To Build a Village™ recognizes the immediate needs of the people are not limited to housing; they include clean water, fresh nutritious food, education and a means to sustain themselves into the future. Our approach is designed to meet these needs through the empowerment of the Haitian people. We believe that if you “Give a person a fish he will eat for a day. Teach a person to fish and he will eat for a lifetime.”

From a systemic perspective,  To Build a Village™ understands that the stability of Haiti’s land is fundamental to the overall stability of its people.  For this reason,  we believe that a pragmatic and sustainable approach to rebuilding Haiti must address not only the resilience of the built environment, but also the resilience of the natural environment.  We recognize that the fundamental issue that has led to the unraveling of the fabric of Haiti is the loss of her forest, upon which Haitian people have historically depended, and which today impacts safety and resources of all that live there.
http://tobuildavillage.com/

High above the charming and popular Spanish Colonial city of Puerta Vallarta, the polished marbled floors of this luxury condominium cover every inch of its three thousand square feet of elegant, contemporary space. The covered porch where I sit is a watchtower, I am perched here, in a cemented niche, like a sea bird in its towering cliff nest.

From here the arc of view is blue; all but a green-foliaged tropical corner and a purple slice of rugged-edged mountains, the Sierra Madre Occidental. Blue-green on the shore side and a deep sapphire leading to the horizon. Small white blocks, a half-inch high, interrupt the restless line of water on the slender slice of land. Hotels so far away that they more resemble lego buildings than the towering structures that they are.

The View from my Perch: Puerta Vallarta, Mexico

Blue continues to occupy the visual space. Almost a white-blue at the horizon, deepening to the color of a blue known as sky. Small cotton clouds in the foreground draw a dotted line above the distant range, describing the coastal air flow that I feel as a cooling, moist breeze, on my skin. As a protected marine environment there is little activity within the bay where migrating humpback whales come to birth and breed.

It is sound that dominates the scene: the rhythmic rush of waves on the shore, a machete hacking away at an unhealthy and unwanted tree, tiny voices of tiny pedestrians taking in the sights and for a few minutes, the drums of an Aztec dance ensemble entertaining the strolling mid-afternoon guests of this city. Sharp-pitched bird-words pop up from the green corner to punctuate the russh-russh-russh of water. They are invisible to my eye except, that is, the angular fork-tailed frigate birds and graceful brown pelicans, visible but silent as they stitch the blue and green together in graceful looped arcs like the cursive writings of a child.

As yet unfurnished, the allure of the lifestyle offered here (a safe haven above the fray) is ultimately appealing, no matter how different from the simple one I have chosen for myself. Desirous of warmth to soften aching joints, this is as much my friend’s medical decision as it is a need to shift life-gears, away from the demands of a high-maintenance home much further north, in the land of cool fog. Ultimately the ecological footprint here will be less than the one before.

Breaking my “petroleum fast” of many months, I came here to deliver much-beloved pets, one too old to tolerate air travel. On the journey here, the sight of so much land in agricultural production, in San Joaquin (California), Imperial Valley (Arizona), Sonora, Sinaloa, Nyayarit and Jalisco, is provocative indeed. These six states produce more crops in more months that the mind can easily comprehend.

This is a January journey, three long days’ drive north of, and then south of, the borderlands which I call home.

I became witness to the burgeoning demands of food grown far from home and booming agri-business as Mexico rises to meet its own demand as well as ours–and, I imagine, global exports elsewhere.

It is my backyard, Nogales, Arizona, that is the late-fall-to-winter entry point for the abundance of Mexican-grown produce that feeds the US population. Up to 75% of our winter produce travels the same route that I have taken, a green river flowing north.

http://www.ams.usda.gov/AMSv1.0/getfile?dDocName=STELDEV3023456

Bordering Mexico’s western Pacific coast, Sinaloa is the second state below Arizona. Like our Western US states, it is large, with a vast fertile valley slung between mountains that lie within the upper tropic zone. A sister state to California with its own vast, now winter-dormant San Joaquin Valley, it is a burgeoning industrial agriculture business. Whilst the industry contributes to a growing middle class, there is an associated squalor around its clean green perimeter: the temporary shelters of migrant workers.

Densely Sown & Flourishing on its Chemical Diet, Mile upon Mile of Corn, Sinaloa, Mexico

I drove for hours past tall, emerald stands of corn with pollen-ready silks, machine sown into the dark soil as straight as the stitches of a factory garment sewing machine. At first it seemed a marvel until, hour after hour, it became dull and uninteresting, a regimented, unnatural and overly perfect, chemically fed scene with not an insect or butterfly to splat on my windshield.

I found myself longing for those hand-made milpas, the small family-worked plots of food that have sustained Mexico and generations of its people until the mid 1990’s, when the then Mexican President absconded overseas with Swiss bank accounts bulging with money stolen from his country’s men, women and children. The resulting economic deflation imploded subsistence agriculture, the foundation of thousands of communities. No longer able to sustain families, men and older boys reluctantly left their homes and villages in search of city wages. Communities were rent apart and families—the heart of Mexican life—lost each other along with their ability to feed themselves.

Living in the borderlands, we are deeply familiar with the migration north, the painful stories of people willing to risk all to take care of those they love. Few tales end well for the refugees that we refer to as illegal aliens.

