Trodden paths...and the show

{View the entire show on my site, with info and pricing. You can purchase any item now-even before the opening}

Of all the places to stand on our farm, this vista looking down to Old Barn is perhaps the most magical for me. I think it has to due with deeply rooted memories of being a child, where I would walk in pastures near our then house-that sat between properties that had once had working barns but development caused them to be repurposed into storage units for more modern dwellings. I can remember finding the trodden paths made by horses and walking them, hoping the neighbors horses were out. I still think of that when I see the many paths created here-by donkey, sheep and goats. They make intricate roads, sometimes running parallel to one another-the donkeys take one path, the sheep another. And they are often on steep hills- it amazes me how they run at high speeds on those paths.

I have been very busy getting ready for the Saturday opening, and I'm so excited for it. I feel this is my best body of work I've ever done for a show. We drove everything up to Astoria, a two+ hour drive, yesterday and I hung out for awhile in the wonderful space my work will be hung. It's the biggest of the rooms in the gallery but still intimate, and it is perfect for the work. I have to say, I was sad to leave my creatures behind, but their lives now are evolving into what they will be. I had the best time making my clay and sewn creatures, and the stories that go with them-I felt those stories deeply and they came to me intuitively. I think they will resonate with people, I really do.

The show pieces are now on my site, with a pricing. You can call the gallery and purchase anything before the opening-even today through Saturday-it is always encouraging to walk into the opening and see a red dot or two!

What do you want right now?

I've been stuck.

I fell into a horrible trap that many artists and writers do-I started paying way too much attention to the bottomless pit of the cyber world, comparing myself to other artists and writers and it has crushed my sensitivity to make prompt decisions for my work. Rather than making confidant suggestions to myself, like,

"I need to work on this story now and go forward with it",

I've found myself immobile, unsure of what project needs to be birthed. This is not like me and it might be too that now that I'm 57 and have a lot of different pokers in many blazing fires, I just need to realize my focus is easily distracted.

What's even more irritating is I have found myself looking at some writers I really don't like or respect as people and thinking, why does that person have an agent or publisher when we all know they are real jerks to people and the writing is self absorbed,pompous and in some case, bad. Ah, but they have 'profiles', some not any better than mine, that for one reason or another was deemed more commercially viable to the guy writing the check.

Katherine, back away from the computer.

So, I must stop that crippling downward spiral. I have one book proposal floating around out there at publishers-and that waiting seems to easily stifle creativity. You think maybe you will hear this week, and you don't, and for some reason it can create that 'frozen' feeling. The best anecdote is to start another project immediately.

So I'm going to start a new idea for a children's book next week. I was looking at some old book dummies ['dummies' are layouts with crude sketches and the spreads of text laid out for a book] I'd done years ago, back when I had an illustration rep and I was anxiously trying to break into the kid book world. I shared some on Facebook and some of the thoughts were very helpful, but I think the muses in those little stories have evolved out of me, and the stories seemed forced and not very magical.

I don't live in the city and am somewhat disconnected with what is relevant in the commercial world of art or publishing, except for what I see online. I don't have an agent to help guide me so I just forge on. I have felt more like I am entering a different market though. I am not hip or trendy to anyone, nor was I ever, but the commercial world wants that. I must ignore that and do my best work, and listen to myself first and foremost, and then seek discussion from someone I trust.

I have a scribble on my wall, in front of me, "What do you want right now?"

That is the question.

To be read by a wider audience. To be acknowledged. To continue to be able to make a living.

But more than ever, I want to...live, and not feel so compelled to spurt things out in teeny online doses. I love sharing images and my life, it is fun, but I am seeking a longer thought process, a quieter dialogue between me and my muses...and my audience-whoever the heck my audience is.

I walked around last night after chores. The sky was so beautiful, and very eruptive, changing each few minutes, grey clouds blowing in with blue windows behind them. When I'm looking at Old Barn sitting in this show of Nature, would it make it more relevant if I get another book published this week? Would my work with my animals lose meaning if I never sold another painting, or lost the will to paint? Does having an agent or not mean I'm not relevant my current readers? Will having an agent like some make my writing more important to me, or better? No.

