Frog Hospital

Voting for the Farm

2012-01-28T16:47:00.000-08:00

In the past month, we have planted 1,600 row-feet of sweet peas. Then we pounded in 8-foot stakes every 15 feet and we are stringing up a 6-foot trellis to support the sweet pea vines when (if) they grow. Now we're waiting for those little darlings to start blossoming with fragrant flowers. I started to get obsessive and worried about the seeds in the second bed because they were not emerging. We reasoned it's January and the soil is cold and that would make it slow, but still I was pacing back and forth.

So I said -- better just walk away and let nature take its course, and I went to another part of the farm and started transplanting all the herbs because Ann wants them by her kitchen door. That makes sense.

Last week in my essay on "sustainable agriculture," I was lying and I need to tell the truth. I made a mockery of the guys with clipboards who come around the farms and tell people what to do and how to conform to regulations. The truth is that I wish I had one of those jobs myself.I can see myself swinging a clipboard and riding around in my car from farm to farm. Of course, then I would have to drive back to the office and write reports and go to meetings. Oh God, I hate going to meetings. But if I had a clipboard job where I didn't have to go to TOO many meetings, then I would like it quite a bit -- steady pay and no sweat.

Farming is not an occupation of choice for me as it may be for others. I do not have a great deal of experience. I write these enthusiastic essays about the joys of working with the soil -- but I am really only trying to convince myself. The truth is that I work on a farm because it's the only job I can get. If I had better pay in town I would be gone tomorrow. Having said that, the farm has been good to me since I know there will always be work for me in this field and, as well, farmers are kind to old guys like me -- they have little prejudice toward youth.

Now, on to what really interests me -- the upcoming election. I enjoy politics very much, although I can't say that I am any good at it. I change my mind frequently, I am not on anyone's side and I don't care who wins...... but I find the process to be fascinating. Here's the Owens Doctrine on how people vote:

You vote where you live, and if you live on a farm, that's how you vote. I'm voting for the farm I live on.

You vote where you live and where you live means where you sleep -- where you come home at night and lay your burdens down. That's where you live and that's where you vote.

And that means nothing matters more than the peace and safety of the night, so that you and your loved ones can rest in peace.

Because you can work during the day, and you can take care of yourself and build a home, but at night you close your eyes and let go of your cares, and when you're sleeping someone needs to keep a watch because the world can be dangerous.

With that simple picture in mind, we can see that the essential purpose of government is to keep the peace, and to keep us safe from dangerous people, whether domestic or foreign. If that's all the government did, and if the government did it well and if we could sleep at peace during the night, then we could take care of the rest ourselves.

Meaning the police, the military, and the administration of justice are essential in government. The rest is optional. We don't need public school or libraries, because, in a safer world, we can make our own arrangements. We might agree to public schools and libraries, and parks, and fire departments, and postal services -- but they are optional and non-essential -- just to keep that in mind.

In the coming election year, the decision to be made is whether to give President Obama another term. It is a luxury for us to be considering the economy as the principle issue. It is the luxury of peacetime to argue about jobs.
But what really matters is that we are alive and we are free and we can sleep well at night, and if can sleep well, we can work during the day and take care of ourselves.

So, are you better off than you were four years ago? That's a good question. But a much more important question is are you free and can you rest in peace at night? That's how you should vote -- you should vote where you live.

I live on a farm, and that's how I will vote.

Now, having established the Owens Doctrine I will document my visits this past week.

I have been an Obama supporter, but I am about to cast him adrift.....I have mixed feelings about this. Arguably, the President's most important duty is to keep the peace and defend our shores. I feel Obama's handling of foreign and military affairs is quite good. He got the bad guy, whereas the previous President couldn't even find the right country to invade. Also cities like Los Angeles and New York are reporting record low levels of violent crime, and that is what you call domestic tranquility. I think you should choose your President on this basis.
The President's second most important duty is debatable -- is it his job to restore and maintain the economy? I take the pragmatic approach -- some gov't programs have worked well and some have not. Right now I think Obama is handling things quite poorly, and I had this moment of clarity the other day watching Our Pres at the Apollo Theater doing a riff on an Al Green song -- Obama sure is cool and he has a wonderful wife and family -- and I compare him to Newt Gingrich who is most decidedly not cool, fat and funny-looking and a marital disaster -- but the fact is that stuff just doesn't matter too much.

So, I have cast Obama adrift, and where does that leave me?

That leaves me interested in Newt Gingrich. Keep this in mind, that doesn't mean I will vote for him, it only means he has caught my attention.

Newt said the most wonderful thing -- we could establish a colony on the moon by 2020. None of this Small Ball that Obama is preaching, but a moon shoot! My fellow Americans, we may succeed and we may fail, but let us do so in the most spectacular manner.
Newt Gingrich irritates me. He irritates everyone. That's why I like him. Gingrich flip flops on the issues. He changes his mind every day -- just like me. And he won't go away. After everyone gets sick to death of him, he's still there and he's still talking -- this is an admirable quality.

I'm not judging Newt's entire presentation, but I did hear him make three memorable comments:

1. He told Juan Williams that it might be good for 12-year-olds to work as school janitors. This is an excellent idea. I earned my first dollar at age 12, caddying and shoveling snow. My two children began work at age 12, working in the fields for farmers. It gives you a great beginning in life.

2. John King asked him about the trash talk from his second ex-wife, and Newt told John King it was none of his business. I was very glad to hear Newt say this because I really don't want to know about the private affairs of our political candidates.

3. Rick Santorum said that Newt had grandiose ideas. Newt responded, yes I have grandiose ideas because America is a grandiose country. Right on. Swing for the fences. Go for broke.

This weekend is probably Newt's highwater mark, but the inevitable Mitt Romney will forge ahead to get the nomination. That will be so dreary -- Romney the button-down white guy versus Obama the button-down black guy, both very corporate and composed and competent, given to a measured response and not easily provoked. My Democratic friends will carefully explain to me why it matters so much that Obama is better than Romney, but I will not be interested because the distinctions seem trivial.

I will vote for the farm this November. It is my shelter -- I will look around these acres and then make a decision.

-- Fred Owenscell: 360-739-0214

My blog is Fred Owens

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Sustainable Agriculture Defined & Discussed

2012-01-19T21:04:00.000-08:00

By Fred Owens

Sustainable Agriculture. "Sustainable" is a buzz word in farming. You can get a masters degree in "sustainable agronomics" and then find a position in high five figures at your state ag department or crop association. You can get one of those clipboard jobs where you travel from farm to farm and ask interesting questions like why is that cow standing in the middle of the stream? "The cow is standing in the middle of the stream because it's hot and she's thirsty," said the farmer.

That's an interesting question, but first I will explain sustainability to the average person. Sustainability means staying in business. It means that you made enough money this year and you've been taking good enough care of your land that you can do it all over again next year. You didn't burn out. You didn't go broke. Your farm didn't turn into a toxic desert. It means you were careful and you saved a little bit. It means you left a little of your corn crop at the corner of the field -- left for the poor people who come gleaning, left for the birds to nibble on a cold winter's day, left for the roughage that will return to the soil.

It means you didn't break your back working. You take good care of your body when you're working by easing off a little bit. You don't work yourself into a lather -- but you ease up and keep going. You work slower because you last longer and you get more done that way. You drink plenty of water on a hot day. That's called working on a sustainable basis and you will still be out in the field years from now.

Sustainable farming might mean reading the history of the Nile River in Egypt. They have been farming on the banks of the Nile for how many thousands of years? -- 6,000 years or more. Despite dire warnings of coming disaster -- climate change! acid rain! frogs falling from the sky! -- they are still farming along the Nile River.

Egyptians farmers are supposed to follow simple guidelines of seven fat years followed by seven lean years. I don't know how that got started but it was a good plan. Of course, over that entire period of 6,000 years, there have been dust storms and plagues of locusts, and human depravity and violence of the worst kind, but they are still farming in Egypt, and I would call that sustainable agriculture.

Currently, Egypt has a much larger urban population than can be fed from Egyptian farms. But you must understand, one of the tenets of sustainability is that disaster is always looming. There is no guarantee or promise of tomorrow. Only hope. So work as hard as you can, but take a break now and then, and you will be sustainable.

I'm going to bill the US Dept of Agriculture $43,768 for this essay. If they have enough sense to implement these guidelines they will save millions.

But I'm not done.

The question I asked was far form innocent. The guy with the clipboard was coming directly from environmental protection and wanted to know -- Sir, why is your cow standing in the middle of the stream? The implication was that the cow should not be there, dropping her abundant nitrogen-rich manure into a public waterway, thereby encouraging algae bloom downstream and clouding the water for the sweet little fishes upstream,

Well, if it was only one cow, it cannot be too much trouble, but a herd of cows watering in a stream can be a problem, and the guy with the clipboard might want the farmer to fence off the stream and find the cows a land-based source of drinking water so that the manure falls on the ground where it can do some good, and the branches and bushes and little trees can once more grow by the side of the stream and cool the water, and provide shelter for the sweet little fishes that hide in the nooks and crannies, safe from herons and hawks and bigger fishes.

Yes, that would be good, and it would be sustainable -- to fence off the stream. Except for one little problem -- who is going to pay for the fence? The farmer says, "I cannot sustain that cost. My cows have been wandering in that stream ever since I was a small boy and this place belonged to my grandfather. We're still here, and we want to stay here and keep on farming."

This is a problem, and I propose no solution. Agriculture is full of problems and costs and expenses and bad weather and bankers that cheat you and lazy workers and it never ends. But if you're sustainable you just keep going. You worry, but you don't worry too much. Because you need a good night's sleep so you can do it all over again tomorrow.

Sustainable agriculture is not really a new idea, it's conservation with a cell phone.

Position Wanted: I'm looking for a new farm position. I excel at working with people, customers, and marketing. I want to work for a well-run operation or farm with motivated and optimistic staff and management. I don't mind a simple customer-facing job but I want to be a part of the business and have the opportunity to grow into new positions over time. Possible jobs include marketing, farm manager/caretaker, customer/sales. Do you know such a place for me?

Be it a well-run large-scale commercial farm or a small hobby farm, in either case a sound strategy can lead to good results. The product is less important than the people I hope to work for. I like to make an extra effort. Agriculture teaches me that we proceed without guarantees and we never give up.

My resume is available by link at the bottom of this newsletter. Excellent references as well.
--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog is Fred Owens

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog is Fred Owens

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Bathsheba's Farm

2012-01-12T08:13:00.000-08:00

I keep changing the title, but the story itself is taking on a shape. As I said before, you can create characters but you can't make them do whatever you want. It's just like God who created us and gave us free will. If you write a story, you become as a god but not all-powerful. People do what they will.

For me, I was going to give up this project, but I could not rest, wanting to know what happens next, and the only way to find out is to keep the writing of it.

In our case Tom and Bessie went upstairs together, to bed, at the end of Part One. Part Two is titled "Sex Ruins Everything." In this case it does and it doesn't ruin everything. They made a night of it and they were immensely glad for that, but trouble lies ahead.

I will send it to you in a week or so.

A HORSE. I have been offered to ride a horse with friends in Santa Barbara. I've not been mounted in many years so it will be good riding for me. I told them I need a horse that is smart enough to do it right without me telling it, so they will get me a mule named Annie. A mule is like a horse with a union card. A horse will act with complete loyalty and sacrifice, but not a mule, not if it doesn't make sense. A mule will carry you up the mountain but then he will take a lunch break whether you say so or not.

POLITICS. Politics are fun because America is a good country -- unless you read Howard Zinn's book, a People's History of the United States. Zinn wrote a catalog of American crimes. The book is all true and it is a useful corrective to the unalloyed admiration of our own past. We did screw up here and there, but that is a side show to the overall performance. We built a hell of a country. Evidence of that is how much we complain about it -- that's the sound of freedom.

The problem with Howard Zinn is not his book, but idiots like actor Matt Damon who swear on it like it was gospel, and the young people who claim it as the basic text -- it might be the only history book they will read and they will get bad ideas from it.

EXCEPTIONAL. The disciples of Howard Zinn are neatly balanced by the Exceptionalists, who claim -- never claim! -- that we are the world's greatest country and the last best hope of mankind. This is very poor psychology. You cease to be exceptional the second you proclaim it. Real Americans strive for excellence and let others make "claims."

DAMS AND RIVERS. I used to be pro-fishing, but now I work on a farm, and now I like dams. Dams provide water for irrigation. Farms feed the multitudes. And we need the water to grow the food.

Fishing, on the other hand, has that romantic appeal of by-gone days, like that show "Deadliest Catch" which is so popular -- those wild and woolly fishermen risking their lives on the stormy waves. I like watching the show, but that's not where our food comes from. Fish are a small part of our diet.

Instead we have the farm, which is too real to make a reality TV show. Think of "Farm Cam" -- watch the farmer, now he's going down the field on his tractor. Wait, wait, he's turning around at the end of the row. Incredible! Now he's coming back!

Our ancestors used to fish and hunt many thousands of years ago and we all lived that way. Fishing is an ancient occupation, by a hundred thousand years more ancient than agriculture which was invented and developed only in the recent past. That is why the lure of the ocean and the river tugs so deeply in our souls, because if you go back far enough, your people were fishermen and hunters and gatherers.

I honor that all-human past, but our ancestors switched over to farming because it was a better way to live. Isn't it?
I am grateful for this abundance of food that we have.

THE OBAMAS. I started thinking about them again. I have heard Obama speak twice in person. He didn't use a teleprompter and he fielded questions from the audience and gave good answers. He was impressive. I also met Michelle Obama at a small gathering -- she was working a rope line and shook my hand and we exchanged a few words. My first impression was that she was tall and beautiful, I also caught a glimpse of her steely determination.

This reassured me, because I had lived through the marriage of Bill and Hillary Clinton, he with the roving eye and the fast hands. If the Clintons had just managed to keep it private I would not have cared, but I really did not want to know about all that. It was like seeing Uncle Bob naked coming out of the shower. Avert your eyes!

So I met Michelle Obama, and I knew instantly that Barack was never going to be chasing interns around the Oval Office. One is that she is so hot-looking. Two is that she would kill him if he did. The Obamas have a good marriage and manage to keep their squabbles to themselves.

Barack Obama has a well-known vice. He smokes. I'm an ex-smoker, so I can spot the habit. He manages to sneak two or three cigarettes a day. He's the President -- no one can make him stop.

It's good to know what a man's vices are, because he surely has vices and you want to know what they are.

RON PAUL. I met some of his supporters in 2008. Their views are even more extreme than his. There is a distant country where the far right blends into the far left. It's way, way out there. I catch a whiff of anti-Semitism in that strange region -- nothing I can put my finger on, but I'm wary. Go ahead, make your own inquiries -- visit with his hard-core followers as I have done.

My litmus test for anti-Semitism is Pat Buchanan on the right. He is okay, but anyone further right than him is suspect in my book. I don't have a litmus test for anti-Semites on the left, but it would be when the shriekers of outrage against Israel become hoarse with rage -- that is a bad business.

POSITION WANTED. I am looking for a new position in agriculture in the Ventura area. I would like to be part of making the plan and carrying it out. I'm looking for a growth opportunity. I would like to able to expand what I am good at. Marketing is my best skill. Teaching others what I know is a close second. My resume is available to anyone who is interested.

Be it a well-run large-scale commercial farm or a small hobby farm, in either case a sound strategy can lead to good results. The product is less important than the people I hope to work for. I like to make an extra effort. Agriculture teaches me that we proceed without guarantees and we never give up.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog is Fred Owens

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

THE REAL WORLD

2012-01-06T19:18:00.000-08:00

H.L. Mencken. I dedicate this piece to H.L. Mencken, who never disguised his ill humor.

Bathsheba's Novel. I started writing a novel in December about Tom and Bathsheba who worked on a farm together and fell in love. The characters came alive for me. It was like having imaginary friends, and I could spend hours thinking or dreaming about what they might do.

But I don't have the time for so much day-dreaming. Perhaps someday when I retire I might take it up again..

Except I have no plans to retire. Some of the most boring people I know are retired. It doesn't appeal to me. Besides, it would be impossible, because I have never saved a nickel. I will work as long as I am able, and then I will become a burden on society. That's my plan.

Politics. I am enjoying politics this season. I find the Republican mob to be kind of interesting. I will miss Michele Bachmann and Herman Cain, but we have Rick Perry to kick around, so we can still have some laughs.

Mitt Romney is the safe and moderate choice. He used to be governor of Massachusetts. I guess this is a silly comparison, but Massachusetts keeps producing losing candidates. There was Michael Dukakis in 1988, safe and moderate, and completely forgotten. There was John Kerry in 2004 -- not a firebrand like Howard Dean -- so he got the nomination and lost a winnable race to George Bush.

Anyway, Romney is so dull that I cannot even force myself to read anything about him.

I like Rick Santorum instead. He has seven children -- imagine that! He doesn't agree with abortion or same sex marriage. That's not how I see it, so does that that mean I should abhor him? You're supposed to despise people like Santorum, but I don't despise him -- he's an interesting character.

Then there's Paul Krugman at the New York Times. I agree with him. The national debt is not a real problem. Government spending should increase in a recession. The real problem is that we ought to pay down the debt during good times, but we lack the discipline to do so.

Being a Krugmanite would make me a respectable Democrat, but I am more of what you might call a Social Democrat -- meaning that all my friends and relatives are Democrats so I'm not switching. Why should I leave? The other people don't look too hot either.

Being a Democrat, I'm supposed to believe in climate change and global warming. I do not believe in it or deny it. Actually, I never give it a thought.

Democrats are supposed to be in favor of affirmative action, diversity and multiculturalism. I'm not in favor of these dreary trends. Especially diversity which is such a bad word. It sounds like divorce and division, and it means you go your way and I'll go my way. I am opposed to diversity. Instead I support integration and harmony -- these are much better words. But the people who run the Democratic Party don't listen to me -- they are idiots.

And feminism? I used to work in journalism, and watched all the women flood into that occupation. I even encouraged them in the beginning, until I realized they weren't really women, but "persons willing to work long hours for little pay." They have done a good job of driving down wages in a profession that never paid well in the first place.

Then the Internet came along and killed what was left of journalism -- it's part of the "creative destruction" directed by our sainted "job creators." There's supposed to be new jobs created after the old jobs are destroyed -- I wish I knew how to find them.

The Republicans believe that most of their fellow citizens are lazy people who readily sponge off the rest of us. That has not been my experience. I have seen that most adult Americans expect to work for a living -- you don't need to beat us with a stick. I wouldn't make a good Republican because of this.

I once tried to attract attention by describing the political landscape as a tortuous narrow path between the twin evils of feminism and fundamentalism. This is what I actually believe, but I fear that most people do not understand what I am getting at.

It's very frustrating to be misunderstood. I open my mouth and people laugh and there's nothing I can do about that.

But I'm still a Democrat. I don't want to be an Independent. I want to be on a side and to belong to a party. These are my folks, and I'm going to vote for Obama.

Novel Writing, Politics & Farm Work. Novel writing is a day dream, politics is an exercise in perpetual frustration, and that leaves the farm work. It's 8 a.m., so I better get to it. By 9 a.m. I will be whistling a happy tune.

thank you and happy new year,

Fred

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog is Fred Owens

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Bathsheba Beckons

2011-12-30T15:45:00.000-08:00

Dec. 30, 2011

Here's the story I told you about. I made some last minute changes, but you can only tweak these things so much. I hope you like it. And I hope you have a wonderful and prosperous New Year for 2012. Blessings to all.

Bathsheba Beckons

By Fred Owens

A red-tailed hawk flew over a field somewhere in Ventura County and saw a man standing there, holding a shovel with one hand and scratching his grey-haired head with the other. He wore rumpled clothes and a puzzled expression on his face. The hawk noticed the man without caring and flew on.

Tom Blethen was facing two 50-foot rows of potatoes. He looked up at the December sky. It had rained, the field was all muddy, and it was going to rain again.

Bessie Blume came out from the house. “You had better get those spuds all dug up now or they will rot in the ground,” she said and walked back to the house, to have coffee with Helen.

Blethen muttered mild curses under his breath, but Bessie was the boss, and he was the farmhand and potatoes don’t dig themselves.

Spuds, I hate that name, why don’t they just call them potatoes, he thought as he wrestled with the spade. This is just like one of those Thomas Hardy novels, Far From the Madding Crowd. Why did I end up in that book, out in the goddam “moors” digging “beetroots” in the rain? Geez, I gotta stop talking to myself.

He pulled out his cell phone and dialed up Charlie Bones in Seattle. Charlie Bones was an artist and not gainfully employed, someone you could call at any time and he might be free. “It’s me, Tom Blethen, down in California, standing in a field, working in the rain.”

“I thought it didn’t rain in California. You could have stayed up here if you wanted rain,” Charlie said.

“I’m standing out here in this muddy field in Oxnard,” Tom said, “and I’m calling you because I’m desperate to talk with someone who has a grain of intelligence.”

“Unlike you,” Charlie replied. “If you had a grain of intelligence you wouldn’t be working in a muddy field.”

“You got that right. I’m too old for this. I moved down to California to get out of the rain and to get out of doing farm work.”

“But you brought it all with you,” Charlie said. “There’s no escape.”

“Okay, thanks for the advice.” Tom said and hung up. He should have told Charlie about being trapped in a Thomas Hardy novel. You read books to find out who you are and then you find out you’re somebody else. Wow, that’s too spacey. I gotta calm my mind. You read books for the images -- my life is like a Thomas Hardy novel. That’s better.

He began digging again. He started with the red potatoes because he liked red potatoes better than white ones. Let’s see, he thought, in fifty feet I might get fifty pounds or better. He worked slowly. That’s what he used to tell the crew when he had a crew, to work slowly. The slower you work, the more you get done. You see those Mexicans over there – barely moving, but they don’t stop, they just keep going. That’s what he used to tell his crew.

“So now I’m a professional Mexican and my life’s ambition has come true,” he said out loud. “I must know something.”

Tom was thinking he was smarter than Bessie. He called Charlie again and Charlie straightened him out. “Tom, you’re working on her farm. If you were so smart, Bessie would be working on your farm.”

“Well, if I was so smart I would be living in a condo in Santa Monica. I’d be buying gold-finger aerobiotic organic potatoes at Whole Foods for $5 a pound – by God.”

“Give it up Tom, you like the farm.”

“I hate it when people say that. You get hit by a car and they don’t say it was meant to be. You end up in the hospital and they don’t say it was what you really wanted all along.”

“So, quit,” Charlie said.

“Remember when we worked in the fields together up there in the Skagit? That was twenty years ago, we were regular peasants back then, doing it for the glory. I was stuck in a different novel then, Tolstoy, Anna Karenina.

“Remember that scene where Count Levin goes out to work the wheat harvest with his own serfs, and he gets his hands dirty and he feels like the salt of the earth? My whole life changed after I read that book. I blame this on Tolstoy, he was such a phony. He talked a good game about the wholesome peasant life but he stayed in his castle, or whatever it was. Not me, I went whole hog and moved right into the book. I took up farm work for real. God, I wish I hadn’t.”

“You’re breaking my heart,” Charlie said.

“Look, I don’t want to seem too self-absorbed. Have you sold any paintings? “Tom asked, changing the subject.

They talked a little longer. Tom could have called Kevin Sunrise or Jim Smith or Rebecca Love. At least he had friends to call. It was lonely out in the field. He kept digging. It was like a treasure hunt because you never knew how many potatoes you would find or how big they might be, and this looked like a big crop. The wheelbarrow started to fill up. “A fucking harvest bonanza is unfolding before my eyes. As God is my witness I’ll never go hungry again,” Tom said and he shook his hand at the sky.

Bessie came back out of the house after Helen drove out. “Nice looking spuds,” she said, which was a lot of motivational speaking for her. She owned 15 acres and rented out most of that to a neighboring farmer, raising her own small crops on a few acres near the house, herbs mainly, to sell, and the potatoes and other vegetables for her table. That and a few chickens.

She was short and wiry. She had strong features and weather-worn skin. Her hair stood out, stiff as a brillo pad and wired like electricity.

“You really got a lot of hair,” Tom told her once. “That’s a sign of vitality.”

Bessie did not care for flattery.

“But you’re awful skinny. You know, if I were you, I would stop drinking coffee all day and make yourself a big chocolate milk shake, fatten up a little bit,” Tom had told her.

“You want to keep your job?” she said.

He did want to keep his job. He liked Bessie, but he was careful about that. Tom lived in a trailer in back of the barn. It was an old Airstream with real wood paneling, kind of warm and cozy. He kept his poems and manuscripts and paintings and photos inside, some small collections of half-finished unadmired work, files of old letters, back when people wrote letters, a lifetime of fits and starts.

Fucking farm job, he thought. The only book they ever wrote about farm work was Of Mice and Men – two tramps going from ranch to ranch. What a bunch of losers, the salt of the earth. I get to live on the far side of the barn, and I can go outside at night and take a piss under the stars.

Bessie had her farm house, and it was nice. She had married well and divorced even better. Her children were grown up and gone. She spent a lot of time on the phone, Tom noticed, and she wrote letters, regular mail letters -- she didn’t like the computer or the email.

And she’s lonely in there and I’m lonely out here, Tom thought. So I’ll make a move on her, like in Lady Chatterly’s Lover, and I’ll be her pet hound dog.

But I don’t know, it’s not a good idea to get up close and personal with the landlady. I could end up going down the road again. And seriously, am I getting any signals from Bessie?

It was nine p.m., the stars were out, the wind was gentle and the fields were quiet. Bessie was in the big house by the light of a warm yellow lamp. She sat on the floor on the old rug in front of the television.

It wasn’t too late to put together a load of laundry and bring it to the house. Tom got his basket ready and walked over. I don’t care what happens, he thought, I’m just going in there. I’m gonna die, probably not for a long time, but I’m gonna die, and what else can I be sure of? And why sleep alone?

Tom put the laundry in the machine and came over to the living room, standing up, looking at the television, Bessie stretched out on the floor, on her side, her head on a pillow.

“What are you watching?” he said. He didn’t care what she was watching and she ignored the question. “What are those little colored flags over the mantel?” he asked.

Bessie stirred slowly. “They’re Buddhist prayer flags. I’m a Buddhist.”

“You’re Jewish. How can you be a Buddhist?”

“I’m a Jewish Buddhist.”

“Fine, I’m a Catholic pagan.”

“Would you like some popcorn? I’ll make some.”

That was Bessie’s idea of a treat, a warm gesture on a December night, but austere, with no butter, and no butter expected. Tom sat in the maroon easy chair by the fireplace. Bessie had lots of books, old hippie texts and arts illustrated, photos of baby children, paper mache sculptures crudely finished, scraps of crepe paper taped to the ceiling from a party long ago, a Japanese screen holding off the dining room, a Chickering upright piano gathering dust, and a broad picture window looking out on the field with no curtains.

Women always have curtains, Tom thought. But not Bessie, she was a little too Zen, like a Rye Krisp cracker without any hummus.

She brought out the popcorn in a very large, very old wooden bowl and set it down on a small table next to the maroon easy chair, taking her own place on the rug, with her stocking feet tucked under her hips, sitting closer than Tom had expected.

“What’s on your mind?” she asked looking up, her face in a halo of wiry hair, her thick eyebrows arched, her gaunt nose unmoved.

“I’ve been on this farm for six months now…” Tom began.

“You don’t want a raise?” she asked.

“No, no, we can talk about that another time.”

“It’s about you,” he said.

“I’ve got all night,” she said and she stretched and began to seem as if she might be enjoying the attention. That made Tom nervous. If I hesitate now, she’ll kill me, he thought.

“How did you end up out here?” he asked, and grabbed a handful of popcorn, still steaming hot, with just enough salt and some of Bessie’s herb mix.

“I’ll say this slowly. It was back to nature for me, just like a lot of people. I grew up on the Lower East Side, I went to City College, I dropped out, I hitched out West, I wanted to be a California sunshine girl. I met Frankie. He wrote poetry and we smoked pot together. His family had money. We got married and had children and his folks bought us this farm. I planted strawberries and worked 12 hours a day. Frankie spent more and more time in Los Angeles. He began using hard drugs. I kicked him out. I raised the children by myself. Now I’m free, but I love my home more than anything, so here I sit.”

“That’s the short version, I guess,” Tom said.

“You wanted to know.”

“What happens now?”

“The wind blows. Om, Om, Om. The wind blows and no one knows.”

“Did you read that book about Bathsheba? She owned a farm, it was in a Thomas Hardy novel.

“No.”

“Well, she was young and pretty and kind of stuck up and she owned a farm. Her name was Bathsheba Everdene, and one day Gabriel Oak came to work for her. He was a shepherd and a kind man. She put him to work, but she snubbed him, then she married the rich man who lived next door, but she was very unhappy. All kinds of bad things happened to her, except all that time Gabriel was her faithful friend, and she finally realized that and then they came together. It was a pretty story. Do you read books like that?”

“I do. I would like to read that book, the way you tell it,” Bessie said.

The television was still on, keeping them company, like a third person in the room. That was safer, buying time. Tom had thoughts. Thoughts aren’t good. Om, Om, Om. Peace is good, not thoughts.

But this is the earth and the body of desire dwells on Bessie’s farm with Tom attending. And the fruit of the soil comes from desire because we are not angels.

Bessie switched off the television and walked over to the stairs. She began ascending, and turning back, said to Tom, “Are you coming?”

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog is Fred Owens

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Bathsheba Beckons

2011-12-24T11:34:00.000-08:00

By Fred Owens

I wrote a short story called "Bathsheba Beckons." I will send it to you in the next newsletter. It's not very long, only 2,300 words. I expect most of you will find it tedious and laced with obscure literary references, but a few of you might enjoy it. I know I enjoyed writing the story. It is my first attempt at fiction.

I am drawing on persons from real life of course --- there is a character named Charlie Bones, an artist in Seattle, who bears a remarkable resemblance to Charlie Krafft.

The lead character is named Tom Blethen. Tom is the name of my older brother. Blethen is a Welsh name. The Blethen family are the owners of the Seattle Times, and I once dated a woman of that name who was a part of that family........Bessie Blume is the female character.... The name Blume comes from my friend Harvey Blume, the Tanned Lion of East Cambridge..... and so the story construction process goes.

I put Tom Blethen on a small farm in Ventura County. He is digging potatoes on a winter's day, working in the rain, working on Bessie Blume's farm. He is muttering and cursing his fate, when Bessie comes out of the house to give him some direction -- but I am giving away the story now.

The great joy of writing fiction is that, once you have set up the characters and the scene, you don't really know what is going to happen, even though you are writing the story. You see, a character, once created, has a mind of his own, he does what he will, not what you tell him to do. It all comes down to the truth. Even in fiction, you have to tell the truth -- because all good stories are true stories.

The title, "Bathsheba Beckons," comes from the Thomas Hardy novel, Far from the Madding Crowd, which is set on a farm in rural England. The main character in the novel is Bathseba Everdene, and she owns a farm, and so Bessie Blume is actually very different in character from Bathsheba but she does own a farm.

With Affection for Christopher Hitchens. Of course he did not say Merry Christmas, but can you imagine Hitchens greeting someone with Happy Holidays? He would have choked on his Scotch before uttering such a nonsense. He was way better than that and I miss him already. I heard him speak in Seattle several years ago, on tour to promote his book on atheism. He was a wonderful, witty speaker who converted no one to his belief. Half his audience in Seattle were Methodist ministers of a liberal stripe, attending as a display of tolerance. Hitchens couldn't win for losing in this debate. God loves a scoundrel.

He was a confirmed smoker and drinker. Had he reformed he would not have lived one minuter longer. Had he reformed he would have died of boredom. If one lives for the sake of "health" then one is rewarded with a long and stupid life -- I'm sure he would have agreed with that sentiment.

Hitchens was a fully enlightened being and he made the decision to dissolve upon death. He will not visit heaven nor hell and he will not be reincarnated.

Impossible to find a gift for my brother. I finished my Christmas shopping, having bought seven gifts for under $100 total. Except I don't have anything for my older brother Tom. Every year it is impossible to find him a gift. He has nothing and he doesn't want anything.

Not me, there are many things I want, and I'm working on a wish list for 2012, a list of things I wish to acquire, places I wish to visit, and experiences I would like to have. This is a secret list, of course.

Learning Chinese. I go to zhongwen.com for a study of Chinese characters. It is easy to learn Chinese. Just say that to yourself every day. It's easy. Chinese isn't difficult. You learn one character, then you learn another character and you just keep going. If anyone says learning Chinese is hard, then throw water at them or call them a bad name.

No Farm News. The sun comes up, the sun goes down and each days passes in its time and toil.

No Politics. I'm biting my tongue, but I'm sticking to my pledge -- no politics here.

Merry Christmas. Cheers, happiness and prosperity to all. May the joy of the season spread across the globe even to North Korea.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog is Fred Owens

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Things Might Improve

2011-12-06T18:47:00.000-08:00

FARM NEWS by Fred Owens

"Things might improve," said Andy Dunstan at Love House Dahlia Farm this morning. I had presented him with a problem while he was eating his cereal. He turned his head to me and said, "things might improve" and then he continued with his breakfast.

To Hell with Celery. Farmers in Ventura County grow over $150 million worth of celery every year, making it the celery capital of the world. So you would think I could easily find a celery farmer to interview, you know, ask him about his crop and his field and how he grows things. Nope. It's like pulling teeth to get these old boys to talk. They don't know me and they don't trust me. Well, to hell with them too.

I left a phone message with a local celery grower, but he won't call me back. They never do. I've been through this dance before. It's not really the farmer's fault. They're just not good at talking. They're out there in the field all day working with great skill to produce an abundance of good food for all of us to enjoy. But you tell them you're a reporter with a few questions, and they clam up tight. What did I ever do to them?

Maybe some other guy wrote a bad story about farming, I never did. I'm just trying to make a living.

Moo. Farming is a very interesting thing to think and read about. As you know, I have become an ardent straddler and fence riding moderate. So I don't take a pro or anti position about organic farming versus conventional, or agri-biz versus small farm, or GM food which is either a plot to control the world by Monsanto or a benefit to all mankind. No, I just hang out here with the cows. The cows go MOOOO, which is OM said backwards.

