You Know It’s Hard Out Here For A… Farmer!

We've divided up chores and among other things, I'm responsible for feeding the cats and rabbits before catching the bus at 6:15am. Mark feeds the chickens, goat, sheep and alpaca before he leaves for the day. Now that my commute will be half of what it was, (I was just hired as part of a Community Health Team) I will pick up the chickens.

We built the rabbit hutch and chicken coop ourselves. When we budgeted for the animals, we didn't take into account a number of very important things. Did you know that when temperatures dropped below freezing that would mean that the water for the animals would freeze? We had to invest in heating lamps. We also didn't take into account that that the heating lamps wouldn't necessarily work as well in a large space. So we needed to invest in a heated water bucket for the barn/shed (another ghetto project)

for the goat, sheep and alpaca. We had wanted to use our shed as a barn, but it's on a solid rock ledge, so sadly we couldn't use it. New barns run $1500-$3000 depending on size and materials used. And we weren't up to building a barn from scratch. Instead, I found a shed on craigslist that we had to disassemble for transport and reassemble on our property. Another ghetto project and it only took us a WHOLE month…

We also thought that the garage (where we house the rabbits and cats) would maintain temperatures above freezing, but it doesn't. We were fortunate enough to get a wood stove for free! But there's this little issue called wood that we didn't think through. As noted in a previous post, Mark is a pyromaniac. He has been cutting up fallen trees and using them as wood in our (now-ruined) outdoor fire pit, since we moved in.

So it didn't seem like much of a leap to use that wood for the woodstove in the garage. Well… Mark says it's not as easy as we thought. Especially since he's now cutting and splitting wood in sub-freezing temps. Thankfully, he does it and now the garage is toastier than the house!

Besides our hot water… you know what else runs on oil – our HEATERS! We dumbass city slickers thought our heaters ran on gas. When we ran out of oil a few months ago, the weather was mild so we didn't realize the heaters weren't working. We went through the last oil fill-up fast! Now that it's cold – it was -1* (minus/negative one degree) the other day – we noticed when we ran out of oil! It's funny how you use more oil in the winter. And we didn't budget for this. We still have animals to feed, not to mention feeding ourselves. Fortunately, the oil company is willing to work with us. They only charged us half of the non-route/emergency fee that they would have… Mark is now rethinking the wood stove project I lobbied for, that he previously protested when it was warm outside. We are not going through this again. It sucks.

I've been riding to Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center for the past four months on a commuter bus. Although it's only 30 minutes from my exit to the hospital exit, on the bus it's about 90 minutes each way which includes the various stops on the way. It doesn't make sense to drive everyday when the bus is only $1 each way. Although I did start ridesharing two days a week.

It's been rough (for me) on the bus since I have motion sickness issues, I leave home at dark and get home at dark, and from the time I get on the bus in the morning to the time I get off at the end of the day is 12 hours. Although it was a great place to work, I won't have to worry about all that anymore. Anyway, some of us were chatting the other day and this one woman was talking about how she spent $6500 on oil to heat her home in one season. She was trying to be frugal and kept her heat set at 60* - which is cold. She said she dressed in layers and slept with her dogs. $6500 to be cold?!?!?!?!? Another woman was saying that they kept their thermostat at 65* and dressed in layers. We all agreed that we want to be able to walk around in our undies and be comfortable, whether it was winter or summer. The woman with the dogs just moved into an energy efficient home and her house faces south, so her heating bills are a small fraction of what they were, plus her electric bills are under $50 month! That's what I'm talking about.

These experiences have made me realize that in addition to the books/manuals and helpful advice from friends and neighbors, we need instruction. I am proudly about to begin taking farming classes - All part of a University of Vermont Women's Agricultural Network program. Budgeting is included! Hopefully this will be the end of just plain ghetto and the beginning of structure with alittle flavor.

Your Sheep Are Out...

We got sheep...and goats. Two of each-all girls. They are sooo adorable. We found them at a farm that was going out of business at the other end of the state (2 hours away). The sheep are merino (imagine a soft and beautiful merino wool sweater or afghan) and the goats are angora (premium fiber there too).

Mark built this ghetto a** fence! It wasn't what I wanted, but he insisted it would work. It's about 100 feet long by 30-50 feet wide (it's not exactly plumb). It was an inexpensive option to what I wanted. Oh well.

