtons and poured out two inches of water. Showers of sweet smelling rain had been coming down for most of the six hours we had spent in the barley field, pulling up wild oats.

            “Oh?”

            “Could be pig shit.”

            Too true. On our second morning at Semeil Farm, where we start at eight am sharp, we were told that we were going to help Eddie (a Scottish local and ski instructor) and Roz (an English horse trainer who spends her winters volunteering at wild animal rescue centers) separate the piglets. They had to be taken from their mother and divided into boys and girls.

            This was going to be a much different experience than the one we had in Swindon on the three acres of Lower Shaw Farm.

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            Back at Lower Shaw, we often heard sounds of the Buddhist choir coming from the non-residential kitchen and large dining room. That area was also used by Shiatsu Massage Therapists and the Wednesday Café, for which we baked lots of organic goodies to sell. In the loft was the yoga room where they have yoga classes for infants and mothers. Lower Shaw has been a communal place for over thirty years, hosting wwoofers, wanderers, and seekers from all over the world.

            At Lower Shaw, we met in the dairy (now a large kitchen) around eight am for a family breakfast. Andrea made soft boiled eggs, which are placed in adorable, little cups. We were instructed on the different ways of eating the eggs. First, cut off the top. You can then cut your toast into strips, called soldiers, and dip them in the egg. You can eat it with a tiny tea spoon or spread it on your toast. After you’re finished, you break a hole in the bottom of the egg shell so a witch can’t use it as a boat. (Huh? British witches must be teeny tiny!)

            The day’s work—watering the garden and/or poly tunnel, weeding, cleaning, and harvesting vegetables—was smattered with charismatic conversations among the wwoofers, farm staff, and whatever family members happened to be present that day. We stopped for elevensies, which was the first tea break at eleven am. We met for a communal lunch, then another tea break around four pm and finally dinner. (Yeah, I thought it was a joke when Merry and Pippin complained that they were going to miss all of the meals in the day.).

            Work on Semeil Farm (located in the Highlands of Scotland) is vastly different from Lower Shaw. It’s a proper farm with 300 acres, tons of sheep, about 50 pigs, chickens, turkeys, rescued Norwegian Fiord horses (a story for another time), posh Thoroughbred horses, and a ragtag pack of domestic dogs.

 

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            We work hard, between seven and nine hours a day. (Over those four weeks, we’ve gained great respect for farmers. They work over twelve hours a day, seven days a week.) Our backs and arms and hands were sore and aching. We’ve never worked so hard—physically—in our lives. Exhausted every night, we pass out often before nine pm.

            It’s worth it.

            Semeil Farm is surrounded on all sides by breathtaking dark forests that creep up hillsides, rolling fields of waving grain, and wide open sky. As we weed and hoe, I pause occasionally to survey the landscape. It’s hard to believe that I’m in Scotland. I wonder if my ancestors worked these hills, so many years ago, before they set off for the New World.

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            These black pigs have happy little lives until they’re taken to be slaughtered. They live in groups in muddy fields surrounded by an electric fence. Our job was to round up the piglets into a makeshift pen, then mark the boys and girls so that we could easily tell which one needed to be hoisted up and placed in the small trailer. When we grabbed the heavy, surprisingly fast pigs, they shrieked as if we were killing them. One kicked hard and got me right in the stomach. I didn’t let go.

            I was so proud of myself as I held the back legs of one heavy, squirming and squealing pig—it had to be at least seventy pounds—and David gripped the front legs. We handed it up to Eddie, who stood in the trailer. Then I realized that the front of me was warm. And wet. I looked down. There was a trail of pig shit going down my tank top and onto my jeans.

            I didn’t have time to clean until hours later.

            This is not a vacation.

            At the end of the day as we nurse our blisters and sore muscles, we’re proud to take an active part in this circle of life. Proud of the dirt under our nails and the farmers’ tan. It feels good to be working again.

 

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   As usual, check out our photos here:  

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=246488&id=537144362&l=ff0b6bdbb4

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=247108&id=537144362&l=5ec4a05089

 

(Written over two weeks ago, but never had the change to upload until now. We're currently back in the States...)

The Night is Far Spent

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  “…primitive people used to watch the sun drop lower on the horizon in great terror, because they were afraid that one day it was going to go so low that it would never rise again; they would be left in unremitting night. […] Somewhere in the depths of our unconsciousness we share the primordial fear, and when there is the first indication that the days are going to lengthen, our heart, too, lift with relief. […] In the Christian Church these weeks leading up to Christmas, this dark beginning of our new year, is also traditionally the time of thinking of the last things, of the ‘eschaton,’ the end.  

