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
Saturday, January 28, 2012
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Sustainable Agriculture Defined & Discussed
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
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
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Bathsheba's Farm
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
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
Friday, January 06, 2012
THE REAL WORLD
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'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
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Bathsheba Beckons
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
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
Tuesday, December 06, 2011
Things Might Improve
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.
"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.
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Farm Income on the Rise in California
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
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
Saturday, October 29, 2011
At Shepherd's Farm in Carpinteria
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.
Unsubscribe by saying so in a reply.
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.
Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214
My blog is Fred Owens
send mail to:
Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001
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.
Unsubscribe by saying so in a reply.
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.
Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214
My blog is Fred Owens
send mail to:
Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001
Saturday, October 15, 2011
bums on blankets
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.
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.
Friday, October 14, 2011
Tomatoes and Sagging Gates -- part 2
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.
Unsubscribe by saying so in a reply.
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.
Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.
--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214
My blog is Fred Owens
send mail to:
Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001
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.
Unsubscribe by saying so in a reply.
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.
Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.
--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214
My blog is Fred Owens
send mail to:
Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001
Monday, September 19, 2011
Tomatoes and Sagging Gates
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.
Unsubscribe Anytime. Just hit reply and say "Unsubscribe."
--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214
My blog is Fred Owens
send mail to:
Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001
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.
Unsubscribe Anytime. Just hit reply and say "Unsubscribe."
--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214
My blog is Fred Owens
send mail to:
Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Olive Trees in the Ojai Valley
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.
Unsubscribe by saying so in a reply.
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.
Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.
--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214
My blog is Fred Owens
send mail to:
Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001
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.
Unsubscribe by saying so in a reply.
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.
Or Use PayPal. Go to the Frog Hospital blog and use the PayPal button.
--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214
My blog is Fred Owens
send mail to:
Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001
Friday, September 02, 2011
A Shabbat Dinner or Why I Threw a Piece of Broccoli at My Hebrew Teacher
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
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Why I Threw a Piece of Cucumber at My Hebrew Teacher
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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--
Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214
My blog: Frog Hospital
send mail to:
Fred Owens
7922 Santa Ana Rd
Ventura CA 93001
Saturday, August 06, 2011
D'Var Torah on Farming and Writing
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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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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My blog: Frog Hospital
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7922 Santa Ana Rd
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