Simple Crucifixes Adorn the Border Fence, Each One Marks a Life Lost. Nogales, Sonora

There are parallels to be drawn here as societies lose their knowledge and skill of self-sustenance. A post-World-War-II America lost its rural populations to the cities and, with them, the faming communities that gave us resiliency and food security. Thomas Jefferson envisioned us a “Nation of Farmers,” and I imagine he must be rolling in his grave about now.

Eighty-five percent of pre-WWII farmers returned to urban areas where the war continued in the form of subdivisions. Land was scraped clear of all life like a bombed-out war zone, then divided into plots. Stick-and-frame structures, the same technology that was first developed for barracks housing during the war, were then erected as housing for the rural refugees. Former farmer-soldiers moved in and went to work in factories producing goods for a society that was being consciously shaped into a consumer machine.  

http://www.storyofstuff.com

Former war factories produced goods that we had no idea we needed—they still do. And, bit by bit, the skills of once-sustainable and organic farmers became eroded by the chemicals of war that now found their way into their gardens in the form of fertilizers and pesticides: invisible bombs that we dropped willingly and innocently on ourselves and our loved ones. Without the liberal use of chemicals such as these, industrial agriculture of the scale that I witnessed would not be possible.

It may be argued that this form of food production is the only way to feed the world’s growing population. And yet each day, even before the most recent crisis, 25,000 people die of starvation (according to UN data). In the USA, more than a million children go to bed hungry every day.

Now it is China’s turn. Ever more rural agricultural populations surge to the cities, seeking a better life and work in factories producing consumer goods to be sold in our stores. Like our returning war veterans of the 1940’s, they are leaving their food-growing skills behind. It is these families and their rural communities who suffer the loss.

Industrial agriculture is on the rise in China and the incredible horticultural knowledge of thousands of generations is rapidly being eroded along with their ability to help themselves.

Big business is interested in the bottom line. To get to that bottom line, ecosystems are destroyed, water is polluted, soil quality is degraded and people suffer social injustice.

Food has become a commodity to be gambled with and something to be shaped, re-formed and processed into worthless crap that makes billionaires out of CEO’s and obese diabetics out of the rest of us. It is an industry that inflicts the worst cruelty on animals and pollutes the land in ways we cannot imagine. And we are sold on all of its benefits by some of the highest paid “mad men” in the world. We have been suckered.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhopal_disaster

Yet I am optimistic: the green movement is not confined to buying our way back to sanity. Beneath the faux green-consumption trend is a deep dissatisfaction with the urban routine; of a life of stuff, lived in the mind. Its urgency is being underscored by the greed-driven economic disaster we are living through.

A new wave of future farmers is building, along with farmer’s markets and the local food movement. There is a desire to engage the totality of who we are in meaningful work that nourishes more than just ourselves. We seek connection and community and relationship with place that is human in scale.

Organic Vegetable Production in the Hand-Worked Alan Chadwick Garden, University of California at Santa Cruz

Scarecrows at the Life Lab Garden, UCSC's Living Classroom

These are the seeds of a new movement toward a lifestyle that will build the resilience, reciprocity and regeneration that the future needs: dynamic mosaics feeding ourselves, our communities, and the earth-nourished spirit that makes us human.

http://casfs.ucsc.edu/

]]> http://katetirion.com/?feed=rss2&p=871 0 http://katetirion.com/?p=858 http://katetirion.com/?p=858#comments Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:24:15 +0000 Kate Tirion http://katetirion.com/?p=858 News Flash:

Biomimicry at its best! Inspired by plant processes, scientists are working toward creating home scale power generating systems.

Learning How Plants Split Water to Utilize Solar Energy Inspires Scientists in the Generation of Power

Follow the link to NPR’s Science Friday November 20th 2009 talk and listen to Professor Daniel Nocera of MIT describe their work toward a new future for home scale renewable energy:

http://podcastdownload.npr.org/anon.npr-podcasts/podcast/510221/120634721/npr_120634721.mp3?_kip_ipx=599876077-1259019252

Yesterday in Phoenix, Arizona, the late-afternoon temperature was 105 degrees with a humidity reading of 5 percent! One hundred and seventy miles to the south and 2,889 feet higher in elevation, our temperature hovered in the low 90’s with humidity in the low teens; thirteen percent to be precise.

This summer’s monsoonal rains became the “nonsoon,” as the long-awaited relief from heat and drought never arrived. I know no person who remembers such a dry summer, though I heard that Cassina’s grandmother, aged 92, remembers a summer such as this.

In an ordinary year, September is the beginning of the dry period, when soil surfaces begin to powder and eventually tesselate, as the clays in the soils dry and begin to fissure, leaving an interesting, uneven mosaic pattern. The lines of the pattern etch deep into soil, creating an effect of irregular black sketch lines against brown earth.

That this is no ordinary drying is registered in my own body: the tightness in my skin, how it feels stretching over sinew and muscle, its papery quality making more visible my years in the deeper etched lines of my face. And, in the ease of a sneeze, as pollens and dust bombard the drier passages to my sinuses. There is no satisfying this level of thirst, my own or the earth’s.

I have heard water stories this year and last:

Fifteen miles distant, a well runs dry. They have no stored water, no roof catchment, but are lucky to have a generous neighbor. They drill another well- two hundred feet, three, four hundred. No water!

