the zyx's of life: "Y" yukon gold

these 26 entries from z-a are meant as a tandem collection of short essays.  instead of the abc's of life, i'm writing backwards for two reasons.  t.s. eliot said that to make an end is to make a beginning, which i find true.  that and my grandfather could say the alphabet backwards faster than i could say it forwards.  now that's some wit.

y-yukon gold:  feeding each other

"tell me about the land who raised you."--victoria loorz

coming from a long line of pastors, teachers, and farmers, i can't help noticing i've devoted over a quarter of a century to the first two callings.  which naturally makes me wonder if the next twenty-five years wants to devote itself to farming?  better yet, what if all three are really a both/and just needing the fullness of time to come into perspective?

my first job, at four years old--where all best professions begin--is to help my parents by watering the disc pods in the greenhouse, causing the soil to swell inside the netting.  this is still magical to me.  i take my role very seriously, seeds in open left palm, choosing one at a time with the fingers of my right hand and pushing them gently below the surface before giving them a light sprinkle of water. 

if watching things grow is fascinating, then digging potatoes is a dream come true.  yukon gold is an apt name for these tubers, because each time i dig them up is like finding treasure.  they come spilling out from the earth to feed us just like that, this death-burial-resurrection motif playing out in the simplest of comfort foods.

in the 90's, disturbed by documentaries like "food, inc." i initiate conversation with one of our canadian farming relatives over black coffee around the campfire.  he practiced organic farming long before it was a buzzword, let the land rest, and planted cover crops to put nitrogen and other essential nutrients back into the soil.  needless to say, i treasure that conversation.

and i think of it when i choose produce with stickers beginning with "9" (or better yet, with no stickers at all) or while cleaning and polishing the residue of god-knows-what off of grapes, to say nothing of the childhood innocence of popping them in my mouth without a thought.  in other words, i think of it often.

in decades since, i feed myself on authors such as David Whyte, Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer, Hildegard of Bingen, and Wendell Berry...watching documentaries on everything from European chefs and bee-keeping to mycelial connections and human-animal relationships.  

they all point to the same thing:  love.  that may sound silly or overly simplistic, but for centuries, they've been saying the same thing:  there's no such thing as separation.  

as a young seminary student, how could i tell people that i felt more connection to God, as i understood Love, when i went to the ocean instead of inside of a building?  or that a walk through the forest brought me closer to Christ as the one holding it all together?  why was it, when i read a book about physics, that i started weeping in a more worshipful way than i ever had to music?  would they accuse me of being a tree-hugger and would that be such a bad thing?

i can plant more seeds in the time it takes to recount how we got here (centuries of colonial noun-loving cultures hell-bent on ownership over relationally oriented verb-loving cultures, corner-cutting, monocrops, chemicals, and other forms of objectification which is killing us). 

trying experiences and signing up for classes to feel closer to my food, i learn to butcher backyard chickens and also to take apart half a pig.  my cuts are ugly, but i understand the animals better.  i'm so excited to share this amazing pork with friends but when it doesn't come on styrofoam wrapped in cellophane, they don't want it.  more organic pork belly for me, i guess.  premise being, bacon doesn't come from Oscar Meyer, it comes from hogs.  (if the chef's table episode of the fifth-generation Italian butcher who grew up wanting to be a vet doesn't bring tears to your eyes, well...) he understands sacred reciprocity when he invites people to the table.

when discouraged, or tempted by the culture of consumerism, i quote poet and Jesuit priest Gerard Manley Hopkins to myself, "...and yet for this, nature is never spent...there lives the dearest freshness deep down things..." and go outside for a walk or dig in the dirt or stare at green trees in awe and wonder of it all.

as an *Enneagram 2, it's natural for me to want to bring people together, to feed them literally and figuratively.  fresh, delicious food plus meaningful conversation feels most kin to nature's reciprocity.  and, the more i pay attention, the more it makes sense.  tomatoes just taste better when they come from the sunshine outside your back door.  (*my houseplants suffer the shadow side of this personality type--caring too much, or in their case, being overwatered.  i can hear an audible sigh from them when i go on vacation, as if to say, "thank goodness she's gone, we get to dry out awhile!")

in Europe, where i note that everyone can eat gluten and the blue-zones see people consistently living into their 100's, i have access to some of the best markets in the world, but no kitchen.  at home, i have a kitchen but rather small markets.  "begin where you are" comes to mind, whether that is a garden-top roof in a busy city or a basil plant in your kitchen window.  in my case five acres of awesome.  within a ten-mile radius, we have apple orchards, grape vineyards, olive groves, apiaries, CSA's, and award-winning cheese.  

talking with a friend originally from Europe who has purchased an acreage for modern pioneering, agriculture on a family-owned scale makes sense to him.  we joke together about redefining wealth to be understood as "how many chickens do you have?"

while i don't love the reason for lockdown,  i love experiencing what Hopkins knew.  for the first time i have time to really watch flowers bloom without feeling guilty for "wasting my time" or that i should be doing something else.  nature has a brief reprieve from our cluttered, noisy, and self-centered tread.  and i can watch her thrive without having to have something to show for it.  

(a hunch tells me sabbatical originally meant rest, not write a book to prove a PhD) i don't want to "get back to normal" if that means anxious and angry people, eyes and waistlines bulging, eating fast food in one hand while mindlessly driving super-luxury high speed vehicles on concrete with the other.  

my American dream is more along the lines of walking everywhere or, at the very least, getting a bumper sticker that reads "55 is fine, bring back the Sunday drive".  i wonder things like " could it be that a Love bigger than ourselves, people (at their best), nature, and our truest self really do conspire to support us?"  could we live in restored relationship in line with this holy longing?

herein lies the sacred:  not just noticing and appreciating the animals, that's a great start, but knowing a particular creature, like the flicker who comes to next in my rafters or the family of deer who return to feed on our crab apples.  it is the same with place--getting to know it, returning again and again to a particular coastline as if dating the silhouette of sandstone against sky, with intent to fall in love.

i visit some neighbors who transformed the typical lawn that came with the house into a vibrant and diverse collection of eco-systems.  they don't have problems with pests and don't need things like "roundup" because everything has a mutually supportive space in each season.  

and the advice of a local chef?  "don't try to do it all on your own."  

a few years ago, frustrated by my lack of control in so many areas of life simultaneously, i took to chopping wood and gardening with a vengeance.  it was woman vs. anything animate, or inanimate for that matter, and only led to more frustration.

the next year, heeding the advice of my neighbors and local chef, i made peace with the pests and allowed the garden to do what it wanted.  i guided the process, but gently, allowing the soil to re-wild itself.  it was the best vegetable year i've ever had; volunteer seedlings found support in and amid larger stalks, taller plants provided shade for ground-dwellers.  it wasn't the neat rows i was used to, but rather a far sweeter wildness that i could taste and share.  

thankfully, i think we're making a return.  or, in the words of my wise ten-year old friend, "you know, i think it's good if we get back to pioneer days." 

so much of life is un-learning and getting out of the way, isn't it?

notice, if you will,  the one little word "who" instead of "that" in the quote at the beginning of this entry?  Victoria Looz (author of Church of the Wild:  how nature invites us into the sacred) knows that language matters.  tell me a story and i'll tell you where you came from.

speaking of which, it's almost time to press seeds into the starter pods one at a time.  and, once i gift them the reverence of forgetting about them awhile, if you need me i'll be out digging potatoes.