The night is far spent. The day is at hand.”  

~Madeleine L’Engle, The Irrational Season

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My grandmother, the only one I’ve known, passed away on October 14th, 2010. She died on her 65th wedding anniversary, after saying goodbye to her husband. We had been back in the States for less than two months. I was there at her bedside to say goodbye. To say thank you for having a secret cupboard just for me. Her only granddaughter. For filling it with paper dolls and color pencils and an endless supply of paper. For writing me letter after letter, even as her Parkinson’s Disease made it difficult for her to keep a steady hand.

 

I was not supposed to be in Ohio at the time. I was supposed to still be in Europe with my husband, but our plans had changed.

 

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Grandma was married in a red dress. At the wedding her mother told the minister that she “don’t want any part of it.” She was afraid that my grandma would drop out of nursing school. She didn’t. But it was against the rules to get married, so Grandma had to continue living in the dorms and keep her marriage a secret.

 

Grandpa was a conscientious objector. During World War II. He was drafted and the government put him to work in a mental hospital for veterans. Grandpa spent one summer planting trees in Michigan. He and his friend would work harder and faster than the rest of the group so that they had time to read.

 

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I’ve been spending a lot of time with Grandpa, listening to his slow repetition of stories of days long past. I’m unemployed. I have a lot of time to sit and listen. But I’m not listening very well. The noise inside my head is so loud. Voices telling me what a failure I am.

 

I’m feeling what a lot of you have been feeling for the last few years. A compulsion to curl into the fetal position, safe in your pajamas, watching old movies. The outside world is frightening. I returned from Europe to find my country in shambles. The job market is a bleak place, overrun with desperate people fighting for the same lousy position. With over ten years of pharmacy tech experience, I haven’t been able to get a job.

 

My family urges me to pray, to trust God. Which is harder for me to do than it was when I was a little girl. Living in this same, small town.

 

We moved into an apartment, down the street and around the corner from the home of my grandparents and my aunt and uncle. I live two buildings away from my dad and my youngest brother. My other brother, the middle child, and his wife and their three kids live within a ten minute walk away. I’m surrounded by family for the first time in ten years.

 

I spent the first eleven years of my life just a few steps from here. The apartment complex I grew up in is a long, brick building. I spent hours playing with my Barbies, begging my brothers to not fight, pleading “What would Jesus do?,” and reading stacks of books from the library.

 

Spending my days at the library, I gorge on their vast collection of movies and books. I stay busy tutoring four students. I recently studied the grotesque in Flannery O’Connor and the American Dream in The Great Gatsby. Now I’m digesting The Catcher in the Rye and To Kill a Mockingbird. Reading is my trusted anchor. It keeps me from drowning.

 

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Grandma spent sixty years in this town. She was involved in various organizations. She learned sign language after her children grew up. She volunteered at the local library and the Columbus Colony for the Deaf. She was constantly taking courses in art, creative writing, and Tai Chi. Grandma taught her children and grandchildren how to look at each new day with joy and wonder.

 

Now she’s gone.

 

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There’s little light in my days. It’s becoming difficult to hold onto the joy of the summer: the days spent in southern France, the discovery and wonder in Brussels, Paris, London, and Edinburgh. I wonder if it was a mistake, to chase our dreams with such passion reckless abandon.

 

Now we’re here at the beginning and it feels like the end. I struggle to find a reason to get out of bed in the morning. To hunt for a job I don’t want. To clean our empty apartment.

 

David hasn’t painted in months. I haven’t been writing. We’re caught in a spiral of despair, anger, and bewilderment. Where is the creative spark? Everything is dead.

 

I struggle with my faith. Yet I find a glimmer of hope in the liturgy. This is the time of mourning and contemplation. This is the season of darkness. We mourn the passing of vivid autumn colors and long days. We surround ourselves with friends and family. We remind ourselves of the harvest—the work of the summer—which will sustain us through the coming months. We look toward the coming of the Christ child. Hope is a faint star on the horizon. We rise up and walk forward.

 

“The night is far spent. The day is at hand.”

 

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images courtesy of 

naruuzumakilvr.livejournal.com/

 www.outbackphoto.com/.../essay.html

 

 

    

Happy Holidays to You and Yours!

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cheesy christmas 

 

Wishing everyone a cheery and cheesy holiday season

from the heart of Ohio!

 

With love,

David & Gwen





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