In the Right Place

The predicted rain did not come. Phil managed to get to the laundromat (where the machines ate $5 or so of quarters). He came home with a very tired finger.

I had turned some dried garlic into garlic powder: I took the dried chips and blended them, then put them through the mesh sieve and capped them in jars.

It was while I was pulsing the fine bits of garlic for the third time to make them even more fine that I realized something that should have been obvious for several years: I am struggling with the tyranny of efficiency.

No matter what I do, I am dissatisfied because it takes me longer than it takes a "big" farm. Though I liked the flavor of our potatoes last year, I disliked the physically demanding hand hilling: a "real" farm with equipment could hill it better, faster, and easier.

If I grow garlic, I hate making the beds because I know I'll have to do it again next year (pointless labor), and the weed seeds will take over. And maybe my stock is diseased, or my soil not fertile. And besides, "real" farms have specialized equipment to help the work go quickly and smoothly.

Even if we managed to cut our feed costs down so that chickens became a bit more financially viable, I would dislike raising them to sell because our processing is so inefficient. Joel Salatin can do it better, so let him!

Joel can raise pigs better, too.

I enjoyed grafting apple trees this last spring. But I can compare my 30% loss on bench grafting, and my dismal rate of "takes" on the bud grafting to the local nursery, nationally known, Edible Landscaping, where a former employee said, "I never knew a bud graft not to take."

Which makes me wonder what on earth I'm doing here?

And I wonder at Phil's lack of frustration over the process. As an engineer, he made a very nice wage. Now he has worked hard for almost three and a half years without a dollar to show for it. Anything we've raised, we've either sold at a loss or given away in failed marketing attempts.

I think I've finally reached a point where I'm sick of it. I'm angry that this is so hard. I'm angry that I feel like we have no direction. A year ago, we had our three-fold plan: fruit, limited vegetables, and dairying.

Now, our peach trees haven't done much. We think about expanding our apple planting. But blueberries require water, and our one-gallon-a-minute well is too little for that, even if our soil was good.

Limited vegetables: still haven't ever grown a decent cabbage, so I buy my kimchi and wish I could afford it daily. And my garlic complaints have been well-documented. Is there a hope for a living with kimchi and garlic? It seems dubious.

Dairying? I loved the idea. I loved raw milk back in Boulder. But we have become so unscheduled here, the idea now of even once a day milking, ten months of the year: it's like a shackle on our time. (Let alone the impossibility of finding customers: do people drink raw milk? I haven't met many.)

I commented to my mom recently that I felt like we were coming to the end of our undergraduate education: almost four years in, we were getting a handle on our life here.

But today I felt totally stymied. Worse than the beginning, because we've tried various things and they've all been found wanting.

I had gone to help Phil feed the cows in the midst of these furious thoughts. With his hurt hand, he needs a boost.

I walked back while he drove the tractor down the road, where he met our neighbors. Their car had broken down right outside our property, only perhaps a quarter mile from their driveway, and they needed some help.

Phil took the tractor over, and some time later I looked out the window to see what looked like the tractor pushing the car down the road. Why hadn't Phil simply jumped it with the van? Very odd.

It turned out that one of the rear tires had come all the way off. Not only that, all the bolts had either sheered or stripped, so there was no way to get the tire back on. Phil used the tractor forks to hoist the axel off the ground, and so, three-wheeled with the tractor acting as the fourth wheel, Phil helped limp the car to the driveway. No tow truck required.

In that moment, Phil was in the right place.

I don't know why we're stuck here in a place devoid of money-earning opportunities. I don't know why we haven't hit on exactly what suits us and this land.

But maybe I need to remember that, like the daily manna for the Israelites, we have provision for today. I bet they grew weary of not knowing where the cloud would lead them, or when they would have to move. Forty years of wandering in a small desert—I imagine they were sick of it.

But the wandering led to the Promised Land. God led them to the Promised Land. They had a destination, and they got there in the end.

I have heard that biblical patience is not the calm spirit that we generally think, but rather perseverance, holding fast until the end. In that sense, I can pray for patience.

The calm spirit kind wouldn't be unwelcome, either.