Dry Here in Ventura. It hasn't rained here in a month, and then we get those dry desert winds day after day -- wind sucking all the moisture out of the soil. Not a big problem except I have 12 50-foot rows of sweet peas trying to germinate, and then sticking up their cute little heads, breaking through a crust of soil and spreading out their tender baby leaves under December skies. Short days don't hurt the sweet peas, it just makes them grow slowly. And a hard frost at night doesn't hurt them either. But that dry wind is not good, so I water the sweet peas every day.

Digging Up Tubers. We have about 65 raised beds of dahlia tubers, beds being 25 to 35 feet in length, and full of dahlias, which have all finished their season, dying back to the ground and someone needs to dig them all up and get them to the greenhouse. Nate was a traveler and he dug tubers all last week, but this week it's my turn.

It's not such a bad job -- crispy cold in the morning so the boss said to pick a row in the sunshine. Isn't she nice to say that?

That's all for now. We're just "doing the kind of work that most Americans don't want to do." This is not really true, you just need to find a good farm to work at.

Farm Income on the Rise in California

2011-11-26T09:02:00.001-08:00

The following story brings us some happy news on this Thanksgiving weekend -- California farm income is on the rise. I'll step out of the way now and let Ms. Marcum spread the joy.

By Diana Marcum, Los Angeles Times

As Californians savor their Thanksgiving feasts, the states' farmers are especially thankful. California's agriculture sector is on track for a record year, a rare bright spot in the state's economy.
Prices for cotton, grapes and other crops are near all-time highs. Foreign buyers are gobbling California almonds, grapes, citrus and dairy products. Agricultural exports through September are up 16% over the same period last year. Net farm income is projected to post strong gains in 2011 after nearly doubling over the previous decade.

At a time when other Golden State industries are struggling, times are good down on the farm. Just ask Steve Moore.

The Fresno County pistachio farmer recently completed the harvest on his 480-acre spread near Huron, part of what's estimated to be California's second-largest pistachio crop ever. Prices are strong, at around $2.10 a pound, driven by growing demand in places including China and Israel.

Moore started with 160 acres in 1982, planting trees that take seven years to produce. "Looking at those bare sticks in the ground, I thought I must be nuts," he said. But the crop is so lucrative he's looking to expand again.

Indeed, prices for all manner of farm products are so high that Vernon Crowder, an agricultural economist with Rabobank, a major agricultural lender, has been seeing some unfamiliar faces at industry events.

"When you go to ag conferences you now have venture capitalists hanging around," he said. "But they find it very difficult to beat out another farmer for land, and that shows you how strong the market is. There's been a fundamental shift as the global market demands more food and more expensive food."

That's good news for California, the nation's leading agricultural state and the fifth-largest producer worldwide. In contrast with the grain-and-livestock focused Midwest, California farmers cultivate more than 400 commodities, including more than half of the nation's fruits and vegetables.

Looking for artichokes? Dates? Kiwi? Pomegranates? California accounts for more than 99% of the U.S. production of each of those crops, according to the California Food and Agriculture Department.

"You ask the average person what California does better than any other place in the world, where we have the most innovation and natural advantage and they'll probably say Hollywood or high-tech. But, it's farming," said Stuart Woolf, president of Woolf Farming & Processing, with cotton and tomato fields near Huron.

"Bakersfield to Sacramento is like a giant greenhouse with really good soil," he said. "The big picture is that we are going to be perpetually stretching our resources as California feeds more people around the globe."

The world's population just hit 7 billion, and emerging middle classes in countries such as India and China are putting more on their plates. California farmers, always looking for new markets, are finely attuned to shifting economies and tastes worldwide. Pistachios are a perfect example of such entrepreneurial farming.

California is now the world's top producer, knocking off longtime leader Iran three years ago. This year the state's crop is expected to be more than 460 million pounds, but 30 years ago the crop barely existed here.

Then came the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis, which led to a ban on imports from Iran, a major supplier to the U.S. market. Some Central Valley farmers saw an opportunity. They gambled on planting pistachio trees.

Innovation followed.

Iranian pistachios traditionally are dyed a distinctive red to cover blemishes left by bits of the hull sticking to the outer shell. California researchers found a way to remove the outer hulls, leaving the tan shells smooth and flawless.

Soon California pistachios were favored by consumers worldwide. The 2010 crop — a record 522 million pounds — was worth $1.16 billion.

In the Central Valley, which grows about 95% of the nation's pistachios, the crop is expected to nearly double by 2017 as more trees mature.

"That's a huge increase. But we think we'll be able to create demand ahead of production," said Richard Matoian, executive director of American Pistachio Growers in Fresno.

Moore, the pistachio farmer, is willing to roll the dice. He's looking to add more trees. "It's a moon shot – a trajectory of seven years. You water, you fertilize, you keep the critters away, and you hope and you pray the demand grows as your trees grow," he said.

The country's largest pistachio farm, Paramount Farms, is capitalizing on Hollywood glitz to build a bigger domestic market.

Located in Kern County, Paramount is owned by Stewart and Lynda Resnick, who created the national pomegranate juice craze in part by putting their POM Wonderful brand juice bottles in gift bags at entertainment awards shows. Paramount is now pushing pistachios with "Get Crackin" TV spots featuring personalities such as Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, who had accused Facebook Inc.'s Mark Zuckerberg of stealing their idea for the social network, promoting "the lowest calorie nut."

"California farmers have guts," Matoian said. "They take risks on new crops."

Sometimes they return to old ones.

California was once a major cotton grower, transplanting the "white gold" empires of the South to the American West. But cotton slowly disappeared as drought and water wars drove farmers to abandon it for other crops.

Then prices spiked in 2010, largely because of poor harvests in China and Pakistan, which are major cotton growers. Some Golden State farmers rushed to plant cotton anew. Now, the Texas drought is expected to push high-end pima cotton prices to the $3-a-pound mark again. California farmers are harvesting 454,500 acres of cotton, almost 50% more than last year.

"Anything, anywhere in the world, affects us," said Ryan Jacobsen, a raisin grower and executive director of the Fresno County Farm Bureau.

So far the concurrence of events has California agriculture prospering and poised for long-term growth. China is still a surging market, and the U.S. recently signed a trade deal with Korea that is expected to boost exports of wine, beef, dairy products and tree nuts.

But Jacobsen said it would be hard to find a big-spending California farmer who would freely admit to being flush. "You know how you make a small fortune in farming? Start with a large fortune," he said.

The most splurging that raisin grower Steve Spate will do is an occasional dinner out with his wife, even though raisin prices are at an all-time high of $1,700 a ton, more than double what they were in 2002.

Fall rainstorms almost ruined this year's crop. And immigration crackdowns and ongoing violence on the U.S.-Mexico border have left him struggling to attract enough farmhands.

Spate plans to invest this year's profits to strengthen trellises to prepare for the switch to mechanical harvesters. "In farming what you buy is the ability to keep farming," he said.

diana.marcum@latimes.com

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog is Fred Owens

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

At Shepherd's Farm in Carpinteria

2011-10-29T11:26:00.000-07:00

FARM NEWS, Halloween Edition

By Fred Owens

I toured Shepherd's Farm in Carpinteria this week. They grow 40 acres of organic vegetables and have been doing that since 1973. It is a beautiful and tidy farm, well-managed. They sell vegetables at six farmers markets and provide more than 150 CSA boxes each week to customers in nearby Santa Barbara. They also wholesale to local restaurants.

I tasted Shepherd's strawberries. I picked them right in the field -- quite tasty and just sweet enough. They grow the strawberries through a white plastic sheet for weed control. These were first year plants, just set out this summer, and it was a pretty little patch of fruit.

I spoke with Antonio and Mark, two Hispanic gentlemen, brothers, who have worked for Shepherd for twenty years. It's good to have steady hands like that. I also spoke with Ricky and Josh, two interns who had been working there for several months -- they are part of the WOOF program.

And Kjessie, the farm manager, who keeps the ducks not lined up in a row, but quacking to the same tune.

A lot of Happy Campers are working at Shepherd's Farm. And last I met old Tom Shepherd himself. I asked him did you ever grow too much of something and then you can't sell it? He said, yes, that happens.

We had that happen at Love House Dahlias this year. We grew more sweet peas than we could sell, and then we grew more dahlias than we could sell.

This is so typical of American agriculture -- farmers are much better at growing than selling.

Autumn Comes. It's getting cold in the morning these days. I use the space heater for a bit. Pretty soon I'll be using the propane furnace. I live in a spacious motor home. The propane furnace really cranks out some good heat on a frosty morning. I was warm here all last winter. But I don't use the hot water heater -- it's too wasteful. Why would I heat up 10 gallons of water in the morning? It's better to go over to the big house and take a shower there. And then I only have a few dishes to wash, so I heat up some water on the stove for that chore.

I set out more winter vegetables this week -- red and green cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, romaine lettuce. We started all that from seed, but yesterday I bought a six pack of white snapdragons and a six pack of stock -- got them at Flora Gardens in Ojai as a treat, and I will plant them today.

We have two new dogs on the premises -- I want to be careful about what I say -- they bark a lot. Yesterday I was out weed-eating the aisles between all the raised beds -- there's about 75 raised beds here -- so this takes a while. And the dogs kept barking while I worked. They will just have to get used to the sound of the weedeater -- I hope. But I was muttering dog-threats under my breath.

Jobs and Steve Jobs.
Steve Jobs eliminated thousands of jobs. His computers launched the era of desktop publishing and self-publishing, which has resulted in the loss of thousands of editorial, typographic, and graphic design positions.

I think the greatest loss is the editorial positions. The editors were the grown ups, the ones who said let's stop and think about this. Now anybody can say anything to everybody else. It's all freedom and no discipline. It's self-esteem with no self-restraint.

Under the old scheme, we had the writer/journalist -- he was a teenager, rambunctious and idealistic, but a bit out of control. The editor was the grownup, the adult.

And the publisher --- this is key to the understanding -- the publisher was infantile. One can function at a very high level and still be motivated by the infantile ego. Me! Me! Me! That's the theme of Citizen Kane -- he with the monstrous, infantile ego. And this was not a bad thing -- that driving force -- as long as you had that editorial control to keep the train on the rails.

But now, in the era of self-publishing, we have become increasingly infantile. We can mess our pants and no one can judge us for doing that. No one will clean it up either.

Steve Jobs and Being a Father. Steve Jobs, who accomplished so much and changed our lives, said, in his biography, that he wished he had been a better father to his children. I agree with that. If he had been a devoted father and in doing so not created any of the fabulous Apple computers, then the world would have been a better place. Being a good father is the best way to change the world.

Income Inequality. Severe income inequality has often resulted in social upheaval. That's an historic pattern, not an opinion. Just ask Marie Antoinette. Conservatives argue that income inequality is a good thing or at least harmless and that we should not indulge in resentment against our wealthiest citizens. But the pattern persists. Just ask the Czar -- oh they don't have a czar in Russia anymore. He was overthrown. It should never have come to such violence. And the Russian people made an even worse choice after getting rid of the Czar.

But we can do better than that. In America, the great industrial age of the late 19th century led to the fabulous wealth of the Vanderbilts and the Rockefellers. But we did not give in to a violent revolution against the upper class. Instead, we introduced progressive regulation, such as the income tax -- which prevented "class warfare." As did FDR's New Deal, which saved capitalism.

So, to repeat, resentment against wealth is human nature. We should not envy those who have so much more than we do, but we are not angels, we are Democrats.

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bums on blankets

2011-10-15T07:55:00.001-07:00

We have Occupy Ventura starting today. It will take place in the Mission Park, across the way from San Buenaventura Mission, founded in 1792. This old plaza is very mellow, a fountain, ceramic tiles, bums on blankets -- why do we insist on calling them homeless? That term is too generic. We have unemployed people, mentally ill people, drug-addicted people, drunkards, life-stylers and wannabes, plus plain old criminals. And bums, especially beach bums, a Southern California specialty.

But they all go by the moniker of "homeless" and they all do the stupid pit bull and over-loaded shopping cart thing. There is a samelessness to this group, and a lack of aesthetic appeal. If circumstance or choice put me back on the street, I would be a lot more creative and inventive. This may sound trivial, but I think not.

I think they are called "homeless" because they are a living metaphor of society as a whole. They are the visible sign of our collective homelessness and our collective business.

Laura Wood would say, and I agree, that when the home-makers quit making homes and got jobs, that was when homelessness began. She would say that women are the home-makers and men are not.

I felt differently. When women wanted to go to work, I felt that an equal amount of men should or might want to stay at home and be a kind of masculine home-maker in place of the woman. This is what I did, and I have been the object of abuse and shame ever since, from men and women alike who applaud the careerist and mock the home-maker.

But the result can be seen in the mission park -- homeless people, bums on blankets.

Tomatoes and Sagging Gates -- part 2

2011-10-14T08:01:00.000-07:00

FARM NEWS

By Fred Owens
.
Georgie started the turnips in the greenhouse before going back to England in mid-September. Last week I took them out in flats when they were about four-inches tall and planted two 30-foot rows.

I put them in the new raised bed that Michael had constructed this summer. He had but good wire mesh underneath to keep the gophers out, then he replaced the topsoil and added a three-inch layer of sifted leaf mulch -- it looked like a work of art after he was finished.

It also seemed like the perfect place to plant the turnips for a winter garden, because it was in such a sunny place.

So I took out the flat of four-inch turnips to plant, but I was concerned about the heat. I figured that transplanting in the heat would put them in a swoon. So, after I got them in the ground, I put a very taut piece of twine between the two poles at each of the turnip bed, and then I flung a 30 by 20 foot piece of shade cloth over the plants, figuring to leave it there until the turnips got adjusted to their new home.

That was five days ago -- and the turnips are doing just fine.

Now I have two flats of red and green cabbage to plant in Row E, near the fence. This is a problem because about a dozen ground squirrels live on the other side of the fence and they love to chew on little cabbage plants. This summer I planted a whole bed of zinnias in Row E and the ground squirrels ate them all.

So I need a plan. I might have enough black plastic netting to cover one or two rows of cabbage plants. This might work, so I will plant a small patch and then wait. If it keeps off the ground squirrels, then I will plant the rest of the cabbages in two or three weeks.

Next I will plant more onions. The ground squirrels don't bother with the onions, so I will just put them in the ground and walk away. I have been doing well with onions this summer, so I'm feeling good about this.

The Possum Tragedy. We are not at war with critters on this farm, we salute all life, and so, not being overly fond of possums, we were still roundly dismayed at a recent tragedy.

Out on the tennis court -- it used to be a tennis court before we turned this place back into a farm -- we store old pots and garbage cans and what-not. One old garbage can had a bunch of culled dahlia tubers in the bottom. Two possums climbed into the garbage can to eat the tubers.

They ate and they ate and then it rained and rained, and pretty soon the garbage can began to fill with water, and you would think that a possum, being smart enough to climb into a garbage can, would be smart enough to get out.

But no, they drowned. We discovered that the next day. I don't know why this made me sad, but I started to think about all the critters around here, great and small, the cute ones and the predators and the pests -- there is a lot of death around here.

I solemnly buried the two possums next to the tennis court and I am constructing a small garden and shrine in their honor. I'm calling it the Tomb of the Unknown Critter. This is a shady spot, so I hope to plant Astilbe, Bleeding Heart and a variety of ferns -- Currently we don't have a budget for buying decorative plants, but someday the shrine will blossom for the possums.

Success with Tomatoes. I grew Brandywine tomatoes from seed this year. Heirloom and organic, low-acid and not too sweet. You can just eat them. I'm trying to eat as many as I can.

Success with Carrots. I have overcome a mental block about growing carrots. You know that feeling, which is "I can't grow carrots. The little seeds are too tiny to plant, and if they come up, they are too thick and I can't thin them out, so I can't grow carrots."

But I gave myself a calm determination to overcome this obstacle and I got the carrots the grow this year.

Sagging Gates. This could happen on any farm. The wood gets soft on the gate post and the screws don't hold and the hinge kind of works its way loose and pretty soon the gate is scraping the ground when you open it. Then you check the gate post itself and it kind of wobbles. We arrived at this problem over at my brother's house. But he said he didn't use that gate very often, and then I said "Well, then we don't have to fix it just yet."

Politics. I don't have much to say. I was going to occupy Wall Street or Los Angeles or something -- I have vast experience in this area. I have slept on the sidewalk a hundred times in a dozen cities. I have dealt with the police. When you live on the street you have to get straight with the police every day. Here's a few things you need to know about "street work."

1. Never scare the police. Never do anything that frightens them, because they will strike back with power. This is what the wise old hobo taught me. He said, "Don't worry about being afraid of the cops, worry about them being afraid of you."
He said, "Never put your hand in your pockets when you're talking to a cop -- they might think you're armed."

2. Cops don't care a fig for political issues one way or the other. With a cop, it's all about turf. If you're on the street, on a certain block in a certain town, then you are on his turf, his beat, and that's all he cares about. He may or may not defend that turf ferociously. You may or may not refuse to move. But don't ever waste your time arguing the issues with a cop -- they don't care. But they do care intensely about the square footage of sidewalk under your feet.

3. Sanitation is not a phony issue. When one or two hundred people camp in a certain spot for over a month, things can get very funky -- believe me, I have seen this many times. You might need to go home for a day to wash your socks and take a shower. I think it would be a good idea to power wash that park in Manhattan -- not as a reason to get rid of the demonstrators, but simply because of basic hygiene.

So, instead of occupying Los Angeles, I went with Laurie to a two-day music festival in a campground next to Joshua Tree National Park. The weather was perfect and the music was wonderful. We had a really good time.

California Will Rise. A while back I wrote a California Booster Essay, about how this great state has wonderful opportunities for personal and financial gain. It was an optimistic statement, and not just a feeling, but grounded in reality. California will grow in a good way. Of course nobody believes that. Public opinion is almost unanimous in declaring that this place is going right down the toilet. All is lost. We are doomed to a squalid future. The California Dream has turned into a nightmare. That's what everybody says -- except me.

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Frog Hospital and Farm News Subscriptions. If you find this newsletter worthwhile, send a check for $25, made out to Fred Owens and mail it to Fred Owens, 7922 Santa Ana RD, Ventura CA, 93001.

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--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog is Fred Owens

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Tomatoes and Sagging Gates

2011-09-19T19:28:00.000-07:00

Farm News

By Fred Owens

I notice we haven't done politics in a while, so it's time.

I never could decide whether George Bush was dumb or just acted that way. But Rick Perry is fairly sure to be dumb from start to finish. It's no act.

It's true there are Texans who, out of modesty perhaps, adopt a low profile in the intellectual parade, but old Rick is the genuine article -- smarter than a cow and equal in brain power to the average Oklahoman.

I hope he gets the Republican nomination, because he will be easy to beat.

Meanwhile, our beloved President has not run out of chances. All you people who think he's finished need to understand this -- Barack Obama is smart and lucky.

California is Not a Sinking Ship. All the numbers and statistics point to a Golden State meltdown.
When I decided to move down to California last year, most people thought it was a bad idea -- the government is terrible, the freeways are falling apart, the smog is bad, the cost of living is outrageous, the state parks are dirty, the schools are radical cesspools and the immigrants are swarming on every block with obnoxious odors and foreign-sounding accents.

True, true, and if you're a quitter, I hope you enjoy your new life in Idaho,

But those same facts don't measure attitude, especially my attitude. I'm not really crazy, I'm just five years ahead of everybody else. I like it here. I see opportunity. I feel energy. I meet people who have dreams. I meet people who are willing to work. The sheer amount of talent in this state is incredible -- from film-making to farming, they have everything in California.

Compare Texas and California. Think of all the wonderful movies about Texas -- John Wayne in Red River, Fess Parker playing Davy Crockett at the Alamo, William Holden in The Wild Bunch, Larry McMurtry's Lonesome Dove -- so many films that captured the true spirit of Texas.

And all those movies were made in California by the creative energy of California's film community -- with a few location shots, of course.

You know, I think Rick Perry ought to make a personal pilgrimage to the Hollywood moguls, those godless liberals, and thank them for creating the wonderful image of freedom and strength that is so strongly identified with the Lone Star State.

But that's glitter and hype and propaganda, real life is about substance, so we need to look at the basics of life and the good of the soil. Where does our breakfast come from, our lunch, our dinner, and our late-night snacks? Which state is the mightiest, most abundant and most fertile producer of agricultural products in the country, in the world, and in the entire history of agriculture -- California.

California leads all of the other states in farm income. We have food and we have movies, We have substance and style, we have facts on the ground and we turn them into legends on the silver screen.

I wouldn't bet against California. It's not over. Wait and see.

Governor Perry has other ideas. He dreams of a country without a minimum wage law, with fewer restrictions on child labor, no social security, no unions, and no environmental restrictions. But all he has to do is drive south until he gets to Mexico where all his dreams of freedom can come true.

If Governor Perry lived in Mexico his grandchildren would be free to work in the fields and to sell Chiclets by the side of the road, and they better work hard at it too because they will be supporting Grandpa Perry in his old age -- Isn't that the good old-fashioned way?

The funny thing is that so many Mexicans want to give up this free-market freedom and come to the United States.

I talked to a migrant worker last month. He was from Mexico, he said to me in Spanish. Seeing my age, he asked me if I got Social Security. I said yes. And he looked like he had died and gone to heaven, and I thought, good buddy, mi hermano, just hang on, get legal and some day you'll get Social Security too.

Amen to that.

Right here in California, working on a farm -- that migrant worker and me, sharing the same dream.

Note: Texas is suffering from a terrible drought this year. My heart goes out to all those good people I know in Texas. What I said here is just politics. I love you all. I'm praying for the rain -- and it will come.

Tomatoes and Sagging Gates. New readers of the Farm News might have expected a story about Tomatoes and Sagging Gates. Instead they got a political angle about Texas and California. Please don't feel confused and misled. Experienced readers of the Farm News are used to these sudden changes -- they realize they are in the presence of a great mind at work.

And I thank you for your time.

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--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog is Fred Owens

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Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Olive Trees in the Ojai Valley

2011-09-14T17:44:00.000-07:00

FARM NEWS

By Fred Owens

Waiting. I'm in the town of Ojai, at the library, waiting for some thing or some one. If I look up from this desk and look out the window, facing north, I can see a ridge of mountains close to 5,000 feet high. The highest one is called Topa Topa.

The mountains are green, peopled with low bushes that stay green all summer. They don't need rain. It hasn't rained since May. This is a dry country.

Yesterday Bob Dent showed me around the Deer Creek Olive Orchard in the upper part of the Ojai Valley.

I waited to meet him at 3 p.m., waiting at an outdoor cafe called The Summit. I got there early, at 2:30 p.m. and had a Pepsi with ice.

I like to get places early so I can see the sounds and hear the scenery, watch the cars go by, and look at people coming and going.

It was hot, it's often very hot in Ojai, but then a cloud came in at 2:45 and it was cooler and I took off my sun glasses.

The cafe closed at 3 p.m. but I was still waiting for Bob Dent. I called him on my cell at quarter past -- he said sorry, slipped his mind, be there in a minute.

So he pulled up in his truck and I followed him over to the orchard.

He showed me around. They have trees planted in 2006, doing fine at 6-feet tall. And they will be kept only 6-feet tall. People don't use ladders any more in the orchard work -- too many accidents, and it's tiring, climbing up and down. Better to just keep the trees small and reach them from the ground.

The olive trees are of a type called arbequina, an Italian variety. The slim silver leaves look so natural in this dry climate.

Bob said he had worked avocados for many years, but olives were much better. "You can't miss watering the avocados, they get stressed right away, but the olives are more forgiving, used to dry country and they don't need as much water."

In fact, a bit less water makes the tree produce more fruit.

The harvest will be in late November. It's a small orchard, a crew will come in -- guys who can pick olives like bandits and go from one orchard to another -- they will come in and pick the Deer Creek olives in one day.

Then the olives go to the press to get the oil. This is scheduled and booked. You have 48 hours, by law and by custom, to get those olives to the press, so you must have that arranged with careful people who know their business.

Deer Creek produces EVOO -- Extra Virgin Olive Oil, the very best.

Bob Dent doesn't know the olive harvest or the oil press, but he knows how to tend the trees year round.

He has a dog named Lily, a Rhodesian Ridgeback. She followed us around the orchard -- a very intelligent animal. Bob keeps the grass mowed between the rows. He uses a gas-powered hedger to cut down the suckers that spring from the older Mission trees. And other chores.

This orchard has 40 or 50 old trees, maybe one hundred years old. Olives give fruit for many, many years. But these old trees have been trimmed at the top, and that forces too many suckers to come out of the base, so Bob will be cutting back those suckers for a few years now.

Fruit flies are a problem. but olives don't have too many pests. They are just a hardy kind of fruit, and make such a wonderful oil. Olive oil is good for you in many ways.

That's the Olive News from the Ojai Valley. But don't forget the dahlia Open House at Love House Dahlias. It's blossom time, hundreds of gorgeous dahlias. Open every weekend in September.

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Frog Hospital and Farm News Subscriptions. If you find this newsletter worthwhile, send a check for $25, made out to Fred Owens and mail it to Fred Owens, 7922 Santa Ana RD, Ventura CA, 93001.

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog is Fred Owens

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Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
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A Shabbat Dinner or Why I Threw a Piece of Broccoli at My Hebrew Teacher

2011-09-02T17:42:00.000-07:00

By Fred Owens

Why it's Better Not to Own a Horse, and, in a complete change of subject, a Shabbat Dinner in New England in 1993

First, the Horses. The key thing to enjoying horses is don't own one. If you own a horse it will cost more than sending your kids to college. What you need to do is get on the other side of the income stream, like the way we do it at the Love House Dahlia farm -- we board horses. Some really nice people pay us to look after their horses and it's a really cool deal.

People make tons of money on horses -- like the hay dealer selling bales of orchard grass, or alfalfa, or straw -- all at $15 per bale and higher. Hay dealers love horses. So do ferriers (horse-shoers) and veterinarians.

Or take something like a fence. Somebody gets paid to manufacture the fence, to sell it, to erect it, and to maintain it -- all those people are making money off the horse's owner.

The three horses on our farm live inside a pipe corral fence. Jack, a 12-year-old pony, rubs up against the fence on the south side of his corral and he's gradually pushing it over, so we need to prop it up.

We had a discussion about that this morning, whether to do what I call a "hippie fix" or something more substantial. Michael, the other farm hand who works with me, was for fixing it properly by putting in additional posts. That would be the best way to solve the problem, only who is going to pay for the extra fence posts? -- not coming out of my wages I hope. That's why I suggested the hippie fix, using available materials on the farm for a cost of zero.

The hippie fix would look a little home-made, but it would keep the fence upright.

My point is that I just love these horses -- Jack, the pony, gets his own corral because he is extra ornery and and very bossy. I admire him for his courage, because he will fight and dominate any horse that comes near him. No matter how big the other horse is, Jack will end up being the boss. That's his nature.

The trouble is that Jack is not a good riding pony for small children -- he's just not gentle enough, so the grandchildren of Jack's owner don't get to ride him. Sometimes when he's being bad, I threaten to send him to Wales to work in a coal mine. That would teach him.

But I give him a carrot every morning when I come to clean up his corral, and he's a good guy.

The other corral holds Fiero, the gelding, and Misty, the mare. They are both Arabians, a little over 14 hands in size, and both about 12 years old.

Fiero is a bully. After he eats all his hay, he goes over to Misty's side of the feeder and chases her away and eats her hay too. When I see him do this, I yell at him and threaten him, but he won't stop......On the other hand, I think Misty bites him when no one is looking. Hey -- it's their life, I just feed 'em and clean up after 'em.

And I enjoy saying hello to the horses on a misty morning, I call out "Hey, Hey, and good morning. Are you glad to see me or do you just want a carrot?"

So why would I want to own a horse?

A Shabbat Dinner in New England, or Why I Threw a Piece of Broccoli at my Hebrew Teacher

As I wrote in the last two issues, I had joined Tikkun, a Jewish discussion group. I had also taught myself to read and write Hebrew and was studying the Torah at a synagogue. It was like the old saying in the advertisement, "You don't have to be Jewish to love Levi's." Note to the children -- Levi's was a brand of rye bread and that was their slogan back in the 1950s and 1960s.

So, in 1993, after being in the Tikkun group for more than a year, Lois Isenman invited me and the rest of the group for a Shabbat dinner at her home, the traditional Friday meal. And here's the story:

New England, 1993. “Lois, do you want me to come and rake the leaves?” I asked her.

The leaves fell in Lois Isenman’s back yard from towering oaks. The yard sloped steeply from her red brick home. I raked up all the leaves and determined to build her a leaf-mulch pile down in the corner by the back fence….. “If I build you a leaf pile, it will be simpler and cheaper. If I drag all those leaves up the hill, into the truck and then off to the landfill that would cost too much money. What do you say?”

Lois was wary. I could see her struggling with the notion. Sure, she could save money, but it would seem unfinished -- a pile of leaves left in the yard, when leaves are supposed to go away, leaving the grass bare to freeze and go brown and grey in the winter. “Look,” I said, “I will make an attractive and tidy pile of leaves, it will look organic……way down in the corner, by the fence.”

“All right,” she said.

It was November in New England, and I was “raking leaves for liberals” as I liked to put it. Making a few dollars, enjoying the fresh air, working in Cambridge and neighboring towns, raking leaves and resenting the affluence that surrounded me. “Why don’t they rake my leaves? What am I, some country bumpkin, blew in from the sticks?” I would mutter as I raked.

Lois lived in Newton, a Boston suburb, in the home where she grew up. I knew Lois from the Tikkun group. “Tikkun ha-olam” is a Hebrew phrase that means “to heal and renew the world.” No one in our group thought we could do anything remotely that grand – but maybe, if we all tried, things wouldn’t get worse.

We shared our tarnished ideals every other Sunday, and this week in November, instead of the Sunday meeting, Lois invited us to a Shabbat dinner at her house on Friday night.

She was a biologist at Harvard at some institute – I can’t remember the name, but she was a Fellow -- what a lovely title, I thought.

I told her, “I work on a big scale, in the garden, you work on a small scale, growing bacteria in a dish, but we’re in the same line of work, when you get down to it.”

Lois didn’t buy that comparison. She liked me, but she was wary.

For Shabbat dinner, in Lois’s dining room, it was formal, with a nice table cloth, but very relaxed. We were seven of us, all friends, seemingly unpartnered, Marty Federman was married, but even when we met at his house his wife did not appear... Lois had a relationship with another scientist, but she did not share any details.

Suffice it to say, we were all single -- which makes it seem lonely. So it’s better to say that we would share a blessing and a meal together as a family.

We were all in our forties, except Gladys Damon who was probably past seventy.

Every Shabbat is special and it felt special that evening -- as if our parents were there, because we had grown up by now, being past forty, and become our own parents, and because we struggled through a week of six days -- fought and lied -- trying to make a living, and it was time for some good food and good company, no matter how the week had gone.

Marty Federman, the most rabbinical of our group, deferred to Diana Lobel, the most devout. She said the blessing and lit the candles, and then she said, “I would like everyone to take a turn in speech. Fred is the newest, if not the youngest member of the group, I would like him to pose a question for the group.”

I was embarrassed at being singled out as “new.” But I spoke, “I have been raking leaves all week. I am justified in my labor. See these hands – that’s how I labored. So, my question is, who is a " Jew and how are you justified?”

I turned to Marty Federman, well-fed, bearded, warm and deep, not a show-man or a comic, even a little shy. “Marty, who is a Jew, and how is a Jew justified?” I asked him.

“How do I justify myself?” he said. “I have studied this week, and searched for the one essential Yiddish word. If you only knew one word in Yiddish …. it would be? ….”

He made a long pause, you could see people wanting to guess – “Heymish…..Heymish, meaning homey and homelike…. That’s all of Yiddish in one word,”

Everyone nodded – home and family are the center of Jewish life.

“I am the director of Hillel at Northeastern University,” he said. “Many of my students are questioning their Jewish identity, so this is a good question for me. I’m a Jew because my mother is a Jew. We all know that’s the law. But some people say you’re a Jew if you do Jewish things. That’s a little broad for me, but I like the idea. Tonight we are all Jews,” he said, looking at me directly. “We are all Jews because we are gathered together on Shabbat for a meal and a blessing and the good company.

“Being Jewish means being part of a family argument that’s been going on for 3,000 years. We talk, we argue, we keep each other warm.

“And how do I justify myself, you asked. I wish I could justify myself. But why should I spoil the evening by telling you how worthless I feel and making a false show of humility. Your question is too hard.

“I will just say what’s on my mind. Don’t laugh….okay laugh, I can’t help it. This is it, No matter how much I study and how much I pray I still think that Moses looks like Charlton Heston. I can’t shake the image.”

No one laughed. This was very embarrassing, because everybody at the table knew that Moses looked like Charlton Heston.

“He’s such a goy!” No one said that, but Charlton Heston was such a goy. And as Moses! Such a mental pollution.

“It is awful to contemplate,” Marty said. “God punished the Jews by making them wander forty years in the wilderness. He allowed the Temple to be destroyed twice and his chosen people were put into exile for centuries, subject to persecution and humiliation. He allowed many terrible things to happen to them. But when God made Moses, he made him look Jewish, or maybe like Al Pacino or Robert DeNiro.

“Still the image of Charlton Heston as Moses cannot be erased for people of our generation. Such is the power of Hollywood -- founded and led by Jews -- in creating false images that defy the First Commandment. Sin and sin,” Marty said and he took a sip of water, he was finished.

A stirring at the table, passing the broccoli and the rice, the quiet sound of salad and dinner rolls, a stretching, a clearing of the throat, a sip of wine. I looked up from the chicken on my plate and noticed Diana Lobel, my Hebrew teacher, wreathed in an unworldly halo -- there was nothing on her plate. Even her glass of water was untouched. This disturbed me. We’re humans, we’re supposed to eat.

But the conversation continued.

Daniel Gewertz, film critic by occupation, was the next to speak. He was younger than the rest of us, closer to thirty. His build was athletic and tall. I picture him wearing a Hawaiian shirt in the summer time, although I don’t know why I say that. He was a handsome fellow, but he seemed so unsure of himself.

