Fog comforts after a death, I think

The fog after death always feels heaven sent to me-like all the departed souls who left come together to cover us in comfort. We had very loud thunder storms the nite after Luci died. I was upset Luci was not in the grave but we had to wait until morning to dig a proper grave–it takes time. Everyone was out grazing and observing the grave digging. She’s in her grave now near the sunflower patch. All is well.

We prepare for winter while relishing fall

It is clearly autumn-cool days and nights, flies are dying, leaves are crisping...it has been beautiful. My favorite season, like many of you I'm sure. The animals can stay unbothered all day by flies and soak up sun without being hot.

Martyn is busy as always shopping large logs and then will split them in coming weeks. I also opted to buy a ton of first cut Canadian hay for the elder horses. They kept their weight so well last year, even old Matilda, who sadly lost her strength in her hind end even though she was doing so great otherwise. The Canadian hay is $13/ a bale...ouch...the local went up to $7.50 delivered and stacked. But It just doesn't have the punch for elders. I'll be doing our fall/winter fundraiser soon. Ive held back on them this summer due to my health stuff but am back in the saddle.

I spent all morning cleaning equine barn. Getting winter coats ready, making sure Earnest the Pig and Hannah both have adequate bedding, organizing tack and bringing in any freezable meds. It's time for the monthly llama shots, not my favorite task, but since switching to shorter needles many eons ago it is not that bad. My only bad day was being ribbed with my elbow when Harry smashed his ribcage into mine-lost my breath for a minute or so.

The old hydrangea continues to evolve in color. Such a beautiful creature. I can't help photograph her over and over. She is over 100 years old, if not 150+, according to Martyn. Imagine...if she could talk, or if I could teacher her human English. The black and white image is almost like looking at our house back in 1760 when it was built.

I hope you are all having a good autumn. Our pumpkin harvest, much to the sadness of little Hannah and Pickles, was muted...thanks to the squash bugs. Oh well, they ate well. We got some, but nothing like normal. They still are so fun, so cheery. I don't carve them anymore, it doesn't feel right, they get to die a natural death and then are fed out to the animals. I suppose that is the same fate but I just feel sad carving into them. And pumpkin tosses that are all the range seem so violent to me.

We swoon every day over her

I am so enjoying spring this year, and all the crab apples are blooming together. It is spectacular. So every day I can't help but take as many photos as I can. The bees are buzzing! 

I am watching out for two mother birds who are roosting-one is the mother dove outside my office window, the other is a robin in the rafters above the pony area. The five chicks are feathering out but sill under heat for now. The garden is popping! The vegetable bed is planted. The sheep are being sheered and the llamas were sheered last week. Spring is so full of work, but hope, and beauty and reemergence.

Everyday of spring I am aware that winter is coming, every day of being 63 I know that 80 is right around the corner. It all goes in a flash. It goes fast every year, just like our wise mothers told us. And that is why I will be outside most of this week, just looking, smelling, gardening, brushing horses...because there will most likely be a day when I can't. We work hard and we rest easy.

Strike a pose

Luna strikes a regal pose

I've been very sick with a chest cold for a week or more and it is finally breaking and today I'm feeling better, but still not back to true form, but there is hope in the beautiful blue sky at least. I've been enjoying the sun on my daily chores, going slower than normal and just soaking in the last days of fall.

I felt this photo of old Luna was one of my best in a long time. She sort of struck the pose for me on her own, but the addition of the branches and blue sky....just really loved it.

Meanwhile Sylvia Pettini struck her usual pose but had her own headdress...which I learned from my followers is called a fascinator. Everybody kept using the term and I stubbornly looked it up on my own. Learn something new everyday.

Anyway....here's to a better day for anyone who is suffering through a cold.

Fallen cosmos with the cove in the background

Sylvia Pettini and her fascinator

Cover me up under the white

Marcella

We had another snow fall of about six inches. It covers the ice so it helps somewhat. To be honest, I'm feeling a bit numb these days. Working Birdie through this horrible ordeal is hard emotionally, for her too. I will report later on how that is all going. I could feel the weight of the new snow as I lay in bed this morning, it is a fact that the sound changes all around. The sound of the snow sounds different depending on how much snow there is. I didn't care if we had one inch or ten.

