Rain on my Parade

Early last week, I got everything lined up for harvest: food grade storage barrels, pallets to put barrels on, a forklift for maneuvering, and a harvester, Doug Mosel. I wanted to save some grain plants before harvest so that people can see the whole plant. Below are photos small bundles.

Dark Northern Rye

Red Fife

Sonora

Triple IV

I've been looking forward to this harvest -- my first crop off my own farm! Everything's perfectly ripe and Doug was going to harvest on the 10th. But what came instead? Rain. Ukiah never sees rain in July!

Rainy day

I walked the field in the rain, rubbing grain heads between my hands to see how easily seeds fell out. They didn't budge.

Developing mold on the chaff

I don't know what's going to happen with my crop. This is, perhaps, a good reminder to be released of attachments, and to view from a bigger perspective.

Deer ate my grains, rains may be rotting them. These are challenges of farming with nature. We tried farming at odds with nature, thinking that the world is ours to control. Because we have, we’ve done much damage to the earth and each other. I’d rather feed the deer than poison or shoot them for entering the farm. They are important partners in managing the ecosystem. The rains may be inopportune for me, but it helps our region by alleviating the drought by just that little bit. If the grains rot, then at least I planted a crop that sequesters significant amounts of carbon from the atmosphere, returning it to the soil so that there’s less to warm our planet.

You know who wanted rain, though? The millet. They seem happier. 

Pearl Millet

Foxtail Millet

Proso Millet

There was no point staying home this weekend and worrying about whether the sun would come out. In any case, I was supposed to attend my friend's wedding. I met this friend in my first physics class freshman year of college. We happened to sit next to each other in lab, but our first interaction was when he moved my hand to look at something on the paper I covered. I told him to pay attention to personal space. We joked about it and, alas, we became friends. He was always supportive in an unobtrusive way, letting me stay at his place when my roommate tried to seduce me, inviting me over for dinner when he saw me digging through dumpsters. 

A few years ago, he went through a dark time in grad school. He felt disillusioned with life and felt alone in being that way. So, I made him a website and asked people to contribute their stories of disillusionment. Many responded, filling the white space with anecdotes and experiences. Nothing conclusive or preachy was said. But it was a way for all of us to see that we're not alone and we're still alive, figuring things out, with some support along the way.

My friend weathered that period and graduated with a PhD in chemistry. He's now in law school (masochist, this one) and partnered with a wonderful, strong, smart, beautiful woman. I'm glad he could shed that terrible time and be open to different possibilities.

I'm thrilled to have been part of celebrating an old friend in a new chapter of his life. I danced in the colorful and joyous procession leading my friend to the temple to meet the bride. Inside the temple a path of rose petals and lanterns led to a canopy for the bride, groom, and their families to sit. They performed rituals to ensure stability, prosperity, and a happy future, and the first and most important prayer was for food. Food is considered the foundation and basic necessity to support a relationship and family.

Though I didn't know it at the time, I, appropriately, included four giant pumba onions in their wedding gift. 

Farming may be stressful and unpredictable, but times like these when I'm encouraged to remember how timeless and essential this work is to support all people, I'm heartened and ready for the next planting.

Procession to the temple