Trees and fields

We have 15 acres total at the farm, and right now it is underutilized. The neighbor borrowed a little strip off the back to add to his corn field this year. Some of it is horse pasture, but they can’t use it much because of their issues (never mind the sad, sad state of the fence.) We have a bunch of pine trees that the former owner planted; they are now quite overgrown. I’m hoping to offer them for bargain Christmas trees since they are unkempt and sort of scrawny for that purpose. They are also getting too tall even for that–some of the tallest ones are probably 10 feet tall.

I’m thinking radical thoughts. I’m thinking of planting a woods back in the open fields. I haven’t done any research yet, but it seems to me that woods would be the cheapest, easiest crop to grow. Of course there wouldn’t be much return for quite a few years, but it’s an investment for the future.

I’m envisioning a mix of hardwood and pines, and maybe some fruit trees, with winding paths cut between them for riding. I love woods!

Of course it would be rather awkward if I were to plant a bunch of acorns and ten years down the road decide to plant crops instead. Imagine trying to plow that field…”*&%#^@ saplings!”

These are the horses in my NEIGHborhood

This is what I saw on my way home today:

There were these three tiny kids on a diminutive cart pulled by the cutest little miniature horse driving around the yard where they have the prettiest garden every year. A little way further, I passed a grumpy-faced old graybeard on an open buggy ( the horse was your run-of-the-mill brown buggy horse.) Then I came up behind two teams in a row, pulling wagons–Belgians, of course, though the hindmost team was a fairly sharp matched set like you might see in the fair if they were cleaned up.

Study hall land

It’s back to school time again! I used to love this time of year because I loved being a student. I liked starting out with all new classes and finding out what we were going to learn that year.

I remember my junior year of high school was a good one. I was just back from Scotland–I was extremely happy about having survived that! I was finally taking American History from Mr. L, and when I found out on the first day of class that he already knew who I was, it was quite a surprise (I’m not sure why I should be surprised, given how small our school was though.) The year before I had Latin in the classroom next to Mr. L’s Government class, and when I sat at the back, near the door, I used to listen to what was going on next door. I couldn’t wait to get there!

I was also taking American Lit, Algebra II, Chemistry, and Spanish. I also took half a year of computer and half a year of typing.

But it was a big year for study halls. I think that I had as many as three on the days that we didn’t have Chemistry lab. I don’t know how that is possible; it seems that they would never have allowed me to have two study halls to begin with. Maybe it was just that even one study hall seems endless.

I suppose I was an underachiever…although I didn’t have to take Spanish at all; I had taken my two years of Latin, and I signed up for Spanish just because I thought it would be fun. That was before I discovered that the teacher was an idiot, but therein hangs a tale for another day.

I didn’t mind study hall that much. It gave me a chance to read books, and also to write queer little stories–usually in the form of notes to my cousin/friend–about StudyHall Land. We had created StudyHall Land out of sheer boredom and (I flatter myself to think) excess of creativity. Instead of just seeing the school cafeteria peopled with bored teenagers, we saw it as a “peaceful, sleepy land, whose denizens rest safely in the charge of S-Man, our Lord Protector.” Okay, it wasn’t really that creative, but it passed the time.

Garden update

We’re reaching the busy time of summer–the tomatoes are coming on fast, the cabbages are heading up, I pulled a bunch of carrots the other day, and I’ve been picking half a quart of black raspberries every day. I haven’t canned much this year because I still have so many jars of stuff from last year. I didn’t even plant cucumbers this year since we had so many pickles, and I need to find a recipe that uses a lot of jam because I have so much.

This was my first year for growing beets, and I have been eating tons (and enjoying them.) I pickled 4 pints of beets and froze some of the beet greens that I didn’t get to. I’ve frozen a nice amount of strawberries, wild blackberries, and cherries as well. It will be a good winter for pies!