“Who is a Jew, you ask. I wonder about myself at this time of year with Hanukah and Christmas coming up,” Daniel said. “I get anxiety. I don’t know what to think. People wish me Merry Christmas. And the music, Silent Night and All Ye Faithful, it’s everywhere, Season Greetings…The whole experience makes me cringe.

“It’s the way I was brought up. My parents were secular, never at temple, no menorah, nothing in our house that said Jewish. I think they would have skipped the whole thing.

“At Christmas we had a tree and decorations and a plastic lighted Santa Claus doll and I got presents. It was crazy. I knew we were Jewish. I was seven-years-old playing on the living room rug with a Lionel train, but I didn’t enjoy it that much.

“My parents laughed and shared drinks with friends and neighbors during the holidays -- just like everybody else. I mean, why not? We didn’t look different or act different. My Dad had a white-collar job, we lived in a suburban neighborhood. We had BBQs in the summer. We went trick or treating on Halloween, so why not have a Christmas tree too?

“I cannot disrespect my parents, they did so many wonderful things for me, they were such good people. But you just know, even when you’re only seven, when something isn’t right, and for me the memory never goes away -- every year in December it’s the same.”

That was Daniel telling his life. I heard this with wonder. For me, growing up a Catholic, Christmas was the most uncomplicated joy and pleasure. I knew that Christmas could be hard for people with bad families—being stuck at home with awful relatives and such. Or a lonely time for lonely people. But I never thought of it as being difficult for Jews. Hearing Daniel say it directly was quite a different experience. Obviously it was difficult for some Jews. They cringed.

“But I’ll go out for Chinese like I always do,” he said.

Harvey Blume nodded. He was the most talented conversationalist in our group, but he had been quiet the whole evening. It was November and he was still tan, he had a burnished skin tone -- he hadn’t been to Florida, he didn’t work outdoors, but then I remembered – Harvey was on the street. His tan was not a matter of exposure, but an act of will. Harvey lived for the street and the drums.

So he and I did this rap thing, which makes it kind of fun.

“The Street?” I asked.

“Yes, the Street,” he said.

“And Kafka?”

“At times -- if it rhymes”

“On the Street?”

“With a Beat”

“On a Drum?”

“Some …”

“With a Bat?”

“Nah, I don’t want none of that.”

“Is it like the Grateful Dead?”

“You must be out of your head.”

“So it was jazz and Bebop?”

“Yeah, now you got it. Bebop. On the street, with a drum, with the people, of the people and by the people -- we’re all on the street.”

“So that’s how you get your burnished skin tone.”

“Yeah, you could say that -- it comes from the experience, from the street, from the sound and the smell and the talk and the traffic. It’s a rhythm of completion and fulfillment not deletion.”

“You’re from Brooklyn?”

“Yeah, but I’m not braggin’ “

“Are you Jewish?”

“I thought you’d never ask,” Harvey said and that was the end.

Harvey lived in East Cambridge. He had written a book about a pygmy who was captured in Africa and taken to be an exhibit at the St. Louis World’s Fair in 1904. Ota Benga was the name of the pygmy and the title of Harvey’s book.

Now the room was going quiet, like we were coming to the end.

Then Diana began to speak about Rashi, the great Talmudic scholar from the Middle Ages. She was working for a Ph.D. in Jewish Studies at Harvard and the Middle Ages was her area of research. And she was my teacher.

So people relaxed because Diana had sat in the center of the table, as a guiding spirit, and now she would hold forth in a good way.

“Let us go back a thousand years, thirty generations of our people, to the Champagne region of northern France, in a time when life was good for the Jews, before the Crusades and Christian orthodoxy marked us as separate people to be confined in ghettoes.

“No, it was a good time, even though we were still in exile from Israel, a thousand years of exile, and every year a prayer to return to Jerusalem and no one knew it would take another thousand years, but that’s why Rashi was born to us, to help us endure our exile with an understanding, and even a lightness of being. That was Rashi’s nature. His deep scholarship led to an understanding and that understanding led to a quiet joy.

“Rashi could explain things so clearly, every verse in the Bible. He would state the peshat which is the plain meaning. So simple that a young child could understand, but never over-simplified, if you know the difference.

“We connect to Rashi, and from him we can go back to Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca, and Jacob and Rachel and Leah, when they lived in tents.

“Here in Genesis it says there was a famine in Palestine and Jacob said to his sons, ‘I have heard that there is grain in Egypt. Go down there and buy some for us, so that we may live and not die.’

“It was a fateful choice. The whole history of the Jews hinges on this one verse. You want to yell from the audience, a hundred generations later – Don’t go – don’t go to Egypt. There’s nothing but trouble down there – slavery, corruption, idolatry, people worshipping monkeys. Don’t go. Stick it out in Palestine. The rain will come back and there will be more crops.

“But Jacob said it is better to live and not die. You can spin that, explain that, write a book on that, or a poem or a song. Fine. Interpret it as you will, and yet the meaning is plain – it is better to live and not die.

Jacob said that…..And Rashi kept it true and simple, deftly separating genuine scholarship from …….”

“Stop,” I said. I interrupted her. “Your plate is empty, you haven’t eaten anything.”

Diana looked at me, surprised. The whole table was silent. I couldn’t stand it. I was angry at her and she was my teacher! How could I be angry at her?

It was the food. “You don’t eat,” I said. I couldn’t explain. Words failed me. I picked up a piece of broccoli, picked it off my plate, and threw it at her. Not at her, but I kind of tossed it or lobbed it over to her plate. Even so, such a physical act was deeply disturbing.

Food is food, you have to eat. Diana was not thin but she was becoming a little transparent. Some parental instinct in me wanted her to eat, for her own good and for my sake too. Eat, for God’s sake. I work in the fields where nature brings us food. My hands are callused. We don’t live by the spirit, but we need bread too.

Except I didn’t say anything. The dining room was tense. But Diana looked at me again, as if she understood. She smiled. She picked up the piece of broccoli and ate it, and she said “Thank you.”

Oh, I felt better. Like I had done something very wrong, but she said thank you, and that was that.

Diana didn’t finish the Rashi story. The verse was about food, and it’s better to live and not die, and here she was not eating and how can you live if you don’t eat?

And it was over. Table talk passed on to other things. Marty and Lois were huddling. Harvey got up to clear some plates. We might be moving back to the living room for dessert.

Then Gladys Damon spoke. “I have something to say.” Gladys was close to seventy or past it, from Manhattan’s West Side, but now retired in an apartment tower in Jamaica Plain. She was stylish, wore a tailored skirt, had good legs. She spoke in a honeyed tone with a good-natured irony.

For her, the plain meaning was only the beginning. It was better to live and not die and she would say sure, but she reminded me that refinement is what made life better.

“This happened to me during the war in 1944. My parents sent me to Smith College, one of the Seven Sisters. You know – Bryn Mawr, Barnard, Vassar, Radcliffe -- all those precious college girls from good families. I could pass, I don’t mean that how you think, but I had nice clothes, good sweaters and shoes.

“And to find a husband and get married, yes, but they hinted, the faculty suggested, and even said so, that we could be what we chose to be.

“I formed surprising friendships with girls who were very different than me.

“But it was war time, and we heard the news from Europe. In May of 1944, the Jews in Hungary – up to that time they had been safe – were being transported to Auschwitz to be murdered. More than 400,000 Jews were put on the trains.

"It was hard to find notice of this in the news. We heard news of stirring military action and home front preparedness -- that was the story -- marching to victory, rumors of the coming invasion of France, profiles of Eisenhower and Patton, the great leaders, but of the slaughter to come in Hungary, it was like a dark whisper. Letters came from Eastern Europe, reliable reports of the real story. We didn’t believe it. I didn’t believe it, and yet I knew it was true.

“I knew it was true because it was far, far worse than anything I could have imagined -- this death and horror.

“But what is so hard for me to describe is the silence. We read those letters, but we were silent, we did not ask questions. We just sat there. We did nothing.”

Gladys was speaking without irony.

“We did nothing to save the Jews in Hungary. Roosevelt did nothing, Eisenhower did nothing. My parents, my friends at school, we did nothing. The Hungarian Jews were loaded on the trains. We knew it was their death and we did nothing.

“It was the most important moment in my life, and I failed.”

. . . . . . . . . . .

Years later I still remember the silence that followed her remarks. It had been a good dinner and we enjoyed being together. In mid-November the night air was frosty and it began to snow as we said our goodbyes and walked outside to our cars. “Lois, thank you for such a lovely evening, you have such a nice home,” someone said.

I walked outside and noticed her privet hedge and how it badly needed a trimming. But that’s me, a landscaper and gardener, I can’t help noticing things like that.

But I thought about Gladys and how she said she did nothing. Not true. Her life was a triumph. It was better to live and not die.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Why I Threw a Piece of Cucumber at My Hebrew Teacher

2011-08-17T18:23:00.001-07:00

Why I Threw a Piece of Cucumber at My Hebrew Teacher

But first the Farm News. August is like you're just waiting. We're working everyday, but our attitude is more like we're waiting for fall to come. Something will happen in September, and we sure hope it's a good thing, but right now we're just waiting.

The dahlias are popping. Stand back! By Labor Day it might be incredible, which is a good thing because we're having an open house and many people are coming to view all 150 varieties.

Onions and Annuals. We picked all the onions -- many pounds -- and left them to dry in a shaded area on the cement patio. Then I made a schematic of the garden, so I can remember not to plant more onions in the same place -- I will plant turnips instead. And some broccoli and maybe a little lettuce. We're going to plant more zinnias and celosia too. We should have 60 more days of summer weather, so if we can squeeze a few more flowers in, then we can sell them -- and get rich!

Critters. It might be bad luck to brag here, but I have been having good luck keeping the gophers under control. I set traps and they get caught. I offer them little gopher treats (poison) and they go off to gopher heaven. I mean the gophers no harm, but it's the way of nature.

Tragedy. We lost a kitten. Tom, the litter mate to Jerry, was out and about around the motor home last Thursday, but by evening, when we scoot them back inside, we found Jerry, but no sign of Tom. Determined searching began with quiet listening for meowing, but no sign of Tom. Sad to say he is gone. It's hard to believe the coyotes came in broad daylight -- we really don't have another explantion for the loss. Tom was a soft-hearted kind of spaced-out kitten -- a dreamer and very affectionate. We miss him. Jerry and I hang together more now. We're all at risk, so let's cherish the moment.

Why I Threw a Piece of Cucumber at My Hebrew Teacher

& How I came to Study Torah in the First Place

They asked me why. Why are you learning Hebrew? Why are you going to the Torah class at a synagogue? You’re not even Jewish.

Buy why is a dumb question. There is only one important question – Is it a good thing?

If it’s a good thing, then why doesn’t matter. If it’s a bad thing, then stop doing it.

It was the summer of 1992, I was living on Blakeslee Street in West Cambridge and working as a landscaper. And I was totally miserable.

I had just broken up with Helen. Her last words were, “Never call me again.” I was heartbroken, tormented, losing sleep, drinking too much, phoning friends late at night -- I didn’t know what to do.

But I had recently joined the Tikkun group, and we met on Sunday mornings for discussion. I had new Jewish friends -- Daniel Gewertz, a film critic, Harvey Blume, a writer, Lois Isenman, a biologist, Diana Lobel, a PhD student in Jewish Studies, Debbie Osnowitz, with porcelain skin and a brilliant mind, Helen Benjamin, who had an impressive collection of Teddy Bears in her Brookline apartment, Ted Pietras, in real estate in Boston’s South End, and Marty Federman, who was director of Hillel at Northeastern University.

It was an ethnic thing. Boston was full of ethnics – Irish gangs, Italian neighborhoods, Armenian restaurants. I should have gone Irish, but that would have been too easy. Instead I picked the hardest one – Jewish. I was going to learn it and figure it out.

So I went to the Tikkun meetings and listened. The talk was really cool. I liked the rhythm of it. I wore clean clothes, but my shirt was always wrinkled -- I didn’t have an iron. It’s not that people were dressed for the occasion, but I felt conspicuous with my wrinkled shirt.

The meetings kept me from suffering – remember, I was heartbroken, obsessively reviewing the very wrong things I said to Helen – and she wouldn’t talk to me, not now, not ever. So the Tikkun meeting kept me from suffering for three hours every other Sunday morning. That wasn’t enough, but it helped.

One day --I was not really looking for a solution, but more or less on a dare -- I found the Judaica section at the Cambridge Public Library. I picked out the books in Hebrew.

It was very bold of me to even look at these books. Loud booming voices were shouting from thunderous clouds, “Thou Shall Not” – you don’t look at these books, you shall not pass, it’s not for you – go back to being a landscaper, pick up your trowel, LEAVE THESE LETTERS ALONE.

I heard the voices, but I didn’t care. I was in too much pain. Kill me, so what!

I took the books home - a Hebrew grammar, a Hebrew-English dictionary and a text book – home to my furnished apartment on 42 Blakeslee Street in West Cambridge. I opened the books on the kitchen table and began to learn the letters – 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet.

In a way, it was easy, 22 letters in 22 shapes representing 22 sounds. How hard is that?

I learned the letters in a day. By late afternoon I was picking out words in the text. And I was drawing the letters on a big sheet of paper. I really liked their shape and the way they flowed.

It was love. It was infatuation. I was so absorbed. Hours passed in delightful study, and I never thought of Helen. I was almost happy. Relief! I could fill up my day.

Although it was a little weird because, like I said, I’m not Jewish, and what if the Jewish cops find out and come over to my apartment and pummel me with sticks.

Oh, the Jewish cops don’t do that. They don’t even care. Well, they do care. Of course, they want you to study the text in a respectful manner, but otherwise you’re welcome to it.

Except they don’t say that. They don’t say anything -- there are no Jewish cops.

But what about the booming voices from the thunderous clouds? Well, yes, those are completely real, the voices of divine spirits who can put you in a world of hurt or shower you with blessings and diamond lights.

The divine spirits are real. I found out that night, after the day when I learned the 22 letters. I had the most incredible dream. I dreamed of black letters in a sea of golden flames.

I never had such a dream in my life, but that night I saw the letters in my dream, living, breathing and on fire.

The letters are alive! Shining black in a sea of gold-red flames!

When I woke up the next morning, I was astonished and full of wonder. And there was no one to tell. I wasn’t going to waste this vision in casual talk. I wasn’t going to tell anyone. That dream was 19 years ago, and I kept it inside my all this time – black flaming letters burning inside me.

The letters kept me warm all this time. If some say it was nothing, fine. Or if they say it was a revelation, that doesn’t matter to me either. I just knew I had found something. I learned the letters and began to study the words. I developed a style of calligraphy and wrote the letters over and over again, like a prayer.

Now I will move ahead to the funny part of this story.

One Sunday at the Tikkun meeting, Diana Lobel was reading a Hebrew text, and I looked over her shoulder and began saying the words aloud. She said, “You know Hebrew?” I said, “I’ve been studying.” She asked “With who?” I said, “By myself.”

She said, “Come to my class. We meet on Sunday night at 7 pm at Beth Shalom.”

So I began learning with her group – not such a big group, three students, me, Bobby Vilinsky and a very strange, very thin young woman who seemed to have wandered in off the street.

I could write a book about Bobby Vilinsky. We became great friends, and we often discussed his disastrous experiences with women or his latest digestive issues. He was an artist of great intensity and poverty.

Diana Lobel was a PhD student in Jewish Studies at Harvard. She had the pale look of a scholar, but she had bright, black curly hair. Diana had a way of seeming so unworldly, as if she did nothing but study and pray -- but that was not true, she was very worldly at the same time -- if she was paying attention. She often surprised me in that way.

We spent several weeks on the first verse, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” She said the whole of the Torah was contained in the first verse – or she may have said that, I’m not sure. But it sounds like something a Jewish scholar would say – that the whole of the Torah, and all of the Law, and a vivid description of all time and all creation are contained in the first verse – so we studied it, from every angle, and believe me, there are many angles -- more than you can imagine. The depth was incredible.

But she was so spacey. Like the time we had a Sabbath dinner at Lois Isenman’s house. It was Friday night, when Jews eat chicken on their best table cloth. I don’t know if we had chicken that night, but Lois lived in a very nice red brick house in the suburbs.

I Have to Stop Now

I have to stop now, or this story will get too long for an Internet newsletter. But you must be excited by now. Did I really throw a piece of cucumber at my Hebrew teacher? Stay tuned for the next exciting segment – coming soon.

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D'Var Torah on Farming and Writing

2011-08-06T19:35:00.000-07:00

Fred's Farm News

By Fred Owens

I am bored with the farm. It's very slow around here these days -- it's the dog days of summer I guess. Low energy..... I feel like my bond-rating got downgraded. Well, collectively speaking, it just did.

"The political brinkmanship of recent months highlights what we see as America's governance and policymaking becoming less stable, less effective and less predictable than what we previously believed," said S&P, one of three leading credit rating agencies...... It's hard to argue with this statement -- it seems to accurately describe the recent madness in Washington.

Okay, aside from that down-graded feeling, the report from the West Coast is that it's been a cool summer and everything is late, tomatoes for instance. We have an abundance of bright green tomatoes on the vine, but they are taken the very longest time to ripen.....We're supposed to be patient in this line of work, but I am not very patient. I look at the tomatoes and think "hurry up, this is August, for Pete's sake."

I know -- they will ripen in nature's own good time, but I'm an instigator and not willing to just let things happen -- that's my human nature and I make no apology

I did learn about beets from Ann. She said the secret to growing beets is to ignore them. Apparently these dark-blooded creatures do not like being watched. So I forgot about them entirely until Michael, my co-worker from Scotland, discovered the beets were ripe and fulsome. Michael, being Scottish, calls them "beet roots." He picked a nice bunch of beets and made them peeled, shredded and cooked with a bit of sugar and vinegar -- incredibly tasty.

Then we ate some of Brian's leeks at the same meal. Brian, with far less total horticultural experience than I have, grew much better leeks. I can't understand this. I planted three five-foot rows of leeks and they all grew with hard, woody stems, and not a single one of them was edible.

Then Brian, Mr. Moonface, who works so slowly that he hardly even moves -- casually dropped in a few seeds -- his leeks were fat and tender and pale green. I don't get it. I was gardening before he was born..........But maybe I'm impatient and I try too hard.

The real truth is that Brian is a fully-dedicated gardener and I am not. It's my day job, and that's all it ever has been or ever will be. Writing comes first, gardening and farming comes second.

I know the difference. Men and women who make horticulture their life's work often succeed -- they grow better leeks....... I salute them.

But writing matters. Here's what I wrote today, and if you think it has little to do with farming then you would be quite wrong.

D’Var Torah
What is the connection between writing and farming as occupations? This reminded me of a saying from Pirkei Avot, a Jewish book of wisdom.

This is the saying, "Im Ein Kemach Ein Torah, Im Ein Torah Ein Kemach." ---- which means, "Where there is no Bread, there is no Torah, and where there is no Torah, there is no Bread."

This saying answers the question, "What should I do with my life?" You don't choose between writing and farming because you need both. You need to farm because you need to eat. And you need to write because you need to seek and serve the truth.

You don't choose one over the other -- Bread and Torah, Livelihood and the Spiritual Path -- both are essential for a good and balanced life.

Now I will eat lunch.
Where there is no bread there is no Torah, where there is no Torah there is no bread.

This still makes sense today. We're working on the watering system -- there's a leak out there somewhere and the pump keeps running, so we just turn on the pump when we need water for something -- gotta find that leak.

We need water. Fortunately, the farm is right by the Ventura River and there is an abundance of water only thirty feet down. It's ours for the cost of the electricity to pump it -- Not free, but abundant.

Where there is no bread there is no Torah, where there is no Torah there is no bread....... Or, in the original language, "Im Ein Kemach Ein Torah, Im Ein Torah, Ein Kemach."

I used to belong to the Tikkun discussion group when I lived in Boston. Tikkun is a Jewish spiritual/political magazine founded by Michael Lerner who coined the phrase "politics of meaning." Hillary Clinton invited Lerner to the White House shortly after Bill Clinton became President. Lerner seemed likely to become a spiritual adviser for the Clintons -- possibly like Bill Graham had been for previous Presidents. But Lerner's presence at the White House caused a storm of controversy, and I still don't know why. He was a little hippy-dippy and lefty-lefty, but not very extreme. His views were not that unusual.

Anyway, in 1991, living in Cambridge, and wandering around town looking for something to do, I happened to notice that Michael Lerner was giving a talk at Temple Beth Shalom -- the famed "Tremont Street shul" near Central Square...... Never having entered a synagogue in my life, I dropped in that evening, and I liked what I heard, and I liked the people I met, so I joined the group. They never said you had to be Jewish and I wasn't.

We met on Sunday mornings at people's houses and apartments, maybe 12-15 people each week, and we discussed topics based on an article in Tikkun magazine. It was very interesting. The people in the Tikkun group were impressively articulate -- I mean, this was Boston. Myself, I never said much, but listened in wide-eyed wonder and they called me, behind my back but kindly, "the space-case from Seattle."

I'm not from Seattle, but I often said so when I was in Boston, just to make it easy for them -- saying "I'm from LaConner, a small town in the Skagit Valley about 60 miles north of Seattle" takes too long.

Also "space case" seemed apt. I was relatively in-articulate compared to my intellectual companions. I truly felt just as smart and just as well-read as these new companions, but I have never had the ability to "hold forth" at meetings like this..... You might recall how I organized the Winter Writers Group in LaConner, but I never talked very much...... Just can't say much in a group.
D'Var Torah means "a few words, a little lesson." D'Var means "word" and Torah is that long hand-written scroll you see in the photo.

The Torah is the first five books of the Bible -- Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Deuteronomy and Numbers -- did I get that in the right order?

When they read and chant out loud from the Torah at a service, they have one person doing the chanting, and one or two others following closely to watch for mistakes. If the chanter mispronounces a word or something like that, then they back up a little to get it right.

So, did I get it right? I'm not Jewish, but I studied at the temple and I learned a lot of things. It's very complicated. It seems to be the delight of Jewish tradition to make things complicated rather than simple.....That makes for good mental exercise as well as spiritual development.

Ted Kaptchuck is on the faculty at Harvard Medical School. He wrote a book called "The Web That Has No Weaver" -- it's about Chinese medicine and it's a very good book.

Ted was a member at Temple Beth Shalom when I went there in the early 1990s. As you recall, I wrote that I first attended this temple to hear Michael Lerner give a talk. Basically, I liked the vibrations in this place, so I stayed for the next three years..... and why? Because of people like Ted Kaptchuck. Sure, he is a most distinguished author and a learned fellow, but also he was just kind of a cool guy......Ted used to pray up front in the sanctuary, up near the altar, but over to the side, even against the wall, always on the right side .... so he was sort of in front of us, but not in front ....

Hey, that was a teaching. Ted standing in front of us, but not in front of us. It's right from the book of Chinese Medicine -- the resolution of contradictions -- the realization of the underlying harmony.

But mainly I learned from Ted about wearing a hat. At a temple a man is expected to cover his head. I don't know why. They keep a basket of yarmulkes by the entrance in case you need one. If you don't put one on, someone might kindly hand you one.....It is not strictly, absolutely necessary for a man to wear a hat at the temple, but it would make them happy, so I did......Except I didn't like it. You can call them a yarmulke or a keppah, but if you ask me they're a beanie and they look stupid......I'm quite vain, and I did not like the looks of it.

But I wasn't about to SAY anything, I just took it as humbling experience, until I noticed Ted up front (but not up front) swaying and praying, and he was NOT wearing a yarmulke, he was wearing a black beret --- totally cool..... So that's it, I said to myself. You don't have to wear the beanie, you just have to cover your head..... So I bought a black beret like Ted's -- and it was cool.

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Barn Cats in Training

2011-07-17T10:21:00.000-07:00

Fred's Farm News

July 17, 2011

By Fred Owens

We got the old rats nest cleaned out of the barn, and we brought the new kittens over to the barn for the first time, just to give them a taste of their new life. One kitten promptly got up on the roof and couldn't figure out how to get down. This is the lively one.

There are two, Tom and Jerry. Tom is kind of dreamy, but Jerry is mad cap. Either way, they came from the same litter and they stick together. I took them to the clinic this morning at the Humane Society to get their first set of shots -- cost $25 each.

I taped a photo of a rat over their food bowl to get them the idea. I want them to go after the rats, but to leave the birds alone.

View Barn Cats in Training, here at YouTube

The common notion is that cats are difficult and complicated creatures. I quite disagree. Of course, you can train your cat to be a fussy eater with neurotic habits, and they will oblige you by acting so. But I discourage that kind of behavior in my cats. Dinner is dinner and you eat it. Rats are rats and you chase them. Otherwise you can sleep all day. I can't stop you from killing birds, but I will give you a very grim look if you do.

And we will be great friends.....Also I object to the term Mom or Dad used in relation to pets. I am not their Dad. I am their owner or master. You don't have to get your head in a knot over the notion of "owning" a cat. Of course, you don't "own" any animal. All that means is that the cat belongs to me and not to anyone else......It means I am the responsible agent.

Meanwhile, the weather has been cool this week and the dahlias are just poking along -- they look quite healthy, but they are not growing by leaps and bounds. I predict a good crop, but late -- "It could be worse," like they say in Minnesota

Dry and Dusty. I got the job of dust suppression around the property. That's how it works around here, after I complained more than once about the dust -- that means I was appointed to head the committee.

It's not hard work, You take the hose and sprinkle the main paths every few days. Then you hose down the ground in the horses' corral -- that's where most of the dust originates -- the horses kick up some dust and the wind wafts it over to where the dahlias are blooming -- but you can't sell a dusty flower, so I'm out there on hose patrol for the rest of the summer.

People take flowers and don't pay. You know people steal flowers. This is awful. We set out bouquets by the road on an honor system, and some people take the flowers and don't pay. How could that be right?

Sweet Pea Seeds. I'm harvesting sweet pea seeds now - we should have several pounds of dried sweet pea seeds by the time I finish cleaning them -- this is far more than we need for planting next spring, so we will have enough left over to sell them in small packets at the farmers market.

Saving your own seeds is a true source of independent wealth.

I am also going to plant a batch of sweet peas in late August, just to see if we can get a fall crop.

You Could Do Worse, again. Up in Whatcom County in the northwestern corner of Washington state, hard by the Canadian border, and a just a hop from Vancouver, lies the little town of Blaine, where Tara Nelson labored as a journalist at a weekly newspaper, until she was let go this week in a "cost-cutting" measure.

She was the last working reporter in the Puget Sound region. She actually got paid every two weeks.

But we knew it couldn't last. Nobody gets paid anymore in that business.

Gosh, Tara, now you have the freedom to self publish.

What does this have to do with the Fred's Farm News? Everything. I used to be a journalist. There is no work in that field anymore. So now I work on a farm, where there is PLENTY of work. I will never run out of work on a farm -- it can't happen as long as people need to eat.

I invited Tara to come down to Ventura and work with us -- I could ask my boss to give her some kind of room and board arrangement...... This is a pretty good place where I live and work. They treat me nice and the pay isn't bad.

"You could do worse," I say again.

Jewish Life. This has very little to do with the Farm News, but I was immersed in Jewish liturgy last weekend, having attended a Bat Mitzvah at a Conservative Temple in Pasadena. It was the full deal -- a three hour service, all in Hebrew. You need to wear a hat, or yarmulke. Everybody was kind to me. I stood up when they stood up. I sat down when they sat down. And if I got really bored, I could wander out to the lobby for a few minutes while the service continued.

Afterward they served kiddush -- a light buffet lunch -- and we enjoyed ourselves. The rabbi came over and said hello. The parents were very proud. The bat mitzvah girl was my niece, the daughter of my brother Tom. The mother is Jewish so Jordana, their daughter, was raised to be Jewish.

It was a good ceremony, and my brother wrote large checks to cover expenses. Good for you, Tom.

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Leaving Oklahoma

2011-07-14T07:23:00.000-07:00

Too Many Mornings

By Fred Owens

Too many mornings I woke up in different places, because we kept moving.

We lived in Kansas, Chicago, Mississippi, Texas, Los Angeles, the Skagit Valley in Washington state, Boston, back to Chicago, then to Africa and back to the Skagit Valley one more time

It doesn’t make much sense to move around like that. It was poor thinking on my part, but at least we got out of Oklahoma.

That’s why this story starts in Kansas in July of 1976, the day we crossed the state line and got out of Oklahoma.

But I have to back track a bit.

We had done a lot of traveling before that – hitchhiking around the country and riding freight trains, but in February of 1976, Susan Simple and I got married. We decided to settle down and live like normal people in a house and have children and get jobs. We decided to do all that stuff.

That was our plan. This memoir is the story of how that didn’t happen. We tried to stay in one place, but we kept moving anyway.

City Hall in Chicago

We didn’t spend much time in the big cities, but we liked them. We got married on February 14, 1976 at City Hall downtown in Chicago. Two or three hundred couples got married that day – they bring in extra judges for the occasion. Reporters with TV cameras came to cover this annual wedding extravaganza.

We didn’t know that, but everybody wants to get married on Valentine’s Day. Susan said it would be easy to remember our anniversary. My sister and her beatnik husband had come in from Venice Beach in California and they served as witnesses. My mom was there too.

Susan wore a black embroidered Choctaw wedding dress – her Oklahoma heritage. I wore a brown corduroy jacket and tie.

After the wedding, after waiting in line for two hours as the couples got married one after the other, we drove back to the suburbs and had a fancy lunch at the Tower Restaurant in Skokie.

A day or two later, we got on the train for Durant, Susan’s hometown in Oklahoma.

Durant was a town of 10,000 people. They grow peanuts in the red-dirt countryside. They had a large granite peanut as a statue on the courthouse lawn.

We stayed at her parents’ ranch. Bill Simple was a vet and they own
ed a hundred acres or so and some Hereford cattle. Her folks put us up in the guest bedroom in a separate wing of the house and they loaned us an old black pickup truck.
Her Dad put me work, but I didn’t take to it. We mainly slept late and smoked pot. I should have worked harder. I don’t know what was wrong with me. We didn’t want to deal with her folks on a long-term basis, but we were there, and since we weren’t planning on staying forever, there’s no reason we couldn’t dance to their music.

So I should have gotten up early every time and gone out to the field – that would have made the old man happy. He could have said good things about me in town, without lying too much. And poured me a drink after work, and we could sit in the easy chairs in front of the TV and talk.

I could have put up with that for a month or two.

But Susan had issues with her parents and it was troublesome and complicated.

Barn cats explained, Plus a Jobs Creation Program

2011-07-10T21:11:00.000-07:00

Farm News

July 10, 2011

By Fred Owens

A Plan to Create Jobs Across the Nation. But first the farm news. I have two kittens, male, about ten weeks old, grey with stripes, litter mates. These are found kittens. Found in a cardboard box by the side of the road, brought to a home that takes in cats, and then brought to the farm.

I had been looking for a barn cat, to take care of the rodents. But I didn't get a barn cat, I got two kittens who, with a little guidance on my part, will transform into barn cats.

We've had little talks. "Hey, little buddies, this is your home now, and you have a role to play in this great agricultural enterprise, you have a destiny and a purpose in life." Then I carry them out to the barn and let them sniff around a bit. Already the rats know there's a new sheriff in town.

Too many rats. They're everywhere. Not just on our farm, of course. An exterminator once told me that you are within 100 feet of a rat no matter where you are on Planet Earth. You just might not see them or notice their signs.

Rats have been around since people moved into caves. But that doesn't mean you accept the situation. No, No, and No. I pledge eternal resistance. They can be kept at bay. They can be minimalized.

Traps work. Except it gets icky. Poison works, but then you're handling poison, which is not good for children and other little critters, such as dogs and hawks and owls.

Then I remembered that every barn I've ever seen had a cat or two. Barn cats. And the only cat on this farm is close to 19-years-old, which is an incredible age for a cat, and a lovely animal too, but way past the rat-catching days of its youth.

That's why we got the kittens. Only we didn't get the kittens, I did -- get the kittens. My life has gotten more complicated.

Like I need to go to the store this evening because we're almost out of kitten chow.

Anyway, not just on our farm, but in many places, the feral cat population has been greatly reduced because the coyotes are eating them. Coyotes, in the past ten years or so, have learned that hunting is forbidden in the suburbs and they have lost their fear of man and his habitations. They come into town now, and closer to rural homes -- and they kill the cats. Then you get too many rats.

Serious Point. It's all part of the balance of nature. And our job is to keep fiddling with the controls. We are stewards of the earth. Some people might feel alienated from nature, and they might project that feeling onto human society in general, and then believe or create a theory that human beings are a disruption and a curse on the planet. Such people believe that "we" are the problem.

But I do not feel that way, or believe that way, or think that way. I am not alienated from nature. I am in nature, of nature, and over nature. And now I have those barn cats and the rats better watch out.

Jobs Creation Program.

By Act of Congress, in a change of regulation that could be typed double-spaced on one side of a piece of paper -- an act that would create thousands of jobs almost overnight and would require very little government oversight or expense.

Prohibit self-service gas across the nation.

Self-service gas is currently banned in Oregon and New Jersey. I do not know if gas prices are higher in those states because of the added expense for labor -- but if it were higher, the expense would be spread across the gas-buying public which is everybody.

Banning self-service gas would not give any retail outlet a competitive advantage -- I don't think so.

And maybe the pump jockey could check your oil...... That seems a like a small thing, but there's a lot of people who don't know how to do that......There are a large numbers of very competent drivers, perfectly decent people, but they don't know how to check the air in their tires.

Anyway, this plan, to ban self-service gas across the nation is much too simple to be credible.

But it makes more sense than Boehner's slash and burn deficit reduction plan, and it seems more practical than Obama's shovel-ready high-speed rail construction dreams.

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Home, Home, Where is Home?

2011-07-08T16:56:00.000-07:00

Washington Park in Anacortes

We came back to LaConner – or, rather, I came back. Precious arrived in her American debut. She spoke Ndebele as a first language, plus a bit of Shona, Tonga, Tswana, and Chewa from neighboring tribes, plus the English which she learned in government school. She arrived with packets of herbs and secret things which I still won’t talk about.

I never could understand her – we managed to get by with a very limited vocabulary. Her English never improved and she had no patience to teach me the African tongue.

