Coarse Woody Debris

or

walking the unmowed path

::(begin transmission):::

composing this post, swinging in a gentle forest breeze, nestled in my hammock snug between the white pines, I struggle to condense and organize my thoughts.

This trip started a lil less than 2 weeks ago, yet it feels as though a warped bubble of spacetime has surrounded me.  Time moves slower here. Like when we were young.

The glens, hollows & swamps up here near the Finger Lakes resonate with something deep within my bones.  These are, after all, the stomping grounds of my Cree forebears, but there's more to it than that.  There's a sense of community budding all around... of neighbors helping neighbors... of progressive thought processes... of regenerative stewardship of the land we rely on to sustain us. And it is invigorating.

Our first week of the work-trade kept us busybusybusy.  As a group we've inoculated shitake mushroom logs, roofed a teacher-space, cleaned and patched the yurt, helped out with animal and garden chores, cleaned out the composting outhouse, dug a french drain around the Octagon (our outdoor classroom), rigged up the outdoor kitchen, built scrapwood trash/recycling receptacles, repainted signs, engineered ventilation for the top of the yurt, cooked, ate, drank & laughed together.

The camp is oddly quiet now,with half the group still off somewhere recuperating from the Grassroots Music Festival, but tomorrow morning we'll be bustling again.  The Permaculture Design Certification Course starts next saturday and we have a lot to do before the other 26 students start showing up friday afternoon...

Here's one of the best bits, though: the course hasn't even started but the learning process is already in full swing.  Each of us offers unique insights and information and we've collected in this shared space off the swamp road. 

We make. We sweat. We share. We live.

And the coyotes hoot and howl like drunken hooligans in the night.

And the ancient grandparents of the white pines in these woods keep silent vigil over the camp.

And the stinging nettles nourish us.

And raspberries have never tasted so sweet.

“All true wealth derives from biological processes.”

:::(end transmission)::