October: Energy Exchange

I am allowing our geriatric lap top's battery to drain while I struggle to manifest my idea into words today: my brain fog is evidence of a diminished supply of energy myself. But in this case, it's largely from the crescendo of a fall week: school days, big harvests, flipping the farm for the next season. In fact, as a crew the four of us are finally finding our way out of a dense fog of exhaustion. Behind the curtain, the last month has been rather trying as the farmhouse turned infirmary and all four of us got sick enough at one point or another to be couch-ridden or quarantined in this or that corner of the house...to no avail. All the while, Rich and I tag-teamed best we could, grateful for the staggered infection so that someone was well enough to cover our bases here. It reminded me of the great energy exchange that defines all of our relationships in life: there is giving and taking. This series of nasty Kindergarten-borne bugs was definitively a taker...a true zapper that arrived just when we need to conjure what we have in us to pull in the big fall harvests. Who did I think I was believing we could avoid the fated inundation of threats to our immunity that the foray into school years brings?

But just like a hero on a great steed, October has arrived. The flipping of this page in my calendar ALWAYS brings an annual sigh of relief...all muscles in my body fully relaxing for the first time since early spring. THIS season is a giver and begins the incremental replenishing which allows us to take on the high season next time around. Autumn is like a good friend, there is a give and a take, but never a Giving Tree effect, where she takes more than her friend can bear.
And in fact as I was noodling over this thought of energy exchange earlier in the week, I happened to have two conversations that gravitated toward this concept...the universe encouraging me in my idea of the theme for this monthly newsletter perhaps. And I now feel compelled enough to step up onto my soapbox to encourage everyone to open the floodgates to the people and the ventures in life which fuel you, like a nourishing plate of food that tickles your taste buds too. And perhaps more prudently I hope you guard your boundaries between yourself and the energy zapping forces in life. Those little nasty microbes who challenged our immunity this past month, passed along to our family no doubt by a shared gluestick or airspace in May's classroom (I know it was you, Clayton), were only overcome by the power of the givers: ourselves giving our bodies what they needed, our family who encouraged us and endowed us with upwards of 3 weeks worth of groceries at the mention of being down for the count, and our medicine man who reassured us when we finally doubted our ability to bounce back.
But how could I forget the honorable mention of October and the arrival of autumn? A scheduled morale boost...a time when no matter the state of affairs in our lives and in the greater world, I feel like I've been let off of the leash to run and breath and play and to collapse in the grass to try to apprehend fall with all of my senses...the rich color palette on the eye, the crisp fall chill challenged by the indian summer sun on my skin, the rich flesh of honeynut squash on my dinner plate, the sound of the Canada goose honking its way south, and the evocative and exclusive scent of leaves changing color en masse (that is a real scent of deciduous trees...familiar to all of us who live in this climate).
May you dip your toes in your respective pools of energy as I am bathing in this autumn.
What's Up?
-Last few weeks of regular market season at the Oakwood Farmers Market. The last day is October 15th. But as usual we will continue to offer online ordering through our website with off-season pick up's on Saturday mornings from 10-11:30 in the same exact spot where we set up our market booth every week: 22 Orchard Drive. You can sign up for weekly order reminders on our site if you'd like :).
-We have a great fall line up of harvest ahead of us: Kuroda carrots, beets, radishes, watermelon radishes, ginger, salad, spinach, leeks, negi onions, micros and shoots, honeynut squash, yellow cooking onions, garlic, eggs from the hens...am I forgetting anything?
-The sheep continue to graze the fall pastures. We 'stockpile' pasture forage for the fall and winter seasons so that they can have access to green growth beyond supplemental hay we buy in.
-We will be offering holiday pies and breads again this season. Stay tuned as we open up pre-orders for Thanksgiving late this month.

-We are in the process of flipping the hoop for late fall and winter harvests while we still have balmy conditions to get little plants a good start to grow through the cold season.