terror

We've long known that the term "terrorist" is used by the powerful to label those they feel threatened by.

White phosphorus bombs showering from planes vs. pipe bombs, or sometimes rocks and shoes: the pipe bombs are terrorism, the destruction of an entire people is "security."

And, of course, the U.S. military bombing Iraqi civilians is not terrorism, but an Iraqi civilian bombing the U.S. military is.

With abortion doctors getting murdered, guys in Newburgh going to prison for terrorist plots dreamt up by FBI agents, and my "domestic terrorist" apron causing a hubub in the commercial kitchen where I work, I knew I had to turn to Green is the New Red (and this image from christianshirts.net) to break it all down for me.

women who know how to dress, and mutts

Them there is Hanna Rydh, by Maira Kalman, and Una Lady Troubridge, by Romaine Brooks. The Romaine Brooks goes out to all the dogs I met this morning at the Beacon dog parade, especially all the rescued pit bulls and greyhounds who are up for adoption. I raise my celeriac-mint-chili popsicle to you!

eat your weeds

The whole world, including the internets, seems to be covered in garlic mustard right now. While most hardy perennials are just starting to peep out, huge mounds of garlic mustard appear overnight. There are plenty of warnings and alarms online about how evil this plant is, how invasive, how it could potentially ruin forests. I tend to get kind of excited about having wild ginger, as it's also called, growing outside my door, especially after my multiple failed attempts to grow my own ginger fueled by stickers on store-bought ginger telling me it hails all the way from China, even when I've bought it at the health food store! OK, ok, I know wild ginger doesn't taste the same as that ginger, and I will dutifully try to grow ginger again in warm weather.

In the meantime, garlic mustard is edible, and that's why it was introduced here in the first place. Because I'm not especially hardcore about native vs. non-native, I like approach of keeping these babies in control by eating them. Eating garlic mustard, that is, not human babies. It's spicy, like horseradish root.The roots are long, but thin, and I'm way too lazy to prepare them like horseradish. A lot of people seem to make pesto out of the leaves and roots. I'm finding the huge roots useful for adding flavor (and good bacteria) to my nuka bed. Lazy tasty, mmmm.

gentle men: how the alphabet is used

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood! Yes, I'm singing that old Mr. Rogers tune today, because the temperature is delicious, spring flowers and leaves and buds are appearing an an amazing pace, the sun is bright, and Beacon's little community food project is finding its feet.

I'm singing loudly, and then find myself thinking about people like Fred Rogers. Obsessed with community, how things are made and by whom, make-believe, swimming laps, and vegetarianism—like me! Fred was probably a lot more gentle to my aggro, but he was a big deal to me (kill your television and all). I was profoundly sad when he died, even though there's that weirdness over feeling you've lost someone who was actually unknown to you.

I had that same feeling of loss when River Phoenix died. To me, he was such a lesbian, a lesbian icon, even. Everything about him, aside from the silly fact that he was a straight man, was as dyke culture as can be. (Is it Kaia or River, River or Kaia?) It was the same year that Kurt Cobain died, the year I lived in the Pacific Northwest. Cobain's death was one I was on the outside of, looking in and seeing what looked like absurd public grief. He wanted to die. I thought people should be happy the poor man finally had some relief. But then, there was how I felt about River and Fred, so I get it, I guess.

Cheers to two gentle men in my life who were never actually in my life. And to those people who actually are my neighbors. It was a stunning sunrise, and it is a beautiful day.

where does the time go?

There's no time for pondering this question while listening to Nina Simone, it's time to get seedlings started indoors or in cold frames!

If you live in the Hudson Valley, please consider getting local seeds from the new Hudson Valley Seed Library, making yourself familiar with the important work they're doing, and enjoying the artist designed seed packs they've created.For extra credit, actually organize your garden plans.

feelin' it

Spring is finally happening. Thank drag queens! (I can't walk around saying "thank god" anymore. Occasionally "thank the goddesses" works, but an unbeliever really needs to expand their repertoire.)

When I went outside this morning, it was foggy and rainy and warm. All sorts of springy things are finally starting to happen, and that was the exact recipe for an insanely happy me. My morning coffee wander included expanses of sprouts, vibrant green moss, a pileated red headed woodpecker, elderberry buds that look like animal paws, the first forsythia blossoms, a groundhog just emerging from her hole, and the discovery that the radishes I planted-too-early-but just-couldn't-stop-myself had sprouted under their protective victorian bells.

Tonight, thunder and heavy rain and crrraaazzzy lightning. Welcome to delicious, dramatic weather and amazing plants and animals. Welcome spring!

a show of strength

Ah yes, I complain about Chronogram, but it did introduce me to the river photographer Carolyn Marks Blackwood. I love a good political print, but have also become obsessed with the river, the river fog, and the sounds the river ice makes when the tide rises and falls. It's terrifying, amazing. Good for humbling a person.