Does Pino care about any of this? No.

All around me, the things that end up in story or art first come through me viscerally, through this life, here at my farm. It's my world. In this way, I'm always working. I just have to get back on track and listen inwardly, to know which story to pursue in the best way I can.

Before Apifera

I have wondered, if I leave Apifera or die, will it cease to exist? This sounds so pompous, but I do realize that it is my energy and ideas that created Apifera, along with those of my side kick, Martyn. Without us two, it would be someone else's property to steward, evolving through their energy.

We are just stewards here. I feel that way about houses, they take on the souls of the keepers. Some keep the house in a warm light, others neglect a structure leaving it wounded and relieved when new tenants show up.

"I hope this one paints my walls a lighter color," it might be thinking.

I know this farm was once a working dairy. I felt a sense of sadness in the entire place, that it didn't have a purpose any more. I could feel the hard work the first owner put into it all. Every time we fixed something or improved something, I would think of those first farmers and how it would make them happy to see the place going back to a use.

The photo here is from our first months at Apifera. It never ceases to inspire me to look at old photos of our arrival. While I sometimes feel like I am moving fast enough, I see how much we have done. There was a very neglected but worthy old barn and fields that hadn't been maintained for many years. Anything you might see now if you come to Pie Day was probably not here-the vegetable area, fencing, paddocks, gardens, arbors, decks, orchard, boundary trees river front trees to name some things. There was a lot of bramble, in fact the current donkey area was almost all bramble and Stella and Iris had an important job, which they did well over the years. There was no chicken coop, no donkeys or sheep, no Misfits, no red horse to ride. There was a lot of debris–a lot of debris–and a lot of cats living in the debris, or being born in it. You might know if you've followed along, I trapped, spayed and neutered over 25 cats that first year or so, and many of them are still with us including Big Tony who now resides in the Big House, and Mama Kitty, still feral but living on the deck with two 10 year old sons. I think we are currently at 10 cats-it's getting sparse!

In a way it is eery to look at this photo. My life then was very different. I was just settling in, reforming my identity with myself and new home, exploding out of city life into a rural area I didn't know. My art career was in total transition going from the known to the unknown. I was making little money and the economy was crashing. We sold our houses right before the crash. We were younger, in our early forties, and we worked into post dusk then. I remember that, how hot it was that first summer, and we didn't have the irrigation from the river yet, so we hauled hoses down to the lavender field to try to get our young field established. The local farmers, actually mainly the ones that weren't farmers but liked do act like farmers, scoffed at our non pesticide ways. One guy said,

"So can you make any money on that lavender?" in a very demeaning way. He's not farming any more. We are.

That winter we had the floods and lost a lot of our young field. But we tried to save it all through a two week period, hand trenching drain areas as we soaked up the rains. It was a mess. But we learned a lot about our land that winter. You see people move into the area and plant stuff, and you know they will learn a lot about their land in that first year. It's just how it works.

We made so many mistakes, some pretty funny-like planting the rows too close together so we couldn't drive our tractor between the rows. Oops. We refused to take out any rows, so for the first few years we hand weeded everything-because we also refused to use weed barrier [thank goodness we didn't] or pesticides. Man, I can remember nights just sitting in the field and sort of crying, I was so tired and felt like I was in a Greek myth, pushing the same boulder up a hill only to have it roll back down. We had 4000 plants back then, by the time I got to the end of a row, which took about 2 hours, I swear the weeds grew back where I first started.