Yesterday I spent a lot of quiet time with Marcella and Benne, aka White Dog. I guess they are my healer animals, my spirit animals. The white animals that have come into my life...they all have very strong spirits–the goose, Noritsu, White Dog, Marcella, and Birdie. Every animal is special and unique and has lessons, just like people, but some of us are born to be teachers, or artists, writers, thinkers, do-ers or doctors. I don't put myself on the same level as my my healer and spiritual guide I've known for about 30 years and still consult when I need too, but I know I have certain innate abilities others might not have nurtured in themselves. I think we all had it before birth. Maybe some of us are meant not to hone it in this life, and some of us are. Maybe its just that some people are enchanted by it and others aren't. I come from a family of scientists, artists and farmers...I think that combination is pretty much at play in my life since moving to the farm.

I do know that I needed to especially be with Marcella yesterday. I sat with her when night chores were done. The pigs kept coming over and wanted to be scratched, but Marcella pushed them away to be closer to me. She understood immediately what I needed from her, to just be acknowledged for what I was feeling at that moment. I thanked her, and went inside.

Marcella

White Dog by M'Lady Apple

Don't worry, The Nose has it under control

Weather is such a crucial part of people's lives, especially those of us that live more in the elements in rural areas. Since I don't have to drive to a job, nor does Martyn in the winter, I actually get sort of jazzed up for big winter storms, especially since we have a generator now. I am afraid of lightening storms even though I love them, but a good snow storm is comforting in some way.

And I got everyone midget sized insulated overall bibs. They are pretty content. We are well prepared here with our barns and shelters, electric water buckets in the most crucial stalls and frost free pumps. And now a generator which we haven't had to use, but could have used a million times before we bought it. Why we waited so long I can't say, although money is always an issue but we have the kind you fill with propane and it does what we need.

The beautiful snow, about 8" so far is sadly turning to sleet. I doubt we will venture out tomorrow either. The temps will be very cold for a couple days, and then warm up. My biggest challenge as the sleet takes over will be keeping gates and sliding barn doors free of ice. Having the electric water buckets for the outer barn is such a god-send. it took some doing to make it safe, but I'm so grateful I have that this year.

The happiest camper right now? White Dog, and Marcella too, they love the cold and snow. The Nose wants you to know we are well, and he has it under control.

Autumn is here...oh yes oh yes oh yes

I entered the barn yesterday morning humming Zippidity Do Da, the weather had me perked for happiness and enthusiasm no matter what came my way. It is technically not Autumn on the calendar, but, for me Autumn begins on September 1 and I am always so glad for her arrival. The weather cooled off for us, I even wore socks last night and a sweater as we sat outside having a glass of wine.

Oh Glory!

I'm relieved for the animals too, who take any kind of weather without complaint. I'd rather see an animal in freezing weather eating hay, than sitting in humid and hot fly infested air. I think they agree.

So, on we go to the beginning of so many things, for that is what this time of year means for me-beginnings even amongst the dying leaves. Something is always starting. Ideas, new projects, new goals, new memories, new animals...are all in front of me.

I even got on Boone yesterday and took a spin around the fields. We hope to ride into the early winter now that the flies are pretty much busted. It was good to be on him again.

When I'm old put me in the garden...please

I do not take my gardens for granted. I am graced by them, helped and soothed by them, delighted, surprised and never disappointed in them. And they are a requirement for my soul, I believe. What would happen if I could not have Nature and gardens meshed in my day? I don't want to dwell on that. I do think too many have become distracted to the point of not even noticing one flower in their daily life, or a the intricate details of a tree branch.

The elder visits I've been doing make me keenly aware of 'what might come". I also know many, including my parents, who lived their entire lives in their own homes, surrounded by things that gave them comfort, grounding and purpose. I don't have the answers for the aging population, not everyone can do that. It is a depressing thought to me to think of living in a place without Nature, without the ability to bend and touch Earth, and smell rain as the sky turns grey. Next week, weather permitting, Opie and I will travel an hour and a half to visit a small dementia home, on the sea, where Nature is a key point to how the residents live. They understand and value the actual past lives, and thoughts that go on in these people's heads, and they do not 'lock up the house'...rather, residents are allowed to go out when ever they want, and roam, with an attendant. The staff-to-patient ratio is set up so this can happen. They also allow pets, and have kept the pets on after residents die. Children were also raised in the house, mixing with the elders. I do not know the cost of the residence, but I assume it is pricey, and not all of us can afford this if our time comes to this. But it is heartening places like this exist.

