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Village Life, mid-May 2017: bottling mead, seedlings for sale and for planting, compost roof structure

Like everyone in the northern hemisphere who is at least vaguely aware of the larger earth environment — I exempt, for example, those who go from air-conditioned house and back to air-conditioned car in garage every day except weekends when they spend all day inside on their screens — it’s spring! — the greening time, when Earth’s inner mysterious primal power begins to arouse and open seeds, push roots down and plants up into myriad glorious forms, all the while birds start to call and respond, frogs spawn and jump about, insects proliferate. Hopefully. Hopefully all these phenomena are still occurring. Sometimes, given all the dire news we hear about, we’re actually astonished to feel the eternally cycling signs of spring yet again, not only via Earth and her air and fire and soil, but inside our own bodies which thrum to the same quickening.

Here in Green Acres Village, of course work ramps up; and so does the fun. As podmate Dan said to me the other day, after an entire day spent on outside projects — “I feel so good. Spending my entire day outside makes me feel WILD.” Yes yes! Our natural wild aliveness springs up in concert with nature’s glorious blooming.

Here’s Dan, our fermenter, on his one recent inside job, bottling from one jug of mead that he started back in February. After one week, the mead found the yeast and started bubbling. Check it out!

That was three months ago. Two days ago, Dan filled and capped 25 bottles; and with the other jug, will get 25 more.

With all the ferments that Dan produces — lots of krauts of various kinds and kim chi, can’t remember what else, but it’s all extraordinary, the best I’ve ever tasted — I keep pushing for him to sell some of it.

One thing holding us back so far, is that we haven’t decided on a logo for Green Acres Alchemy,  the name we’ll give to our various land and food based businesses. I mentioned this to my friend Julia who used to live a few doors down, on the phone awhile ago, and she said “the name gives me chills.” Then, instantly, she continued, “Here’s the logo, an actual alchemical symbol,” and sent it to me on the phone. “It could be green,” she said, and as Evan — who does calligraphy! — noted later, “the name could go above (Green Acres) and below (Alchemy), creating the circle with the letters. Ah yes! And Oh wow, I just noticed.  The logo is also the letter “A,” (for Alchemy), and it has three prongs, symbolizing the three houses with three occupants each in our village pod!  So that’s in the works. Evan: “Shoot me the logo and I’ll see what I can do about it.”

Meanwhile, Rebecca has all the plants outside the new greenhouse now, with some of the seedlings for sale —

— and the rest going into our various gardens. Here’s Grant, an Indiana University intern who is with us for two full weeks, and who Rebecca says, is unusually aware and observant.

(Unusual because it’s true, she and I and other elders both notice that many “millennials” seem to be preoccupied, even when they think they want to learn how to garden. Too much screen time too early in life?)

Okay, back to “Dan the man,” who, with Evan, is here outside, constructing the frame for what will become the roof of the compost area. Compost is another form of alchemy . . .

Final Community Dinner of Spring Semester, May 10, 2017: Seafood paella, fire, music!

It looked like rain, so we decided to hold the feast inside, including seafood paella, by podmate Logan’s visiting girlfriend Stefania, who hails from Spain.

Just prior to dinner, Mariella decided to do a little video, “for my friends,” she said, “who wonder why I talk about Green Acres Village.” Her project caught me, for one, by surprise. My distaste for the camera at that moment is obvious here. Not sure why I felt that way. And I’ve never seen myself feel that way — from the outside. WOW!

Anyway, here it is, our first village video, uploaded to youtube:

There were so many of us, and we were all restless and hot, wanting to be outside, and it didn’t seem like rain after all . . . Evan decided to make a fire in the fire pit. That got us going. Within minutes we were all, including four dogs, sitting on the patio.

Tim is obviously a dog magnet.

So is Evan. While Logan began the singing and thrumming — all original songs, by the way — my Shadow was about to hop onto Evan’s lap.

Yup! (See them both, slightly right of center.)

Meanwhile, Mariella’s son Juakim decided to play . . . what? Darth Vader?

 

Juakim is being mentored by Eva’s teenage son Andrew. Hmmmm. . .

Soon, darkness stole in.

 

And it was Bryn’s turn to sing and play — again, as with Logan, original songs, some hilarious, others wrenched from the painful journeys of truly human beings.

 

 

I can’t emphasize enough how wonderfully musical and authentic — even, at times, breathtaking! — I find the compositions and renditions of both of them. Hopefully, we’ll be soon videotaping their spontaneous performances, to put up here on the Green Acres Village website, under a new category: ART, which will also include poetry, drawings, painting, sculpture. You name it! We got it. Just like all people’s the world over, our creativity, once unleashed, is protean.

The music lasted into the night, wafting out of the darkness through my open bedroom windows, lulling me to sleep.

 

April 5 Community Dinner: RAINBOW RAINBOW RAINBOW!!

So. I was walking the path between our Overhill house and our original DeKist house early Wednesday evening, bringing food for our weekly Community Dinner, when I realized  . . . hmmm. Hey! It’s raining — and the sun’s out! WHERE’S THE RAINBOW? I looked around, and there it was, horizon to horizon across the eastern sky. I ran in and yelled RAINBOW RAINBOW RAINBOW! — and those who were gathering for dinner ran outside. YES!

BTW: from what I heard (of course I went to bed before 9 p.m.), the evening wore on past midnight, thanks to Logan’s guitar and singing, with over two dozen people altogether. So much food that we had to use two counters to hold it all.