Directions to the feed store
The old proverb says to “make hay while the sun shines.” Today’s proverb is “drop everything and get hay now because really there is no other time. No past, no future, just now.”
Tag: zen
The object in an empty box
“Love and death are the two great gifts given to us. Mostly they are passed on unopened.” – Rainer Maria Rilke This quote was spoken softly into my ears in the almost too-intimate way that earbuds can achieve when set at just the right volume at just the right moment. The quote was recited by […]
Bird, I, M
We can’t relieve what we don’t understand. Understanding violence means recognizing our own intimate experiences with the situations and emotions that give rise to it in our own lives, every day.
How to move a mountain
It’s morning at the farm and the spring air is airish. Precipitation is so fine that it seems to hang there, not falling, just wet. Last night’s rain left shallow puddles that reflect the gray skies above. Task of the morning: move a mountain. In reality it’s a heap, but if you crouch down and […]
How to feed the world, in 42 easy steps
I have a confession to make: I don’t celebrate Earth Day. Every spring, the day comes and goes and I’m always too busy planting the season’s crops to pay it much mind. This essay is my humble attempt to honor Earth Days past and future. One of the articles that I regularly present to my […]
Mamas, Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Oceans
We human beings have always singled ourselves out from the rest of the natural world. We classify other animals and living things as “nature”, a thing apart from us, and we act as if we are somehow separate from it. Then we ask “How should we deal with nature?” (From The World We Have […]
Zen and The Art of No Security
A dear friend and mentor gave me a book called Zen Shorts by Jon J Muth. Here’s one of the stories. My Uncle Ry lived alone in a small house up in the hills. He didn’t own many things. He lived a simple life. One evening, he discovered he had a visitor. A robber had […]
A Commute Via The Himalayas
We Chicagoans love to complain about the Winter. Each year we are incensed, outraged even, that we are subjected to such injustice. “It took me an hour to get to work”, we say. We threaten relocations to such exotic locals as Portland, but we never go. We can continue to complain year after year, or […]
Dharma On The Farm 