I met a woman in Hudson who used to walk across the frozen river to work making handbags on the other side. Really, she said, they ran, because the cracking terrified them. She didn't ever hear of any of "the girls" falling through.

the real cost of prisons

It's fascinating watching the Rockefeller Drug Laws be knocked back a bunch of steps. Drug arrests and arrests of vendors or homeless people in public space are so much of what the NYPD is about. The entire Hudson Valley is covered in prisons, many of which are filled with people being held for absurdly long sentences on drug charges. The bulk of the arrests were made just for possession. Of course those people should be freed.

It has an interesting edge, though, because for the first time in decades, prison populations may shrink, and some prisons may close. Of the three prisons near my home, at least one is filled primarily with drug offenders. Maybe two. (Different people give different reports, and prison websites are useless.) One expert on Democracy Now said whole upstate towns would be closing down when their prison closed. It feels really strange to live in a town that may see collapse because its evil main industry is being challenged.

Reading an entirely different article about Queens County Farm Museum (agriculture in the city, we like that), they make reference to sending animals to slaughter at a slaughterhouse on Long Island that uses prisoners as workers for "job training." More like training your free workers, a.k.a. slaves, to be killers. Crazy!

Things like this shouldn't surprise me. After all, we live in a country where people couldn't figure out where Timothy McVeigh got his killer instinct. Duh, the military! There's nothing quite as brilliant as locking up innocent people and training them to be killers.

Image from the book The Real Cost of Prisons, from PM Press.

sugar sugar

I tried to be grouchy about the weather today, thinking, "More of this!" But then I kind of enjoyed it, trying out snowshoes for the first time (more on this later), getting them tangled up in each other and falling face first into deep snow, eventually wandering where I would otherwise not go in 19 degree weather, discovering trees tapped to make syrup, and dreaming, dreaming of learning how to tap maple trees and make syrup myself.

I absolutely plan to go to the mini maple introduction at the Sharpe Reservation on March 21st, and in the meantime, am satisfying my curiosity by reading about other people's first experiences with it.

gorgeous

Don't tell the Beaconites, but sometimes I wish I lived in Newburgh. There's a forest in the middle of the city, beautiful old Main St. (Broadway), authentic Mexican food, a happenin' waterfront with an indie movie theater, and amazing architecture. When moving to the Hudson Valley, we looked at a house there: a view of the river, a walk to both Broadway and the river, across the street from a nice, quiet cemetery. The slumlord selling it and done a number on it, though, and it wasn't livable.Sometimes I wish I lived in Newburgh because commuters who do live there get to take the ferry across the river to the train. What a gorgeous** way to start one's day! I know from swimming in the river and from sailing on the Woody Guthrie that the view from the middle of the river is even more stunning than from the banks. Bannerman Island and Storm King can host your hazy morning daydreams.
As I've watched from the train platform as the ferry got stuck in the river ice in the past days, I've even thought it would be exciting to be caught on that boat in that ice. Being on the river every day,* I think, would ground me here, in this place.
*Aside one: Years back I participated in an Act Up demonstration against Coke on the Chelsea Piers. Coke was sponsoring a party for AIDS activists, pretending their own African employees weren't being denied health care. Besides the protesters on the pier, we had a little boat with a big banner going back and forth in the river, podunk Greenpeace style. The people who owned that boat used it to travel to work everyday, from one Manhattan location to another, floating around the island. Amazing that people live their lives that way, on open water, even in Manhattan.
**Aside two: Let me explain my use of "gorgeous." My friend Ron was a recovering heroin addict and had his share of awful experiences. Every day was a big struggle for him, and that fact made him revel all the more in the beautiful, the positive. When Ron said "gorgeous" he drew out the word, bent his knees, leaned back, and rolled his eyes to the sky. "Gooor jus." Ron said, "I threw some candy on the pavement and photographed it. G o r g e o u s." When I appreciate something, I like to take the time to appreciate it Ron style. Bend my knees, make it last.

Photos are from wmbraine

love the one you're with

I'm from the southwest. I like road trips in the car with the windows down listening to conjunto music, bakingly hot weather, sandals, javelinas and jackrabbits and roadrunners, cacti, swamp coolers, big skies filled with insane lightening, and walking really slow. That said, I've lived away from "home" longer than I lived there, making it so that I can't use where I'm from as an excuse for everything anymore.

It's warm enough to be rainy here in the Hudson Valley, but not really warm at all, and me and my stack of seed catalogs can't stop fantasizing about planting season. I've been following chatter about growing various fruit in southern California, and it's driving me a little crazy. As if I don't miss fresh pomegranates, kumquats, tangelos, and prickly pear tunas enough. Should I really be listening to people talk about their avocado, jujube, and meyer lemon trees? It hurts.