I got smart and put the animals to work. I believe in seeking out an animal's purpose and letting them incorporate that into their life. They are happier with their own skill at work. I have failed Muddy, the younger chocolate lab that way, he has no job except Frisbee which I have little time to really play. Seeing Marcella already starting to work is wonderful, and it reminds me how I've failed Mud a bit. Not Huck, his job is to be an old soul and he did it well from a pup on. So anyway, I first put the donkeys in the lavender as they loved teasel and thistle and it worked great for about a month but they began to eat the fresh buds of the plants. The next season, we discovered that the sheep didn't eat the lavender and they became our main weeders. It cut down on our annual weed around the plant manual labor, and it sure looked pretty too. About four years into it, we realized the young ram lambs like lavender and I now have to time it and put them in at just the right time. We didn't have as much fencing then either and now have much more area to cross pasture our flock-good for them and the fields. I always said if I woke up filthy rich-besides buying some new boots and sharing some of it, I'd save most of it but I'd hire a fence crew to reshape the fences and do all wood corners. I envy a field of professional fencing! But you do your best.

Farming is creative that way–it is a daily puzzle and you have to roll with the punches. One animal gets sick and you might have to change the mix in the barnyard to let him recover properly. You see a fencing issue and have to drop everything to deal with it or suffer the consequences. I like that about my life, it's engaging, manual, fertile, expanding daily. I never lack for something to do, or figure out. It keep me sane, really.

Non denominational shepherd

The barn is my church for non organized sermons of light slipping in through holes worn from weather and bird bills. It is here I can retreat from my head. I don't feel half as damaged when I leave.

Old Misfit of wood

{My latest entry for Huffington Post...}

"Dream deep," I heard a voice say warmly, like an old Aunt sitting and knitting on the front porch.

It was Old Barn, back on the day I first looked at the property, the place that would become Apifera Farm as we know it.

It was then that my relationship with her began, for she recognized I was a dreamer. It was the first of many brief conversations we would have, as I learned that Old Barn was a creature of few words, but when she did speak it became a pivotal moment for me.

I had no idea at the time that she and I would work side by side with so many animals, old and young, helping some pass on and encouraging others to live. It was all part of the dream and Old Barn intuitively knew about it before I did. Just as I was enticed to move West by invisible wisdoms allowing me to find my human mate, there were powers that brought me to this old barn and her land and together we became a dreamed reality.

One of the last century wood barns in the surrounding area to still stand, she had become a Misfit herself. Her kind had been replaced by aluminum and metal structures that wouldn't rot and could hold off fires. One person suggested we tear her down and sell her fir boards using her concrete pad as a starting point for a new barn. But I approached her condition like I would any neglected creature that would some day arrive here - giving her sustenance to make her limbs stronger. To this day, she stands in a state of elderly attire, rusted roof and faded red wood exterior softening in fog and lighting up at sunset.

Her life of service defines her and she has what many old creatures are missing - purpose and companionship.


{Old Barn is part of a book I am writing about the Misfits of Apifera}

Black Elk, Campbell, Jesus and me

I often speak about Old Barn as if she is a creature in and of herself, because she is.

While I spend enormous amounts of time in Old Barn it is often to fulfill my daily duties as shepherd or animal caretaker. But I do stop, more and more since I am aging and I need to take breaks more between walking loads of hay or water to and from stalls. These moments of rest give me the opportunity to really be of her, not just in her or with her, but of her.

I did not grow up in a church going family and I searched in my early adult hood for what my faith was. I had some ideas, no doubt. When I moved to New York City in my mid twenties I was very alone and began going to a high Episcopal church of an old friend. I found it comforting - the hymns, and the feeling of community. The history of such an old building intrigued me - who had sat in the pew I was in, I wondered? I never felt anger or judgment from the stones, brick and beautiful light emanating from the stained glass windows, but eventually I did feel like a misfit and the sermons began to feel like one man telling me his fears, twisted into a sermon.

I could always walk into a church - in New York, in Minneapolis, in Paris or Zurich - and take shelter and comfort, knowing the walls would engulf me, the light would warm me and room itself would silence me into clarity. I would not be judged by the building itself.

That's what Old Barn is for me, my church, where I worship with pitch fork and donkey breath over my shoulder. When I am in her care on a windy or rainy day with only whisperings of straw fluttering about, or a hen scratching, I am of her.

If I could meet Jesus, and I would love to have him out, especially if I could have Joseph Campbell on the same visit, and maybe Black Elk, I would take him to Old Barn and we would break pie there, and just sit.