Near Tucson: Last year, 4.5 inches of rain. This year, 2.5 inches of rain. As of a year ago their well was down sixty four feet over three years. The land around them has been developed: thousands more thirsty people, pets and lawns; this is when the well began to diminish.

These earlier residents have no lawns and the plants that they grow tolerate extreme dryness. They grow small crops of food in the winter but are mostly dependent on a grocery store for their basic supplies. Thick-walled earth houses with a small footprint were built, naturally insulated and solar oriented. Every structure directs rainwater into cisterns, grey water feeds crops and the eighteen-acre watershed has been worked to slow and catch much of the rain that does fall–very little leaves the site.

Nature's Way: to Catch & Hold. Small Desert Pools Hold Sway Over Life & Death

Though we are geographically close, we are fortunate here: we do not depend on our own rainfall and crops to sustain us, we can find what we need in the municipality: piped water and a grocery store. Is there wisdom in such dependence? I do not believe so, such a fragile system holds no strength, no resiliency. One solid smack and, like a three-legged stool with one leg missing, there is no standing it up again. It will no longer be able to support us.

This week I began to search for news of an El Nino event and found this interesting and hopeful piece from JPL:

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/features.cfm?feature=2325

The 1998 Rainfall (Thanks to El Nino) Brings to Life This Sonoran Desert Region of Northern Baja California

For this part of the globe, El Nino is a friend. Like the mythic Kokopelli who heralds fertility, this Pacific Ocean water pattern has global implications and often favors our land with much needed rain from fall through spring. This year the lack of summer rainfall underscores our need and the desire for the return of our water-bearer friend.

I am transported back in time to the El Nino effects that are forever etched in my mind. It was the fall of 1997 and then the winter of 1998. I was living and working in Mexico at the Southern end of Baja California Sur, a place where hurricanes are a consistent weather pattern, part of a boom and bust cycle that, like a venomous serpent,  can have devastating effect if it strikes too close. Hurricanes are directly linked to water temperatures and El Nino is a trigger.

Around the world at least 2100 people died from El Nino’s effects during that fall and winter and at least 33 billion dollars in property damage occurred. This was the biggest such event in one hundred years:

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/elnino/mainpage.html

On the twelfth day of September 1997 I was living in a glorious and simple camp a few minutes’ walk to one of the numerous sandy beaches that embroider the edge of the Gulf of California. Surrounding the open-sided palapa was almost an acre of coastal dry-tropical vegetation, a dense privacy screen and stout windbreak almost fifteen feet high. I had chosen this site because of the protection it afforded from hurricanes: it sits below the coastal edge in an sheltered undulation of the earth.

Barely Visible In Upper Left Corner, the Palapa is Sheltered by an Undulation in the Earth Form and by Dense Vegetation; the Coastal Edges Receive the Brunt of Hurricane Forces.

Very costly coastal sites would be the first to receive blows from big weather. As wind strikes the earth mass, a blocking effect compresses and lifts the wind, which touches down beyond my camp.

These patterns of air movement are elegant, aerodynamic vortexes known as the Von Karman trail:

http://disc.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/oceancolor/additional/science-focus/ocean-color/vonKarman_vortices.shtml.

On this September day, von Karman was my hero; it was his discovery and my knowledge of it that allowed me to stay safe during one of the biggest storms ever recorded in the Pacific in the last two hundred years: Hurricane Linda.

So profound was Linda that she was featured on the front cover of the National Geographic the following June, a stunning satellite image of a powerhouse of energy. Sustained winds of one hundred and eighty-five miles per hour, a massive moisture-laden spiral that was tracking north toward the spit of land where I was encamped. Neighbors gathered and emergency plans were made.

I had experienced a hurricane before, one year ago to the day. That time I was encamped on nearby mountains, working to build a retreat center. That time, we had abandoned the mountain and came into town–we knew road access would be washed away, and in town we could regroup and direct repairs to the road.

It was a “small” hurricane that year, with winds at ninety-seven miles per hour. Seventeen inches of rain fell in that twenty-four hour period.  Sharp-razored  raindrops flung horizontally, stung our eyes as we screened them with slatted fingers so we walked backward, leaning into the wind to stand straight. The coastal waters turned brown with silt from mountain torrents, whole trees and vehicles bobbed in once dry drainages, now inundated a quarter of a mile wide, a brown frothing furor.

Our hotel leaked everywhere, the swimming pool overflowed, the power went out, and sandwiches were served with beer and tequila before that too was gone. A party grew out of the chaos, strangers became friends and the emergency became an adventure.

For others, those whose lives were lived in marginal shelter, perhaps in vulnerable places, this event was likely a frightening and devastating experience. Life threatening. For me it was an experience of the great power of Nature and of my own insignificance: how little I mattered; how control meant nothing and surrender everything.

Now, a year on and Hurricane Linda was headed our way. We sat transfixed before a satellite television in a hotel bar, nine miles away. If she landed here, as the lesser one did a year ago, it would devastate this place just as the smaller hurricane did in Kauaii in the 1980’s. It was prayer time for all of the residents here–in particular for those who would not escape. We were in this together and we hoped for the best possible outcome: no death, no mud slides, no one person or animal washed away. We hoped she would track west and into the Pacific Ocean. She did, though not without leaving her mark. How much rain fell I do not know.