I have to focus here, what grows here. Past years have seen the beginning of my perennial fruit excitement: I've planted raspberries, elderberries, cranberries, wolfberries, ligonberries, hawthorne berries, black turkey figs, cherries, apples, a plum. Some of them have done swimmingly, some didn't make it through a season. Some aren't really meant to be perennials in this climate, and are angry with me for dragging them indoors for the winter. (Hang in there little goji!) I think it's spectacular that wild fruits and nuts were here in the yard before I came. Woohoo for mulberries, black walnuts, wild strawberries, and quince! And there's that one fruiting tree that I still haven't been able to identify after five full years.
I can't help searching for additional food perennials for this climate. I've found siberian kiwis which I'd love to give a go, and pawpaws, which seemingly would require hand pollination (alternatively fascinating and frightening, since I'm not that skilled a gardener). Maybe seaberries and honeyberries, too. Or an asian pear for the mini orchard.

Many of these plants won't produce anytime soon, but it is amazing to be learning about them, and turning this yard into a truly edible landscape. When considering planting a fruit tree in her yard but knowing she wouldn't be there anymore when the fruit came, my friend realized someone would live there, somebody would benefit. If I do someday run back to Arizona and go to work for Iskash*taa, may this yard feed whoever lives here well.

*The berries pictured aren't edible. They are cotoneasters, and just look dramatic in the snow. Especially with a cardinal sitting on the branch. The other picture is of black walnuts from my yard. No longer green, but with the fruit still "on."

crashing planes and sweating feet

It's confusing. Planes are crashing all over the place, people in LA are just pulling carrots of the ground, and I'm seeing the ground here for the first time in months. Yes, the few days of weather above freezing have melted all the snow here and all of a sudden it feels like there's so much SPACE and I can't stop looking at the exposed ground, the wet smashed leaves and dirt and the slick branches except to look away to look at pictures taken in May. May last year, May the year before, and Mays years back, and I don't even believe that this place can turn into that place in a mere three months. At the same time, there's no way I can wait three whole months. The sun has felt amazing and the days, though they've been getting longer for a while, finally FEEL like they're getting longer. You can actually feel the sun hitting your skin because the moisture in your skin isn't so busy freezing. And my feet are actually hot in my shoes and I can't wait to expose my pale feet. And other people in the 'hood are complaining about flip flops, as if the opportunity to wear flip flops isn't one of the most delicious things. Especially right now, when we can see the ground for the first time in what feels like a frozen lifetime of news of crashing planes.

These pictures are my compost path, which I shovel religiously but finally gave up on this year and just slip slid my way. I did not give up on the little path I shovel for my mail carrier, since he's older and a bit fragile, and I'd hate my laziness to be the cause of a slip and fall. The other picture is the side yard in May, when all the colors are clashing and ridiculous and you can't help but feel happy at the over-the-top fluffiness of it all.

tour della (o)possum

Sometimes all it takes is speaking their name to get them to come visit.

pickle

Status update (a): Fermented Beverages

I "made" my own kombucha mother rather than ordering one or harassing people I know for handouts, and I did it based on the thin instructions of the people I've come to call the "kombucha femme boys". (You know from me that's a loving term—aggro-sincere.) I was discouraged for a full month, poking at it and sniffing it. Apparently, there's no warm enough place in my house, not even on the shelf right behind the wood stove, so it just took a dang long time. But...success! A mother is born, and she's happily floating in a new batch, looking like a crazy jellyfish.

Then there's the ginger beer. Tasty to me, lemony and fizzy, but too strong. No-one looking for a soft drink experience would like it. Again, I think it's the heat cold thing: too cool, so that in waiting extra long for the fizz to come, the acid flavor overrode the sweetness. I'll try again in warmer months.

Status update (b): Root Cellar

The veggies are going strong. Hudson valley squashes and radishes and potatoes and apples and onions and garlic and carrots are still fresh and crisp after being under the cover of darkness since late October. Why haven't I done this in previous winters? Why doesn't everyone (who doesn't live in a tropical clime) do this? I'm having a conspiracy moment, convinced our lack of veg storage knowledge was perpetrated by Green Giant or somebody equally as cunning.

Status update (c): Merit Badge cute news

The woman who's daughter's girl scout vest kicked off the abovegroundpool merit badges awards contacted us to say she likes the idea of recycling scout merit badges for righteous activist activities. Unlikely scouting bond!

more snow today

by Gunther Uecker

use what you've got

There's a guy in Poughkeepsie composing music, amazing music, by hitting the bridge with various tools. This idea isn't so new...people who haven't had much have created musical instruments out of whatever they could find for eons. Those of us who ride the NYC subways are intimately familiar with the bucket drummers who keep us dancing on our commutes.