We bought a house at 410 Caledonia Street, on the South side of LaConner. It’s such a tiny village, but there is still a wrong side of town, and that’s where we lived.

I didn’t love that house. If I did love it, I would probably still have it. But it was too low, a ranch house, built on a cement slab, and lower than all the surrounding houses – too low.

The one thing I did right was paint it yellow. Yellow is a wonderful color for a house.

Otherwise, nothing went right. She was beautiful and graceful, but we made no sense as a couple -- not to ourselves or to other people.

We lived in that house for six years. Then she left. I was glad she left because she drank too much beer and I was tired of it. But it was lonely in the house after she was gone.

And I wanted to get shut of her business, so we sold the house and divied up the money and got a divorce. I was no longer obligated to her in any way.

Afterward, many times, I wish I had kept that house --- fought for it. Never sell. Never sell. Never sell…… That’s a wise strategy. Then you have something. Most people who own property mange to hold on to it somehow. Not me.

I let it go. Nice furniture too -- gone. Everything was gone except for the content of 12 storage bins – about one pick-up load of worldly goods – mostly memorabilia like my Boy Scout merit badges and a crystal bowl from my mother’s house – stuff like that. I stored these bins in a friend’s garage and I went camping.

It was June, 2004. I went to Washington Park in Anacortes to camp, and it was blissful. The air was kind, blowing through the fir trees, coming cool off of Rosario Strait. I could see the ferry boats going and coming to the San Juan Islands. I took walks and made quick dips in the frigid salt water. I cooked supper and made a fire in the evening – enjoyed a glass or two of wine.

I could hear the fog horn in the distance. I guess I stayed there a couple of weeks.

I really felt all right – sleeping on the ground again. I was planning another trip, but it doesn’t matter where. This memoir ends with me in the campground.

Going to America

2011-07-07T14:33:00.000-07:00

Getting married in Zimbabwe, then moving back to America.

We were married September 1, 1997, the day after Princess Diana was killed in an accident. Her family, some fifty members, came to our wedding. But me, I stood alone, except Mr. Jones, the Coloured Man who lived next door, agreed to be Best Man.

In October we took the long journey to Malawi to visit Precious’s ancestral village -- a place called Chembe, high in the mountains, way off the road, where the Yao and Chewa people lived.

Mr. Mataka, her grandfather, and two of her Aunties came with us – a thousand miles by train and bus, and then ten miles by dirt track to the village. The village people, all relatives to Precious, did not know we were coming, but they were very glad to see us. We brought boxes of town food – flour and cooking oil and Coca-Cola – but no beer, because this was a Muslim village of some 600 souls with a mud-brick mosque in the center, and an ancient imam with a white beard who called the prayers, morning and evening – a haunting sound, not by loudspeaker, but just his voice in the still mountain air.

We stayed there a week – “lived there” – I should have put this on the listing of places I have lived – because we were not visitors, we were family. The chief of Chembe was my host, and now my relative by marriage. He invited us to choose a place to build a home – we could stay if we wanted.

No, we were going back to the world -- back to Zimbabwe, and then, four months later, back to America.

Getting Precious her visa was an interesting story. She needed a police record to qualify. It was then I discovered that my lovely bride had been convicted of assault some years previously. She could pack a punch!

It was things like that – her determination and courage – that led me to believe she could handle a life-changing transition to American ways.

We got on the South African jet – her first plane ride and she was completely relaxed – flew to Johannesburg, but changing planes required going up an escalator – this terrified her – so we took the stairs instead.

We landed in New York City in February, 1998 – it was so cold. We took a small plane to Boston and rented a room at a B & B in Brookline. Precious seemed okay, except she broke out in a rash of pimples -- being terrified. “Everyone here is white!” she said.
“Yes, dear, I told you a hundred times, they are all white here in America,” I said. It was tough for her -- yet I had survived a year in her country, now she would see mine.

We visited friends in Boston and then flew to LaConner -- that little town in the tulip fields, in the Skagit Valley, where we decided to make our home. I determined that I would choose the town – how could she choose a town? – and then I agreed that she would choose a house for us to live in – having more domestic sensibility than I had.

But why the hell did I decide to go to back to LaConner? It was a far from inspired choice. I have to say I chose it be default, by lack of inspiration…… I had already lived there and owned a home there with my first wife, and my children had been small there, and I had started two business there which both failed, and my first marriage failed --- it was a pretty town, to be sure -- and other people had been happy there and well settled – but why did I go back?

That’s the theme of this memoir – Too Many Mornings – too many bad choices. I don’t know – people who find lasting homes might just be lucky - they might, by sheer chance, pick a spot, on a whim, and yet that very spot will nurture them for decades, and they will build a most happy home.

I never had a home. But here it was February, 1998, going back to LaConner, with an African bride, and enough money, based on the sale of my deceased mother’s property, to buy our own place in

God, we tried to make it a home, to finally have something for keeps. But it never worked.

Sweet Peas and Dahlias

2011-07-04T14:19:00.000-07:00

Farm News
July 4, 2011

By Fred Owens

We spent all weekend tearing down thousands of sweet pea vines. We had a bumper crop and sold bouquets by the boat load at the farmers market -- but spring flowers have only their short season for shining. Here it is early July, and the old sweet peas were getting mildewed and haggard and gone to seed.

Farming is so rich with cliches -- "gone to seed" being one of them --

And here at Love House Dahlias, the sweet peas are gone to seed literally. We chose the very best, tallest, most abundant, and most beautiful stand of sweet peas to save for seed. We will let them dry out and die -- they will die because they are annuals -- and then pick the peas -- more cliches -- pea-pickin' -- we will pick the dried peas and save them to plant next year.

Meanwhile the dahlias are set for take off -- 150 varieties, planted in some 70 raised beds, the raised beds being 25 to 35 feet long -- and the dahlias spaced every 18 inches or so......Okay, I admit that we are late with the dahlias -- we got a bit over-excited with the sweet peas and spaced out the dahlias a little bit -- should have got them in the ground a few weeks earlier than they did -- but dahlias are good at playing catch up - all they need is plenty of sunshine and water -- and some fertile ground, and a good defense against gophers.

So that's the dahlia news.

Otherwise we have vegetables -- more than we can eat and not enough to sell -- chard, onions, carrots, turnips, lettuce and so on.

We're adding a greater variety of herbs this year -- like Rue. Isn't it wonderful to have an herb named Rue? It's so Shakespearean -- so old-fashioned -- so politically incorrect. "I rue the day....." Let us celebrate all that we have rued and regretted.

I will sit by the Rue,
Pass my life in review,
And you might too.

So much for the herbs of regret, let us pass on to the Rants of the Moment as the Farm News ends and Frog Hospital begins.

My two Least Favorite Political Women. Continuing the Frog Hospital tradition of heaping abuse all around, we begin with Michele Bachmann from Minnesota.

What ever happened to Minnesota? That used to be Hubert Humphrey country -- lots of Scandinavian socialists, tidy farms and good wall-eye fishing. We rode into Minneapolis on a freight train in 1974 -- they not only put us up at the shelter, but they gave Bartholomew some free dental care -- and he really needed it.

But no more free dental care for wandering bums with Ms. Bachmann in charge of things. We are cursed of Adam's sin and we shall labor by the sweat of our brows and women will give birth in pain if she has her way.

You see, I'm not a conservative. I'm what you call a social liberal, in that all my friends and relatives are liberals -- they have no particular merit or distinction, but they're my people and I am one loyal dude.

Except can't we get rid of Ariana Huffington? I despise her. I refuse to read her web-page. She's rich enough to be a Republican, so why does she hang out with us? I am tempted to use strong language, but I won't. She hoodwinked hundreds of earnest young writers to become "citizen journalists" and write the news for free. Then she sold her web portal to Yahoo for some hundreds of millions of dollars.

In the old days the publisher got most of the money and the reporters only a little -- fair enough, because reporting the news is too much fun and restricting access to the profession is not possible on account of the First Amendment (meaning you don't need a license or the approval of your peers to be a journalist)

But that was the old days. Ms. Huffington has the new model, where she keeps ALL the money, and the citizen journalist, tirelessly blogging, paying for their own lattes -- and they get NOTHING.

Let's Find Two Awful Men. To balance criticism of Huffington and Bachmann, I need to find two awful men, but that's too easy.

Cultural Relativism. This next piece requires thinking. Frog Hospital readers tend to be highly intelligent people, so I'm sure you can handle it.

The powerful and wealthy French minister was arrested for the rape of a hotel maid -- an African woman newly immigrated from Guinea. Her story was convincing enough to bring the minister's immediate arrest and he was held at a very high bail, lest he flee the country.

But she told too many stories, too many conflicting details, and the prosecutors knew they had no chance of a conviction, so the French minister has been let go -- still to face charges, but that seems more like a formality.

This is the sentence that caught my eye and inspired the following remarks:

"Over time, the well-placed official said, they discovered that she was capable of telling multiple, inconsistent versions of what appeared to be important episodes in her life." -- quote from the NY Times, said of the alleged rape victim, an African woman.

I understand this far too well -- having lived in Africa, having lived with African immigrants in the United States -- I very often heard stories, told over and over again, and never the same way. I met people with multiple identities. I knew a woman with two passports, from two countries, with two different names and two different birthdays -- she showed them to me -- this is not remarkable in Africa.

But in America we have facts, and objective evidence, and we struggle through argument and research to come up with something we humbly call "the truth." And we swear to tell that truth in the court of law. And also, but not sworn, in our daily lives. Ours is a literate culture and our law is the English common law. "Facts are facts, Mister Dumbarton." Charles Dickens might have written something like that.

"The Law is a ass." Dickens did write that. But the law is the law, and we cannot support the testimony of a crime victim who presents multiple, inconsistent versions of important events.

I'm telling you this because I argue against any appreciation of cultural relativism. I am a strong opponent of "diversity" and multi-culturalism. Let Africa be Africa, I say. It is a most wonderful people who live there, and they can tell their stories anyway they like to. One name, two names, three religions, four languages, you can be who you want to be today, and be something else tomorrow -- Africa is a rich and varied land.

But not here. Our crime victim -- and I suspect something bad happened to her in that hotel room, and not of her choosing -- will become an American if she stays here long enough. I would welcome her, but she will learn we only tell it one way on this our Independence Day. We are founded on facts and principles. We serve these ideals poorly, but it is our path.

We ought not to become like other people, but to become ourselves better.

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--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

The Aunties

2011-07-02T14:45:00.001-07:00

The Aunties

I left Nyanga, walking alone, and traveled to Matopos, where the most ancient granite stones form fantastic shapes. The African woman emerged from the very earth -- or maybe it was that I met her at the Palace Hotel in nearby Bulawayo over a beer -- but I like the version where she emerges from the earth better.

We talked about her life and her family. I told her I was single -- divorced. She asked, not innocently, "Who cooks for you?" What little resistance I had disappeared.............I began courting her. I rented a car to take her to fountains and night clubs. She brought Her Aunt Janet and her Aunt Winnie on these dates. The aunties rode in the back seat.... I bought them plenty of beer and chicken and won their approval ....... We were properly and legally married some months later -- renting a house in suburban Bulawayo.

It was a good home, very strong and solid. The cement walls and tile roof kept us cool even on the hottest days. The front yard had an enormous pepper tree blessing us with shade. I built an herb garden in the back yard. I worked as a volunteer at a nearby nature preserve..

My wife's relatives constantly besieged us. They would sit for hours in our living room, waiting for food, leaving when they were fed and given bus fare home .... I learned the African word for "son-in-law" is Umkunyani, meaning "he who pays for everything.”

Mr. and Mr. Jones were coloured people who lived next door and fairly prosperous. They said we must move away or the relatives would consume everything..... And I was getting too homesick, so I asked Zodwa, my wife, "Do you want to go to America?" -- I had never mentioned this possibility before, but I think all the time her answer would have been yes.

Why are you Walking Alone?

2011-07-01T14:48:00.000-07:00

Nyanga -- the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe

I should have stayed in Kalk Bay. I could have written a book of poetry and romanced the waitress at the Cafe Matisse -- gone swimming in the warm salt water, but no ......
Fatima Laher was my hostess at Chartfield House. I mentioned an interest in seeing Africa. "Then you must go to Nyanga," she said.
But why? What is so special about Nyanga? "You must go there," she said. I guess she was trying to tell me something. So, a thousand miles and two weeks later, with an interesting diversion to the Karoo, where the Bushmen dwell, I arrived in Nyanga......Nyanga is in the eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe. The name means "moon" or "witch doctor" in the Shona language. Being at high elevation, Nyanga has pine forests, apple orchards, and rushing mountain streams. Small farm plots yield abundantly because there is ample rain....... I took many solitary walks around the countryside. I visited homes..... One day a young woman, really a girl, about 12, said, "Why are you walking alone?" ...... Such a good question, and I had no answer.

Writing Stories for jesus

2011-06-26T09:46:00.000-07:00

I heard the voice of Jesus last night, talking to me. He sounded a lot like Denzel Washington .....

But it was Jesus himself. You see what happened that day is I wrote a story on my laptop -- about growing strawberries and the farmworkers who pick berries in Ventura County. I worked with a single-minded focus for 2 hours and whipped up a really nice 750 word column for my Farm News newsletter -- Good work, Fred, I thought.

Then I reached for the Save button, but I hit the wrong key and erased the whole story -- gone, vanished into cyberspace .... There was a stunning and very hurt silence. I took four or five deep breathes and slowly backed away from the laptop ..... I decided to take a drive -- went up to Ojai and past Ojai in to the Los Padres Forest, a way up high, by a waterfall.

I walked a little trail, I wasn't mad or anything -- but I wrote such a good story and nobody read it .... That's when I heard the voice.....
"I read it." What, who's there? "I read it. It was a good story."

It sounded like Denzel Washington, but it had to be Jesus. I just knew it. I poured out my heart to him. I said I hate it when I write a story and nobody wants to read it, it gets too frustrating. He said, "I read everything you write." You do? "Sure. Everything. It's pretty good too." That just blew me away. I was writing stories for Jesus all this time, but I didn't know it.

Kalk Bay, South Africa

2011-06-24T07:40:00.000-07:00

Cafe Matisse

I flew to Cape Town, South Africa in early February, 1997. It was a fateful year, Princess Diana died. She was beloved all over Africa. You see her photo on the wall in simple homes, next an image of Bob Marley.

This story is very condensed. The Facebook format forces this writer to get right to the point. Why did I go to Africa? So many have people have asked me that -- but no, upon reflection, I have to say that's kind of a dumb question. A lot of times you learn more just by listening -- so listen to my tale..........Going back to Africa wasn't the beginning of time, it was before that, when there was no time..... in the dream time .....

I flew from Chicago to Miami on Delta. Then got on the big 747 --South African Airways -- such a big plane and only a few passengers, we flew all night over the ocean, nothing but stars and glimmering water far below, going south, south, south across the water .... I had never been so far away in my life.

From the Cape Town airport to a B & B in Kalk Bay. I could see the ocean from my room. They were an Indian couple who ran it, Mia and Fatima Laher..... Michael Pam was the old poet of Kalk Bay --- we drank tea together at the Cafe Matisse. The Coloured woman who served us was beautiful, but Michael gave me a warning glance -- I wasn't aware of distinctions he had lived with all his life.

I swam in the surf. I walked the hills. I drank beer. I met members of Parliament at the State House. I saw Nelson Mandela in a parade....I called my daughter long distance. I told her of my reverie, she said, "Dad, when are you going into Africa? You can't just hang around like it was a resort." ...... I wish I had not acted on her advice, but I soon took off for the country.

But you would rather hear about the kittens. As you wish. It's 7:30 a.m. They have just gotten up, eyes wide open. The one who likes me came over and scratched my pant leg to say Good Morning.

2011-06-23T07:26:00.000-07:00

I have no business taking care of kittens. I just stare at them. They're sick. They're not moving. Let me think -- that's what I do when I'm sick. I just stop moving. I lay down until it gets better. Usually it does get better. So for now, I'm not going to do anything...... But resume telling this story, to wit: my mother died, we sold the house, and then I went to Africa.

We're in Chicago that December. Katy and I are living in the house. Mom still seems to be there in spirit. Everyone comes for a last Christmas at home, all the grandkids, and the house is full. It was wonderful.......But in January hard work began -- we were going to sell the house, all that stuff had to go, and it was a big house with a full attic, upstairs, downstairs, and a large basement... That was my job. I'm the guy who is good at getting rid of things and moving on. And the Owens family was moving on after 50 years --packing up was the hardest job I ever had, it seemed..... First thing were the clothes, going into Mom and Dad's bedroom, not thinking, not looking at stuff, not rushing, but not lingering, just carrying armload after armload out to the old Buick in the driveway until the car was full, then down to the Salvation Army, don't think, don't cry, just keep moving, give them all the clothes .... I came home and the house was empty now. She was gone.

I spent a few more weeks emptying the house of everything but some furniture and momentos, carefully marked and cherished, that we would be keeping. We made arrangements with the real estate lady. Then I left. I ordered a cab, and when it came I grabbed my bag and my pack and strode out the front door, and did not look back, could not look back..... That is in the Bible, you know what happened to Lot's wife when she looked back. She turned into a pillar of salt. And two-thirds of every song sung by Bob Dylan says the same thing -- Don't Look Back..... so I got in the cab and said, "Take me to O'Hare Airport." I was going to take the plane to Capetown in South Africa.

Yews

2011-06-22T16:47:00.000-07:00

I need to have patience. I wish to write freelance farming stories for the local newspaper, but I think they will not respond to my email. I have the urge to throw a rock through their window -- "What do you mean, you don't like my stuff?" .... Instead I will continue the story.

We laid mother to rest in a cemetery out by Des Plaines, a long drive from the house. My folks had a plot in the parish cemetery right down the street, but when my oldest sister died in an accident in 1974 that space was used, so mother was taken out to Des Plaines .... In our family we never cared about graves and tombstones very much -- not much for visiting the dear departed ones and the old bones. Our old folks did not teach us reverence for the past ... It was more about the future .... When they came to America they left their old lives behind and rarely looked back ...... My mother herself had no sense of nostalgia - she more enjoyed setting us up for the adventures of life.

And that newer life began after the funeral. I did feel a little scared and unprotected -- like being an orphan. It was mother and father who stood between me and death -- but now the cold breath was on my shoulder ..... Carolyn and Tom flew back to Los Angeles. Katy and I stayed in the house that autumn. I got a job as clerk at the Crate and Barrel. I took karate lessons and piano lessons..... It was very pleasant at our old home......In my mind, I could not separate mother from the home in which we were reared. And it was if she was still there.

But I made one significant change to the landscape. My folks bought the house on Forest Avenue in 1946, the year I was born. They planted a double row of yews -- the low spreading yews by the driveway, and the taller, arching yews next to the house ...... It was a wise decision to plant the yews, for they are the strongest protectors of a good house. A dark green in foliage and sometimes with little red berries, the yews were always there, my whole life. But they had gone decades without being trimmed and they were far over grown, starting to block the driveway and crowd the house. They looked very old. ---- a good pruning might have been in order, but this was too significant ..... We were going to sell the house and whatever family moved into deserved a fresh start ..... I used my chain saw and cut all the yews flush to the ground -- I planted a new double of yews, young and vital, for the future, for the new people who are to come....Mom would have liked that.
Yews

Taking the Bus from Boston to Seattle and Back

2011-06-22T07:36:00.000-07:00

Now, to catch up with the story. It was the autumn of 1996, the year my mother passed away back in Chicago -- but this is the short version of the story and I am leaving a lot of stuff out.

I have been leaving stuff out -- like the bus trip I took that summer. I took the Greyhound Bus from Boston to Seattle and back -- three days and three nights each way. I brought a paperback edition of the Brothers Karamazov, which was the perfect novel to bring on such a grinding journey --- some 800 pages of incredible psychological depth and unrelenting intensity .... If I had not taken the cross country bus ride, I would never have read the book......Otherwise the Greyhound is a depressing accumulation of desperate people -- a homeless shelter on wheels -- it's probably gotten worse in recent years.

Nevertheless --- I have written 7,000 words into this story without using such a fancy word as "nevertheless" -- but nevertheless, I needed to take that bus ride in order to see the land. If you drive, you have to watch the rode, which was not my purpose...................................... This may sound grandiose or sentimental, but America is my home and I claim it -- every single acre. I am the co-owner along with some 300 million other people. Being co-owner, I need to take a look around from time to time -- to see the farms and the trees, and the big cities and small towns................................ So while I was reading Dostoyevsky, I was looking out the window...... I am a wise traveler -- long bus rides across wheated plains blend perfectly with long Russian novels

Smiling Babies

2011-06-20T08:13:00.000-07:00

Eugene Owens, my son, photo taken in 1978

Smiling babies make everyone happy. Mom dying of cancer back in Chicago is quite a bit different -- but it's not really sad. The sad parts of "Too Many Mornings" are the defeats and failures -- that's where the pain lies -- but Mother leaving us -- that was just awesome.

We all came home that summer, Tom and Carolyn came in from Los Angeles, Katy came in from Denver. We took turns looking after Mom. She bore it well , but she didn't like being sick -- I don't mean that lightly. Mom was a strong-willed woman who never got sick because she did not like being sick and would not waste her time lying in bed...... And she did not like being looked after by her kids or by anyone else. She was not going to become some sweet old lady who needed help to get into the car ...... She was scared of dying, but not that scared -- she just didn't care to linger and draw it out.

Toward the end, she went back to the hospital and she sent me away. She only wanted my sisters with her at that point -- because of her hair. She could not get her hair fixed and combed right in the hospital, and she did not care for her sons to see her disheveled.... That's not silly, that was important to her.

It was a gift. She was our mother and we were everything to her. She died in September after only three months of illness. I remember this awesome feeling. I told myself, "This only happens once in your life, so do it right and give it all your attention." ...... I never felt so special and so blessed. Mom had arranged everything to make it easy for us. Katy and I went to the funeral home to pick out a cheap casket -- what Mom wanted. Instead we spent money on white flowers -- but not lillies...... It was like the whole world stopped for our benefit .... Neighbors brought food over. Relatives sat in the living room..... It was like floating on a cloud.
Frank Munaretto was over at the house and in close contact with my brother Tom. Frank was Mom’s accountant. Mom always said there’s no such thing as security but she sure watched her money carefully.

And dying was a problem for Mom, because, seriously, what was the point of going to heaven if you can’t take it with you?

I know she would have preferred to keep her money herself, but her second choice was to give it to us kids, and Frank was all ready and prepared to divide everything into four equal piles. Kids will fight over $5 and a bread basket, so the amount doesn’t matter, what matters is the process and the passing on of goods -- done rightly, it is a blessing. That was Mom’s gift, she kept us together as a family after she was gone, because that’s what she wanted.

Contributing with PayPal

2011-06-19T19:19:00.000-07:00

Too Many Mornings

Please consider hitting the PayPal button and making a $25 contribution. I want to turn this memoir into a book, and your $ will buy me some time to work on it,

From Walden Pond, back to Chicago

2011-06-19T19:14:00.000-07:00

Our home back in Chicago

That summer in Concord in 1996 my daughter threw me a surprise 50th birthday party. I was very happy that such nice people came to wish me well....But otherwise I was living on fumes. After Neil gave up his landscape design business and failed to hire me again for the season, I had to scramble to make contacts with my old customers and get some income -- My heart just wasn't in it anymore .................. Beside, I wanted to be a writer. I WAS a writer, but not published anywhere -- manuscripts were piling up unread, but it was always more important than my "day job." ........................What I learned from Neil, who was truly a master gardener, was that I could never be that. Neil was successful in his work because he gave it his fullest attention. He lived and breathed azaleas and rhodies and maple trees, soil types, rainfall, and especially stone......................... Neil was a stone genius -- he would place them in the garden just so, and we had the most artful discussions about this -- talking about stone as we sweated and wrestled with a granite boulder .... but it was over -- no Neil, no easy wages and good lunches, no joking our way through the day. I couldn't handle another defeat.
My mother was dying. She had scarcely been sick a day in her life, but she had major surgery that summer and she had only a small chance of survival..... My daughter was going to college in the fall and my son was already out of the house, so it was time to break camp. I had a garage sale, because I had actually accumulated possessions in the six years and three apartments of my new England sojourn. What did not sell I marked "free" -- it was all gone within hours .... Just one pickup load to take with back to Chicago ....................................... That was our home in the photo, 1612 Forest Avenue, Wilmette, Illinois. A white stucco house where my mother had lived since 1946 -- 50 years in that house, the only home I've really had, and it's the trees more than anything else -- the most wonderful elegant elm trees towering --- see the dappled shade on the brick street. In the backyard -- large oaks -- such wonderful trees. That's where I grew up, and this was my last summer, home after many years gone on continental wanderings.

Bad Luck

2011-06-18T16:28:00.000-07:00

Walden Pond at Sunset

1995 was a good year. I worked in Concord, amid the hallowed stonewalls of history. I was hired by Neil Jorgensen, the best landscape designer in New England. Neil was in such demand as a designer that you had to book him months in advance, if he was even willing to do your garden. We worked on $100,000 projects and did award-winning work -- and Neil was such a great guy to work for...... It was unbelievable -- having fun, making lots of fun, and being real proud of the work too ..... I thought I had it made .. We worked every day, clear into November, when the ground started to freeze and our last day it was snowing -- but what a season we had.
I took a temporary job that winter driving a Buick regal -- driving executives to and from the airport. I was often stuck in Boston's horrible traffic, but I was getting paid by the hour, so what did I care -- the Buick was a nice ride.
When spring came, that's when my bad luck came with the melting snow. Neil's marriage broke up, and he became terribly depressed. He stopped working. Customers kept calling him and begging him to get started on their gardens, but Neil stayed in seclusion. He went up to his cabin in Maine, where there was no telephone .... Like a real Scandinavian he brooded and sulked and drank ..... Worse for me, I was out of work .. I begged him, when I finally got him on the phone..... Neil, don't just think of yourself, you're putting me out of work .... It was awful -- after getting so close to a really good deal, and it was the first time in my working life that ever happened -- working with the very best people and the best plants and the best equipment, making and building the most beautiful garden -- and then nothing.
I call that bad luck, which has been rare in my life. Most of my problems have been self-inflicted, but this one time it was bad luck -- fate, and the gods went against me ..... Later that spring, I got a call from Chicago that my mother was dying.

Other People's Property

2011-06-18T15:44:00.000-07:00

FARM NEWS

By Fred Owens

"Owens confesses to Pruning Atrocity"

I have to get it off my chest. I can't die with this burden on my soul. In the spring of 1991, I rented a three-bedroom apartment at 42 Blakeslee Street in the very best neighborhood of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Mr. Magestrelli, my landlord, was a kind old man and the rental income from this property was added to his pension as a retired civil service employee.

It was a nice place, with a small driveway providing off-street parking -- no small benefit in that urban setting. Next to the driveway was a huge and fiery pyrocanthus bush -- famed for its bright green foliage and dazzling scarlet berries. But it comes with thorns, and every time I got out of my car my jacket would get hooked on the thorns, and I got annoyed.

And more annoyed and then one day, without so much as a by-your-leave to the man who actually owned the bush, I took out my pruning saw and cut it down, flush to the ground.... Glad to get rid of it, I was .... Mr. Magestrelli came by a few weeks later and found the bush gone and he was really mad, and dumbfounded too -- "How could you possibly think it was your right to cut down that bush?" he asked.

To make the crime worse, I took a smart aleck attitude and replied, "It will grow back, don't worry, I just trimmed it." He went off in disgust and never mentioned it again.

Okay Mr. Magestrelli, I apologize.

Another Pruning Atrocity. I also butchered a glorious pieris in West Seattle in 2007, but at least my intentions were good. I meant to trim it just a little bit, but I just kept going and I couldn't figure out where to stop. I cut too much on one side, and for balance, I cut too much on the other side -- it was a disaster. I meant well, but I am sorry this happened.

Another Point. I could go a long way with this, and in several directions. First, because this newsletter is about farming, we re-state the primacy of private property in agricultural abundance. Bushes belong to people -- that's good and important. And farms belong to people. There is no society on earth that has produced a surplus of food using collective methods -- although the kibbutzes in early Israel may have come close.

State-run agriculture was the ultimate failure of communism in Russia -- the people finally got tired of not having enough to eat. Sorry, but Ronald Reagan doesn't get the credit -- it was empty shelves at the grocery store that ended the Iron Curtain.

Now Russia, as it did in czarist days, produces a surplus of wheat.

In contrast, the government seizure of farm land in Zimbabwe has produced widespread hunger and starvation.

So, I guess my point is that a bush, or a field of wheat, does better when it belongs to someone who takes care of it.

It's funny, because I don't feel that's true when it comes to health care. Food is a basic need, and health care is a basic need. But health care can thrive under collective responsibility -- at least I believe so.

Rant Warning! Rant Warning!

More Apologies. So, the pyrocanthus and pieris both belonged to someone, and my "crimes and misdemeanors" were against property, but I have apologized and the matter should be laid to rest.....so what brought this up?

What brought this up was sight of yet another Congressman issuing a public apology for his private deeds. I mean, I'm a Democrat and I try to be a good liberal, so I figure I better apologize for something. You gotta be guilty of something or you're nobody on the left wing.

Well, we are a mangy bunch of idiots. Our leaders in Congress are Nancy Pelosi and Debbie Wasserman. Those two couldn't lead us to victory in a foot race across a tennis court. They are profoundly inept.

Weiner was a fighter -- with poor social skills, to be sure, but he was on our side. I know that Barney Frank got away with all kinds of trouble because he's a warm and friendly guy. Everybody likes Barney. Nobody likes Weiner.

But you don't get rid of people like that. I have friends who are highly competitive and driven, often very earnest in their efforts -- but damned clumsy in terms of social skills. I mean, they act like people who crashed their own party..... They are just a type of person in our human galaxy. They are attack dogs -- you point them at the enemy and say "git 'im."

What Weiner did was break the Over 35 Rule -- He forgot that things get a bit stricter when you pass that barrier. A buff 28-year-old can get away with sending photos of himself in his underwear -- naughty, of course, but he can get away with it.

But Weiner was at least ten years too old for that prank.

I mean, what is the standard here? Social conservatives have the benefit of a simple, but not simplified, belief -- that there are two good states, traditional monogamy and abstinence. Everything else is sinful. That's their standard.

But over on the left, it is a murky sea of confusion. Can you even say there are any standards? Roughly speaking, the rule is consenting adults -- not with children, and not by force -- but otherwise, do what you will.

This is so broad and so open that some guys simply do not know how to behave, because they don't know what the rules are. The rules keep changing. For instance, some propose the notion that No means No. If it does, a lot of people need to be informed about this.

Maybe the old definition of a gentleman still applies at the crudest level -- keep your fly zipped and keep your hands to yourself.

I don't know the rules, but I would like to pre-emptively apologize. I am deeply sorry. I profoundly regret ...

Mangy Democrats and True Conservatives. I'm a mangy Democrat. I listen to conservatives because they say interesting things -- but then you hear them talk about who is and who is not a "true conservative." Whew! That's scary..... David Mamet, the wonderfully talented playwright, has made a "conversion to conservatism" and is making the rounds of the right wing talk shows with his new friends. I wish I had five percent of his skills as a dramatist, but in politics Mamet is peanuts. Good grief.

Back at the Farm.... I do my farming chores, but I feel like I could write and write and write some more. And it's not a feeling -- it's a fact -- that I have a lot of things to say and these things are worse saying, and now is the time to say them..... Take writing itself .... I heard this from Ernest Hemingway, and not even from Hemingway, but from the actor who was pretending to be Hemingway in Woody Allen's new movie, "Midnight in Paris." What Hemingway said is that writing takes courage.

Courage. Yes, writing takes courage and I have always known this, because writing is only good if it's true. If it's not true, then it's not any good, and it always takes courage to tell the truth. Forget the minor distinction between fact and fiction. If you want to be a good writer, you have to tell the truth.

"Too Many Mornings" is the title of my memoir now being serialized on the Frog Hospital blog and on Facebook. It is the story of "21 places I have lived since 1976." I have moved around a lot, so it is a tale of "landscape and memory" to steal a march from Simon Schama ..... I have been writing 500 words each day and then posting it. You are invited to lean over my shoulder to watch the work unfold -- you are also invited to post comments as you read it -- kind of fun and kind of interesting.

Farm News...... It was a great rant that I wrote about these tiresome apologies, but my firm intention is to write some straight-up farm news in subsequent issues -- the latest dope on what is growing in these fields in Ventura County and around the world.

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My blog: Frog Hospital

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at home with Ralph Waldo Emerson

2011-06-17T07:31:00.000-07:00

At home with Ralph Waldo Emerson, the sage of Concord...... Helen and I had our season. I was heart broken when it ended .... We left Cambridge and moved to Newton for two years. Newton is a suburb of Boston and largely Jewish. It is also where the Fig Newton was invented -- true! ..... Then we moved to Concord, close to Walden Pond.

I came to Boston with literary ambitions, which were soon dashed. I did get an interview at the Boston Globe, but my strength as a writer was a kind of quirky humor -- which is simply not done at the Boston Globe ..... In fact, Boston is the least funny town in America. Jokes die in that city, and my pen ran dry, except for a few short stories, all about Helen and our sad romance..... So it was back to the land and the soil .....

I started a landscaping business and found plenty of work. Boston and environs is heavily forested. Many residential streets are fully shaded by glorious elms, oaks, ashes, and maples ..... And all the leaves fall down in October -- and someone gets paid to rake all those leaves ..... That would be me .... Raking Leaves for Liberals -- they were too good and too snotty to rake their own leaves, but they would hire me. I loved the work, but I resented their superiority .... "we'll do the thinking and you can do the chores." ....... I dated Irish women and joined the Yeats Society -- we read poetry aloud and drank wine by the Charles River .... I assumed a rugged pose, being of the earth, with cracked and callused hands ....
I'm skipping the Jewish episode in Newton -- that is a book-length story, seriously .... I spent two years full absorbed in that culture, and studied with great devotion at the shul and earned some respect as a Jewish scholar, of all things -- I don't know how to summarize what I learned. I'll try to say one thing -- the Jews are very strong people, although they may not seem so. They are stronger than anyone I have ever met.
We moved to Concord in 1995. Eugene finished high school and went to an art college in San Francisco. Eva took home-schooling because, as she said, most accurately, "high school is stupid." How could I argue with that? I taught her at home and she thrived .... I tended the gardens at beautiful New England mansions, old homes with slate roofs, copper gutters, and granite walkways. I trimmed ancient wisterias, big around the trunk as a man .... I learned about stones .... New England has more stone than soil and I spent hundreds of hours on my hands and knees uprooting weeds and pulling stones from the earth. I re-built the old walls .... Some days I did volunteer work gardening at the home of Ralph Waldo Emerson.... On hot summer times, I would knock off early and go to Walden Pond, the best swimming hole in New England .... I began working for a highly-respected landscape designer who paid me very well... Then I had some bad luck ....