That night, as wind and rain slashed through everything, I covered my bed with a waterproof tarp, tied the outer-edge side to the foot end frame of my bed and climbed under the sheet and tarp. I hoped for some sleep though I was alive with the energy of the moment. Wind and rain cooled the typically muggy night, howling through and around every obstacle, its voracious force not restrained by anything more than an undulation in the earth and walls of vegetation.

By morning, it was clear that we had been lucky this time. We later learned that Linda had tracked 300 miles to the west. I can only imagine how it would have been if we had met face to face.

The rain had stopped and the sun shone as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

Everything in the palapa had gotten drenched. Today, in my library, there are books that wear the memory of mold from this time, an odiferous reminder of my place in things.

I had a flight to catch and several drainages to cross on the way to the airport. Nine miles of graded dirt roads promised to be a challenge as I would navigate through washed out sections and deeply incised banks. The biggest crossing was several hundred yards wide, a main outlet into the Gulf for water draining off the huge catchment of mountains and surrounding lands.

A Single Stream Becomes a Wide Braided Drainage as it Leaves the Steeper Confines that Birth It.

With others, similarly wanting to cross the full, fast-moving river, I parked along its banks, my truck already in four wheel drive.

In Mexico I had been witness to a great deal of bravado, inventiveness and courage by those who live less sheltered lives than ours. Like a duckling watching its mother, I waited to see if anyone was daring enough to cross and if so, would they succeed?

People, holding onto each other, prodded long sticks into the channel bed, looking for danger: deep spots that would float a vehicle, washing it and its occupants out to the Gulf and then the Pacific.

There was an air of nervous anticipation as the first vehicle geared up and moved to the edge, nosing carefully into the water. Neighbors and relatives stood thigh deep in the brown current prepared to help push a vehicle ashore or even across the channel if need be.

I remained unconvinced until the fifth vehicle, an old brown sedan, moved slowly toward the edge. The driver gripping the steering wheel and his family of six perched on the edge of their seats, young children peering from the windows, faces drawn and fingers tightly grasping the edge of window and seat, pale in the late morning light. Chatter ceased and everyone was focused. I held my breath.

The car nosed into the current and began to turn downstream, a dozen people pounced, and pushing, turned it away from the current. Water lapped high, brown against brown, a slurry of earth and water surrounding metal and glass, threatening to overwhelm, to kill the engine, to snatch this family away. The people were having none of it, it was their will, their strength in pulling together that would overcome the odds.  By now I was out of my truck and on the sidelines with everyone else; we shouted support, cheered them on, women young and old fingered rosaries and prayed, crossing themselves. We were a community together, strangers who were no longer strange to each other, connected by common purpose–the safe passage of each of us, and in this moment, of one particular family.  There were moments when it seemed as if the current would win and then more men and youth leapt into the water to lend strength and will.

They did it. As the dripping sedan slowly pulled out of the channel, easing its way past me, I saw palpable relief on all of their faces, open grateful glances broken into wide and toothy smiles.

On the banks we cheered and shouted at the helpers, and at the family in the water-shedding sedan laughed and beamed at each other, nodding knowingly that we knew that they would make it, there was no real doubt, was there?

I crossed the channel two vehicles later, with newly fortified bravery and an array of sodden men and youth ready to help this Gringa out of a pickle, should it be needed.

The crossing successful and now on board a flight north, I gazed at drainages far below, wondering about the changes wrought by the storm.

It would be almost five months later as I drove north through once dry and desolate lands that I would witness the magic of Kokopelli in the El Nino effects on the desert.

Now, the tessellated soils, open in their thirst, are as receptive as I am. The autumnal equinox marks another turning and a lessening need for water though in deep recesses of the earth roots seek moisture that may not be there, seeking winter resilience. Without rainfall soon, I expect more oaks will fall to the drought in the months ahead, reducing valuable habitat for those that forage for a living.

Little by little I shape the land, mostly by hand, with soil and rocks and branches. The effort may seen miniscule given the scale of things but I have been witness to the power of one person and the capacity we hold in our hands.

Materials From the Site Are Used to Build Simple Basket-Like Catchment to Slow Water & Store Silt

One day it will rain again- perhaps a winter El Nino- and that which I have created will catch and hold water, effectively increasing the rainfall. It is Nature’s way to catch and hold and there are examples everywhere.

Stepped Earthworks Form Shallow Ponds That Soak Rainwater Into The Soil

There will be time for water to be absorbed into the ground, for the small structures to gather soil, organic matter and seeds; for life to flourish. I dream that others will be so inspired and that each piece of the mosaic pattern will grow into dynamic, interconnected parts of a resilient and whole ecosystem–habitat for all, including people.

Will you join me?

I was home from school the day the electricity first surged through the network of thick grey wires that wove throughout our house. In this old, old house made of stone and earth, it was impossible to channel a niche for the wires; instead, they lay on the surface, ending in domed brown switches the size and shape of a tea cake.

Cat, My Daughter, Visits the Old House, Vacant For Forty Years

I had been ill, nothing serious, simply a childhood malady that had given me an edge. I must have been six or seven at the time, so the whole affair represented a significant percentage of my life.

