Open Heart Farm
At the end of season I will often do a year in review. Well, Open Heart Farm is ending as we know it, so I am doing a farm in review. Let me preface that review, by addressing your shock. Open Heart Farm at the very least has to take a pause between beats. It will take a while to assess whether it will recommence elsewhere or not, and in what form. Rachel and I have been talking about a possible retreat involving writing, performance arts etc that would also have the food growing at part of it. This is an idea that is resurfacing after about a 20 year preparation. When we were first talking about it, I was in Iowa getting an MFA in creative writing, and had still never set foot on a farm (that first bite of feed corn was a real surprise). The skill set has changed a little since then. The desire to live in the city has changed a little since then. The ability to farm successfully in this particular floodplain known as the Intervale has changed since then.
I guess rather than go through some point-by-point plus-and-minus grading of the whole life of the farm, something more appropriate for a business strategy session (that can happen later if/when something new (re)develops) I would just like to appreciate it for the life it had. I would say we (me, Rachel, Ciaran, Francis, everyone who worked with me, members of the CSA . . .) gave it alot, and it gave us alot back in terms of food, so much learning about so many things (plants, tractors, rules and regulations) and even most of a livelihood for eight years.
The whole thing reminds me of this bit from Metropolitan
Charlie Black: Fourierism was tried in the late nineteenth century... and it failed. Wasn't Brookfarm Fourierist? It failed.
Tom Townsend: That's debatable.
Charlie Black: Whether Brookfarm failed?
Tom Townsend: That it ceased to exist, I'll grant you, but whether or not it failed cannot be definitively said.
Charlie Black: Well, for me, ceasing to exist is - is failure. I mean, that's pretty definitive.
Tom Townsend: Well, everyone ceases to exist. Doesn't mean everyone's a failure.
Like I said, I'm not even sure yet OHF has ceased to exist. Below is a picture of a curly willow that we sprouted from Ciaran's Morning garden a year ago, now planted in this year's fire pit. These things love water.
I guess rather than go through some point-by-point plus-and-minus grading of the whole life of the farm, something more appropriate for a business strategy session (that can happen later if/when something new (re)develops) I would just like to appreciate it for the life it had. I would say we (me, Rachel, Ciaran, Francis, everyone who worked with me, members of the CSA . . .) gave it alot, and it gave us alot back in terms of food, so much learning about so many things (plants, tractors, rules and regulations) and even most of a livelihood for eight years.
The whole thing reminds me of this bit from Metropolitan
Charlie Black: Fourierism was tried in the late nineteenth century... and it failed. Wasn't Brookfarm Fourierist? It failed.
Tom Townsend: That's debatable.
Charlie Black: Whether Brookfarm failed?
Tom Townsend: That it ceased to exist, I'll grant you, but whether or not it failed cannot be definitively said.
Charlie Black: Well, for me, ceasing to exist is - is failure. I mean, that's pretty definitive.
Tom Townsend: Well, everyone ceases to exist. Doesn't mean everyone's a failure.
Like I said, I'm not even sure yet OHF has ceased to exist. Below is a picture of a curly willow that we sprouted from Ciaran's Morning garden a year ago, now planted in this year's fire pit. These things love water.
posted by Josh May at 11:05 AM
1 Comments:
Best of luck in whatever incarnation the next journey takes for you!
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