What about the Bush?

2011-06-16T14:26:00.000-07:00

What about the Bush? So, I could drive up to Newton to see Helen and play the Steinway piano in her living room -- it was such a vivid contrast to farm work and crude dinners back in the Skagit Valley. But first, I must talk about the Pyrocanthus.

I rented the apartment at 42 Blakeslee Street -- three bedrooms furnished, in the best part of Cambridge. I even had off-street parking for me car. Except I had to duck around the fiery prycanthus every time I got out of my car. It was big and beautiful, but it was thorny and it was in my way. So I cut it down ........... Down to the ground ... You know, it wasn't my bush..... Mr. Magestrelli was my landlord -- a perfectly nice man. When he came by a few weeks later and saw that the pyrocanthus was gone, he was very upset ..... And me, a supposedly mature man of 44 years, took a smart aleck attitude toward this kind senior citizen, like I had done him a favor by cutting down the bush ..... "And it will grow back again," I said, as a feeble defense ...... I was not a good tenant. I was careless with his property. I abused the furniture and the curtains .... Well, for an excuse, I had been living too rough.

Living too rough, so I sought refinement and took a course in good manners. To wit, I read four of Jane Austen's novels -- that was my first winter in Cambridge. I think it was "Emma" that was the first one I read ..... Somehow, I recalled my mother's urgings at the dinner table -- to sit straight and take small bites and ask to be excused ..... I wasn't raised to be a farm hand --- but it was like a war inside of me .... because I had rebelled against the sterile suburban lawns of my youth .... I had found the soil as a young man, had slept on the ground and dug gardens and made trails in the woods and the soil was everything.

But that first winter in Cambridge, Helen found two tickets to the Boston Symphony -- orchestra seats, front row and center. We went together and heard Yo-Yo Ma play the Bach Cello Suites. He was magnificent and yet so humble, a great artist. I squirmed in my seat like an unkempt canine, and yet I was so happy and Helen was beaming with pleasure, that she had done this for me ..... I was still lost, but now it didn't feel so bad ....

Lois Wauson
We used to have a pyracantha bush in the 50's at our first home on Trudell Dr. in San Antonio. I loved that bush. I cut branches off with the red berries to make a centerpiece for Christmas every year. I know how your landlord felt. I would have been heartbroken if someone cut it down. And my husband did that many years later up in N. Texas, when he cut down my favorite honeysuckle bushes. saying 'they will grow back'"(they didn't). I was devastated and mad for weeks.

Encrusted with Prestige Like Barnacles on a Piling

2011-06-15T08:50:00.000-07:00

A dramatic change of venue is coming at "21 Places I have lived" -- I think you folks may have gotten comfortable hearing about my four-year stint at Cold Comfort Farm -- just settling in that pile of old boards in a blackberry bramble.

Photo: elm trees on Cambridge Commons in Massachusetts

But the title of this story should remind you that we're going to keep moving on -- I left the farm right after Christmas in 1990, heading for Boston. I brought my 13-year-old son with me, and he blames me to this day for yanking him out of school and taking him to New England.....But I reasoned it this way, that he was doing poorly in junior high-school both academically and socially and I thought a spin around the country might doing him well..... Anyway, we loaded up the car and never looked back at that damn farm....Susan and my daughter Eva were left behind -- this was the only time we ever separated as a family, but they came to join us on the East Coast some months later, so it wasn't really a hard ship ............ But I have to address the readers again -- the whole movement in America is westward bound. Every town in Washington and Oregon is full of refugees from the Midwest. California is full of immigrants from New Jersey and Pennsylvania ......... This is what everybody is used to -- like in the Grapes of Wrath -- they head out to the West Coast afte the farm goes bust in Oklahoma -- or Jack Kerouac "On the Road" -- going west on Highway 66.

But there's a smaller trend of young men from the rural West going East to learn in the halls of higher education and join the citadels of power. Think of William O. Douglas, who grew up in Yakima, Washington, and headed east to become a Wall Street Lawyer and then a Supreme Court Justice....... That's what I did. And you may have heard about the Liberal Establishment -- yes it is there -- I found it there in Boston .... We rented an apartment in Cambridge, not six blocks from Harvard University, within touching distance of some Very Important People ..... I never saw so much importance in all my life, the old buildings seemed encrusted with prestige like barnacles on a pier piling.

Helen lived in Newton, a Boston suburb. I've changed her name. She was the romantic interest. Believe me, you should never go back to an old girl friend. Never.....And why didn't someone tell me that? ... We resumed a relationship after a 25-year-absence. It started out well , but it ended in the same train wreck ...... I'm going to blame her for most of this, strictly as a literary device -- you and God and everybody else can form your own judgment ..... We were lovers when we were 18, but I was a cad back then -- I wanted to fool around, and I left her in tears ...... But she kept a piece of my heart, that small piece I had given her -- and she kept that small piece for 25 years -- had a husband, several children, a home and a good suburban life -- but kept that small piece all this time, and I never wholly loved another woman -- couldn't be whole because of that missing piece.... She never let go of it .... and I came back to her.

from Cold Comfort Farm to Boston

2011-06-14T12:29:00.000-07:00

Suzie Wiley Racanello, "happy up fred!!!!!!!!!!!"

photo of Barney Lake, near the farm

How can I make this happy? It was a tough year on the farm -- 1988. That summer I moved out of the house, and that ended a 12 year argument...... a "friendly divorce" .... which is slightly less of a disaster .... After a bit of shifting around, I moved back into the farmhouse and she moved out ..... I became a single father, which, of all the ways devised by mankind, is the worst possible way to raise children ..... It reminded me of a story in the newspaper about the one-legged man who climbed Mt. Rainier... Sure, he made it to the top, but it would have been so much easier with two legs..... I struggled on. I grew a very big garden the next summer and my triumph was a huge and wonderful patch of sweet corn -- more than I could possible eat or give away ... I bought a new car ... Mainly I did not like being un-married at all... What are you supposed to do? .... And people thought it was just fine -- or else they didn't know what to say, or else they didn't want to interfere ..... I guess it was up to me to work it out -- my behavior wasn't especially weird or self-destructive, so people let me work it out ..... However, there was a bit of concern when I decided to move to Boston .....
I'm skipping a lot of things from 1988. -- In January I played a central role in the Fishtown Woods Massacre.... In February, my mother-in-law died and we flew back to Oklahoma for the funeral. It was the first and only time I communed with my wife's deeply conservative Southern cousins....... In July I joined the Quaker Peace March and we walked, 12 miles a day from Portland to Vancouver -- all the way across the state -- for the cause of nuclear disarmement. A year later, 1989, the Iron Curtain fell, thanks in part to our effort....
I came back from the Peace March after six weeks and we started fighting again and I couldn't stand it anymore.... That's when I moved out .... The last straw was when we had an argument at dinner -- nothing new about that, we patched it up, and later we went to bed.... Okay, but for the first and last time, we started another argument in bed .... That was it ... I moved out of the house the next day.
I was lost..... That was a big reason why I wanted to take care of the kids -- because I knew how to do that and it was honest work.... I took good care of those children -- I never asked anyone's advice and no one interfered.
I'm gonna stop for today -- but I need to finish this part. The next year I went to my 20th college reunion. I ran into my old girl friend and she lived in Boston. So I took the kid outs of school, packed up the car, and drove across the country in the middle of winter -- to Boston...... Why didn't someone stop me? ... Boston -- and we lived there for six years, and at least we were out of the Cold Comfort Farm -- might a had to move 3,000 miles just to shake off that demon.

The decade of drudgery and disappointment

2011-06-13T08:51:00.001-07:00

"21 places I have lived" or "Too Many Mornings" -- your choice of titles. You can find the whole story on my blog, but we're at ten years now and half way through.
It's 1986. The Red Sox lost the World Series to the New York Mets that year, and I turned 40. Thus began the Decade of Drudgery and Disappointment.

We moved on to the farm outside of Mount Vernon..... There was no electricity and no running water -- no rent to pay either. The owner just wanted occupation. Our first winter we had kerosene lamps. We cut a Christmas in the back yard and illuminated it with tiny candles -- it was a miraculous glow to see that warm light in our living room ..... But otherwise it was hard times. It wasn't rustic living to me anymore, it was just poverty, and I didn't care ......................... The fact is, our marriage was over ... we still had two years to go before a separation .... but I didn't care anymore ... She didn't want to live in LaConner, so I just found this dump of an old farmhouse and there we sat -- hoping without hope ........................... I worked here and there and made a little money .... We put in a waterline -- that involved me digging a ditch 250 from the house to the road, and then digging a much bigger, wider ditch in the back yard to serves as a septic system for the toilet ..... and for a few hundred dollars we got an electrician to scab together some wiring ..... but the place just looked run-down no matter what I did --- or maybe because I've how I felt -- hoping without hope .... We had a nice dog, a black puppy named Sparky, and he was the happiest critter on the farm. He was a wonderful little dog and he just ran around all day -- 250 feet from the road, we never tied him up.

swans

2011-06-12T18:11:00.000-07:00

The trumpeter swans flew over our old farmhouse every evening about twilight. Honk-honk they talked, and they flew so low you could hear the wind going through their wing feathers. They would spend the day out in the Skagit flats, and then come home to their roosts on Barney Lake, just down the hill from our little farm .................. I would often be outside in the dimming light, chopping wood or fixing the fences, and then I would hear the swans calling --- the call of the Nookachamps -- for we lived in the watershed of that tributary. The Nookachamps River flowed out of the Cascade foothills and joined the mighty Skagit ......................................................................That was our home -- 3325 Martin Road on forty acres of brush and second growth timber, with a barn that once held a dozen dairy cows, back when you could run a dairy with a dozen cows, and some ten acres of badly overgrown pasture................................ There was a tender cedar grove out in the field, right where the old well used to be. A tender grove of young trees -- because the old behemoths -- the ancient cedars -- had been cut down by our fathers and grandfathers -- cut down to build the barns and the houses we lived in. So the new tender cedars were growing again...............................................New growth will become old growth, I said, and it only takes a thousand years or so -- just leave it be .............................. I used to walk down to that grove and it smelled so very, very good, all young and green................................. Yeah, there were some good parts about that farm ...................................................

I've Done Worse and I'm not Resigning.

2011-06-11T20:28:00.000-07:00

Home on the Range. Life is good along the banks of the Ventura River. The weather has been cool. We are still picking sweet peas although this might be the last week. I grew some beets and onions, and then put them together for a righteous beet salad. And the cucumbers are good too -- I ate them with some smoked salmon and heirloom tomatoes.

I got the salmon and tomatoes at the farmers market in Camarillo this morning. The booth next to me sells hydroponically grown heirloom tomatoes -- Norman Bauer in Oxnard is the grower. Most of the tomatoes go wholesale to the Los Angeles area ---- and then out to all the best restaurants that are willing to pay $2.50 a pound for a tomato that tastes good. But Norman warned me about unscrupulous growers who are foisting "heirlooms" on the public. He says they are not vine-ripened and they are gassed with ethylene and they have no flavor at all -- but they piggyback on the heirloom reputation for good flavor.

What a corrupt world! Well you just need to know your local farmer. I would trust Norman Bauer. I eat his tomatoes all the time, and they taste wonderful.

I've Done Worse and I'm not Resigning. I didn't look at the photos, did you? Because if you did, that makes you part of the problem -- manifesting some kind of prurient curiosity, a wish to be titillated or horrified. A description of what the photos entailed was enough for me to make a judgment. And I can sum it up this way -- "I've done worse myself and I'm not resigning."

But I'm referring to Congressman Weiner, of course

We're all vulnerable, you and me both. Let's put five determined investigators on your tail. Let's examine your every word and your every action over the last five years. Might we find something?

Well, I can tell you that there are things I have done and said that I don't want the whole world to know about. I believe poverty and obscurity protect me from the harshest kind of public scrutiny -- no one really wants to know.

A society cannot function without a certain amount of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell."

Take LaConner, where I lived for many years, a small town of 800. Do you want to know who is sleeping with who in that little burg? Well, you can find out without much effort, but it doesn't go in the newspaper. People have a right to screw up their own lives without the rest of the world watching.

On the other hand, there is this really weird new tendency for people to drop their pants in public -- Congressman Weiner is part of that trend. Ugh!

But I urge Weiner to tough it out, by next month no one will care, and I really doubt he will indulge in this kind of behavior again. His public humiliation has been a sufficient correction.....Otherwise I know nothing about him or his politics, and it's up to the people of his district to decide his future..

I'm still a Democrat. We're the natural party of sinners like Congressman Weiner -- we are adulterers and give in too easily to lascivious urges.. We are lazy and unkempt.. We accept government handouts. We sleep late and drink too much. We want other people to pay taxes, not ourselves... We're just not as good and as respectable as the Republicans. We take a casual interest in religion, if any......We are quarrelsome and disorganized and about the only reason we win elections is that there are so damn many of us.

But I like Conservatives. My very favorite conservative writer is Laura Wood who writes the Thinking Housewife blog. She calls herself a "traditionalist." Half the women in North America are self-publishing their memoirs this year, and most of it is drivel. Laura Wood, however, is worth reading. She hosts an intelligent discussion. I have often posted on her website -- now agreeing, now dis-agreeing.

I think it is true that conservatives can handle disagreement in a better way. Consider the feminist saying that the "personal is political" -- what that means is that "I don't agree with you and so I don't like you anymore" -- because it's all so personal and subjective and we know that objectivity is a sexist scam.

Not me, I think a degree of objectivity is obtainable, and a good argument is a stirring thing. So, I prefer Ms. Wood. She thinks and writes clearly. I don't agree with her, so what?

It's her premise that really appeals to me -- that women are different than men -- that's the simplest way to state it, but it's a startling idea and it opens up a whole world of intelligent discussion. Here's one, Why We Must Discriminate

Let me make this distinction -- I like her premise, but I do not particularly care for her conclusions. And it's not personal.

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

from LaConner to Texas

2011-06-10T14:15:00.000-07:00

We lived in the double-wide on Maple Street for five years. The kids -- toddlers by now -- had a sand box and a swing. We had a vegetable garden and several apple trees. I had a shop in the back where I collected and repaired used fishing tackle. Susan used a corner of our bedroom to make puppets and other craft items .... .... I took my kayak out on the river and spent a lot of time fishing .... We often trudged across the field to visit Keith Brown when he lived in Fishtown ..... I worked at several weekly newspapers as a reporter. I also worked part-time for my parents fishing magazine ... When my parents retired in 1984 and sold the magazine, I took my share of the proceeds and started a fishing newspaper that served the Pacific Northwest --- it was, editorially, an excellent publication. It was a complete expression of what I believed was the best possible description of the northwest fishing community..... Even today, so many years later, I can tell you how good it was .... but there was hardly twelve people who bothered to read it or subscribe to it or take out ads .... A disaster, a complete business failure, it really hurt.

I need to pick up the pace and get this story moving again.... We lived in the double wide for five years -- a perfectly nice home if you like living in a tin can. I never liked it very much. That was my ,mistake -- buying a house that my kids liked and my wife liked -- but I didn't like it or love it . You should hold on to your home with all your might, but you have to love it first, and I never loved it...... Then the fishing publication failed, and I had this immature urge to flee. And compound that with my wife's constant complaint about "life in LaConner." She thought it was a snobby, snotty, in-grown, cliqueish little town -- too many stuck up people .....She wanted to go back home to Oklahoma, which I could not abide .... So we made what I think was a very bad decision -- to move to Austin, Texas, where Susan could feel more at home, and where an old hippie like me could feel welcome.

We should have never left LaConner. It was January, 1986. I got a menial job at a software company. We rented a nice apartment. The kids enrolled in a new school. We made friends. I began playing the piano again.....Austin was easy living......I got tired of the software company, so I got a job as a reporter at a weekly newspaper -- a really good paper too, but they decided not to keep me -- it's a long story -- basically they were just using me until their son finished journalism school -- I wish I has known that .... Anyway, I quickly got another job at another newspaper -- but it was in East Texas -- in the swamp! Back to redneck city -- alligators, mosquitoes, Cajuns, rice fields, water moccasins, high heat and even higher humidity, in a little town called Anahuac, just across the bay from Houston. And we moved AGAIN.

We moved again, from Austin to Anahuac. My wife -- it's hard for me to write this story without dragging her into it -- a woman I still respect and cherish even though we have been divorced for many years -- but I thought she would be the anchor in this partnership. I mean, most women, then and now, are good at keeping things -- they like furniture and curtains and other home-stuff. But not my wife, she would be happier living in a tent. If I ever said let's go, she would say, Okay, I can be packed in an hour --- we'll just grab the kids and get in the car..... So there was no one working the brakes....We just kept moving....That's what we were good at.

This story is getting repetitious. I just kept moving and changing jobs. We're only on town Number Nine and we have twelve more towns to get to. Are you all getting bored with this?..... There's a lot of bad parts that I'm leaving out -- a cycle of depression and anger that I kept going through. And all the marital conflict.....Let me summarize. I was not an angry man when I got married on February 14, at the City Hall in Chicago in the year 1976, but by ten years later when I was leaving in this mosquito-ridden swamp called Anahuac in east Texas --- by this time, in 1986, I wasn't just angry, I was almost nothing but angry, except when I was depressed.... There's no one to blame, except myself, and I just kept moving.

It was October of 1986. We were living in Anahuac, and I was driving ten miles every day to my job as a reporter at the Libertyville Vindicator, a weekly newspaper. The editor, Ernie Zieschang, cared about high school football and the Rotary Club. I don't know why he hired me -- we didn't get along, and after a short while, for the only time in my entire worked career -- I was fired! Ernie just gave me two weeks pays and told me to clear out..... living in east Texas and being employed is a condition that can be endured -- but being unemployed in that miserable country? Not acceptable by any means.

We left. We decided to go back to the Skagit Valley. Susan refused to return to LaConner. I said would Mount Vernon be okay, and she said yes (Mount Vernon being a larger town some ten miles from LaConner). I went ahead, driving across country in our old Buick. Susan and the kids took the train to my sister's house in Los Angeles. She took the kids to Disneyland, and then they headed up north to the Skagit on another train -- to the Cold Comfort Farm where we spent the next few miserable years. Talk about a dump .....

Too Many Mornings

2011-06-08T21:52:00.000-07:00

Too many mornings -- I woke up in --

Lindsburg Kansas
Evanston Illinois
Long Beach Mississippi
Venice California
Marblemount Washington
LaConner, Centre St
LaConner, Maple St
Austin Texas
Anahuac Texas
Mount Vernon
Cambridge, Mass
Newton, Mass
Acton, Mass
Bulawayo Zimbabwe
Pull and Be Damned Rd LaConner
Caledonia St LaConner
couch surfing -- 18 months
Floresville Texas
Fir Island
5th st in LaConner
Ventura -- where I am now

But I haven't changed much, I'm just good at moving.
May 28 at 5:43pm • Like

I don't have a lot of stuff. I brought my car full of stuff down here from LaConner. I left 12 boxes -- my archives -- in storage in a barn on Beaver Marsh Road. That's everything I own.
Louis Cayou SO U A GYPSY
Alexa Robbins I think it's only 15 for me!
The trouble with traveling for your life is that you never get to go on a vacation. But I would like to stay here, and then go to France next summer -- not to move there, for God's sake -- but just for a vacation, like a real tourist.
We left Oklahoma in the summer of 1976, heading north. The truck broke down in Lindsburg Kansas, just north of Wichita. So we camped out by the river at the edge of town -- and found jobs at a factory making aluminum windows, and then rented an apartment behind the Swedish bakery....... This was summer in Kansas, got over 100 degrees day after day -- hot in the factory -- but cool enough in the town swimming pool after work. We should have stayed there. It was a decent town and we could have found better work if we had been more patient.

We left Kansas after a few months. My wife was pregnant and she didn't like the local doctors. She wanted to go to this commune in Tennessee and have natural childbirth -- a bad idea, I thought..... I said we could get a midwife, yes, but near enough to a hospital just in case. So, for some reason, that entailed moving to Evanston, Illinois, where I myself was born and grew up.....I found a job as a shipping clerk at a large printing company.....We found an apartment on Clyde Street near the Howard Street boundary with Chicago.... I picked out that apartment because there were a lot of old ladies living in it. Chicago, as you know, gets bitterly cold in the winter, so I figured these old ladies lived in a building with really good steam heat.....That was a smart move....we stayed all warm winter, the baby was born in the spring.

The child was born in April 1977 in Evanston, Illinois. We left in September. We took the river road -- Highway 61 Revisited -- and camped out, heading down the river -- Dubuque, St. Louis, Cape Girardeau, Memphis, and then Vicksburg, in Mississippi. We stopped there and I got a job at a sawmill way out in the woods. Talk about rednecks! Geez, they closed the sawmill on the opening day of squirrel hunting season......I took wood scraps home from the sawmill to the house we rented and built some simple yard furniture, which we sold....Otherwise Vicksburg wasn't such a good place to live.
So we left Vicksburg and drove down to the Gulf Coast, renting a trailer in Pass Christian with a view of the Gulf. This was 60 miles east of New Orleans and a little bit west of Biloxi, but still in Mississippi.....I got a job on a construction project. By now it was December and cold working outside.... plus mosquitoes, alligators, rednecks, preachers, and lots of fat people ... I got into an argument with our landlord and he told us to leave -- that was a good idea -- I don't know why we lived there in the first place, probably just to be stubborn.

Suzie Wiley Racanello so fred.... how do you remember this in such detail??????

Carolyn Rios probably just to be stubborn, what YOU Fred?

If we proved a point by living in Mississippi, it was to make the whole country inhabitable. From Atlantic to Pacific, all the land needs love..........But enough was enough........ They said Pappy Crain was connected to the New Orleans mafia, and then he and I had this argument and he told me to clear out of his trailer court. So we did the sensible thing and left....... We had to sell the old Buick because it wouldn't run anymore and then get on the Greyhound, me and Susan and the baby, bound for West Coast ...... the Promised Land, the Golden State, California..... and not just anyplace, but Venice Beach itself.

In Venice in 1978, the old beatniks were still around. They didn't just listen to Billi Holiday, they knew her -- it was a small world for hipsters in the 1950s and Venice was one of their locales -- still with a trace of it in 1978 -- the old beatniks were people I listened to and talked with. They found me to be amusing, sincere....and clueless.....But we arrived from Mississippi and we lived in a tricked out school bus in my sister's back yard....I took the city bus every day to my job in Culver City as a shipping clerk at a silk screen shop, where they made giant banners that said "Sale!" and "Grand Opening." ...... I liked taking the bus to work, it went past the Hare Krishna Temple and the old MGM studios with giant sound stages. I could sense the ghosts of old dramas -- images of Judy Garland, Clark Gable and Myrna Loy .... it was almost tangible....
We got to Venice in January and left in June. I think we should have stayed. This is what happened -- I had finally saved enough for us to move out of the school bus and get into a decent apartment -- with first and last month's rent and a deposit. I found this nice place, a tiny one-bedroom bungalow. I had the money in hand but the landlord wouldn't rent to families with children, and by this time we were expecting another one -- what a bummer......As I said, we should have stuck it out in Venice and just gone looking for a better landlord ..... but I guess that baby wanted to be born in the Skagit Valley, because we went back up there -- in late June. We made a summer camp at Illabot Creek up by Marblemount -- a way back in the woods..... It was a pretty place, but we had no money and I had no work.

We camped for the summer on the creek, then found a cedar-shake cabin on the road and nearer to town -- town being a grocery store, gas station and post office. The cabin had electricity but no running water -- just a hand pump out the back door, plus an outhouse. We had a wood stove for heat, and wood cook stove in the kitchen......It was decent and the rent was $40 per month .... Lots of fresh air and beautiful scenery in the wild Cascade Mountains up the Skagit River, but not much work. I borrowed money from my folks and we got food stamps. I chopped wood and carried water. Susan was expecting our second child -- she liked it there living out in the woods...... but I found it somewhat isolating and my mood was sometimes sour -- time passed too slowly and it rained all winter.

Suzie Wiley Racanello fred.. you never answered my question.. how do you remember all this?????

I thought everyone remembered all this stuff about where they have been.....so I don't know how to remember anything, I just do.

Suzie Wiley Racanello but you recount it in such detail!

I could write this much, much longer, with much greater detail -- but I'm keeping it very short to fit on to Facebook.

Our daughter was born March 4, 1979 at the hospital, we brought her home to the cabin in Marblemount. She was beautiful..... I planted a garden that spring and I built a studio and did art and calligraphy. But I had very little paying work -- a few days at a shake mill, a couple of weeks at a local farm -- just scraping by ..... And by now we had two children in diapers -- but only a hand pump in back of the cabin for keeping clean ...... we stuck it out until November, but another raining winter with little work seemed like a bad idea...... I drove down to LaConner to check it out -- a bigger town -- more than 600 people! -- better housing, more work, and a bookstore and a good coffee shop for hanging out -- a good tavern too...... We moved down there and rented a house on Centre Street (British spelling for some reason) -- good plumbing, gas heat, no wood to split and water to haul -- it was easy street, and I was back to work making a few dollars at Tillinghast Nursery.

Cindy Nelson Fred, you really should write a book about your life! It would be amazing!

Living my life has been the hard part, writing about it is easy.

Lysa Sherman I grazed my pony in empty lots. I went barefoot and worked the garden all summer. In fall, my Mother taught me which seaweed you could eat. We boiled nettles and ate them. I babysat on the river for a woman named Joy, who had no running water and kerosene lamps for light and a wood stove for heat. I learned that rabbits do, indeed, scream when they are killed. But if you boil them long enough, they are delicious. These are the things that shape us as individuals. Let us be not afraid of those things that let us know that we are, in fact, alive. Your daughter carved her name on our porch, and we left it there. A testament to who had come before us in that place. There is no life without acknowledgement of the lives that have been there before us, forging their way in ways that can only be imagined. We are not alone, and if we are aware of that we never live alone....

Lysa, Joy lives in Texas now -- I hear from her on Facebook -- Joy Daley

I need a better title for this piece. It is about the 21 places I have lived since 1976. I am writing it in the comment section of the previous post --- writing one paragraph for each place that I lived.....What prompted me to write this was getting a letter from Paul Schulte, my college classmate, who has lived in the same address in Cinncinati since 1976, whereas I have kept moving.

We rented the house on Centre Street in LaConner. It was big and carpeted -- so nice after living in the cabin with a wood stove, a pump in the backyard and an outhouse... We had good plumbing, gas heat and all you gotta do is twist that dial on the thermostat and get as warm as you want. Twist the dial and pay the gas bill -- that was great. And a washer and dryer for the two babies. Clean and warm...... We lived there for a year and more, until the owner, a commercial fishermen, had some bad luck and sold the house at a loss and in a big hurry. Kirby Johnson, the realtor, came over to tell us the bad news....I was concerned that my spouse would get too upset about this, so we went out and bought the first house we looked at and did not dicker over the price. It was a double-wide trailer on Maple Street in LaConner on a 100 by 100 foot lot..... Then we just moved over there and figured not to have trouble with landlords anymore.

Sad Eyed Lady with Chickens

2011-05-27T08:25:00.001-07:00

The sweet peas keep putting out new blooms. The trellises are heavy with vines and we spend half our time propping them up and trimming the excess. But we found a wholesale buyer for all those blossoms, so let 'er rip.

Meanwhile we are planting dahlias, several thousand of them and 150 varieties, in rows between the sweet peas. The dahlias will benefit from the nitrogen-fixing quality of the sweet pea, which is a legume.

When the sweet peas are done blooming, we will pull them out from between the dahlias -- without crushing or damaging the dahlias of course. It could get complicated, but we are hoping to have a continuous progression of flowers to sell.

The Gap. The gap is what happens if the sweet peas stop blooming before the dahlias begin their season -- then we won't have much on the table at the farmers market, so we are hoping some annuals we planted will fill the bill -- amaranth, lisianthus and zinnias and a few other varieties

Calm. It's calm around here. We filled our first wholesale order and that seemed to go well. Now the sweet peas are showing signs of powdery mildew -- but it's always something. We're going to order more seeds of the black radish "nero tondo" -- it has a beautiful black matte color and a nutty, peppery flavor when grated into salads and soups.

We're sticking with the cut flower business, but it won't hurt to grow a few vegetables on the side if we can make it work. This black Italian radish might be a good specialty -- and they're easy to grow too.

Nothing is easy to grow. It won't be easy to grow radishes. With the summer heat coming on, they're going to bolt. Maybe if we put them in a shady spot, or erect a shade house -- something like that might work.

Sad Eyed Lady with Chickens. I made a video of the chickens and me singing "Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands."

It's just wonderful. You see the camera holding steady on the old wooden chair, on which sits a pot of cilantro, with the breeze moving the grass, and me singing off-camera. Then I pan over to the chickens and some special painted rocks.

But the video is over four minutes long, and my cranky old laptop cannot handle the uploading process. Six years old is this wonderful machine, but I have about run it into the ground.

A Computer Expert. I am a computer expert. I only know what I need to know in order to get done the things I want to get done. That's rule number one. Rule number two is that computers cost money. Rule number three is Internet Karma. Never waste anyone's time with unwanted posts and email. If you send Spam, you will get it back in spades.

Anyway, I drove over to Fry's Electronics in Oxnard. I spent $650, including sales tax and a new carrying case, for a 17-inch HP laptop, 4 GB Ram. and lots of room in the hard drive -- enough to download and upload my stupid videos.

Stupid Videos. I say that with affection. They are quite good. This one is in homage to Bob Dylan. You probably could have written the song yourself, if Bob Dylan had not -- isn't that how it seems when it's really good?

Bob Dylan is a great songwriter and musician, but he does not have much of a voice. And here, many of us can truly say, "I can sing as good as Bob Dylan."

"Sad Eyed Lady with Chickens" is from my heart and for many years and for the many places I've been.

Frog Hospital and Farm News Annual Spring Subscription Drive. Send a Check for $25, made out to Fred Owens and mail it to Fred Owens, 7922 Santa Ana RD, Ventura CA, 93001.

Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

"Too much of this and not enough of that"

2011-05-18T15:59:00.000-07:00

We have too many sweet peas and not enough labor to take care of it all.

We have weeds crawling up in BeauDee's garden and no one to spread the mulch -- if we could spread mulch we could smother the weeds, but it would take one worker all day, carting loads with the wheelbarrow and then spreading them out.

We're just short of people right now. Oh well, weeds growing is a sign of soil fertility.

We raked up three huge leaf piles in January, so we have these piles ready to deploy -- tiny oak leaves, huge sycamore leaves, and a third kind from this tree, but I don't know its name.

Cool weather. Cooler weather has prolonged the sweet pea harvest. We have too many flowers and not enough buyers. Last night Andy made contact with a wholesale buyer and if the deal comes through, the wholesaler will have us pick the place clean and take every one of them.

Except we don't have enough pickers for that, so we're making phone calls and sending out emails, and help should be on the way.

I used to worry about stuff like this, but it's always that way -- too much of one thing and not enough of something else.

Bugs. After the late-spring rain, if the sun and the heat come back, we will have bugs and more bugs, so it's a good thing to see swallows flitting about, because they will have plenty to eat.

Too much lettuce. We planted too much lettuce and it will bolt before it gets eaten. Then we planted a lot of beets but for some reason they won't grow -- got these puny little beets and a few leaves -- I don't know why, because the turnips have been a bonanza. Solution -- eat turnips and forget about the beets.

But mainly too many sweet peas. Mainly we have too many sweet peas and that's a good thing.

My Arab Friend. My friend is from Syria. He owns the mini-Mart and liquor store down the road from the farm. He always has Arabic TV news going on when I come in to buy some Fig Newtons or beer. He's the only person I know from Syria. So I'm not on his side exactly, and I can't say whether he's right or wrong, or if what he is telling me is true. I can only pass on what he told me.

He likes President Assad. Assad is a good man, he says. That surprised me, but I followed the clues. He sells liquor and he's not a Muslim, but a Christian. Then I looked up "Syrian Christian" on Google. I found several news stories. Ten percent of Syrians are Christian, they have always supported President Assad, and he, in turn, has favored and protected them. Syrian Christians fear the Sunni majority. They fear the mob, so they support the tyrant.

Most of us will have a strong dislike for President Assad and his brutal troops, and we may be right that he ought to be deposed. But keep this in mind -- in the Middle East, things are far more complicated than they seem at first glance.

African Story. The African story surges ahead on Facebook. I use Facebook differently. I do not care to write about my personal angst or indigestion, but want to tell this story because I think it is interesting.

I will be giving more background information -- some facts and figures and maps about Africa -- to make things more familiar to the readers.

Africa is a pretty strange place. For instance, there is a small country in West Africa that used to be called Upper Volta.

There was no Volta, or Lower Volta, just Upper Volta -- like some country in a Marx Brothers movie.

So they changed the name of the country to Burkina Faso, which is not an improvement, to my mind. Who lives in Burkina Faso -- the Burkino Fascists?

Worse, the capital of this country is Ouagadougou. Say it fast three times, "Ouagadougou, Ouagadougou, Ouagadougou." Like a choo-choo train.

It's a funny name and they never get any tourists in Burkina Faso, unless some one traveling to Chad gets lost.

Chad is a very big country with a nice, short name. Nobody ever goes there, all desert and poverty and civil war.

You never hear about these countries unless there's a coup.

Learning about Africa. I will be presenting simple facts like this about Africa as background information. My advice is do not try to remember any of this, but say the words out loud slowly, so you get used to it.

And get over to Facebook and find me at "Fred Owens" to follow along with the story.