It seemed as if the prospect of having electricity had gone on forever. Oh the good fortune to be home when that magical moment transformed our lives: the surge of electric current, the switch turned on. A hard, smooth switch, a new sensation for small fingers that flipped them up and down, over and over. The sharp snapping sound of the switch, the instant brightness of light and a lit-up room.

Among the fragments of the negotiations that remain in my memory are deep concerns about the safety of the livestock–the cows in particular. What if lines came down in a storm?  These animals were at the heart of my parent’s livelihood and passion: the small pedigree dairy herd that, in later years, would shape the future of the breed.

The poles and lines would change the landscape forever, interrupt the beauty we had grown accustomed to. Trees were in its path and some had to go. One ash stood in full and glorious stature at the bottom of the farm yard, woven into the hedgerow that separated the built area from the meadow. Roots, dipping into the water of the mill race, gave it every advantage, and for my mother it was part and parcel of the larger vista, the element in perspective, a key foreground feature. She was loath to lose it no matter the advantage of this energy source. Ultimately it went and others were saved. Electricity came with a price.

Strangers came and went. Some talk was heated, some not. Electricity was not just coming for us, the whole area would be linked into the grid and everyone was dealing with the up and downside of it.

Our lives were lit with paraffin lamps: elegant ones for the living room and kitchen; tiny versions that accompanied us up the stairs to bed and big Kelly lamps softly hissing light from their bright mantles in the sheds at milking time. The hiss of the lamps, the rhythmic pulse of the milking machine vacuum, and the steady chewing of milking-time feed had an odd, soothing quality that I loved.

Amongst the treasures tucked away into enormous, mothballed steamer trunks and hidden boxes were lamps and lamp shades that my mother had brought with her when they moved to this farm in 1946. They held no meaning for me until this day when they were brought out like Christmas presents, carefully released from tissue and brown paper and given a dusting. Slinky tasseled fringes fell from lush damask in shades of rose, cream and green. The fabric stretched tight over wires hidden by a soft lining that felt strange and bouncy to my fingers.

I discovered light bulbs: delicate glass structures that, unless handled with extreme care, could fracture in my hand and cut deep into my child-flesh. I was not allowed to install them, though I was given a chance to hold one in my hand, its smooth rounded glass cool as it rested in my palm. Mother showed me the delicate filament and explained how it would light up with the current surging into it, like magic. I watched my mother and my aunt as they set up lamps, attached the bulbs and offered me the chance to be the first in our family to switch on a lamp in this house! I was amazed at how bright they were, how different the room appeared in this stark light; things were visible as never before.

A vacuum cleaner appeared, perhaps brought over by my aunt. Its round little body sat on small wheels and a long, flexible hose extended out from a curved end like an overgrown elephant trunk. It was grey and shiny with silvered ends. My mother attached a wide, hollow part to the end of the hose and showed me how to turn the machine on.  It was hard to hear the next instructions because of its great whooshing sound. My hand was guided to the attachment and I felt the coolness of the air as it sucked my little fingers into its wide, black mouth. I laughed, delighted by this new thing. I then tried my hand at vacuuming, its novelty so engaging that I could hardly wait to show off to my sisters when they came home from school. I had an edge, after all!

For my mother electricity meant many things, the most important was to minimize labor. One of the earliest appliances that she acquired was a second-hand Lyons ice cream freezer, a small chest freezer that would easily fit into our long, slate-pan-lined pantry. At an earlier time in her life she and her sister-in-law had had a home-made ice cream business and she knew first-hand the advantages of freezing foods. Not one to can (perhaps because of an already over-full life), my mother intended to stock the freezer with summer’s excess for winter consumption.

Enter plastic bags, another novel item in our at-the-time bio-degradable world. We did not have easy access to shopping, and even if we did, plastic bags would not have been readily available. Freezers were not commonplace, and other, more typical forms of food preserving were not geared to the need for electricity– this was new-fangled stuff.

An order to purchase these mysterious new plastic bags was placed over the phone and some time later arrived in a box, delivered by Jim-the-Post. Jim delivered our mail rain or shine. Often, in bad weather or on holidays, at Christmas or Easter, he would be invited to stop in and have a cup of strong tea and a slice of rich fruit cake to fortify him before his return walk across the meadow, over the footbridge and through the neighbor’s farm where his Royal Mail van waited for him. Jim was curious about the package, a largish awkward box to carry over his route of rutted ground, and my mother set to show him what he had delivered.  We gathered around to listen to my mother as she described how she would use them, Jim nodding sagely as though he fully grasped the import of this new thing.

The first lesson about plastic bags was the first of many that we would be required to attend to over the years. Plastic in our world, for all its benefits, was a dangerous and potentially deadly item. If an animal ingested it, the cattle in particular, it could well mean intestinal blockage and death. For valuable stock such as ours, this was no simple admonition. We monitored each other, my sisters and I–we were being trained to not litter, and the bags were the reason. A large and ugly “bug” was artfully created, attached to a length of bright yarn, it bore the large letters “LITTER BUG’. Anyone caught littering was required to wear it, as a necklace, for a whole day. It was a very effective awareness tool.