If only the masses of elders and special needs could have facilities like this all over, at affordable prices, where they are treated as creatures versus patients put in a holding tank. Does it all come down to money? Or does it come down to the breakdown of the family system where multi-generations lived together and cared for one another. When someone was sick, or dying, the person was in the house. Children learned that grandpa had great stories and knew how to do a lot of cool things. My mother talked of this a lot, and told me many stories of the relative in the back room on their death bed-still listening to the sounds of the youngsters running about the house, smelling the scents wafting from the kitchen, hearing a familiar sound as simple as the screen door, the rooster, the dog, the mail truck.

I have always looked at my farm that way, a multi-generational community, sometimes birth is going on, sometimes death. How many times did I sit quietly with a dying matriarch of the sheep flock, while little lambs milked right near by? Those were spiritual moments, and I wish human death could always be like that–surrounded by the clan, familiar sounds and smells.

Gardens allow those of us prone to floating off [not always a bad thing] to stay grounded, right here on this realm where for now, we are supposed to be until we are not. When I die, I don't know what or where I will go, I think it will be something that meshes all the beauty of garden, animals, acceptance, safety and a feeling of worth into a skin of some kind, and maybe we won't even 'see' things, we will just be them and become of them, of their essence.

That is the privilege of having a garden, and land to work on-it allows you to become of it, without judgement. And when you do become of it, you reach your higher, calmer, less angry, less judgmental self-your higher being so to speak.

Art meshed with land and life

Guarding the Pussy Willow and Rat

The brush piles all over the farm at this time of year are like evolving sculptures to me, and in winter snows they become even more pronounced. In certain month the sheep are in the fields before we have picked up wind fall branches or pruning from the trees and they move the wood around with their heads, creating a living sculpture area. I hat thinking we will burn these pile, but many will be burned. We try to use as much as kindling as possible, and leave some fro woodland critters, but many must go or they create trouble when the grass begins to grow.

I did a painting a few days ago, with Marcella guarding the home of a little rat. The photo was taken at dusk after last week's storm [another on the way tomorrow night]. All around me life is going on and it ends up often in the art, especially my brush piles.

It's different here, I tell you

While there are many things about our Maine home that remind me of my growing up years in Minnesota, there are things here that are still exotic to me-like the fact there is a cove across the road that we see, and some nights especially this time of year, the blue sky at dusk time suddenly is engulfed in a wet fog. The fog here is coastal, it is different than the fog we had in the valley of Oregon.

I watched it last night from the porch and I could see the little wet crystals, almost like there were family clusters of rain or mist. It was really beautiful and moved elegantly. and quite fast.

The Goddesses in the front garden are making me happy. They bring color as the rest of the garden begins to fade into the browns and ochres. It is a beautiful time. I must remember next year to plant the sunflowers as I did this year, two weeks apart to lengthen their fabulous show.

M'Lady returns

I have waited patiently, full of anticipation. I will never tire her. Last year when we arrived, almost a year ago today, she was in bloom but due to the dry winter and spring last year, the other apple trees around her [there is Little Lady, Little Apple and Old Apple at the outer barn] were not as full of flower. This year we had lots of rain and they are all so beautiful.

I see her from my studio and from many of the vistas from the house. When the sea blows in dark, brooding clouds, she stands firm, her color pops out even more boldly, and in the the sunny days with deep, blue windows behind her, she sings, literally, with hummingbirds and cardinals.

She is a confidant of sorts when I sit under her to give myself shade.

I realized this weekend how much I love it here, how this location is a blessing-despite my initial mistrust of the front road, that road will also bring me what Apifera needs. I started planting the vegetable garden this year and thought when people drive by they will see my sunflowers at the barn and it will make many of them happy.

The land is old here, who walked her in 1760? It also means it has seen and felt trauma of many kinds, struggles of our first Native Americans and their struggle with the Europeans that would come and push them out, killing and judging. I was on the fence during a lot of our first year, about opening up-truly opening up-to our land. But as I plant the vegetables, as we shape the front gardens this year and give it our touch, our covenant, I can feel it now-the land is reciprocating and recognizing we are committed to her.

This is when the magic really starts.