Sweet Peas

2011-05-11T20:34:00.000-07:00

The Sweet Pea Harvest is going gonzo. Imagine all 9,000 plants blooming prodigiously -- except for the ones in Row A which are partially shaded.

But you go out to Rows C and D, into the full sun, and we can't pick them fast enough. We picked 300 bouquets last weekend for Mother's Day -- and sold every one. Bonanza. But farmers aren't supposed to brag, so forget what I just said.

It's not like we got rich selling flowers, but at least we had some income. And if we sell enough flowers we can do it again next year.

The problem -- this is so typical of American agriculture -- is that we over-produced. We have sweet pea flowers coming out of our ears. We could carpet the highway from here to Ojai. We could throw them from airplanes and smother small towns with delightful colors and fragrance.

Mainly we just want to get to the farmers markets and sell. That hasn't been so easy. I'm not going into details here -- but taking flowers to the market involves "dealing with other people" and you know that is not always so easy. Never mind. I don't want to sound like I'm complaining.

Better to take a deep breath and start planning for next year. And here's my idea -- we don't plant so many, and those we do plant go in the ground progressively to stretch out the harvest season. If possible, we can build a plastic hoop house and grow early sweet peas inside of that.

The second thing we can do is work on getting into more of these farmers markets. Most of them have waiting lists -- business is good.

That's all I have to say about sweet peas, except I love them and you ought to come by Love House Dahlias to see them -- only call first, because we don't leave the gate open. Call 805-648-6808.

Overproduction. American farmers, in every region and with every crop, have produced so prodigiously that, time and time again, they have driven the price right down into the ground.

That's a problem. But it's the kind of problem you want to have. We have too much food in America. And that is so much better than having too little food.

Zapata Lives. This incredible video features my first performance in character. Only 16 seconds long.... I am "quoting" from the final scene of the movie Viva Zapata, the story of Emiliano Zapata and his great revolutionary army in Mexico 100 years ago.

They shot and killed Zapata in the end, but some of his poor followers did not believe he was dead. They said he still rides in the mountains on his white horse.

The clothes I am wearing are not a costume but sensible for outdoor work in the hot sun -- a broad straw hat, and loose-fitting cotton shirt and trousers. This keeps you cool and prevents sun-burn.

Frog Hospital and Farm News Annual Spring Subscription Drive. Send a Check for $25, made out to Fred Owens and mail it to Fred Owens, 7922 Santa Ana RD, Ventura CA, 93001.

Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Detroit Blues

2011-05-03T16:56:00.000-07:00

I visited Ann Arbor, Michigan last week for my daughter's graduation. We took a tour of downtown Detroit the day after the ceremony and this is what I wrote:

It was blissful spring in Michigan. Yellow forsythias bloomed, red tulips danced on brilliant green lawns, and everywhere trees were budding with new leaves.

I especially watched the young weeds and saplings working there way through the cracks at the ruins of the old Packard factory in Detroit. They have not built cars in this half-mile-long building since 1958, yet still it stands brick-strong, windows smashed, waiting for new purpose.

I wanted to clean it up. I wanted to tell my tour guide -- "Just leave me here. I'll get a rake and a broom. I want to get started today. We can have this place fixed up in no time. Then we can start making cars again -- better cars."

In a vacant field near the plant, we can grow tomatoes and sweet corn, and the car makers can stop by the farm after their shift and buy some juicy tomatoes in the hot humid August sun, and bursting-sweet sweet-corn aching for hot butter in the cool of the evening.

The Packard factory is idle now because the Detroit folks needed a rest. They built millions of cars and we all loved the ride. They built planes and tanks and they won World War II. After that came a chrome-plated fins-flying era of triumph called the 1950s, but the Detroit folks were getting tired and finally the Packard line came to a halt in 1958. They blocked up all the windows against vandals. They just shut it down and walked away.

Then weeds began to grow. Little trees forced their way through cracks in the pavement and now they are 30-feet tall. The land is fresh again, and folks are coming back to work it..

They can build more cars now, and then in the summer they can take a vacation -- drive up north to the cool pine forest and go fishing for walleyes.

Detroit Blues. Everything bad you heard about Detroit is true. It is a burnt-out case. My daughter parked our rental car in front of a no-parking sign. I said, "Eva, we're going to get a ticket." She said, "Dad, they don't have any cops now."

So you're on your own in Motor City. Maybe that's good, being on your own. Maybe that's what brings out my pioneer spirit when I see this ruined but fertile landscape.

Think of a young family wanting a place to start, a chance to make a home and have some land.
They could do worse than go to Detroit. They could get a house for cheap and fix it up. Grow a garden. Start a business.

And they would have to fight every inch of the way to achieve any kind of success. They would have to be tough and determined and willing to make a relentless effort -- I don't want to minimize the problems they would face, There's a reason Detroit fell apart.

But if it's so bad, then how come I don't feel depressed when I see it.

I know you can't re-build an urban landscape with only a good feeling -- you need to have substance, capital, labor, good regulation, and better government, and last of all, you need a little luck.

Obama as Gary Cooper in High Noon. The question is --- If President Obama were a movie star, who would that be? and in what movie?

A younger respondent suggested Will Smith -- He's got the ears, she said. But not the gravitas, I said. Then how about Denzel Washington, she suggested. Okay, that's a possibility, He's definitely a serious dude.

I have transcended race in my own selection. Obama is Gary Cooper -- tall, lanky, serious, taciturn, patient, and totally determined. In High Noon, Gary Cooper played the sheriff even though he didn't want the job.

There was a bad guy and he had to be killed, and it was Cooper's job to gun him down. He took a grim satisfaction in winning the gun battle, but there was no glory in it and he never expected that. He just rode out of town at the end.

Frog Hospital and Farm News Annual Spring Subscription Drive. This newsletter, going for 12 years now, relies on subscription revenue from a few faithful followers. Some readers send a check every year and I am very grateful for their continued support.

Other readers send a check as the spirit moves them, and those checks are most welcome.

As I have said before, these checks keep the writer from getting cranky. When you starve the writer, he is liable to get self-righteous and don the martyr's robe and begin preaching and hectoring the readers.

But with a small bit of income, the writer can take a more detached and benign look at the many joyful events in our lives, paying equal attention to the suffering and pains we endure.

So, if you can afford it -- after you pay the rent, the mortgage, the groceries, and what ever you need to save for the education of your children and grandchildren -- then ...

Send a Check for $25, made out to Fred Owens and mail it to Fred Owens, 7922 Santa Ana RD, Ventura CA, 93001.

Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Mother Earth News

2011-04-25T10:02:00.000-07:00

Bolivia seeks to extend rights to 'Mother Earth'
"Bolivia will this month table a draft United Nations treaty giving 'Mother Earth' the same rights as humans - having just passed a domestic law that does the same for bugs, trees and all other natural things in the South American country."

This is such a bad idea, but at least it gives me a chance to articulate my own views about nature and to declare that I am profoundly in favor of rights for all humanity, but not for any other living creatures.

I am a humanist. I love people. You take the meanest, lowest bum hanging out in front of the grocery store in downtown Ventura, and that bum is far more important to me than the most beautiful horse in Kentucky.

People are more important than trees, rivers, oceans, clouds, stars or galaxies.

Human beings have rights, Animals don't have rights. Trees don't have rights, nor do frogs or glaciers.

They have life, but they don't have rights, only people. And that just barely. If all the people, in all the lands, had the fullest rights that they deserve, and if we ever reached that state, then I might think about the rest of God's creatures and want to include them too.

But people come first -- in my life they do.

Mother Earth? That's a wonderful concept -- the nourishment and necessity of nature. The inspiration of rainbows, the nuisance of mosquitoes. A cause for wonder, and a cause for frustration as well. We love the earth, we abuse the earth. We are "out of touch with nature."

(This last is so often an accusation against someone else. Those loggers, strip miners, those corporate greedmasters are "out of touch with nature." These accusations are often true, but just as often they are a projection of the accusers own separation from nature.)

But Mother Earth has no rights. No "standing" in court. You know, if you have rights, you also have responsibilities. You can go to court -- yes, indeed. You can also be taken to court. The people of Japan might take
Mother Earth to court at some international tribunal, accusing her of causing the earthquake and the tsunami and the deaths of many thousands of people.

Yes, if Mother Earth needs to make an adjustment in her tectonic plates, can she please do it more gradually, and perhaps give us a head's up?

But animals don't have rights. You can't sue a dog. They don't have religious freedom either, although it would be hard to stop a cow from praying to the god of her choice, mainly because it would be so difficult to realize if a cow was praying or not.

Or bears. Currently bears do not have the right to bear arms. But they seem to be doing quite well with their teeth and claws. And armadillos may not be armed.

Or horses. Some people say that horses are smarter than people. I wouldn't say that. I would say that horses know things that people don't know, and you can learn a lot by hanging out with horses.

Take Apple Jack. He's a horse, a 12-year-old gelding pony. And, despite his small size, Jack is very much the boss of the corral at our small farm. He will walk up to a horse twice his size and fight him to the death -- which doesn't happen, because the bigger horse gives up quickly. Jack is the boss.

But Jack is a rapscallion too, and sometimes he steals Misty's hay. I have talked to him about that -- that he ought to show a little class and not be hogging the hay.

A good horse, over all, is Jack. But he has no rights.

Don't make me seem Old Testament. God doesn't have rights either. Nor the angels. Nor the leprechauns and fairies.

Now, Jesus, if he were to return to Earth, as many folks say he will, then Jesus would have rights because he is and was fully human.

If Jesus came back and visited America, he would have rights, but he would need to go through immigration first.

Can I see your passport, sir?

I don't have one.

Well, you'll have to step in to this room for some questions.

Fine. I have plenty of time.

Tell us your full name.

Jesus H. Christ.

What does the H stand for?

Haleluljah, but you can just call me Hal.

Okay, Mr. Christ, we're having a bit of a problem here, you coming without proper ID. Now, where did you say you were from?

...... But you get my point. Jesus, being human, would benefit and would be subject to due process of law.

Just like he was two thousand years ago under Roman rule.

And our law, our common law, our constitutional tradition, is descended from Roman law -- and vastly improved as well. For instance we no longer allow torture as a method of interrogation. Oops, I was forgetting that President George Bush re-introduced the use of torture. But mainly we have at least eliminated crucifixion as a method of capital punishment, and we provide lawyers to accused persons.

But not then and not now, did we ever give rights to any kind of non-human, and I don't want to change that. Our legal tradition will not be improved by extending the rights of law to other living creatures. And our love for nature will not be improved

There is a good way to treat nature. I am part pagan and part Christian, which is to say, Catholic.I believe in grottoes and maternal spirits.

But that's not an argument, and it does not make good law. And we need the law to be as clear as it can be, and we need to keep it in the service of humanity.

I can understand the people of Bolivia wanting to try another approach. They have suffered centuries of tin mine dictators and cocaine criminals, and the rule of law has been a cruel joke in their country.

Let them experiment with rights for Mother Nature. We might learn something from their effort, but that's their country. Personally I think it's a wing-nut idea and I don't care to try it here.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Taxes

2011-04-18T10:41:00.000-07:00

Two opinions this week, guaranteed to annoy persons of most political persuasions, but first the farm news.

Sweet Pea Bonanza. Delayed three weeks by cool, wet weather here in Ventura County, the peas are blooming overtime now. We picked enough for the Saturday market and sold out. Then Saturday evening we picked again and sold out at the Sunday market.

The sweet pea flowers emit a heavenly fragrance. People walk by our flower booth and immerse their noses in the bouquets. It is so old-fashioned and delicate.

The mass-produced commercial growers do not make this flower because it does not ship or store well. People who buy our sweet peas already know that the experience is short-lived, but your house will smell wonderful for a few days.

And then come back to the market next week and buy some more! The season should last a month or so. (Contact me for local information)

Farm Income. Sweet peas have been an effort and an expense since I arrived at this farm in November, but now, finally, they are a source of income. We are a happy place, but we are even happier now because the harvest is good.

Now for two opinions, and I am not trying to be balanced, it just comes out that way.

Taxes. President Obama wants to raise income taxes on people making more than $250,000 per year. Technically, he wants to repeal the Bush-era tax cuts for this group, but it means the same thing.

This concerns me. Why are we picking on this group of extra-income earners? They work harder and they're a lot smarter than the rest of us -- they might be a little lucky too and so they are making more dollars.

I am moved to sympathy. I am even willing to do something about this. I hereby offer to trade places, straight across, with a $250,000 earner.

That's right. I will exchange all my income, liabilities and assets in a clean swap, and assume the tremendous burden of a high-income American citizen.

I realize I've been living on easy street, making south of $50k.

But I am offering that wealthy man a chance to lie in my hammock for a season or two, tax-free.

Any takers?

In general and regarding the federal deficit, I am a Krugmanite. That is, Paul Krugman, the NYTimes columnist, makes more sense to me than some other financial writers.

Krugman is not over-wrought by the current deficit and neither am I.

In contrast, the tenor of the right-wing demands and their righteous posturing looks like political showmanship.

"Oh, woe," they cry. "The country is in ruins."

I've heard that before, but there is nothing wrong with this country that we can't fix. And one of the tools we use to fix it is progressive taxation, as established by an amendment to the Constitution.

Enough of that. I would be a better progressive, or at least a more popular one, except my own people are often lunatical.

We're pregnant. This might not bother anyone else too much, but I'm a writer, and I live and die by my words -- which is why, when I overheard that phrase the other day at the cafe, I wanted to get up and choke the fellow.

He said, "We're pregnant." I wanted to say the hell you are.
You are not and never will be.

I know that the intention behind this new usage is to include the male parent in the process -- like he was actually doing some of the work, which he is not.

Like he would know what it is like, which will never happen.

Famously, at least up to the present, you were either pregnant or you were not. It was a word with one of those rare precise meanings in the English language.

Now it's "we're pregnant." I suppose we are all pregnant. Is it something like indigestion?

As a shared experience, we are all included now, and the world has become a better place.

This is the kind of spurious "improvement" that gives the left a bad name. Changing the meaning of words is a waste of energy and can even be destructive. We are not pregnant.

African Song. Nkosi sikeleli Afrika is an African hymn, It means God Bless Africa. It is the national anthem of several African countries.

Here it is sung in the Xhosa language of South Africa. Just one verse and humming the tune. You can sing along with it.

When I was in Africa, I would try a word or two of Xhosa, which has numerous click sounds. People would fall down laughing at my attempts, but they appreciated the effort.

Frog Hospital and Farm News Annual Spring Subscription Drive. This newsletter, going for 12 years now, relies on subscription revenue from a few faithful followers. Some readers send a check every year and I am very grateful for their continued support.

Other readers send a check as the spirit moves them, and those checks are most welcome.

As I have said before, these checks keep the writer from getting cranky. When you starve the writer, he is liable to get self-righteous and don the martyr's robe and begin preaching and hectoring the readers.

But with a small bit of income, the writer can take a more detached and benign look at the many joyful events in our lives, paying equal attention to the suffering and pains we endure.

So, if you can afford it -- after you pay the rent, the mortgage, the groceries, and what ever you need to save for the education of your children and grandchildren -- then ...

Send a Check for $25, made out to Fred Owens and mail it to Fred Owens, 7922 Santa Ana RD, Ventura CA, 93001.

Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Farm News from California and stories from Africa

2011-04-10T15:21:00.000-07:00

Still Cold in Sunny California, but the Drought is Officially Over.

We had a lot of rain this winter. Governor Jerry Brown saw that the reservoirs were full and the snow cap was substantial. He said the drought was over.

But here it is April and it's still cold like winter. We had a frost twice this week -- pretty late for our territory. I had to rush out in the dark of night and throw a plastic tarp over the tomatoes.

Meanwhile some nasty little bug is eating the turnip leaves. Geez, they got a lot of critters in California. Half the precious baby turnips were gnawed by these nasty bugs.

I take this personally. Or I did, but I got over it. I don't know how to fix it. I just planted more turnips.

Then the ground squirrels come out at night, or during the day when no one is around, and nibble the edge of the Romaine lettuce. For those guys, I douse the lettuce patch with cayenne pepper -- buy it in bulk and spread it around. This slows them down.

That's how you get to sustainable agriculture, because a few nibbles on the lettuce is something you can live with. There's enough for everybody, if you don't get too piggy.

Malibu Garden Club. We drove to Malibu to hear a lecture on sustainable landscaping. I'm what you call a sustainable gardener. I try not to work too hard, and then I don't get all worn out -- in other words, I work on a sustainable basis.

Now all I have to do is write about a book about this and give lectures. I could make a bundle of money. But I would need to make it much more complicated, so people would believe that I am an expert.

Anyway, the guy at Malibu was a pretty good speaker, and Malibu is wonderful. It's a magical, beautiful seaside village. All the movies stars and wealthy Hollywood people live there, and I can see why. If I had four or five million dollars to buy a house, I would buy one in Malibu and watch the sun go down from my deck...... although I don't know if four or five million is enough for a good view in Malibu.

Some people are put off by the pretentiousness and total social-climbing atmosphere of Malibu -- but I just ignore it. I'd go there anytime -- it's a little piece of heaven on earth.

Politics. The rich Democrats live in Malibu and the rich Republicans live in Santa Barbara. Let's raise their taxes.

The Song of Bathabile, the Song of Africa. I'm seeking a title for my new work about Africa. Bathabile is a girl's name in the Ndebele language of Zimbabwe. It means happiness. The new work, this "Song of Bathabile," will be a book, but it starts now as fragments on Facebook.

That's right, I'm going full over to the new social media. I write fragments and pieces of this story and post them on Facebook along with a photo. People write comments. I am not going to write this all by myself, but will include the words of other people.

Fact or fiction. Don't even ask. This is so way beyond the derelict category of fact/fiction. But it will be good and it will be meaningful.

I urge you to go to Facebook and friend me (awful new verb, to friend, as the English language is both corrupted and beautified by new usages) --

But, on Facebook, you will find me at "LaConner Views." -- I know, I know, everyone on Facebook uses their real name. But I don't. It's the way I got started, posting photos of nice places in my old hometown of LaConner, so I called it "LaConner Views" -- because I didn't know that you're supposed to use your real name.

Anyway, go to LaConner Views and be my friend. Then you can read and join in the "Song of Bathabile."

Frog Hospital and Farm News Annual Spring Subscription Drive. This newsletter, going for 12 years now, relies on subscription revenue from a few faithful followers. Some readers send a check every year and I am very grateful for their continued support.

Other readers send a check as the spirit moves them, and those checks are most welcome.

As I have said before, these checks keep the writer from getting cranky. When you starve the writer, he is liable to get self-righteous and don the martyr's robe and begin preaching and hectoring the readers.

But with a small bit of income, the writer can take a more detached and benign look at the many joyful events in our lives, paying equal attention to the suffering and pains we endure.

So, if you can afford it -- after you pay the rent, the mortgage, the groceries, and what ever you need to save for the education of your children and grandchildren -- then ...

Send a Check for $25, made out to Fred Owens and mail it to Fred Owens, 7922 Santa Ana RD, Ventura CA, 93001.

Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.

Either way I will very thankful.

Everybody Loves Somebody

2011-04-03T12:32:00.000-07:00

It's been cool and wet in Southern California, but after all those winters in Puget Sound, it feels like a day at the beach to me.

Here at Love House Dahlias we have 9,000 sweet peas plants just eager to burst into blossoms, all healthy and strong, vigorous and upright -- but you don't get flowers without sunshine -- and so we're just waiting, day after cloudy day.

I keep telling the boss, "Any day now we'll have thousands of flowers," but any day hasn't come yet.

Our hope is that they don't all blossom at the same time. Seeing as half the plots are partly shaded by trees, and those shaded plots are coming along much more slowly, then we might get lucky and have the harvest stretch out over a month's time.

Meanwhile I planted several rows of red amaranth, zinnias, cosmos and other annuals, which we hope too have blooming after the sweet peas.

Plus a lot of onions and garlic. The gophers don't seem to like onions, but we do.

You heard about the gopher wars in the last newsletter. It goes on. "Never give a inch," is what old man Stamper said in Ken Kesey's novel, Sometimes a Great Notion." And that's what I say.

Henry Fonda played old man Stamper in the movie version of Kesey's novel, which also starred Paul Newman and Lee Remick.

Speaking of movies, I made a video:

Everybody Loves Somebody, with Chickens. It's only ninety seconds long, so please take a look. I can only say that if you sing for the chickens, they will lay more eggs.

I do have the performance bug I admit -- comes from living close to Hollywood

Like a spell of magic, or just a coincidence, but I was at the Ojai Library the other day, and I decided to read some plays, to begin to understand dialog.

Randomly, it seemed, I grabbed Bell, Book and Candle, then I grabbed Blithe Spirit by Noel Coward, and I grabbed Peter Pan.

Three plays -- all fantasies about magic and ghosts. Except that was not my intention. I need to look up Carl Jung on this one, he would say there's an unconscious archetype at play here.

Bell Book and Candle was a wonderful movie starring James Stewart,Kim Novak and Jack Lemmon. But it also had a supporting performance by the incomparable Ernie Kovacs.

Do you realize that the Coen Brothers, producers of Fargo and True Grit, learned everything they know about making movies from watching Ernie Kovacs? -- at least that's the legend.

Not forgetting small parts played by Elsa Lancaster and Hermione Gingold, both frequent guests on the "Jack Paar Show," if you're old enough to remember that.

But I digress. The movie was wonderful. I didn't know that it was based on a Broadway play, circa 1950, which is the version that I read from the library.

Blithe Spirit was mildly amusing, lots of very British language, as you would expect Noel Coward to write -- dry humor and dry martinis.

Peter Pan is a classic, played by Marty Martin on the TV version in the 1950s, back when everyone was watching one of the three major networks, and she called out to virtually all the children of America, the vast millions of baby boomers, when they really were just barely beyond being babies, she called out, "Do you believe in fairies?"

And we did believe in fairies from that day on -- hence the Sixties and the resulting cultural revolution.

I often see fairies dancing in the fields at the dahlia farm, but I still work for a living. I think we learned, after the sixties, to enjoy a sense of wonderment, but to stay grounded all the same.

Keep working, praying, and paying taxes -- be honest and be generous, and you will sleep good at night.

Sing to the chickens now and then, and things will be all right.

In politics it's either feminists or fundamentalists, and I'm not one, not one of either. Pax on both houses. That's pax, not pox -- an obscure joke, I guess.

Frog Hospital and Farm News Annual Spring Subscription Drive. This newsletter, going for 12 years now, relies on subscription revenue from a few faithful followers. Some readers send a check every year and I am very grateful for their continued support.

Other readers send a check as the spirit moves them, and those checks are most welcome.

As I have said before, these checks keep the writer from getting cranky. When you starve the writer, he is liable to get self-righteous and don the martyr's robe and begin preaching and hectoring the readers.

But with a small bit of income, the writer can take a more detached and benign look at the many joyful events in our lives, paying equal attention to the suffering and pains we endure.

So, if you can afford it -- after you pay the rent, the mortgage, the groceries, and what ever you need to save for the education of your children and grandchildren -- then ...

Send a Check for $25, made out to Fred Owens and mail it to Fred Owens, 7922 Santa Ana RD, Ventura CA, 93001.

Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.

Either way I will very thankful.

And now I will go back to tending those sweet peas with a blithe spirit.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Fighting with Gophers

2011-03-11T16:02:00.000-08:00

I stand guard. I will never give up and never retreat. Who's farm is it? It's our farm, and if those gophers think they can borrow under the raised beds and eat our Brussel Sprouts -- I'm telling you, this will not stand.

They got a whole hay field, twenty acres, just next door, they can roam all they want. I am not saying to make the species extinct. I'm just trying to establish a boundary.

And these so-called wise people say you gotta live with nature. Well, of course you gotta live with nature. And I tell you, if nature is a gopher, then nature better darn well learn to live with me too.

Because you, Mr. Underground Rodent, will NOT take over our vegetable patch.

Or eat the roots of the roses, which have been here many years.

Friends in High Places. I have friends in high places. I'm talking about hawks and owls. I see them floating above, or perched in the trees. They get hungry every day. And they can see YOU, Mr. Gopher. So you better watch your step. Dinner is dinner and we all gotta make a living.

I'm going to live with nature. I might get plucked from the sky someday myself. But in the meantime, you leave my Brussel Sprouts alone.

Little bastards.

Colonel Kaddafi Will Lose. I want him to lose. You want him to lose. So we only need to construct a winning scenario for the rebel forces in the East.

CNN reports the rebels are in headlong retreat. I also monitor the BBC, Al Jazeera, and Ha-Eretz for news from the Middle East, and these sources report the same news.

Kaddafi is winning but all he has is cash, a mountain of it to be sure, but cash eventually runs out, it does not grow. He has cash, but no income. Even the Russians and the Chinese will abandon him.

He pays mercenaries $1,000 per day. They will fight for him until he runs out of money.

But the rebels have much more -- they have friends. Friendship grows and becomes more powerful. But cash -- without income -- eventually disappears.

So the Colonel will lose.

And we will never give up.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Ordinary Things

2011-02-26T08:35:00.000-08:00

RAIN. I have been in California since early November, facing sunshine day after day after day. I have gotten used to it. And then today it's raining, and right away I get depressed and I wish the sun was shining, even though I live on a farm and I know we need the rain.

SNOW. LaConner artist Janet Laurel called me at 7:15 this morning. She is an early riser and a high energy woman. I am barely awake at that time, but I welcome her calls, because I am inclined to be gloomy and her voice cheers me up. She said, looking out her window, there was six inches of snow on the ground and it was 18 degrees cold out there -- really cold, but the skies were diamond clear. LaConner is all socked in by the snow.

Janet loves to drive around -- she will zip down to Seattle on short notice, and fight all the way through traffic and then come back hours later and still be energetic for some other project.

But today Janet is housebound -- not by the snow -- but she is confined to her living room sofa, recovering from surgery on her foot. The doctor said, "Janet, stay off your foot, or it won't heal." And she is not allowed to drive her car.

This is not easy for her to do, being so energetic. I said to her "Do you knit or embroider?" She said no. But she's an artist, so I said, "You get a small sketch book and start sketching. That will use up some of your restless energy."

She agreed that was a good idea. We talked about other things for a while and then I said, "Goodbye, I gotta eat breakfast."

But it's still raining. I have to change my farm routine on account of the rain. On most days the first thing I do, upon arising at 6:30 a.m., is put on my coat on and my shoes over my pajamas and walk over to the chicken coop and let the hens out. Then I feed them and gather what eggs might be there.

Then coffee and journal and email and shower and eat.

Then work -- but this is where I am adjusting. Yesterday, knowing the rain was coming, I spent extra time in the garden planting seeds.

I planted shelling peas, 51 days to harvest. I planted turnips in the other row, and I snuck a row of radishes in between, because the radishes will come and go quickly.

I also planted two rows of beets.

I avoided planting carrots. They make a problem for me because the seeds are so tiny, and I think I just have bad luck or some kind of mental block when it comes to growing carrots.

Do you ever have that problem in your garden? Like some vegetable, and you just can't seem to grow it, even if you try year after year?

Tomatoes, for instance. I used to have bad luck with tomatoes, but this year I feel that my luck has changed. This year I am going BIG on tomatoes, Brandywine, Heirloom, Zebra Stripe, Grape-size and a few others. I believe the force is with me. I have the seedlings started in the greenhouse, and I watch them with loving care. The danger is over-watering. If you water them too much you can love them to death. Better to have a little faith and not watch them too closely

But that was yesterday. It's too wet to work in the vegetable garden today. I might plant some more flats of seeds in the greenhouse, but we are running out of space. The greenhouse is close to a 1,000 square feet, but it is full of 3,000 dahlia tubers, all carefully marked and identified, all 200 varieties, all laying in 3 inches of compost on tables -- it's very complicated. I would have to give you a seminar on how to grow dahlias, but this is the commercial part of the organization, so dahlias, and the space to grow them, are the Prime Directive on this little farm, this little piece of heaven by the Ventura River.

We were planning to have a tractor class today. Andy was going to show me the tractor and how it runs -- it's fairly simple, a diesel engine with hydraulic power to the front scoop and power take-off in the rear.

We were going to scoop out and re-arrange the manure pile. It's getting to be quite a pile, considering that we have five horses boarded on the farm. They generate two to three cartloads of manure per day. It's black gold, but it has to composted first, and we need the tractor to up-end the pile.

But it's too wet. Okay, I know what you're saying. If we were really hard-core farmers we wouldn't let a little rain stop us from the tractor work.

Except there are plenty of things to do around here that do not involved getting wet and muddy. My Mom and Dad sent me to college and I am an educated man. So I will apply myself agriculturally but keep my socks dry at the same time.

Ordinary things. I am writing about these ordinary things because the news is full of mass demonstrations and violence across the Middle East. It's scary and it's hopeful, and some young people are having the best time of their lives, and some other young people are wounded and dying, and some other older people, in those blessed countries, are wishing with all their might that it was just back to normal and be quiet and ordinary, like it is here on the farm.

So I am writing about these ordinary things on the farm as a gesture of solidarity to the struggling Arab people -- their countries will get back to being ordinary again, and I hope and pray with all my heart that it's a better place than it was.

UNSUBSCRIBE ANYTIME. I am cleaning up the mailing list this week. If you got on this list by accident, then I can get you off easily. Or if this is clogging your mail box and you never read it anymore, just hit reply and type "unsubscribe."

EXCEPTION. There is an exception to the unsubscribe rule. Certain persons are considered "legacy readers." I could not bear to continue this work without your support. You may hardly ever read it, but I like to know that you are "out there" and receiving these stories. Legacy readers may request to unsubscribe, but their request might be denied. After one or two requests, if they STILL want to be taken off the mailing list, then the request will graciously be approved.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

This Writers Life

2011-02-20T18:14:00.000-08:00

Kentucky author Wendell Berry courted arrest when he and some friends occupied the Governor's office. Berry objected to the coal mining which strips the mountains of soil, and this kind of civil disobedience was a very strong move on his part, way past his usual comfort zone of essay-writing and speechifying.

Is Wendell Berry a farmer or a writer? Can you be both? Can you do both well?

I heard Noam Chomsky speaking with Amy Goodman on her TV news show, Democracy Now. Chomsky is an important and very intelligent idiot, known for the volume and quantity of his prose. My take is that if you spend enough hours typing you might get something right and Chomsky does.

Chomsky should write less -- you can't be an expert on everything even if you are the smartest guy in Boston.

From Bahrain to Wisconsin. But something is going around, from Bahrain to Madison, Wisconsin. People are in the streets in both places -- is this only a coincidence, or is some there some kind of surging energy coursing across the globe, like a wave about to crash on distance shores, fueled by atmospheric changes we can barely understand?
Is it from the left? the right? forward? backward? I have no read on this.

Brought to you by Facebook. This revolution is brought to us by the faceless billionaires who operate Facebook and Google.

I am glad -- don't get me wrong -- glad that the young people are using social media to get around the current regime in the Middle East. But I warn them to remain skeptical of the new powers and the new media. Use Facebook -- I do -- but don't trust it.

In Wisconsin, the governor is selectively breaking public employee unions. He is targeting the teachers and letting the police and firemen keep their arrangements. I would listen to the governor's argument if he wished to abolish or reduce the power of ALL public employee unions.

One is reminded of Governor Calvin Coolidge in Massachusetts when he broke the police union in Boston in 1919. This staunch stand against public employee unions won him a vice-presidential nomination in 1920, and then he became President when Warren Harding died in office.

At least Coolidge took a consistent and clear position.

But when you pick on the teachers, and let the cops and firemen take a pass -- because they supported your election last year -- well that just stinks of politics, and I oppose the whole thing.

What I read: "Police and fire unions, which have some of the most expensive benefits but who supported Mr. Walker’s campaign for governor, are exempted."

The Persian Gulf. Meanwhile, trouble erupts in Bahrain, and concerned citizens like me rush to Google and Wikipedia to find out where this little island IS. We don't even know where it IS, or what they do there, except it says that the Navy's 5th fleet is based on this little island.

Why is the fleet there, for the fishing?

Let's back up to last week's revolution in Egypt. We all know a little about Egypt. Many Americans have been there as tourists. The pyramid appears on the backside of our dollar bills. Our Biblical heritage depicts stories of the pharaohs, and we older folks can't help but picture Charlton Heston as Moses, leading his people out of Egypt.

We know SOMETHING about Egypt, but NOTHING about Bahrain.

So why is the fleet there? For the oil. We need to bring the fleet home and get off the oil economy. We can do this in five years if we ever really wanted to.

As clumsy and as cynical as our foreign and military policies can be, we meddled in the affairs of Egypt and Israel and helped maintain a broader peace. We have done more good than harm in that area.

But the Persian Gulf is nothing but war, death and oil. And I say get out now.

Okay, that's enough opinion. The title of this piece is "the Writer's Life." That's me, the writer.

Last week on Wednesday, I woke up feeling lonely and I was tired of working on these four acres. I was irritated at my co-workers for no apparent reason.

By the next day I figured it out. I ain't a farmer, I'm a writer.
I don't know how or why Wendell Berry does it, but it drives me nuts. Farming is a clear second choice for me, as a way to make a living. Writing is my first choice, but it always leaves me broke and breathless.

I figured by this time in my life, I would have some modest success, a few books sold, a newspaper column that paid, a writer-in-residence gig -- something. But it didn't happen.

That's why I went back to work at the farm last summer, and glad of it. But I will never be a first-class farmer like Dave Hedlin, the man I worked for back in the Skagit.

I just get tired of it. That's what happened to me last week.

Fortunately, they are not working me to death here at Love House Dahlias. I only work part-time and I can adjust my schedule, so I have begun spending more time at a house in Altadena -- not a farm, but a home filled with books and a darn good high-speed Internet connection. I go there to write.

But I do not like this multi-tasking life, trying to farm and write at the same time. You end up doing poorly at both. I don't know how Wendell Berry does it.

The Seven Storey Mountain is Thomas Merton's autobiography, a tale of his spiritual journey, one of the great confessions, from a man whose confessions are worth knowing.

The confessional genre is the most debased in current literature. People feel compelled to bare their souls in blogs and Facebook rants, and they have NOTHING to say. It's awful.