Fifty-five short years later, and the world is drowning in plastic waste:

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/the-worlds-rubbish-dump-a-garbage-tip-that-stretches-from-hawaii-to-japan-778016.html

Like my mother before me, I wash the few plastic bags I use, over and over again.

Plastic Bags, Washed With the Dishes, Drip Dry

It may seem like an ineffective effort to stem the tide of plastic garbage, but it gives me personal satisfaction to use less and to re-use what I have. For years I have carried my own shopping bags made of canvas or other natural fibers, though I periodically forget to bring them. Produce comes home, most often, without the plastic bags that we are encouraged to use. I know that these small contributions are important.

http://www.cawrecycles.org/living_green/shopping_list/bags/bag_facts

Each of us, like the single mosaic in a picture, are essential to the whole; and each small thing that we do creates an effect that ripples out far beyond our imaginings. We do make a difference you and I, and if you and I and everyone else were participating in these small ways, we would be a proverbial tsunami.

http://www.envirosax.com/plastic_bag_facts/

Container Doors Have Since Been Painted to Blend in With the Broader Landscape

This 8X8X20 steel shipping container is only visible from the north side of the hill, which faces the house site.

Just Tucked into the Notched Hill, the Container Awaits its Earth Covering

When approaching from the road, the container is invisible–you see only the grassy hills, one of which is crowned with a small ventilation chimney, eventually to be crowned with an ornamental weather vane.

Roof Vent, Eventually a Weather Vane Stand

The shipping container has been buried in the hillside to create a hidden…and temperature-controlled unit for storage. The door and chimney ventilation allow a through flow of air to prevent condensation and doors are insulated with 1.5” rigid foam.

The interior temperatures vary by just twenty six degrees year round (ranging from 48 to 74 degrees), while outside temperatures range from 10 to 105 degrees. This fluctuation can be narrowed by creating shade  on the exposed metal doors: either by planting a tree or a trellised vine

On This Day it was Warm in the Container.

Two Earthen Berms Built from Excavated Materials, Work to Harvest Rainwater. The Upper Vehicle- Width Berm Also Serves as Access to the Storage Container

The buried container is an experiment in the investigation of the potential for energy efficiency in earth-sheltered structures. Currently the unit houses antique furniture, art work and seeds. Future uses may include storage for grain grown on site, curing cheeses, root cellar or mushroom cultivation. It can also serve as a safe place in the event of a wild fire.

The material removed to create space for the container was used to build an access road that doubles as an earth-work for harvesting rainwater.

A Catch Basin, Upslope From the Road Berm Collects & Holds Rainwater During a Storm

Berm & Vehicle Access Revegetated Rapidly, Stabilizing the Soil

The soil covering the container was rapidly revegetated with native plants to prevent erosion and to blend in with the surrounding area.

Native Flowers & Grasses, Seeded & Mulched in Time for the Onset of Summer Rains

Starting at age four I walked (a mile or two) with my sisters to the proverbial two-room schoolhouse with its productive gardens (for school lunches) and its composting toilets. We had our biannual visits to town to see the dentist- an enormous undertaking for my mother. If we were lacking anything we were unaware of it. To this day my sisters and I speak of our lives on the farm at Felin as idyllic.

This story of The Harvest….. is one of many stories that emerge from that life and time, though its relevance to today is not archival. There are rich experiences here that inform my  life now, in this time of chaotic change, as we move toward creating a new pattern to live by. Stories serve to illustrate possibility, of other ways of being in the world that are rich, appealing and balanced.

I have lived many lives since that time in great cities, in their cosmopolitan arenas, and yet it is this early life that imbues it all with meaning, that which I polish every day as if it were a precious stone.

HARVEST

His figure, a dark sturdy shape against the golden wave of wheat, moves as a dancer in easy rhythm with the scythe. The long curve of its blade, glancing lightly against a thick stand of dry stalks, glints sharply in the sunlight and a swath of sturdy stems fall to the stubbled ground, drawn down by heavy ripened heads of grain. He strides, arcs his body and swings, like notes in a lullaby its soothing and simple grace mesmerizing. The curved handle, an extension of himself holds the integrity of this movement, drawing blade to stems again and again. To his side, the felled and ordered row lies patiently in the heat of the late summers sun, waiting.

My Father Takes a Break From the Harvest & a Post Lunch Nap with His Cousin

The beauty of the scene, like an impressionist painting, reins her in and she holds herself still, so still that the only movement is in her breath, her lungs catching up with this pause in her exertions.

In her hand a basket, the weight of it lengthening the already developed muscles of her youthful arms, heavy with food and drink that she is bringing to the field.

The scent of fresh baked bread refuses to be contained and her still-flared nostrils transport its fragrance, woven through with the fresh-mown wheat, into her lungs and her blood, into her cells and her body’s memory, out of the flowered cloth that wraps it in her mother’s love.

The soft worn cotton of her dress sticks to her skin as if thirsty, drinking in sweat from the uphill walk.  Socks, slumped around her ankles offer little protection from the sharp stubble that covers the distance between them. Today, her father’s high top, brown leather boots-his summer boots- could protect her soft skin, though her feet would slip and slide inside their spacious interiors as if on ice. Her legs remembered other summers’ rashes, painful abrasions and reddened skin halfway to her knees. She is torn between mission and memory, reluctant now, the excitement dimmed in hesitation.