Matilda's window

Matilda will have her own chapter in "Misfits of Love". Please consider pledging for this project. We are 20% funded but time is running out. Help me share stories of old and neglected creatures who have a purpose.

She is the first to dine on hay, which is presented to her through her own window. Too high up for the mini crew to reach through, I show her the hay, she grabs a bite and looks at me with, "That will do, thank you."

I don't ever have to search for Matilda, her ears and eyes are always there for me in the morning and evening as I enter Old Barn. I say her name, and the tips salute towards me in acknowledgment.

We have an understanding that no matter what, it will be a new day.

Barnyard harbor

I rarely go to the barn after dark. If I do find myself there after sundown, it is usually because of an emergency or helping a sick or needy animal, including my shepherdly duties each March.

Daily earth prayer

I was thinking over what to write for an Earth Day post, but as I mulled, I realized that my farm and our endeavors on it are in and of themselves daily prayers to the Earth.

Reciprocal land love

Huck and I have begun a new ritual. Climbing up the side acreage to view our land from the high point. It is one of my favorite parts of our property, and few people have experienced it. Part is covered in Savannah Oak where I dream of building a small writing hut where I could spend a nite in the thicket, perhaps with a small corral to leave my donkeys at nite, who would carry up my wine, bread and water for the evening.

I have lived in many houses I loved, and had gardens too that I felt connected to. But owning land is a love affair like no other. This may sound over dramatic, but it's not. It's one thing to fix an aging house, it's another to help the land, over grazed, or underutilized. We have much to do, and the work will never be finished to our liking, but I do know this land will be left in better condition than when we bought it. I do know that when I'm walking on that upper pasture, looking down at the old barn, the lavender fields, and the moss laden oaks, I feel appreciated by something very internal in this land.

Perhaps the feeling of walking on this expanse of land is very primordial, poking my heart's library of unconscious memories, reminding me of a time I can't photograph, a time when I roamed the earth free as another creature without a land deed.

When I took a walk with Huck and Martyn up to the top point this weekend, I made a promise to myself, and the land, that I will visit each day if possible. Walking straight up, I watch my feet sink into soft soil, I feel my heart pumping, I hear Huck running and the stream clicking on rock. I have much to do, with pleasure.

Standing on the 'it'

After four+ years of living with goats, I truly believe they have Monday morning meetings, complete with note pads coffee, and doughnuts. "Stella, you take down the north side of Pasture A, I'll handle the south side. This should keep the Tailless One busy mending that area of fence, and with the distraction, we can get into the pump house rose pavilion."

But all messes in one's day have a golden lining. Because I had to mend the fences, I also was had a visit to a spot of the property I have loved from the first moment I stood on it. And because it is also part of the Joe Pye field, it is not an area I get to frequent. Joe and I have an understanding - "You stay over there, I'll stay over here. You come in here, I take my head which is thick bone mass and hit your thighs."

Our land used to be 100 acre dairy, mostly on rolling hills that bordered up top to the forest lands and down below to the river. Within time, the farm was cut up and our spot is the original home site and barns. Fortunately, the house was well sited, sitting in a spot where we don't get too much distraction from nearby properties. And the property goes about 10 acres up the hill, so the higher one walks, the more vista one sees. When the fog rolls in, and I stand looking down over the 100+ year old barn, I can't help feel transported back to another time.

There's a certain pull of this spot of the land, and a certain welcoming. Perhaps it is the century old oak that stands there, some of its limbs newly mangled by a wind storm. Those limbs now keep our house warm, and perhaps it recognizes the partnership we have together. I stood up there for awhile, enjoying the view and the silence of the fog, the rose hips scattered behind me. I thought about how I had come here, an unknown to the state, the county, the people, but this one section of land just welcomed me that first day we looked at the property. I like to think it was a personal greeting specifically to me. All the houses I'd lived in and fixed up and nested in over my 30's and 40's, there was still a horizon out there that seemed a bit more enticing. There was always a sense in me the house I was in wasn't quite 'it'.

This small piece of our property always rekindles the small embers in my heart, reminding me in a very physical way, I am standing on 'it'.