Well, it wasn't Thomas Merton's fault. We were put on this earth to commit interesting sins -- that is why God does not destroy humankind. I hope we never bore Him.

Merton preached, hypocritically, against worldly fame and fortune. His books were best sellers. He was a media star at the time. Merton was a Trappist monk with a vow of poverty, but the revenue from his book sales made him a great power within his monkish community.

That was his sin -- success and wealth, and he enjoyed it.

I have committed some interesting sins. Those are the ones I find worth writing about. But Merton never "told all" in his confessions and neither will I.

The Style of Leo Tolstoy. I am at page 771 of War and Peace. It is such a wonderful and very long novel -- 1,300 pages altogether, as broad and as deep as Russia.

I was trying to identify Tolstoy's style of writing and became astonished. He has no style! That's why he's so good.

Style has its place with lesser works and lesser writers. I have a style, a way of saying things. But I am going to rise above this. I am going to write like Tolstoy -- with no style, just the story itself. What a grand ambition.

Harvey Blume. Harvey Blume is from Brooklyn and lives there now. I met him in the 1990s when we both lived in Boston. We both attended the Tikkun salon on Sunday mornings, a discussion group of bright Jewish Intellectuals. I especially remember Debbie Osnowitz -- she could speak, off the cuff, in whole paragraphs. But Harvey was a pretty good talker himself.

Anyway, Harvey wrote this piece and I liked it. Boomers -- Part One.

Wendell Berry, Noam Chomsky, Thomas Merton, Leo Tolstoy and Harvey Blume. These are some writers I admire although I did not find anything good to say about Chomsky. These are guys I hang out with. They say writing is a lonely occupation -- not so. I live with these people, learn from them, steal from them, despise them, love them -- and other writers too.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

10,000 years of farming in Egypt.

2011-02-15T09:17:00.000-08:00

The silt comes down on the annual flood, making the soil fertile. The ancient people began to grow more food than they needed. It was the surplus that made it possible to build the pyramids and the cities that came to follow.

The great city of Alexandria rose at the mouth of the Nile, a center of ancient learning and trade. Learning was possible because with enough food came the leisure to read and write books, and with a surplus of food there was something to trade.

Egyptians traded wheat to the Greeks who would have starved on their soil-poor rocky shores that were only fit for grazing goats.

In later centuries, Egypt became the breadbasket of the Roman Empire.

Trade and knowledge -- it was the farm that made it possible.

Farmers in Egypt and elsewhere tend to be more conservative. The country people, since those early times in Egypt, were very conservative. And in all places and times, in our nation as well, the country people have been more conservative, more old-fashioned, resisting change and clinging to orthodoxy and the ways of their fathers.

The city people work for changes, admire fashion, trends, and ideas, pursue novelties, develop progressive philosophies, concoct startling new theories, and they want to overthrow the established order.

But the city people have always depended on the agricultural surplus from the conservative country side.

That is a curious mutual dependency, which began in Egypt.

So the old Egyptian farmer said, "It would be so much fun to be in a riot and get my fair share of abuse. But I am too old for that now, so I think they should all be arrested."

He did not trust those young upstarts in Tahrir Square, even though he had once felt that way himself.

But everywhere, across Africa, voices rose crying out for change.

In Zimbabwe they heard the call and said, "Dear Mr. Mubarak, When you leave, will you take Robert Mugabe with you?"

In South Africa, they upheld an image counter to the stubborn-ness of Mubarak.

Nelson Mandela was the real hero of African statesmanship. It was not his years in prison, not even his service as a President of a liberated South Africa. No deed was more important than his final choice -- to step down after serving one term. Mandela went home when his job was done, and that made him the best man in Africa.

But Mubarak could not learn that -- he had to be shown the door.

I am glad that Mubarak will stay in the country side, in a resort villa near the Red Sea.. His plea was heartfelt -- "I will die in Egypt."

He may deserve exile or criminal prosecution. Yet it will be a strong testament to the strength of the Egyptian people if they can let him live out his days quietly -- because they no longer fear him.

It's just kind of classy -- if they let him go.

No Jobs for College Graduates in Egypt. They are educated but unemployed, by the millions in Cairo, festering on their Blackberries and iPhones, boiling with knowledge.

This revolution began in Tunisia with a college graduate who got tired of looking for a job that did not exist, an office job where he could wear office casual clothes, like he had seen from videos on YouTube, designing and selling Arabic software.

No jobs existed like that. But he was determined and he borrowed a cart, loaded it with orange and bananas, and began to pursue the noble occupation of fruit peddler.

This man is my hero, I too am a college graduate, I too have sometimes worked peddling fruit.

But this young man was harassed and beaten by the Tunisian police because he had no permit and no money to bribe them.

It was his outrage and self-immolation that sparked the revolution in Egypt.

What this means, and I tell this to the young men and women in Tahrir Square -- you are know free to become fruit peddlers. You can repair shoes, you can open a cafe -- seriously, I'm not kidding.

Because there is no way on earth that any new democratic government in Egypt can provide millions of professional-level jobs to college graduates. It won't happen unless they hire a million more bureaucrats who will then burden the working public with massive taxation and regulation and by doing so, create a government as bad as the one they just got rid of.

No, that won't happen. If the government is good at all, it will stay out of the way, and permit and allow the young people to sell fruit from a cart, and build up the country that way.

That would be a good thing with so many young people wanting to work.

Egypt imports food. Egypt was self-sufficient in food until 1960. And let's not forget the long-term time frame. Egypt was self-sufficient in food for 10,000 years and was often a net exporter. In Roman times Egypt was the most valued province because of the vast wheat crops, harvested for the hungry thousands in Rome.

But not now. Now Egypt imports 40 per cent of its food. The production of food has not kept pace with the increase in population.

Where is the is freedom? Where is the independence, if you can't feed your own people?

So the young college graduates in Egypt had better face this problem squarely. Take your Twitters and your Facebook and your Google and start talking about food independence. That's where the work is.

Grow more food. The future of Egypt depends on better farming.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Out of Africa

2011-02-01T10:09:00.001-08:00

Never forget that Egypt is in Africa -- it is clearly and most definitely an African nation. Only look at the map to confirm this fact. The media repeats endlessly the Arabic character of Egyptian culture -- true, but not true enough.

Egypt is African. The great book of the Bible is the Exodus, about going "out of Africa" -- a sentiment repeated endlessly in Jewish liturgy -- "Thank God we are no longer slaves in Egypt."

Thank God we got out of Africa.

Out of Africa -- The title of Isak Dinesen's wonderful book, and the movie of the same name, with Robert Redford and Meryl Streep.

Out of Africa -- the story of the human race, is it not? The human race began in Africa and lived within that vast continent on the savanna for a hundred thousand years, and another hundred thousand years, and we did not leave, expand or evolve until a mere 60,000 years ago -- although scientists keep adjusting that figure up and down, but they all agree -- we came "Out of Africa" and spread across the globe.

And the people of Africa -- always mentally include Egypt, even though it is also Arabic and part of the Middle East -- but the people of Africa endorse the findings of scientists -- that Africa is the true home and mother of the human race.

This all happened before the invention/development/discovery of agriculture, and we need to know what happened before that, before we planted crops and built cities and learned to read and write.

That is what we call pre-history, which is actually pre-literature and pre-agriculture.

Almost all pre-history took place in Africa, where the Nile and the Congo Rivers flow, and the River Niger, and the Limpopo and the Zambezi Rivers flow. Those are the principle rivers.

So, as events unfold in Cairo, I just want to remind people that this is a story about Africa.

Who Cooks for You? I'm going to write a book about Africa, but not until next winter. I'm too busy on the farm right now.

But the book will be about, or developed from, the year I spent in Africa in 1997.

I would like to call it "Out of Africa" or "Exodus" or "Heart of Darkness" but those titles have been taken. Well, I have plenty of time to think of a title.

The book will be classified as fiction. It has to be fiction. There are no facts in Africa -- I never found any. Anything that looked like a fact in Africa turned out to be a mirage, or the first layer of a hidden truth, which also turned out to be a mirage.

All non-fiction books written about Africa are quite dubious, in my opinion.

So the book will be fictional, and one chapter will be titled "Who Cooks for You?" which is the story of my romance and engagement to an African woman.

She -- She -- I'm not even sure of her real name, but I met her near the Matopo Hills, which is clearly, or possibly, the site of King Solomon's Mines, as described by H. Rider Haggard.

You understand? It will be so much easier to write this if I just let it be a fictional story.

These kinds of stories are really necessary for understanding Africa, and understanding the current crisis in Egypt.

Well, I have to go out now and tend the sweet peas and look after the horses. We had a good rain yesterday -- what a blessing.

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Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, 7922 Santa Ana Rd, Ventura CA 93001. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

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Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Pale Yellow Primroses

2011-01-25T19:37:00.001-08:00

I bought seven pale yellow primroses in four-inch pots, to plant on the path to the Johnny.

It was a triumph -- Andy and I moved it yesterday from in back of the barn. It had been sitting there for at least four years. "It was here when we bought the place," Andy said. And the Johnny has been used by itinerant workers who stayed in the bunkhouse. It was cleaned and emptied regularly by a company in Ventura, and that cost $50. A large tanker truck drove into the yard and a cheerful fellow hooked up a long hose and drained the Johnny -- that hardly took five minutes and he was gone to the next place.

All for the better sanitation of these lovely acres by the Ventura River. But it was too far from the bunkhouse to the barn. Our loyal and efficient workers deserved a sweeter moonlit path, should the need arise in the wee hours.

So we figured to move it in back of the bunkhouse, where you couldn't see it, but it was much closer.

Yesterday, we hitched the Johnny to the tractor with a rope and dragged it over. We had to manhandle it into position for the last twenty feet. That took some sweat and strain, but we were close to the finish and almost inspired at that point.

Andy and I were quite proud of getting it done with such dispatch. There it was, the Johnny in a better place. I wiped it down for cobwebs, and I thought we might burn sage to honor the Johnny's new home.

But it was at dinner that evening when I realized the proper and living benediction would be a primrose path. Not a metaphor, heck no. But real pale-yellow primroses glistening in the moonlight on a path from the bunk house door, around the side and then to the back to the Johnny.

So I drove to Wal-Mart on Saturday morning to buy the flowers. It was crowded when I got into the parking lot, I was listening to FM radio -- Live at the Metropolitan Opera from New York. The third act of Rigoletto was just beginning.

I heard the famous aria, La Donna E Mobile as I parked my car. What a thrilling song. The woman is fickle, the tenor cries. She tears your heart and fills your life with beauty but you can never trust her.

How true! But if we die of love, is there a better fate? Yes, leading me down the primrose path with pale yellow flowers.

Well, I guess I'm getting my metaphors mixed up, but it all seems to matter -- the bunkhouse and the loyal crew, the flowers that grace our lives, the determined teamwork between Andy and myself, and the fabulous music that beams across the continent on electronic waves -- live from New York City, connecting us to the wider world.

Serious Work. We actually do some serious horticultural work here at Love House Dahlias. We're not a big player in Ventura County which had more than $1.5 billion in farm sales last year, but we are a part of it, and we are generating real farm dollars. There's a future in this kind of work. I get pretty excited on many days because there is so much to do around here and so much to learn.

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Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, 7922 Santa Ana Rd, Ventura CA 93001. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Rainfall plus news of sweet peas, dahlias, and horses

2011-01-16T15:48:00.000-08:00

FARM NEWS

December rains make the Ventura River flow. December's unexpected rainfall has put a lot of water in the Ventura River. It's been dry so far into January, but the river is still flowing.

I was out there this morning to look -- the river is only 150 feet from the motor home where I live on this small farm. So I walked past the arena where the horses are ridden, then through the brush, and across the small round rocks, and I heard the river rushing.

It is such a sweet sound, clear and cold water pouring over the rocks like a mountain stream. Like a real river, which it is.

We are seven miles from the mouth, where the Pacific Ocean waves pound against sand bars, piling up sand to form a lagoon, ideal for pelicans.

I am often driving down to Ventura Point where this river meets the ocean.

A thousand years of rainfall have created a small point, jutting out from the smooth curve of the shoreline.

The point makes long cascading waves with curling tubes -- ideal for surfers seeking long rides.

I come to watch the surfers watch the waves. Surfers wait in their cars for good surf, watching the waves. Then they paddle out and wait and wait -- for the right wave.

This is a great teaching.

I'm going there -- to Ventura Point. I'm going in the next hour, after I finish this report.

Life and work is going well at the Farm. We planted about 8,000 sweet pea seedlings in seventy raised beds. That's a lot of sweet peas.

We cut river cane, which grows like a nuisance in the back of the farm -- but they make good stakes and we needed several hundred stakes, to string up the netting, to serve as a trellis for the sweet peas, climbing to the sky, all 8,000 seedlings in seventy raised beds.

It was a lot of work, but we had willing hands, even during those rainy days in December.

Now we are looking at the sweet peas all tucked in and about to grow as the days turn longer, to bloom and fill the air with sweet scent, to cut and harvest and sell these flowers at the market in March and April.

It's all a gamble. A lot of labor and expense goes into these flowers. A million things could go wrong -- bad weather, a plague of insects, plant viruses, or an invasion of hostile anti-sweet pea aliens from Mars -- all a great risk.

But a tidy profit is a possible outcome as well -- that's our hope.

After the sweet pea harvest, we will plant about 3,000 dahlia tubers. This is the Show, over 200 varieties.

It is the best and biggest spread of dahlias in Southern California. Get some for your garden -- go to Love House Dahlias and see the brilliant colors -- each variety of dahlia is lovingly portrayed on this website.

Horse News. We have a new horse. His name is Maverick, a gelding, 17-years-old, all white.

And very big, a cross between Arabian and Percheron. The Percheron (who, we hope, was the mother) is a draft horse, so that explains why Maverick is so big.

He's a friendly guy, but he gets "mouthy," as they say, wants to give you a little bite, like a love tap, only he has very big strong teeth.

He better not bite me. I told him this morning, "Maverick, if you bite me, I'm going to bite you back. And don't step on my foot neither."

Then I gave him a carrot.

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This book is a treasure that will still be worth reading ten years from now.

Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, 7922 Santa Ana Rd, Ventura CA 93001. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My blog: Frog Hospital

send mail to:

Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001

Requiem for a Farmer

2011-01-01T20:41:00.000-08:00

FARM NEWS from Fred Owens
Man dies in torch fire accident on farm

ELTOPIA, Wash. (AP) -- A man was killed in an accident on a farm near Eltopia.

The Franklin County sheriff's office says 75-year-old Everett D. Monk was cutting scrap metal in a field with a torch Saturday when his clothes caught fire. The Tri-City Herald reports he apparently died of burns.

A friend found the body.

That was the news story. Just those few words. It was in the paper last year, but I kept this file because I wanted to think about this man, 75-years-old, and his name was Everett D. Monk.

I thought of calling his people in Eltopia to find out about his life, but I didn't need to do that. I found I could read his whole life story from this news item.

He was out in the field cutting scrap metal with his torch in early December. It was cold out there in the sage brush country.

This was in eastern Washington, with low hills and no trees -- just wheat fields lying fallow in the winter sun.

This is where you could research it -- you can find things on the Internet. You could find what the weather was like in Eltopia on the day that Everett Monk died.

But it was almost surely sunny and cold -- that's the typical winter weather, and it's good working weather.

Everett Monk was 75, but he didn't want to sit around the house. He had been a working man all his life. He grew up on a farm and started doing serious chores every day since he was ten years old.

Starting work at the age of ten, driving the pickup around the ranch and handling tools.

So he worked every day for 65 years, until December of last year, and he wasn't going to just sit around in his easy chair on that last day.

He just wasn't used to that.

Instead he got dressed and went out. There was a "bone yard" -- a pile of rusted out implements and machinery -- but it was a good hundred yards from the house.

The bone yard was a little bit out of sight, and his family was gone to town. There's not that much to do in December on a farm. That's when you have the time to work on some projects -- like making modifications on a piece of farm equipment.

You can't just buy a hay baler and use it, but you need to adapt it to the special conditions of your own piece of land.

Everett Monk knew how to do that, and his welding tools were in the back of his pickup that cold and windy day.

I'm not sure about that -- was the wind blowing? Or was it calm?

Because he began cutting the scrap metal and working in a careful way.

Then the accident happened. Maybe it was calm and then, all of a sudden, the wind picked up, and blew a spark from the torch to the sleeve of his jacket, and he may have been distracted by a sudden noise over the hill, and the spark settled on his coat sleeve and began to burn, and the wind picked up and he was on fire.

He was on fire. And he was shocked. Did he drop and roll on the ground, which is what you are supposed to do if your clothes catch on fire?

I could call the sheriff or the friend who found his body and ask them -- if he just fell down, or if there was evidence that he dropped and rolled on the ground.

But that doesn't really matter too much.

A friend found his body. Everett Monk was dead, after working on the farm all his life. He may have suffered in agony from his burns, or he may have gone quickly from the shock.

But it was over. Everett Monk, the farmer from Eltopia in eastern Washington, may he rest in peace.

He could have stayed in the house on that day in December. He could have just taken it easy, but he was used to working.

In Other News

Homicide in Los Angeles drops to lowest rate since 1967

price of onions in India

Happy New Year,

Peace and joy to you and all your loved ones in 2011

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Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Frog Hospital Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

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Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

send mail to:

Fred Owens
Box 1292
LaConner WA 98257

Being Nice to Chickens

2010-12-17T15:00:00.000-08:00

FARM NEWS from Fred Owens, December 18, 2010

Being Nice to Chickens

But first, the Harvest News. Lots of apples in Washington this year -- 102 million forty-pound boxes are predicted. The mind boggles at that huge number of apples, and they didn't just jump into the box.

Somebody had to pick each and every single apple -- hard work. I hope they were paid well, and the farmer should get a profit too.

Red Delicious is still the dominant variety in Washington, followed by Gala, Fuji, Granny Smith, and Golden Delicious.

These are the "industrial-strength" apples that get shipped all over the world. Persons of more refined taste can shop the farmers markets and buy the tastier varieties.

Oranges. Likewise in California, the orange harvest is underway. Yield is predicted to be 93 million forty-pound boxes.

Just to push this point a little farther -- Every orange you ever ate, somebody picked it, had their hands on it before you did.
May that person prosper, and the farmer who hired him deserves a profit.

Quality is good for California oranges this year. More than 85 percent is good enough to sell as fresh. The rest get sold for juice at a lower price.

And the harvest is running two and three weeks late -- that's because of the cool, wet spring that pushed every crop late this year on the West Coast.

It doesn't matter, early or late, eat your oranges every day, and a blessing for the people who grew them.

Ventura County in California. Strawberries are a big crop in Ventura County, where I am now living. Last year, they harvested berries with a total value of over $500 million. It's kind of hard to visualize how many strawberries that is.

I don't have figures for this year, but it should be in that range.

Again, these are the "industrial strength" strawberries that get shipped all over the world. You could criticize their quality, but it would be better to feel grateful that you have berries at all.

There is no machine that picks strawberries. Somebody had to bend over to the ground or crawl on their knees to pick each and every single berry. Hard work -- you should try it some day.

May the strawberry pickers prosper, and the farmer deserves his profit.

Being Nice to Chickens. We have nine chickens on the farm -- to be exact, we have six hens, two ducks, and one bantam rooster.

It's colder now and the hens are not laying so many eggs, but they are the very best eggs you can eat.

I let the birds out of the coop first thing in the morning and feed them. They also get table scraps and whatever they can find by pecking around.

These are well-housed and well-protected chickens. They move into the coop on their own every evening because they know it's safe inside. Nonetheless, someone closes and locks the door, just to be sure.

Lots of critters around here would love to eat a chicken -- hawks, owls, and eagles ready to swoop down. Raccoons and coyotes too.

Chickens are domestic fowl and we protect them, feed them, and gather the eggs.

Now, if you want to buy eggs as good as what we have, you can find them at the farmers market at $3, $4 or $5 a dozen.

You can buys eggs for a lot less at the supermarket, mass-produced eggs, laid by chickens who don't live the life of luxury like ours do.

That is the problem. Now comes the politics. In 2008, by a margin of 63 percent, California voters passed an initiative requiring poultry farmers to be kinder to their chickens, banning the small confining cages that chickens are often kept in.

"They need fresh air, they need to scratch in the air and flap their wings. They need to live like chickens in days of old, when the housewife went to the yard and scattered her scraps of vegetable parings and bread crusts."

By law! By a vote of the people!

I am very suspicious of efforts like this. I believe that the government ought to have a minimum of regulation against cruelty toward animals.

Because the voters, by and large, simply do no know enough about chickens to have an opinion about how they ought to be cared for.

I don't want to sound like an expert or anything, but I know a happy chicken when I see one. and I know the abuse too, abuse that can arise from carelessness or a wicked desire for profit.

But the government can only prosecute the grossest offenses.

Everybody wants the chickens to be happy. No wonder the proposition passed by 63 percent. Who would vote against it?

But it was not properly worded. It should read, "We favor better care and more freedom for poultry and we are willing to pay more for our eggs."

Not that's being honest.

And this kind of thing is happening all over the country anyway -- people are paying more for eggs from free range hens. More and more people are raising their own birds. Search "urban poultry" on the Internet -- it's everywhere. People doing it themselves, and becoming real chicken people.

We're going to have happier chickens, and we're going to be eating better eggs. But it won't happen by law.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

send mail to:

Fred Owens
Box 1292
LaConner WA 98257

Back By Popular Demand

2010-12-06T19:37:00.000-08:00

A certain lady from Orcas Island has lamented the lack of political content in recent editions of the Farm News. She wants to hear some snap, crackle and pop.

I am not sure what good that would do. Could my remarks possibly improve our nation's circumstance? That is doubtful.

I think it has been good to be quiet for a change. But I have been reading, mostly on the right. My special favorite is the Thinking Housewife, and I often post my own reactions on this blog.

Laura Wood is the hostess at this Internet salon and she invites you to consider a remarkable premise -- that men and women are different, different from each other, or, to put it another way, not the same.

It's an astounding thought, and the discussion is rich. Her conclusions, derived from this premise, are quite conservative, or traditional, as she terms it.

Not me. I'm not conservative. I've decided to call myself a Merry Christmas liberal -- to wit -- I support the extension of unemployment benefits for as long as jobs are scarce.

And how do we pay for that? By jacking up the tax rates paid by wealthier people.

I'm not inviting any disagreement here, I'm just telling you what I think.

That makes me liberal, a Merry Christmas liberal, because I really hate this Happy Holiday nonsense. Christmas is about Christmas, and the other religions can just lay low until it's over. I do not support diversity.

Jews, for instance, have wonderful, meaningful spiritual feasts. Passover and Rosh Hoshannah are world class and deeply impressive, but Hannukah is boring and over-rated.

Kwanzaa is contrived and pointless. And what do the Hindus do in December? Nobody cares.

To be even handed I should now insult Moslems and pagans. Except I do not support "inclusion."

I oppose inclusion. I invite whom I choose to my party, and if anyone was left out, it was deliberate.

Well, that's a part of what I think. Here in California, we have Jerry Brown as the new governor.

Jerry Brown was not the safest choice. In California, being foolish can be the wisest thing to do.

You can hear all about the mess -- the long list of problems. The place is going to hell, it can't be fixed -- just move and get out and put your equity into someplace that isn't so crazy.

Good, I hope all those people leave right now -- maybe they should all go to Texas. Governor Rick Perry would be glad to have them.

But I like California. I'm glad to be here. And I'm going to be a part, a very small part, of what is going to make things better.

That's my attitude -- with a good attitude, you can make plans and solve problems.

And I will keep working on the farm, because that's where a lot of the good energy comes from.

This is another piece from the Thinking Housewife. No politics here, but the very best words to someone facing a life with a chronic illness. I include this because many Frog Hospital readers will find Laura Wood's politics to be very wrong

Laura writes to the woman with a chronic illness

It sounds as if you are thinking about what you
can’t do and not focusing on however little that you can. You have to expect less in every department and remember that no matter how much you can’t do, you are still irreplaceable. Your presence alone matters.

Do as little as necessary to get by. Someday your children will be older and they will help. You should enlist their help as soon as you can. Don’t feel sorry for your children or your husband because they have a sick mother and wife. Don’t feel sorry for them at all. They have you. You have given them life. That is enough. Besides, sickness provides the opportunity for an entire household to slow down and to spend more time talking or doing simple things.

Your illness is not a detour from reality. There’s a temptation to look at the rest of the world, so energetic and vital, and think they are more alive while you live in some kind of lesser, shadow world. This is false. You are more alive at these times than those who are filled with so much vitality. You are closer to the center of things. They cannot see their own mortality and the fact of death. It awaits us all and fortunate are those who see it clearly.

No moment is wasted. No time is lost. You are not on a side path, but on the main road, heading step-by-step to your ultimate destination. When you arrive there, every moment you have loved God despite your misery will be remembered. I don’t say this out of pie-in-the-sky sentimentality or wishful thinking. I say this because it is logically deducible from the facts of our existence, from the laws of nature, from our subjective experience of the world, and even from the love you still feel for your children despite your illness. This love is a form of self-forgetfulness. Where did it come from? It must have come from a Being capable of even more love.

You are confined by illness, but still you are alive and on the move every hour of the day.

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Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Frog Hospital Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

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Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

Agriculture is the New Golf

2010-11-29T09:01:00.000-08:00

FARM NEWS from Fred Owens

November 29, 2010

"Agriculture is the new golf."

I saw this story in today's Los Angeles Times. Don't mock this notion, it bodes well for the future of farming.

I have spent the weekend in Los Angeles, where new companies have spring up -- they will plant a vegetable garden in your yard, if you don't have the time to do it yourself, and -- going further, because this is Los Angeles -- they will plant and cultivate the vegetables for you.

Then all you have to do is go into the back yard before dinner and harvest some arugula for your salad.

This service is for persons of affluence, and it's a good thing -- they're taking the money they would have spent on golf and yachts and put that money into a more wholesome activity -- their own back yard for growing food.

Back to the Farm. I am leaving Los Angeles in thirty minutes and driving the 68 miles up the coast, back to the farm in Ventura. I had a great time in Los Angeles. I really love this great big city although I can't say why.

Winter. It's been cold here -- in the low 60s with wind chill making it even colder. Still I see some locals wearing shorts and sandals. I figure they simply don't own any pants or shoes, and they just endure the chill when it comes.

New Terms. We say "hobby farm" or "weekend farmer" or "gentleman farmer" -- using these terms to describe people who do not make a full living from their work in agriculture. The implication is that they are dabbling, or doing it for fun. But that is far from the case. These part-timers, as I have known them, do some impressive work of high quality and they deserve a more respectable name -- possibly "artisanal farmer" -- that term has been suggested, but it's too much of a mouthful.

A Short Newsletter is a Blessing. This newsletter is short because my ancient laptop is not working and I must borrow my sister's machine to compose this message. But short stories are good for their own sake -- I should not apologize.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

send mail to:

Fred Owens
Box 1292
LaConner WA 98257

On a Farm in Ventura, California

2010-11-15T15:36:00.000-08:00

FARM NEWS from Fred Owens

November 15, 2010

I drove 1,312 miles from LaConner to this small farm in Ventura, California. I spent $108 for gas and used two quarts of oil. My old Toyota has had a small oil leak for the past 50,000 miles, but it's not getting any worse. I listened to Books on Tape -- CDs, actually -- and that made the drive very easy.

I have a little cabin for myself on the farm. I am working part-time for my room and board. My hosts, Ann and Andy Dunstan, are really nice people and we get along well. And there is plenty of work to do.

The farm has a website, Love House Dahlias.

Here's how I found this farm. I joined Worldwide Opportunities in Organic Farming, or WOOF. All the kids know about this website. It lists hundreds of organic farms around the country and around the world -- places where you can work for your keep and where you can learn about farming, or just for people who want to travel on the cheap.

Back on the farm. First thing, I get up. I let the chickens out of their coop, collect the eggs, and then give them food and water.

Then I go back to my cabin to drink coffee and do some email -- this place isn't primitive - I get wi-fi from the main house, which is about 75 feet away.

Then I go clean up after the horses in the corral. They have four horses here, being boarded. I am getting to learn a lot of about horses, so this is very interesting.

After that, I go to the greenhouse and right now we are getting ready to plant 30,000 sweet peas.

The sweet peas will be a winter crop to fill in the space left by the dahlias. Dahlias are what they grow here on a commercial scale.

The dahlias are finished blooming for the season and slowly dying. But as long as they stay a little green, they will keep sending nourishment down to the tubers -- so we wait.

We wait until they're finished, and then let the plants sit for a couple of weeks, before we begin the big job of digging them all up -- all the tubers, dig 'em up, bring 'em into the greenhouse, wash and sort them and divide them -- some get sold, some get saved to re-plant in the spring.

That will be a lot of work.

Meanwhile, as we wait for the dahlias to finish, we plant the sweet peas in the trays in the greenhouse to get them started.

The dahlias will come out, the sweet peas will go in the ground -- being legumes, they will fix nitrogen to the soil and help the dahlias to grow. They will also provide spring blooms for sale.

That's the job. Plus feeding the chickens, looking after the horses, and I'm doing a bit of landscape gardening around the place as well.

And there's a vegetable garden to work on. Plenty of things to do on a small place like this.

And so much to learn too -- this is a very different climate and there are so many new plants to learn about.

After work, it's a six mile drive to the beach, where it's nice to go and watch the sun setting...... or six miles into town and various amusements.

Corn Harvest. The US Dept of Agriculture estimates a corn crop of 12.54 billion bushels this year -- the third largest crop on record. Average yield was 154 bushels per acre.

Most of the corn was harvested at less than 15 percent moisture. This is very good, because if the corn is harvested when it's wet, they have to run it through a grain drier and that costs time and money.

Dry corn is the best. What they do is order up a weather forecast and have it rain when the corn's growing, and have the sun shine when the corn is ready to harvest --- right!

Twelve billion bushels! That's a lot of corn -- mainly grown back there in the Midwest. All those farmers in Indiana growing corn year after year after year. Nothing but corn for miles and miles, billions of bushels.

U.S. Grains Council. Corn harvest news comes from this website.

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Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Frog Hospital Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

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Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

send mail to:

Fred Owens
Box 1292
LaConner WA 98257

Hazelnuts & Strawberries

2010-11-06T20:00:00.000-07:00

FARM NEWS from Fred Owens

November 6, 2010

On my way to California I stopped in Eugene, Oregon, to visit some friends who just bought some acres on the outskirts of town. They have planted trees all over the property -- poplars, cedars, pears, and -- for an experiment -- they planted eleven olive trees.

Olive trees may or may not grow in Eugene's climate, and they may or may not produce fruit -- but you don't know until you try, and my friends won't know for a few years.

Isn't that exciting?

Olives are iffy in Oregon. Hazelnuts are what matter, and Oregon leads the nation with an expected crop of 38,000 tons this year.

Let us attempt to visualize a 38,000-ton pile of hazelnuts -- the mind boggles.

But that's peanuts -- I mean, that's nothing. Turkey is the world leader. The Turks will harvest 630,000 tons this year -- it's a Moslem threat. They will bury us in filberts! Oh No!

Italy is number two and will harvest an expected 100,000 tons, followed by Georgia & Azerbaijan at 85,000 tons.

Okay, the USA is number four at 38,000 tons, but Oregon hazelnuts taste better.

Thinking about all that, I visited a local farm stand and bought a sack of roasted unsalted hazelnuts -- got them for a road sack, because I left Eugene the next day and headed for San Francisco Bay.

Information from the Capital Press. You can find a wealth of information about agriculture in the Pacific Northwest by reading the Capital Press, either online or in print. This weekly journal is published in Salem, Oregon, hence the name -- but the content is all about farming.

Strawberries in California. I drove to Alameda, on the San Francisco Bay, to stay with relatives. We visited the Saturday Farmer's Market just a walk down the street from their house.

We saw such an abundance of late season vegetables. It was the end of summer squash and field-grown tomatoes, but they will have strawberries and raspberries through most of the winter, plus winter greens, broccoli, turnips, carrots, and lettuce. It never ends in this climate.

Don't forget persimmons! Actually, I don't quite understand persimmons, but I respect people who do.

Anyway, I spoke with a woman from Gilroy, the Garlic Capital, the home of the renowned Garlic Festival. She was selling strawberries and raspberries, and proud of her family farm in Gilroy.

"We don't grow garlic anymore. There's only one farm left that grows garlic now," she said.

t's because most of our garlic comes from China these days, more than 75 per cent. Especially if you buy processed garlic -- powder, flakes, minced garlic in oil, and so forth -- it will likely be the cheaper Chinese garlic.

California grown garlic costs more -- and tastes better, a lot of people will say -- but you have to look for it and ask for it.

It's Time to Plant Garlic. While we're on the subject -- now is the time to plant garlic for summer harvest next year. A good catalog supplier such as Filaree Farm will mail you some high quality bulbs to plant in your garden.

Or, at no cost whatsoever, take whatever garlic bulbs are in your kitchen, break them into cloves and plant them somewhere in your garden -- you might do very well.

Like I said in the beginning about the olive trees -- you never know until you try it.

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Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Frog Hospital Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

This book is a treasure that will still be worth reading ten years from now.

Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

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Fred Owens
Box 1292
LaConner WA 98257

Ode to the Lone Kohlrabi

2010-10-31T10:17:00.000-07:00

FARM NEWS from Fred Owens

Nov. 1, 2010

Yesterday day the farm stand closed for the winter. It was sad. The frost came two weeks ago and the flower season ended -- but the fields kept pumping out fresh sweet corn and lettuce, so our shelves were well-stocked right until the last day.

The farm will continue to harvest and sell vegetables to restaurants and other wholesale accounts into November, but the farm stand is closed now and my job is over.

I had an exit interview with management. I said, "I would like to work here next year." They said, "We'd love to have you back."

That would be sometime in April, when the farm stand opens again.

So I will be going to Southern California for the winter, to work at another farm, but it will only be part-time, and I will be taking it easy.

I will be in Ventura, which is about one hour north of Los Angeles, if this was was 1970 when the freeways ran free, but more like ninety minutes to LA these days.

My sister lives in Venice near the beach, and my brother lives way to the east side in Altadena, so I can spend some time with them.