It does still seem novel to be playing the Mid-Hudson bridge. The compositions will be complete and made public this summer, celebrating the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson's voyage up the Hudson River. You can listen to a clip here.

And, I don't know if there will be drummers there, but this summer will also see the opening of the Walkway over the Hudson. This railroad bridge, just north of (and visible from) the Mid-Hudson Bridge, was the longest bridge in the world when it opened in 1889. In the 1970s a fire damaged the bridge, and it's been out of use since. It's being re-engineered as a park and walkway over the river, connecting rail trails on either side, and promises to be a stunning public space. Parks and paths and views and drum music make for happy living.

storms

Here in the Hudson Valley we experienced, this week, the craziest wind storm I've ever been through in my life. Twelve straight hours of howling and whipping high winds, falling trees, flying roof tiles, and miserable looking birds. Then it poured rain for a full (warm) day, and the temperature dropped in a matter of hours, causing a huge ice storm, and all the associated ice-covered glittering trees, lack of electricity, and ice storm damage.

Today, it's still freezing but with a clear blue sky, super sunny. At the park were a huge mass of crows (or ravens, I still can't tell them apart!), so thick and so many that they covered the grass. I was standing there wishing I had the camera, and an ice-covered tree fell and knocked down the power lines. Huge pop, and all the crows flew away, one big black cloud.

sometimes living in the country punches you in the gut

The neighbors who knit me sweaters and invite me to their children's birthdays and make me vegan cinnamon rolls on christmas also kill a deer once a year, and hang it in a tree in their yard.

I watch them drag the body across the lawn, struggle to hang it, hose out the insides in the deep slice. I stare from every window in the house, trying not to look but unable to look away, checking every few minutes if it's still there for the entire three or four days it hangs there.

The first year I knocked on my neighbors' door and talked with them about it. That year, and most years, the deer has hung from the tree in a noose, and I talked with them not only about hunting, but about the trauma a body in a tree in a noose causes. They listened, and went on eviscerating the deer.

Now, powerless to stop it, I hang a "no hunting" sign on the house every year, cover the windows with sheets, but pull those sheets aside and stare, check, watch, make sure it's real. I see dead animals strapped to cars every year, and I get furious, terribly sad, I rant. I talk to myself about hunted animals having at least lived free (unlike the billions of animals in factory farms).

But the body hanging in the tree every year remains one of the hardest parts of having moved to the country.

tool talk - ecofan

Somehow this desert rat ended up living in the frozen north. Well, not the most northern part of the world, nor the most frozen, but cold enough to make heating a big issue. Living in a big, old, drafty house that's heated by oil is not comforting: The house is still very cold, the oil is outrageously expensive, and the use of resources is impossible to make peace with.

A couple of years ago we got a wood burning stove. The decision was hard. Pellet stoves are more efficient, but there often seem to be shortages of available pellets, especially the winter after Katrina, making it obvious that pellet ingredients are not local. Corn burning stoves are interesting, but uncommon enough that it's hard to get fuel unless you have your own cornfield. Solar heat is the best answer, since there's no pollution involved and no shortage of sun. Unfortunately, solar prices are going up and the tax deductions down, making it still an unreachable goal for us low income types. (It's still in future plans!) We looked around our area at all the deadwood lying around, all the branches from storm damage, all the cut trees stacked up at roadwork sites, and decided to buy the cleanest, most efficient wood burning stove our scraped together dollars could buy.

Last winter we moved the heat around with a little electric fan salvaged from a computer, given to us by our bio-diesel brewing neighbor. (Love the frugal and tinkering neighbors!) This year, we tore down a wall to allow the heat to penetrate the whole house. And we got an eco fan.

The computer fan did the job, no doubt. But it required electricity, and was loud. This lovely little number sits on top of the stove and is propelled by the heat. Light the stove, and the fan starts running. And it's perfectly silent, letting you enjoy that cold-night-by-the-fire ambiance thing.

There's a whole explanation that comes with the fan about the physics of how it works, but I didn't bother with that. To me, it's just beautiful magic.

my roots

In an effort to plant more perennial edibles, I planted sunchokes this past spring. I'd only tasted these rich and nutty roots a year or so ago, but am a super lazy gardener, so they had a lot of appeal. Nice bright flowers on tall plants (they are in the sunflower family), tasty and prolific root veggies that can stay in the ground through winter, and plants that come back year after year on their own. What more can a gal (who can't be bothered to turn her compost) ask for?

Edible roots are exciting plants for gardeners: all that magic going on underground, hidden from the eye.

I'm leaving a lot of the sunchokes in the ground to harvest them when they're super sweet in the spring. But I pulled a few of these beauties to add to my Korean style radish pickle ferments. Yum. I'm as proud as a mother cat with a new litter of kittens.

If you're not familiar with sunchokes, here's the full 411.