My tomatoes are doing well this year, for me. I have never had much more than moderate luck with tomatoes. My plants don’t get very big, and neither do the tomatoes. I have had trouble with the leaves turning yellow, curling up, and dying. I’m sure there is something wrong there, but I just haven’t put any effort into figuring out what yet. I usually get a small to moderate yield of tomatoes, so it’s not a loss to me. I just don’t get the massive inundation of tomatoes that you hear about gardeners having to deal with. Someday I want to be able to can tomatoes and juice and sauce and salsa, and still have leftovers!

I’ve eaten one head of cabbage, and I have another that is ready to cut any day. Someday I want to figure out how to make sauerkraut, but that’s not the highest thing on my list right now.

I pulled a lot of carrots this week. It’s fun to tug on them and see what you pull out, especially when it’s a big one. I was pleased, considering I’ve never done carrots before either. They’re all pretty short, but pleasingly plump, and tasty. I was afraid they’d be all gnarly, but they have been quite nicely shaped.

I canned 4 pints of pickled carrots, but one didn’t seal. I also did 11 pints of tomatoes.

See what happens when you wait until the last minute?

Somewhere there is a history teacher I’d like to strangle, or at least give her a good shake.

At work today I had a high school kid who brought in the list of books she had to choose from to read over the summer. Of course, they were all checked out. Lesson one: don’t wait until the last minute! The only book that was available was this massive biography of Teddy Roosevelt, and the look on her face when I pulled that one off the shelf was priceless. No, actually it was a pained look: ohmigod, I gotta read that?

I just have to ask that teacher what her goal was with this assignment, because if it was to teach the kids not to procrastinate or else you’ll end up with some godawful chunk of a book, then she gets an A+ from me. But if she ever wants these kids to even remotely appreciate, let alone like history, then that transaction right there was a total failure.

I will say from experience that sometimes the best books are the fattest, and skinny books can be a real bear. But not always. And honestly, if it was me I would probably make the same face this girl did; of course, I wouldn’t have waited until that was the only choice.

To be fair, there was a nice variety of titles on this list. Someone who started earlier in the summer could have his or her pick of a wide variety of historical topics, etc. Especially if you consider the fact that, given enough time, you could actually ILL some of the books that our library doesn’t have at all.

My suggestion would be to put a brief but enticing summary of each book on the list. It wouldn’t take that long and it just might convince the student looking at it that there is an exciting and broad array of history books out there. Show some enthusiasm for your own subject, and maybe the students will pick up on it. And don’t tell me “they should do their own research on the titles to pick one they might be interested in.” This is the real world, and even I’m not that gung ho about typing each of those titles into Amazon to see what they’re about.

And try to pick books that are less than 500 pages.

Deep pockets, short arms

I am in general a very frugal person. I am very careful about where I spend my money and I use things until they wear out. Frankly, I am as tight as the bark on a tree.

I always find it amusing when magazine articles or talk shows say they can tell you how to save money. The advice is usually the same–cut out the lattes and you can save $15 a week! They have all sorts of cost-saving tips, but it doesn’t help a bit if you are a frugal person who already does all that. Where’s the advice for people who already have cut spending to the bone? Yippee! I saved over a million dollars last year, just by not buying that Porsche and the property on the lake.

The only debt I currently have is my student loan and the mortgage on our house/farm (which is in the 5-digit range.) But I have hated every minute of having student loan debt hanging over me. I graduated twelve years ago, and I hope to get it finally paid off next year.

I got into the student debt before I fully realized what it meant. I was a naive 18-year old who fell for the old “you need to have a college education” bit. I also had a touch of Monopoly-itis–money didn’t seem quite real to me yet. When I graduated with loans totalling more than 200% of my annual salary I felt smothered and a bit helpless. Now I feel like I can breathe again.

Like everyone else, I receive regular requests for donations from my alma mater. I’m sorry, but I refuse to donate money to them until I have at least paid for my own education.

I also am extremely hesitant to lay out any more cash for education while I still owe on the last.