My son also lives in Venice, working at the Barnes & Noble bookstore in Santa Monica.

I have lots of family down there, several nieces as well, plus the sunshine.

Oh, they have what they call "winter" in Los Angeles, but it doesn't amount to much.

And the delights of California culture --- this I have to see and comment on. If America has lost its sense of confidence and optimism, then LA is the epi-center of decline

If America was and is a dream to fulfill, then LA is where dreams are launched -- or were launched. Is it over? or will it begin anew?

I want to see for myself.

Otherwise I will be working at this small farm in Ventura County, learning the soil and the climate.

You will notice, perhaps gratefully, that I am not writing about politics these days. We're having a national election on Tuesday, and I have followed these events closely, but I will not comment.

Except to say that it's good to be working on a farm, and I lead by example. I will say this, "Young man, go to the farm and go to work."

There's plenty of work on the farm and you will find it very satisfying. It will truly be a "growth opportunity."

If you're in the city, build a garden. Start today.

Here is my closing video-poem for the last day at the farm stand. It's about the end of things -- as you see the past slip away and you wonder what the future will bring.

Listen to the "Ode to the Lone Kohlrabi" -- it's very short and you will enjoy it.

Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Frog Hospital Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

This book is a treasure that will still be worth reading ten years from now.

Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

send mail to:

Fred Owens
Box 1292
LaConner WA 98257

Kim Chee Shortage in Korea

2010-10-22T07:32:00.000-07:00

FARM NEWS from Fred Owens

October 22, 2010

Kim Chee is the soul food of South Korea, that fiery concoction made from Napa cabbage and hot peppers, but the crop failed this year because of bad weather, down to half of the usual amount.

Facing a national shortage, the Koreans had to make humble and import cabbage from China, suspending the tariff that usually keeps foreign cabbage out of the country.

This story in the New York Times describes the national custom -- making Kim Chee at home every autumn as a family ritual, but now it's more often bought at the store because people are too busy.

The New York Times story only stated "crop failure due to bad weather." I wanted to know what kind of bad weather -- too much rain or too little rain are the most common causes of a crop failure. Insect damage, or an epidemic of plant disease are other likely causes.

How can I find out? I don't know any farmers in South Korea.

I went to Google to search. I found many news items reporting the same thing -- a kim chee shortage, but no explanation of why the cabbage crop failed.

I checked out the website for the U.S. Embassy in Korea, and I discovered the U.S. Agricultural Trade Office.

Of course! Our farmers export billions of dollars of fruits and vegetables, meat and dairy products to Korea. So naturally we have a trade office there.

(Don't tell the Tea Party about these people -- government employees, waxing fat on our tax dollars, interfering with the free trade of farm products.)

Well, my tax dollars paid for the farm trade office, and I found it useful in providing some statistics.

We export billions of dollars worth of food to Korea -- beef, rice, potatoes, oranges and apples -- everything but cabbage.

I sent an email to the Agricultural Attache Officer in Seoul, and he replied that the crop failure was caused by an excess of rain and a typhoon -- so I had my answer.

One more thing -- we do not export cabbages to Korea, but here in the Skagit Valley we grow most of the cabbage seed that Korean farmers use for their crop.

Pomegranates from Iran. Boy, we're really going to stick it to the Ayatollah now. The market report from our embassy in Korea says:

In the past two years, the U.S has gained a 99 percent market share of imported pomegranates in South Korea due to a devastating freeze and consecutive bad crop years in Iran, Korea’s past top exporter. A great opportunity to secure this market has presented itself as Korean importers prefer the uniformity and consistency of U.S. pomegranates. Pomegranates are increasing in popularity and there is currently not enough supply to meet demand.

So that's the international farm news, here at home:

The Frost Comes. In the Skagit Valley, the hard frost came a few days ago, on a still and cloudless night. The cold sunk in and by early morning the dahlias and zinnias were bejeweled with crystals of frost on their petals - - a beautiful sight, but by noon those same flowers had turned to brown mush, and the floral display is over for this year.

So Much More. I have so much more to write about, but working full time at the farm stand takes up all my energy, and then I'm getting ready to head for California pretty soon.

The farm stand closes October 31, and I leave a few days later.

I kind of miss the scattered and random format of Frog Hospital, but I know it will be good to stick with this more focused effort, so I will continue to write about farming and I hope most of you readers will stick around to see how this develops.

The Largest Kohlrabi in Captivity

2010-10-10T09:59:00.000-07:00

FARM NEWS from Fred Owens

October 11, 2010

The frost is not yet on the pumpkin, but on some mornings it feels a little crisp and we all know what's coming.

Watch this video for a detailed report about the weather and the "largest kohlrabi in captivity."

The long-range forecast for the Pacific Northwest is for a cold and wet winter. Nobody is thrilled about that.

You have three kinds of people in this country. The first kind love the rain and it makes them happy. The second kind say they love the rain, but they're lying. The third kind just endure it and try not to complain too much.

I'm one of the third kind, and I'm going to Southern California this winter because I need a break.

A lucky break, it turns out, because that same long-range forecast predicts a warmer and drier winter down south.

So, here's the news.

Grape Harvest, from the Los Angeles Times. California's signature crop, the grape harvest is coming in late. What a surprise! It's been a cool, wet summer from San Diego to Seattle and everything is late.

The article states, "most red grapes remain on the vine statewide, anywhere from 10 days to three weeks later than last year."

Late -- and what can you do but wait.

Here's another quote from the article, more complicated, but intriguing -- if you ask me.

"This is a normal cyclical pattern for La Niña," says Peter Cargasacchi of Cargasacchi Winery in the Santa Rita Hills. "If you were aware of that, you could incorporate farming practices based on the historical patterns of the weather." For Cargasacchi, that meant leaving a cover crop between vine rows to suck up excess winter rainwater, then deficit irrigation to stimulate the vines into ripening — "to give them a sense of urgency," he says.

Okay, this vintner did more than just wait. He was expecting the La Nina pattern to bring cooler, wetter weather. So he planted grass and clover between the rows of grapes to soak up the excessive rain fall.

Then he did deficit irrigation -- this is the sexy part, almost a tease -- meaning he cut way, way back on his watering in mid-summer -- to make those grape vines work harder, to put down their roots deeper, to conserve their energy and not produce too many leaves -- that is, to give them a sense of urgency.

That is highly anthropomorphic, as he put it -- to give the grape vines a sense of urgency.

Do plants feel urgency? Are they like us in some ways? We gather the grapes, we make the wine, and then we drink it.

That spirit, from the earth, comes to us through our palates.

That urgency, from mid-summer, has now, in fall harvest, become a fullness, and a good vintage is expected for 2010.

It's never a sure thing. Urgency is natural. And Harvest-Home is often the reward.

So, that's the farm news from California. I will be driving down that way in three weeks, and this newsletter will have more reports on the vast complexity of California agriculture. I hope you find it interesting.

Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Frog Hospital Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

This book is a treasure that will still be worth reading ten years from now.

Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

send mail to:

Fred Owens
Box 1292
LaConner WA 98257

More Farm News

2010-09-26T09:39:00.000-07:00

It seems that last week's newsletter went out to only half the mailing list -- due to technical problems and pilot error. But I announced last week that "Frog Hospital," after ten years and a book of the same title, was finished, and I am now writing under the plain title of "Farm News from Fred Owens."

I am working on a farm right now, selling premium organic produce from the market garden, right on the outskirts of LaConner. I can look out the back of the farm stand and see the fields where these vegetables are growing.

I have the easy job, at the stand. I am too told to work in the field. I worked in the field three years ago on the transplanting crew. I lasted five days and I got so worn out that I just couldn't come back to work anymore. That was no disgrace -- everybody else on the crew was thirty years younger than me.

But I became a senior farm worker after that. Now I load the truck every morning at the packing shed. I back the truck up to the cooler and pick out about thirty different boxes of vegetables to sell at the stand -- looking for the very best Swiss chard and English cucumbers and Kohlrabis and not picking the stuff that looks too tired -- that goes to compost or it goes to Kevin's pigs -- but I load the best stuff for the farm stand.

The farm stand is a few hundred yards from the packing shed. So I drive over to the stand and unlock the door, then I unload the thirty boxes -- nothing very heavy. My motto is don't work fast. Fast and farming are two different things.

After I unload the boxes and set them about in an attractive way, then I drive over to the farm office and get the cash register from Mary.

Mary counts the till and keeps track of it all. She has assured me that the I have been keeping the dollars and cents in good order - balanced to the penny one day, she said, and close enough on other days.

First Frost. We have a lot of interesting conversations on the farm. Like when I made a joke on Monday morning, when I traipsed into the office and Mary asked "What's the word today, Fred?"

I said, "Walk softly and carry a big lunch."

They all laughed.

Today we discussed the first hard frost, which will kill all the flowers just like that. Bright blooms turn to brown almost overnight, and it's over for the year. The dahlias, zinnias, yarrows, and delphiniums -- the whole glorious show will end.

Last year the frost came in mid-October, but who knows when it will come this year.

Would that be like your first kiss? Frost is the first kiss of winter, the end of innocence, the nearness of mortality, and the quickening of time.

Frost improves the sweetness of some vegetables, notably the cabbage family. They say to wait until after the frost for the Brussel Sprouts to get tasty.

Some varieties of apple improve with flavor after a frost.

Winter squash seems hardy enough, but actually, a hard frost will hurt the pumpkins, and it is better to get them in storage before that -- if you can tell when the frost is coming.

Why is the frost like a kiss? You don't know when it's coming, but it changes things. And, with an Irish sense of humor, you know that every beautiful thing in life brings us one step closer to the grave.

Think of Orville and Wilbur Wright tinkering in their garage in Dayton Ohio -- not inventing an airplane, not inventing machines that harvest crops more efficiently, but inventing machines and technologies that improve the lot of farm labor.

American farmers are awesome innovators -- I have seen them do that with my own eyes.

Yet they have a blind spot to the comfort of labor, seeming to believe -- "it's hard, it's always been hard, and it will always be hard."

There are a thousand ways to improve the working conditions of the farm worker -- if we decide to focus on that problem.

Most agricultural technologies, beginning with McCormick's reaper in the 1830s, have been "labor-saving" devices, but the main result of these labor-saving devices was to get the workers off the farm and into the big cities to work in giant factories.

We see a different situation today -- an opportunity, if you will -- because so many Americans want to get involved in agriculture. They don't know how hard the work is, but they will find out, and I hope they will not give up, but instead, will finally insist on making the conditions and technology more suitable for the modern worker.

And those improvements will make food more expensive for the American consumer -- a topic I will be glad to address in a future newsletter.

Jane who was reading my Frog Hospital book, came into the farm stand and told me how much she liked my "stream of consciousness."

Well, I tried very hard to put things in an orderly fashion when I wrote the book, but it might only seem orderly to me -- marching forward from point to point and building to a conclusion.

We don't control how other people interpret things we have done. Frog Hospital is widely considered to be "at random."

I guess that's fine. Anyway, Jane is enjoying the book quite a bit.

Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Frog Hospital Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

This book is a treasure that will still be worth reading ten years from now.

Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

send mail to:

Fred Owens
Box 1292
LaConner WA 98257

Farm News from Fred Owens

2010-09-19T10:46:00.000-07:00

My friend Karen in Alaska asked me what happened to "Frog Hospital" because she hasn't received one in more than a month.

I told her that I wrote the Frog Hospital newsletter for ten years and then wrote a book with the same title and I guess I am finished with that name and that concept.

So I came up with this very plain alternative -- "farm news" -- because that's where I have been this past month -- working at Hedlin's Farm on the edge of LaConner.

Specifically, I am working at Hedlin's Family Farm Stand selling premium organic vegetables to friends and strangers alike.

This takes up all my time. I can't complain. The farmer hasn't had a day off since April, but he lets me go home once in a while -- like today, for instance, Sunday morning, I'm sitting around the house drinking coffee.

Since this is the farm news, let's start with the weather -- awful, nothing but rain and overcast for several weeks now, which is bad for the sweet corn but good for the crucifers (cabbages and their relatives)

You can't grow sweet corn without heat and sunshine to make those ears pop out. Customers drive up to the farm stand, get out of the car, trudge across the sawdust to the little shed where I stand behind the cash register and ask me plaintively, "Is there any sweet corn?"

No, I tell them, and how many ways can I say that. "No sweet corn today, but we might have some in a few days. We have corn trying to grow out there, but all we can do is hope for it.

"How about some broccoli? We got boucoup broccoli. Heaps of it, luscious and green. The broccoli thrives in this wet weather."

But they want sweet corn, and they trudge back to their cars with their heads hung down.

I want to sing out, "We have cabbages too. Ten pounders. Solid and crisp. You could make enough cole slaw for your entire Bridge Club."

But they leave, heading down the road to some other farm stand, which might have sweet corn. I don't blame them if they want to keep looking, because they get this idea that it's late August and early September and you're supposed to have sweet corn.

But not this year, not in any abundance....

With the rain, as a way to be happy, flowers sales are strong. We are selling bouquets as fast as we can make them. I am learning to love dahlias. They are just astounding -- ranging from light lemon colors all the way to red darker than a bull fight in medieval Spain.

I can pick the zinnias and yarrows when the stand is not busy. These annuals grow right near the stand, so if I hear the crunch of the gravel, meaning a car is here, then I can get back to the stand and wait on the people.

But the dahlias are too far out in the field. I never go there, except last week, I asked Mary if she could cover for me to give me a chance to walk out to the dahlias and see them all. It was wonderful.

Anyway, I need to talk with the boss about this -- I can't hype the farm stand without coordinating with him, and her, and her -- it's a family farm -- so I will stop for now.

Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Frog Hospital Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

This book is a treasure that will still be worth reading ten years from now.

Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

The Old Barn

2010-08-17T14:23:00.000-07:00

You can make friends with an old barn. This one was built in 1906 by John Basye's great-grandfather on Beaver Marsh Road in the Skagit Valley, out in the flats where the wind is blowing and the soil is fertile.

You need to watch the video, which is only 90 seconds long, to get a picture of it. This Old Barn.

They're harvesting wheat right now -- farmers loving this hot, dry weather, good for harvesting wheat. Drought in Russia makes wheat scarcer, raises the price. They were looking at $4 a bushel, and some farmers sold their wheat this spring on the futures market at $4 a bushel -- often a smart move -- but not this year. It's gone up to $7 a bushel on the spot market because of the drought in Russia, causing a trading frenzy at the wheat pits in Chicago.

Our Skagit farmers grow wheat as a rotation crop, it's not how you make a living, like potatoes, or seed crops, or berries, but you grow wheat because you cannot grow potatoes every year. And this year at $7 a bushel, it doesn't hurt.

John Basye's barn is getting a new roof. He tore the old cedar shingles off and they can't be replaced. All the cedar has been logged in this territory, and good cedar for roofs would come from Canada at a very high price. Instead, the new roof will gleam with metal, which is a long-lasting material and has reflective qualities, brightening the sunshine and bouncing the rays back into the sky.

Metal roofs ping-ping the rain. It will be a different winter this year with a new metal roof. It will be louder.

Right now, the roof is off and the rafters are exposed to the weather -- for the first time in 100 years, seeing the sky, breathing and drying out in the heat of summer. You can hear the beams groan like arthritic grandfathers.

But this essay is not an exercise in nostalgia, not some hearkening back to the old days when the big trees were logged, and the stumps were blasted out with shovels and dynamite.

No, "This Old Barn" is about the future. You put a new roof on your barn because you're betting on the future. You're betting on one hundred more years of farming in the Skagit Valley, growing food for our children's children's children on broad, flat and fertile acres.

One hundred years from now we will need this barn. Of course, you never know, it's a flood plain. A big enough flood could float this barn away. And there's fire -- the old barn is built of wood. And it gets windy in the flats -- a really strong wind might damage the barn beyond repair.

But you bet on the future when you put on a new roof. There's no sure thing and where else can you put your money?

Please unsubscribe if you don't read Frog Hospital, or if you got on my mailing list by mistake. Even if you are a close personal friend, it won't hurt my feelings.

Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

This book is a treasure that will still be worth reading ten years from now.

Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

Will they celebrate Gay Marriage at the Ground Zero Mosque?

2010-08-14T14:47:00.000-07:00

Will they celebrate Gay Marriage at the Ground Zero Mosque?

I'm getting the issues confused.

But if New Yorkers can tolerate a mosque at Ground Zero, shouldn't it be a highly tolerant mosque?

Back to gay marriage. I've thought about it for about ten years, and I've decided it's a good thing. It really bothered me that judges were interfering with my own thinking on this question, because it is not a matter for the courts to decide.

Marriage is customary, legal, and moral. They all go together and the nature of marriage ought to be determined by the legislature, and failing that, by referendum.

The courts are the very worst place to decide questions like this, and that judge in California is doing no one a favor by ruling in favor of gay marriage -- or against it. He is a usurper against my own voice and I resent it.

It would be much better if people are persuaded, as they can be. Proponents of gay marriage have full access to the political process and can take their case to the people. I expect they will win if they take that course.

But if they keep going to court, the question will remain unsettled for decades. Keep the lawyers out of this, please.

Going to court is always the very, very last option in any dispute.

The Mosque. I was married to a Moslem woman for seven years. She was from Africa. Her ancestral village was in the mountains of Malawi. We visited this village shortly after we were married in 1997. Chembe village it was called, with a small mud brick mosque in the village square, and an ancient bearded imam in a blue robe.

The imam had several tattered copies of the Koran. He sang the call to prayers each morning before dawn -- no loudspeaker and no electricity in this village -- only the haunting call to prayer.

Five or six men would come to the mosque in response to the imam's call.

There were no dogs in Chembe village I liked that, because there was no barking in the night and it was quiet.

There was no alcohol -- not exactly, more of a low key kind of thing. In the evening the women gathered in the cooking hut down the hill. The village chief would invite me to join him at his place where we sat in chairs -- probably the only two chairs in the village.

He would bring out a bottle of rum and we had a drink together. It was fine. We treated each other as equals. I was proud of my life and my American heritage and education. He was proud of his village. I was married into his family and was welcomed in that way.

After some conversation, we would go to the women's cooking hut -- they had a fire going and it was warm in there, and we sat around the fire on mats and talked.

That's really all I know about Islam from personal experience. I think the villagers took their religion very lightly, and I wish we were all like that.

Having said that, the Ground Zero Mosque -- actually I don't know what to think. Legally it's a slam dunk -- they can build it wherever zoning ordinances permit a house of worship.

Otherwise, it's entirely up to the people of Manhattan, who are not likely to notice it amid the roar of commerce and culture

But if they do build it, this mosque should be the center of a mission to Islamic countries, which often forbid the construction or even the repair of churches and synagogues in their lands.

If the mosque is built, it should be a shining example and we should seek reciprocal treatment in Moslem countries. "Allow the free interchange of ideas, welcome our preachers as we welcome yours. Respectful argument is a good thing. We can challenge each other."

I was married to the African woman for seven years, but other than going to Chembe village to visit the graves of her ancestors, we had no more exposure to Islam. She claimed it as an identity, but only that. She had no knowledge or practice of Islam, but was more familiar with Christianity and indigenous spiritual practices -- in the way that Africa people can mix these things all together.

I have learned and thought about Islam since then -- from reading books and newspapers, from knowing about the attacks of September 11, 2001, and our military invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, and reading about the endlessly complicated disputes between Palestinians and Israelis -- but I will not let those images intrude on what I actually experienced first hand -- I think I will cherish and remember the evenings with Chief Chembe in his village, a man just like me, except he had two wives.

So we end. And we realize that the Mosque and the question of Marriage are actually related.

And there is a lot to talk about -- if we can keep it out of court.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

send mail to:

Fred Owens
Box 1292
LaConner WA 98257

2010-08-06T14:15:00.001-07:00

A long, long time ago I picked flowers for my mother. I picked violets and lily of the valley. They grew in the wild area on the north side of our home. I gave the the flowers to my mother and she put them in a vase on the table. She was happy and I felt like a good boy.

The yard was mowed and fenced except for this wild area. The grass wouldn't grow on the north side, so it was left and the flowers just grew all by themselves. I could go out there in the summer and lie down and have my own dreams.

We lived in a white stucco house in the suburbs of Chicago, under the shade of very tall oak trees and elm trees. The high-dappled shade is the best because the air flows smoothly on hot summer days. A white wooden fence ran around the back yard. We played baseball and badminton and left bare spots in the lawn from playing all summer long. Mother grew peonies and roses in the back of the yard, just a small garden, but it was pretty.

In the winter, when the ground was frozen, she had me cover the roses and peonies with oak leaves to protect them through the coldest days. That was an easy chore and I was glad to do it -- only once a year, and then in the spring I would take the leaves away. It was something special I did for her.

Outside the fence, between the fence and the alley, the tiger lilies grew thickly -- day lilies, but we called them tiger lilies because of their bright orange color. They grew wild, all by themselves.

One of my regular chores was taking out the trash, out to the alley. I put the trash bags in a wire basket and lit a match and set the trash on fire. I liked standing in the alley, all by myself, outside the fence, watching the flames in the wire basket -- bright orange flames, but green and blue muted flames from the coated pages of magazines and the wrappers on tin cans.

I liked being out in the alley, outside the fence with the tiger lilies and the unpaved alley way with gravel and mud puddles, where I could have my own dreams. I think this is what made me how I am today.

I hated Little League baseball. I didn't like Lilttle League. They had rules and uniforms and grown ups bossing us around -- they called it "coaching" but I didn't like any of them. I liked playground ball much better. We were kids -- we chose up teams and made up our own rules. We had huge arguments too.

"He was out."

"No, he was safe, I saw him touch the base."

"You liar, he was out by a mile."

So, we had our own arguments, but we didn't need a bunch of stupid grownups hanging around to show us how to play baseball. Geez.

Skateboarding. Kids don't play ball like we used to, they want to be skateboarding. But it's like playground ball --- it's not officially sanctioned with umpires and coaches and stupid grownups. The kids can do it all by themselves on skateboards and create their own form of play.

A few of the skaters in LaConner are known to be ill-behaved. I was told that one of them cursed at the librarian. I could ask the librarian if that was true, but it's bad enough that rumors go around like this. How are the kids going to get a skateboard park this way?

What they should do, the kids that are serious, is have a talk with the smart alecks who cursed at the librarian -- and then beat the crap out of them, because they're messing it up for everybody else.

Just my opinion. These kids want to skate without a lot of adult interference. I know the feeling. I can hardly stand grownups myself. But then you have to make your own rules and enforce them.

I don't tolerate too much attitude in children, but then, looking it at from another perspective, if the worst thing they did is curse at the librarian and leave some trash in the parking lot at the grocery story -- how bad is that? You know, how does cursing at the librarian compare to a drive-by shooting? Pretty light weight stuff.

Unless you're the librarian, who I happen to know and like.

Now, to change the subject:

You Can't Write. This message is for all the new writers who are planning to self-publish their memoirs. You can't write. I know what you heard on the Oprah Winfrey show about how you should express yourself and why your story is valid and strong and worthwhile. It is your story and a true one. That d't mean anybody else wants to hear it.

In the old days you kept a diary and kept it private -- as it should be. Writing, that is writing something of value to a larger group, is a skill and not everyone has it -- like being a carpenter or a farmer. It takes years to get good at it, and not every one can succeed.

So this message is for you, my friend. You are surely very good at something, but it might not be writing.

Let me explain it another way. It's like the difference between gardening and farming. I can garden. I can grow a pretty good garden, but there's no way I can farm. Farming is when you can grow enough food to sell it and make a living at it. But gardening is a past time.

So maybe my few words are put before you to re-establish a boundary between writing as a past time and writing as a profession -- a friendly, but meaningful distinction.

Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

This book is a treasure that will still be worth reading ten years from now.

Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

send mail to:

Fred Owens
Box 1292
LaConner WA 98257

Ronald Reagan would be proud

2010-07-25T15:03:00.000-07:00

That's the title of a video I made for YouTube.

"I have six part-time jobs and no health insurance, and that makes me a real American hero, in the kind of America that Ronald Regan dreamed about. No Pension! No Paid Vacation! None of that Democratic sissy stuff."

"No, and I am grateful to the wealthy people, the top one percent, for making my working life possible, because it is their wealth, trickling down from above, that sustains me."

"What if I get sick? Well, I don't go running to the doctor. No, No. I'm tough. I just rub on a little of grandma's lotion, then I take a shot of whiskey and sweat it out."

"Isn't it wonderful living in Ronald Reagan's America?"

Well, it's kind of funny, I hope. And relevant, because the Congress will now decide, in its painfully difficult process, whether to keep or repeal the Bush (son of Reagan) tax cuts --those tax cuts to the wealthy who can take that untaxed money and spend it to hire us little people and create thousands of jobs.

If they spend it. But they don't have to spend it, being wealthy, and they don't have to spend it in America. They can take their pre-tax dollars and invest in textile manufacturing in Thailand -- no jobs for us.

So I favor the repeal of these tax cuts for our high-income friends. Better they should pay taxes rather than you and I. The Sixteenth Amendment to the Constitution permits progressive taxation. It's a good thing.

Fishtown Blues. I've almost recovered from the Fishtown Art Show Disaster The pronounced euphoria this show produced among so many people is a matter of profound shock to me. The experience has been deeply isolating, because I think the show isn't half what it could be, and I look at the other people who loved it and I think -- we're not from the same planet, are we?

But I will try just the same. Kathleen (speaking to Kathleen Moles who curated the show), Kathleen, you tried and you made a great effort and I truly appreciate that. It's not a bomb. It's not a failure. It's even worse -- it's that thing that's close to being good, but not really good. And every artist and writer I know has had that experience.

You write something or you paint something and it's good, but there's a nagging feeling, there's some little something wrong and you can't quite put your finger on it. You step back and you realize that it's almost good. That's the key word, "almost."

And comes now the hardest part for an artist -- when it's almost good, you THROW IT OUT. You crumble it up and toss it in the wastebasket.

So the Fishtown art show is almost good. The right thing to do is to scrap it. Take it down and start all over again. Get it right. This is how we get to the truth, by accepting our mistakes as part of the learning process.

Am I wasting my words? Once the concrete sets on a museum show, it can never change. We are doomed to this inviolate display until October, when the show formally comes down. But I'm saying something worthwhile here. This initial euphoria from the show's opening will be wearing off. It's like the honeymoon rush, but the tired days of August will bring a truer appreciation of this show -- the beauty will have faded.

Don't let that happen. Fix the show now, before the beauty fades.

Back to the Video. Frog Hospital readers have indulged me -- bellyaching for three consecutive issues about the Fishtown art show, and most of you don't live around here so it doesn't matter, and everyone else who has seen the show thinks I'm wrong.

So, let's go back to the Ronald Reagan video. It's really good. I have been making great progress in this new medium. Learning to speak -- mumbling a few of the lines, but that's all right. Getting the light right -- I shot this one in partial shade in the park in Anacortes. Practicing my lines -- what I said I spoke out loud two times before I turned the camera on. Keeping a good pace to it, with changes in intensity -- now light-hearted, now strong and serious, some expressive hand movement and body language. There's a strong ego present -- I love the camera and the camera loves me.

But there's a really scary part to this video -- I'm kidding, right? But am I really kidding?

Three Dreams. I am working my six part-time jobs with three dreams to guide me.

1.A little dream -- to go whalewatching. Forty years in Puget Sound and I've never seen a whale. It's time. I'm going this week.

2. A medium dream -- a kayak trip with my daughter, paddling around the islands someplace, camping under the stars. My daughter Eva is my favorite camping buddy.

3. A large dream -- I leave the Skagit Valley in October, when the weather is still good, so the parting is sweet, but a little sad. I go south for the winter, to southern California, where the roses are still blooming in January. I stay south until winter is over.

Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

This book is a treasure that will still be worth reading ten years from now.

Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

The Turkish Woman Who Lived in Fishtown

2010-07-20T17:22:00.000-07:00

I'm trying ...... trying to appreciate the Museum of Northwest Art (MONA) in LaConner, but I fear the judgment of small minds in small towns. The way the small mind works is this -- since I wrote a critical comment about the Fishtown Art Show, currently at MONA, I am henceforth and forever branded as an enemy of the museum. That is far from the case, but it is the kind of talk that goes around a small town.

In fact, I am on the best of terms with Kathleen Moles, the curator of the show, and with many of the artists whose works appear in the show.

I had a long conversation over dinner with a museum staffer, and she warmly understands me as a supporter of the arts, of museums in general, and of our NW museum in particular.

In that conversation we compared MONA to internationally recognized places such as the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, and the de Menil Museum in Houston, those being two of my favorites.

I want MONA to be that good, which is a very demanding standard. Should we settle for less? No, we should not settle for less. Making allowances for the size and scope of our regional effort, we should be as good as the best.

Having cleared that up, I viewed the Fishtown art show again today. It made inexpressibly sad, and this is entirely a projection of my own miserable state of mind. I saw failure and lost chances where others see a soft beauty..... I viewed Ralph Aeschlimann's paintings but I wanted -- needed -- to see see his beautiful, hand-built flying kites. I remembered long ago seeing my two small children chase Ralph and his kites across a field of grass. We were prescient kite runners then, and it all seems lost now.

Gull? Where is Gull, the Turkish woman? Why is she not included in the Fishtown Art Show? She was extravagant beyond measure. She was the original terrorist from the Middle East. Even barefooted, she wore spiked heels. And she lived on the river, someone's wife, not a poet or artist, but making meals, tending the fire, minding the children. And she left no trace of art? Are you kidding? She was an awesome anti-Zen Buddhist, a non-Sufi miracle of contempt for boring people.

Gull was never boring. She was alive and that scared the hell out of people.

Everybody Liked the Fishtown Art Show Except Me

2010-07-14T17:11:00.001-07:00

Everybody liked the Fishtown Art Show at the Museum of Northwest Art in LaConner. We had the Opening Day this Saturday and the museum was packed with happy people, looking at walls dense with art and minutiae from days gone by, of poetry and late-night sake parties, stories of Fishtown back in the day ....

Everybody liked the show except me. I'm sorry to be the designated heavy in this picture, but I was not swept away. I thought the show was nostalgic and sentimental. A little too sweet, like a cherry pie made with too much sugar -- it needs a little tartness.

I felt very emotional viewing these old familiar pieces -- like Bo Miller's Chevy Mandala. But I didn't trust the emotion.

It was like a high school reunion or "Old-Fashioned Hippie Days" at a theme park.

Charliev Krafft had a great time. He was one of the featured artists, and I liked seeing his earlier paintings, back when he was making beautiful paintings. His current art is quite a bit different. You can see it at the Smith & Vallee Gallery in Edison. You can see the connection between the past and the present in Charlie's art.

But the connection was missing in the show over all. It was musty-dusty, moldy-oldy stuff dug out of attics and crumbling shoe boxes. Memories.

I don't have much use for memories unless they connect to where we are going today.

Where are we going? I don't know and I got no sense of direction from the Fishtown show -- just an old path down a road that used to be.

I love the past and the history of our lives -- when it serves, when it's real, and when it gives strength.

But I didn't get that from the current show. There was something missing. The show was all about the beginning of Fishtown and not one piece about the end of Fishtown.

So let me have an opinion -- the end of it matters, the end matters as much as the beginning. The end was about drama and conflict and an almost violent destruction of the cabins so sweetly depicted in the show.

The beginning was stillness and quiet, the end was a theatrical crescendo.

Some young artists came out to Fishtown in the late Sixties to escape the turmoil sweeping the land -- the demonstrations and riots and raging war in Viet Nam.

They left the city to connect with a larger presence. They cultivated quiet and nurtured simplicity.

But the conflict which they escaped came back with a vengeance in 1988. The conflict was real and genuine, over the logging of the woods behind Fishtown, and a radical challenge to property rights that the Fishtown residents launched, in order to stop the logging.

It's a long story, but the protest and resistance was as much a work of art and a work of beauty as any ink-stained sumi poem composed by candlelight.

It's too bad they left that part out of the show -- that essential bit of truth, and that's why I didn't like it.

That Photo of Richard Gilkey. See a video version of this Fishtown art show rant at my Facebook page, LaConner Views.

I wanted to see the photo of Richard Gilkey, a great artist, a native son, an ex-Marine, being led away in handcuffs by the Skagit County sheriff's deputies in January, 1988. He was arrested, among many people arrested, because he stood on the ground, on the property of the Chamberlain Family, and blocked the logging trucks.

Gilkey and the others made a radical challenge to the dominance of the old farm families. This rebellion of artists-without-property had to be crushed. And it was crushed.

So the story of Fishtown ends in a tragedy, and the old farm families won.

But did they really win? The farmers themselves are threatened today and asking for help to preserve their way of life. Isn't it time they realized that the Fishtown artists were their true friends?

But no, the conflict remains unresolved. I was involved in the Fishtown Woods Massacre of 1988 and I am still persona non grata on that hallowed ground.

Charlie Krafft went out there last week -- tried to go out there but he was shown the door. Get lost!

Maggie Wilder still has access. She lives in Steve Herold's old place. Steve stayed out of the conflict in 1988, perhaps wisely, and his cabin was spared the vengeance of destruction.

We just need to add that one photo of Richard Gilkey to the Fishtown Art Show. To make it real. To make it whole. Otherwise it doesn't matter. Otherwise, it's just an old story about some old men and what they did when they're hearts were young and gay.

Campground Meditation. I have been tent camping these past few days at the campground in Washington Park in Anacortes.

This morning I went for a walk and left my package of Fig Newtons on the picnic table.

Dumb and dumber. You know what happened. "Caw, caw, caw," the crows were laughing in the trees when I came back from my walk. They ate every one of my cookies.

Rascals! This is serious. They're not getting any more of my snacks. The food is in a box with a lid and a frying on top of the lid.

Just try, Mr. Crow, just try. Caw-caw yourself. Find some other fool.

Subscriptions and Signed Copies of the Book. It used to be that you sent in $25 and did not get much more than my appreciation, but now you get a signed copy of the Frog Hospital book.

This book is a treasure that will still be worth reading ten years from now.

Send a check for $25 to Fred Owens, Box 1292, LaConner, WA 98257. Or go to the Frog Hospital blog and pay with PayPal.

Thank you,

--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

send mail to:

Fred Owens
Box 1292
LaConner WA 98257