Moving pretty fast for my size

You've probably heard me quote that line before, from a Neil Young song,

There's a comet in the sky tonight

Makes me feel like I'm alright

I'm movin' pretty fast

For my size

I really didn't mean to stay

As long as I have

So I'll be movin' on

I'm not moving, from here anyway. But I am moving. I've been thinking a lot about the land here, the actual property, and how it feels like it suffered more than the place out West. I mean that the individuals that lived here in 1760 era when the house was built, suffered– the war[s], the deaths of all but one son that lived here in that war, the indigenous peoples here fighting for their land as immigrants arrived–all of that hardship vibrates here, for now. I felt the land here sniffing me out when we arrived, and a year later, I sense the land thinking,

OK, she's sticking around while, she seems committed to us, we might be able to make this a true communion. 

I tend to come into a new situation with guns a blazing, with optimism and big visions of what is to come. The old farm seemed sad when it arrived, it had been neglected, the century old barn that spoke to me that first day needed purpose again-and it got that from us. I miss her but am so glad I was able to work with her.

Here,  each month I peal a new layer of hesitancy off the relationship the land and I have together.

And as we enter the one year anniversary of our departure from Oregon, I was thinking about that old wisdom of giving oneself a year to make any changes after you have moved or been through a huge transition-either of your own making or one that was thrust on you. I have always found that there is truth to this, in a healing or growth process-the year marker helps us look back and see where we were but from a new perspective. And the day you go past that first year mark, it is like starting over, fresh, you tend to not look back at markers from the year before.

I would not want to go back and relive the final months at the old Apifera. I can see now looking back just how upsetting it all was for me. I had to say a lot of goodbyes, and make so many rapid, difficult decisions for the good of the whole. Would I do it again. Yes. Would I do it differently-some things, definitely-and if I ever do a move again I hope I remember the things I would have done differently.

I sat in my second office, the one in the outer barn, on my collapsible lawn chair. I've been sick for five days and have felt lousy and weak, but manage to rally to do barn chores twice a day. I'm hoping today is a turning point. I was sitting and letting the sun just soak into my face. I could hear the sheep, feel the wind, smell the horse manure and hear the occasional sea gull. Random thoughts entered my head,

The sun felt like this at the old Apifera too. It was the same sun that hit my face there, and the same sun that would have warmed the faces of so many-my parents, my friends, me as a child, all the former presidents and all the former loves of my life, the Beatles and Pavarotti and Grace Kelly in Monaco. Native Americans saw that same sun. Hitler, Matisse, my father at age seventeen battling in the Marines in WWII Pacific islands saw that sun.

It was just a moment in a day. Just a clear moment of feeling like I was one of a big whole, as were each creature in my life, and the land.

Earth prayer

Earth findings.

Ground friends.

One is just born the other is in her swan song.

I celebrate Mother Earth each day in different ways but on this Earth Day I just pray for her and we will work on our garden plan and just be with her.

Hang in there, Mother Ship, there are many who are trying to care for you properly, without greed.

Apifera hunkered down in the nor'easter... a place of deepness

It's winter.

It's really winter.

The storm they predicted to be "epic" did not disappoint. I guess I was glad it was all it was cracked up to be. It gives us a chance to see the improvements we need to make for next year. And it also is a cold, hard reality check that we have left Oregon.

I am no wimp. I ate weather whining, as you might know, at least in public. I have to say though, I was very restless last night and I kept waking up and wondering why I was restless. The worst of the storm hit in the late night/early morning when the winds picked up too. One thing that is different here in a storm compared to Oregon, is the windows get really snowy and crystal speck, so you feel a bit covered in an avalanche. That has cozy moments, and moments where I think I am feeling a bit claustrophobic, which took me by surprise.

This morning Martyn shoveled a path to the front barn for me, and as I did feedings he shoveled another path to the new barn, about 200 feet I guess. It's light and fluffy so not that hard, but the snow was deep enough to go down into my Mucks and create snow packs in my socks. Icy! When I got out to the new barn, there was White Dog, in full winter spirit, ready for his breakfast. Rosie's slider and blown open an inch and the high winds had blown in some snow–she was buried in her usual hay bed, but had snow on top of that. But she was snoring and warm to the touch so all is well.

I did my chores and just wanted to hold all the animals. They are so stoic with weather, and in some ways, I think the cold and snow [it was 25 so not that cold, but very windy] is almost easier on them than constant rain and mud. Once you're wet, it's hard to get dry out West.