So the other day, I gave him a shopping list for Thanksgiving dinner. He had the day off, I didn't. While he's roaming the aisles frantically searching for the items on the list a man walks up to him and says "you're Mark, right". Mark responds in the affirmative and the man (of course Mark doesn't remember his name) introduces himself as one of our neighbors around the way (our road is several miles long). Then the man tells Mark "your sheep are out". Mark says something like "excuse me" and the man repeats, "your sheep are out" then tells Mark to have a nice Thanksgiving.

Then Mark heads for the checkout line and is stopped again by another neighbor. This neighbor knows our address, but not the name. He also tells Mark "the sheep are out". Mark then stops at the corner store to get cancer sticks and guess what, the owner says, "hey Mark, I heard your sheep are out". When he finally gets home guess what, the sheep are out... They had challenged the fence and were able to squeeze their way under it. They were just grazing, all morning. They stayed on our land but grazed up field, down field, in the wooded area near the road. The had plenty of food, but no water. The goats were still inside the fence.

Mark spent the next several hours chasing the sheep, trying to guide them back into the fence without letting the goats out. He called me a number of times cussing and spitting and threatening to shoot them. He said they were "slick". He even called Carlton to help him. They almost got them in. He finally just let them be until he could get a third person. I was the third. We used the quad to guide them up the fenceline, Mark and I to keep them on the fenceline, with the truck angled by the door to force them toward the entry. That didn't work. Then we cornered them with the quad on the fenceline. Mark got a hold of one and popped her over the fence. I was scared they hurt her, but she seemed fine. The other one got away. We cornered that one near the wooded are, while the one inside the fence was butting the fence trying to get to the other one. Carlton tackled the sheep and plopped her over the fence.

It was all quite exciting. In the end, Mark reinforced the bottom of the fence the next day and they've been happy as clams inside the fence ever since. It's all good.

SolarFest Follow-up

It has been suggested that we cut down trees to accommodate solar paneling on our roof.

This is what the front of our house (the part that faces south) looks like from the top of our driveway. This picture was taken at the beginning of summer.

This is gorgeous (to us) and we wouldn't think of cutting down these trees. Time to think of alternatives. Any other suggestions?

Pitch Black Follow-up & Getting Hot Water

Bart and his girlfriend came and helped us fix our hot water heater (that is a long story*) so we went and helped them stack wood. It was great exercise. OK, so it wasn't fun, but we were happy to help out. Besides, they are way cool.

Any way, on the way home, at twilight I noticed that the long dark road that felt 10 miles long was actually 2 miles long and had quite a few houses on the road. Glad I was able to get a better perspective. Still wouldn't want to have car trouble there in the middle of the night...


*Living in a rural area requires quite a bit of adjustments. Actually moving to a new community is always an adjustment. When I moved into a condo back in CT, we had just had a major snow storm. It was cold. I adjusted the thremostat so we could warm up. Although the blower came on, it was blowing cold air. I called the previous owners who said they had no problem with the heat. The husband even came over to make sure I was using the thermostat correctly. Guess what, I never called the gas company. Previously, heat and hot water were included in the rent, who knew I had to call someone for heat and hot water!!! Of course the gas company didn't consider it an emergency. Fortunately I had a place to take a shower and had a portable heater so the bedroom was toasty because the earliest appointment I could get was two days later between 6pm and midnight. Guess who showed up at 11:55pm, the gas company! I was tired and irritable.

Fast forward several years later when we run out of kerosene. We have kerosene for the water heater, gas for the heat and cooking, and electricity for everything else. So guess what, no hot water. It's a pain to lug pots full of hot water to fill up the tub so you can take a warm bath. And guess what, the oil companies don't consider it an emergency. If you want them to deviate from their normal route, its an additional $100!!! Plus, the minimum is approximately $300 worth of fuel!!! (so you can't have them come out for $50 worth...) Thank goodness it's not yet the dead of winter. Thank goodness it was just the hot water. Thank goodness we resolved the issue quickly!

Vermont Women's Conference

"I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand."