The stooks he builds stand golden and graceful, like ancient and cloaked Japanese warriors, spread across the field. Taller than her father’s six-foot-one-inch frame, they are built of bundles of sheaves, in turn are made of bundles of wheat: stems gathered, as thick as a man’s hand can hold, then tied at the waist by a length of straw, tucked in at the end, a loose knot that awaits  threshing.

Loosely Stacked Stooks Drying in the Field

A broad circle of sheaves forms the base, standing on their cut ends, leaning into their neighbors for support, with enough air circulation to allow for drying, thick enough to support several  layers as the stook is built skyward. These small, circular, pyramidal field graineries will stand only until the grain is dry enough, taken down before voles and field mice, feasting on tender ears, build their homes inside. Before Monet can come and paint them, before the snow falls or too much rain ruins the harvest.

Some of the sheaves will decorate the church for Harvest Thanksgiving and fragrant loaves, shaped into sheaves by her mother’s hands will stand alongside them, filled with the meaning of  harvest.

Baskets of apples and pears, jars of honey from the hives, golden butter and more produce and flowers than can be imagined, will spill from deep-set ancient windows, rendered more jeweled by the angled light that streams through rich hued glass.

Familiarity links what she sees before her, the bounty of the land, the nurturing farmer, the weave of weather; and hope embedded within it. Hope that it will be a good harvest, that the community will prosper, and that abundance will transform the simple stone architecture for a few magical days, filling her senses with beauty, fragrance, and the texture of a communities’ hymns of celebration.

At once, alerted to her mission, her reverie interrupted by his pause, the weight of the basket suddenly too much, she swings it to the other hand with an easy familiarity.  Anticipation carries her: home-grown flavors tucked in the basket, salty, sweet and textured against the tongue. Her father’s appreciation, flattened stubble where they will sit, their backs against a tall stook, side by side, just the two of them; and the curve of the hill, the old, dark, mossy apple tree and the hedge where the lilacs bloom in Spring, the scent of it carried on the soft breeze of memory.

The Little Girl With a Lunch Basket Full of Imagination

It is quickest to cut straight through the field, though the hedges offer a soft grassy path along their base, it is twice as far. A deep breath, a sigh, she bends pulling on her socks, stretching them as far as she can toward her knees, then skips out boldly into the golden stubble, basket swinging.

]]> http://katetirion.com/?feed=rss2&p=747 0 http://katetirion.com/?p=729 http://katetirion.com/?p=729#comments Wed, 05 Aug 2009 01:12:07 +0000 Kate Tirion http://katetirion.com/?p=729

It is that time of day when the last bright pinpoint of the setting sun suddenly pops below the mountain’s wide black edge. l track its movement, following this pattern over months, noting which ridge or dip marks this days’ exit.

Heavy clouds, dark with rain sandwich the last light, seemingly squeezing the remnant color onto high reaches above the darkening valleys. The mountains behind me pick up tantalizing shades of terracotta, clay-ridged against the deepening dusk. All is aglow in this golden time, colors richly saturated and evening primroses punctuate the settling dusk with floating sulphur flowers. The air cools a few degrees as its direction begins to shift from daytime upflow to downflow, starting its nightly slow-slide down the slope of the mountain to the valley where I live. There is a promise not of rain but of cooling air that will invite deep, satisfying sleep. The lack of seasonal rains disappoints the thirst of the land though the cool air is welcome.

I stir myself to attend the responsibilities of plants and poultry: watering a young orchard that is developing in containers, waiting for its new home, a patch of greens going to seed and a harvest for the dinner table.

In duckland it is bedtime. As the light dims, the ducks know it is time to go in, so it is a simple exercise, a pleasing end-of-the day ritual: dump out their soiled water, alternating which plantings rooted under the duck house most need it, careful not to waterlog any one area. Pour enough grain into their bowl to last through early morning feeding.  Then to lock them into their predator-free zone for the night.

My job almost done and suddenly a sound arrests my movement; it is distinct and familiar, not unlike the rustle of dried seed stalks. It takes a few moments for its source to register in my brain and as soon as it does I become hyper aware. In the dimming light I want to hear it again, to pinpoint exactly where it is coming from because it is the alarm note of a rattlesnake, the venomous vipers (Family Viperidae) of this Western landscape. Ducks and rattlers are not the best of companions and besides that they, like us, eat eggs. An easily unnerved duck can inadvertently alarm a rattler and the duck is likely to loose in a confrontation.

I aim the hose toward the direction of the now silent sound and hear it again as the water finds its mark. Hidden under wood & rocks, a perfect ambush cover whilst waiting for a mouse meal to show up. It is the cycle: grain for ducks invites the mice and mice invite their predators.

Diamond Back Rattlesnake (Crotalus atrox) with its Distinct Black & White Banded Tail Crosses a Road

I value these creatures as part of the ecology of this place, though I too have boundaries. I imagine that rattlers would be disturbed if I were to encroach on their home too.

Staying calm is essential.  I know that rattlesnakes are typically shy and would rather leave the scene than engage in something that does not translate into a meal. Moving it safely from the duck house and transporting it some miles distant is the wise thing to do if it is not to return. I will get skilled help, but first, the ducks get chased back into the garden, out of harms way.