It was, and is as I type, white out conditions. I had momentary thoughts about Oregon, and know that the buds are on trees and the grass is green and on and on. I wondered why we were here. What is so important, I thought, that we felt propelled to come here. I went through the long list of the facts of why we chose to move, and that was all fine and good. But I wondered, there must be something that will happen in time that will make a nor'easter just like another rain storm.

I refuse to be a winter wuss. I will go hiking in The Wood tomorrow if the wind dies down, look for tracks. I had moments feeling like I'll never see the grass again. I felt kind of agitated.

And then I realized that the storm is bringing up something in me, memories, or deep down things to be examined in an intimate setting. Someone I really admire that I've sought guidance from over the years, recently said that our time in Maine is for a reason and part of it is to allow me to "go deeper".

I think winter is like that here. It is a place of deepness, it is not a carefree place like a walk in a spring field can be. It can bring out darkness, or help you reach for ways to address darkness that may keep you in touch with light.

White out conditions all day today

Digging a tunnel from the front pig barn

Hundred words for snow

It happened.

We had our first real snow, a beautiful blanket of snow, with snowflakes all day yesterday that came down in different sizes, large snowflakes, some wet looking gin the sky as they fell. I had been looking forward to the winter here in Maine since arriving. Yes, that's correct, looking forward to winter. It is by far my second favorite season right after fall, with summer being my 'carry on and endure" season.

Winter and snow are, for me, full of a deeper form of communication, not only with myself, but with nature and therefore with my creative soul which is wrapped in nature. The fallen snow covers, but it hides things and one gets to rediscover them if we pay attention. I walked from the Misfit barn to get to the pig water bucket, and tripped a bit...it was the hose we had not picked up yet. It left a faint mountain range, the hose, with the snow on it. An entire new shape was created with the snow over the hose. In Japanese there are many words to describe the different forms of snow. "Yuki" means snow, but "yuki-boshi" means the little hat shapes that form when snow covers an object.

So I admired all the yuki-boshis yesterday.

The White Dogs love the snow, Benedetto especially. He was not a fan of rain. I knew he would thrive in Maine. He lays around in it, plays in it, eats it, sleeps in it into the dark night. The sheep's thick wool coats are like yuki-boshis too. The Eskimos have over a hundred words for snow. "Jatla" means snow between your fingers and toes-we all had that too.

I sense that Maine is bringing me something I needed, that for whatever reason, I had to get here, and nowhere else, not Oregon, not any other place on the planet. I had to come to Maine for the next step of my journey. It will be about going inward more, a deep journey. I also realized I have been hesitant to fully engage here, but that changed a few weeks ago. Perhaps it was the fact six months have past and I am over the shock phase of leaving our land in Oregon. The land played a crucial role in my art and psyche there, and it shaped my stories in ways that only that land could. My image was wrapped up in a pastoral feeling there, this property is different, and it has taken me some time to come to terms with it. It is more of a village feeling here on the property, very New England, meaning the Misfit barn sits about 30 feet from the house, and the new barn we built is about 150 feet from the Misfit barn. Everything is spaced more tightly. Houses often sit on the main roads here, very common in many winter climates. Our sits slightly back, about 100 feet, but it is not a feeling of being 'way out in the wild west' like the old place in Oregon. I had to come to a sense of peace with that. The road itself has been a real hardship on me. But I have come to a new understanding about that road. Rather than see it as an annoyance, {I am very sensitive to sound but also the vibrations that sound enfolds -it is not just the sound of cars driving by, it is all that comes with it, the feelings of that driver, all the stuff that driver is carrying and transmitting, it all astounds my senses}–I am now seeing the road as an entity, a bringer of news, a conduit for something that is going to come into my life that I can't grasp yet...who knows who will drive on that road by Apifera and meet me. The old farm was one thing, this Apifera is something else, and I am ready to embrace it.

Anyone seeing the farm in the snow, yuki-boshis all around, the sounds of the creatures, the wind over and through The Wood, they would feel its magic. I have felt it too, but it was the snow that highlighted my new sense of wonderment with this place, this Apifera-not the old one. The land here is more reserved, less embracing, to the newcomer. But its been waiting for me, as the house has, to relax a bit, and fully accept my environ.