I would sort of like to get a library degree, just so I can be a professional at what I do, but I don’t want to take the gamble of laying out a ton of money and ending up in more debt. So I’ve put off the MLS, at least while I’m still paying for the BA (the cost of the MA is negligible since I had an assistantship that paid for that.) Now with the end of the student loans visible on the horizon, I’m starting to think about it, but that decision rests largely on what scholarships are available.

The ghosts of classrooms past

The funny thing about working in the same area I grew up is that I often see my old teachers. And I mean from my Kindergarten teacher all the way through high school, and even college profs. And grad school professors too.

It makes me feel like I’m taking some sort of test, that they’re checking in to see how I’m doing. See, I really did learn alphabetical order, and I can prove it! When my Kindergarten teacher came in, I realized this lady is the reason I can read and do my job. Wow!

I keep waiting for the day when one of my early grade school teachers pops in at the same time as a college professor. That would be weird. Today I looked up and there are two of my elementary school teachers standing at my desk–my 3rd and 5th grade teachers. Both, strangely enough, named “Mrs. H.” I just wanted to say “hey, get out of here, this is really too weird for me!”

Compulsive reading

I am a compulsive reader.  I read constantly, voraciously, compulsively. If you put words in front of me, I will read them. If I am doing something that allows reading, I read.

There are people out there who read more books than I read. It depends on the specific books I’m reading. Some books are light and quick; others are heavy and take some time to get through. I tend to read more of the latter. For the past several years I have read a minimum of ten books per month.

But what good does all this reading do? I enjoy it, but then couch potatoes enjoy mindlessly watching TV too. Does my reading habit measurably increase my utility, or even my sense of worth as a human being?  

Here is the crux of my personal crisis: I exist, but what benefit do I bring the world? I take in oxygen, but what do I contribute in return?  I have this nagging feeling that I’m supposed to do something, maybe not bring world peace, but help out someone in some small way. And helping them find Saw IV on the shelf at the library just doesn’t seem to qualify.

Surely there must be some valuable commodity that can be gotten from reading. I definitely have an active life of the mind. There’s a lot going on in there, but I don’t find many opportunities to turn it loose on the outside. Maybe that’s why I read; it’s a self-sustaining compulsion. I read because I would go stir crazy without intellectual stimulation.

And on the flip side there is writing. I write quite a bit, keeping journals and what-not. But the problem with my writing is that it lacks a receptive brain. I wish I could stop people in the street, hand them something I’ve written, and say “here, read this, tell me what you think.” Dang, I miss being in school, because that’s what school gave me–a response. In the real world no one cares what you’re thinking unless you can somehow make them care.

Hmmm…let me ponder that one.

Picking stuff

I haven’t written much, but then not much is going on. The days blur together. I’ve been sick for almost two weeks now, and that slowed me down. I celebrated my birthday a day early because I had to work on my birthday. My usual celebration is to not do any work, but just sprawl out and read. Like I used to do all summer when I was a kid.

The garden is just coasting along right now. This is the easy time–all I have to do is water (when it doesn’t rain) and pick. It’s been raining pretty frequently this year. My tomatoes are loaded with green ones, but none has ripened yet. At the moment I’m pulling small beets and enjoying them. This year’s wild blackberry crop was fabulous; I picked enough for two pies and also froze four quart bags.

We still have no fence for a dry lot, so the horses are still inside 22 1/2 hours a day. They don’t mind a bit, but we’re getting heartily sick of picking stalls. I was complaining about it to my farrier yesterday, and he said he has to clean EIGHT stalls. I must remember to keep things in perspective!

Last night we went to the grocery store, and I noticed several items that touted the fact that they contained “real” food items. Wow, ice cream “with Real Milk!” One wonders what all the other products contain. It is a sad state of affairs, truly, and it makes me glad that I have a garden that contains real beets and real tomatoes and real cabbage. My real corn was eaten by a deer, which is running around somewhere with a label: contains Sarah’s real corn.