After a phone call and sandals switched for high boots, returning to the duck house I wait, keeping an eye out in case the snake changes location, this is important.  In minutes Richard arrives with his hand forged snake tongs, designed to grip well without crushing the creature. We work as a team, me with a long handled manure fork prying away stones and wood to reveal the frightened reptile, now attempting to leave. Richard patiently waits for the moment to grab it behind its distinctive head with his tongs.

The weight of its body hangs writhing and it attempts to bite the steel that grips it. He talks to it calmly as I open the trash bin and step back. Carefully he lowers the panicked reptile into the bin and I clamp the lid on. The sound of its fear, the dry rasp of leaves, echoes off the metal walls and then it is quiet. calm again.

We share the last of the sunset with our passenger as we head South. At a place that seems right we pull over, lift the bin from the truck bed, remove the lid and lay it on its side, pointing the opening away from the road. The snake does not respond, so we lift the bottom and slide it out. Disoriented, it winds its way into the grass, its dark serpentine form is almost imperceptible in this light. It stays, motionless, no fear, no alarming whisper of rattle. We climb into the truck and head home, pleased with the outcome and excited by the adventure- the chance to get close to this secretive creature.

I work with land to create functional, wild spaces, that hold tension between my sense of order and Nature’s innately complex and beautiful systems- the source of my deepest inspiration. It is a relationship that evolves as the land becomes the canvas, in the same way that the blank page is a canvas for externalizing an inner voice.

The canvas captures the essence of a moment in time, whereas the landscape is a constantly-evolving, living entity that carries its own life, where nothing is fixed.

Reflecting on the stationary moments of individual acts of creativity, a series can express shifts and changes over time. I see this in these collage images that I have created. Click on the image below to view full album.

Growing up on an old-style farm where ducks were an integral part of that world, you may be led to believe that I knew something about them; though if you know ducks at all, they are more independent than cats. And that is how you want to keep it. A duck that becomes a pet can be bossy- especially if it is a drake. The life of hen ducks is decidedly of the lower pecking order and I know of one woman who did not tolerate that kind of authoritarian bullying. He, the boss-drake, following a close friendship, ended up in her freezer!

I have studied them for ten years now, intimately; well, as intimate as one can be with a duck. They are part of this garden’s habitat, the place where I created a green-grocers for the wild ones in the neighborhood, as well as for ourselves. With the concentration of food in the landscape there must be a counter balance, and this is where the ducks come in. They have a job here, a role in the system that has proven its value over a full decade. In the process of being an avid observer of how well the system is working I have learned a lot about their behaviors as well as their needs. They continue to delight and entertain me.

Moving Like a School of Fish, these Young Drakes are Distinguished by Dark Feathers

Initially I read the available information and found that all of it was based on commercial poultry management which does not take into consideration the social needs of the birds, nor my interest in having them actively in the garden, rather than confined.

I was taught early on to respect animals, even in a farm environment. Animals were considered sentient beings, though this was hardly the expression my farmer- father used. Careful animal husbandry that considered their needs so they would live healthful, productive lives would be more consistent with his (and my mother’s )view.

We live in an arid environment which has periods of high heat, and water is a limited and precious resource, not a world that ducks necessarily embrace. We also have our share of voracious predators that enjoy easy game: neighbor’s dogs, raccoons, skunks, coyote, lion, bobcat, owl, raven, hawk and so on. The toughest of them being raccoon and skunk. These two predators can squeeze through small places and can also dig under enclosures. Thus a perimiter fence to inhibit daylight thieves (coyote and dog) and a safe. secure place for them to be at night, and to nest.

Mallard Blood is Evident in the Coloring of this Female

Our ducks have become infused with wild instinct through the blood of the half- Mallard drake our Postmistress Maureen, gave me.

Both Indian Runners and Mallards are small

bodied birds that are less damaging to plants as they move about the garden in their typical ‘school-of-fish’ fashion, and they have proven to be a good breeding mix: plenty of instinct to keep them safe, good foragers of worms and pests such as the voracious grasshoppers, the pill bugs & earwigs that inhabit the garden mulch.

Though we supplement their diet with a mix of grains, it is clear that fresh, raw creatures are their preferred diet, along with some greens. In particular, at the onset of laying in late winter, green, leafy plants are highly sought after. I give them the leaves of vegetables that I discard, torn up and dropped into their water; they are always thrilled!

A thrilled duck is impossible to resist, their conversation, as animated as their actions, plucks at the corners of my mouth, tugging it into a smile.

A ducky partnership is a pleasurable thing if one takes some basic planning into consideration. I find that I work for them for about ten minutes of the day and the ducks put in some long hours grooming the mulch, fertilizing and laying eggs. Their duck house which  is about 150 square feet, has become the source for potting soil and “duck muck”, a rich garden soil amendment embedded with fat earthworms. Just a few years ago this was sub-soil, hard packed clay, bladed clean down two feet below the natural surface grade, with not even a hint of top soil. The soil’s transformation into a valued resource is a gift from the ducks which saves outside purchases.

Water is the essential element. Though commerce says it is only needed to keep their nostrils clean it is far more vital for their well being than that. A duck’s whole social life and essential grooming revolves around water, and it does not have to be much. I cannot imagine a duck without its water.

Delightfully Ducky