So I decided to go to this conference to get feedback on my ideas for being a farmer/rancher (more about that in a future post). I had no idea how many women would attend, but I had a pretty good idea that I would be the only person of color. I was wrong! When I walked in there was actually another Black woman there - I immediately introduced myself. She was a dear! We attended the same workshops and had lunch together. She invited up to her home. Later I saw two other women who were ambiguously ethnic (unknown ethnic origin). I was strangely encouraged. And everyone else I met in the workshops and at the organization tables were very nice.

The keynote speaker was Lilly Ledbetter of the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act - the first Act President Obama signed into law. She was fabulous! She was introduced by Senator Patrick Leahy who was joined by his spouse. The President of Vermont Technical College, where the even was held, was a pretty good speaker as well. I completed bogarded (is that a racial slur?)my way to the front of the line and took a picture with them.










Senator Leahy's office sponsored this conference. He chatted with me about the picture he took of President Obama (I just love writing that) signing the act. He stood behind President Obama and took the only picture from behind. Leahy and his wife presented the picture to Ms. Ledbetter. Leahy also advised me he had a Black son (in law?) and several Black grandchildren. Apparently his son is now one of the photojournalists on President Obama's staff. Then he had his assistant take my name. Not sure why, maybe he wants this picture...?

The workshops I attended were pretty good - very informative and encouraging. The other women had some fabulous, eco-friendly, interesting ideas, all in various stages of development. Stuff I never would have thought of. Although everyone was pretty friendly, I was hesitant to share my business ideas. I wasn't sure it was a safe space. But a wise friend of mine once told me that we create our own safe spaces. So I shared my ideas and was very encouraged by the feedback.

The inspirational speaker at the conclusion was good. She said if we always have to witness something before we can do it, we will never be the first (like President Obama) and we will be limited to what others have already done. I liked that.

SolarFest

When we moved up here, we decided we were going to go as green as possible. The first thing we did was get a small plastic container to start composting. I had read and heard lots of different ways (with and without meat products for example). We were pretty good about putting our table scraps, paper towels, egg shells, etc into the pail. We felt pretty good about it, until it began to smell. Badly. We had neglected to prepare for the next step - having an outside container to mix the leaves and grass and indoor stuff with. We abandoned te idea until we could get it together. Then I saw and advertisement for SolarFest. SolarFest boasted seminars, vendors, and general information about green living. We just had to go! It was over an hour away in the Green Mountains of Southern Vermont. The drive was beautiful through back roads and some highways. Some of the signs were obscure or downright missing. When we crossed the border into upstae New York we knew we were lost, but some nice folks gave us a map (mine was in the other car) and redirected us.

It stormed the night before, so we were glad we decided to go on Sunday.

It was alittle muddy but my Jeep handled it very well. :) Some people got stuck in the mud.

Although this festival was over 10 years old, this new locatio was only a couple of years old. Someone had donated their hundreds of acres for the festival to use. People had camped overnight. It was kind of wierd watching people (OK a bunch of white people) walking around barefoot. It wasn't the cleanest environment (muddy) and it wasn't the easiest terrain (very hilly) and there were branches and rocks all over the place. It was pretty odd, but we ran with it.

We were impressed with the effort to make this event as green as possible using solar energy. We attended one seminar and Mark was ready to go. But I dragged him around to the vendors so we would discuss possibilities for our home. Did you know that approximately 30% of heating costs are from heating water? We found a cool solar system with tubes that mounts to the roof and connects directly to your hot water heater. Very efficient, guaranteed to reduce your bills.

They had great food too. I even got Mark to try some vegeterian food. OK, I tricked him into trying it. But he grudgingly agreed that it was good.

This is a solar powered car. They also had the next generation of solar powered full sized cars as well

It was a beautiful venue.

Yeah, we had to use port a lets. At least they had hand sanitizer, which makes it alittle less gross.

Separately, I was filling up my water bottle at a faucet they had set up when a woman walks up, turns the faucet off, pulls my bottle up to the spout and turns the water back on. She says that I was wasting water by not holding my bottle way up to the faucet. I thought I was not getting other peoples germs by holding my bottle away...

We saw a representative from the State of Vermont who explained the different programs and incentives for converting to solar, wind or geothermal power. Apparently wind isn't an option unless you're in a very windy area. The poles have to be about sixty feet high which some communities consider unsightly. He gave us a list of approved vendors and schooled us on going green. He was cool.

They had events for families with kids. I think this guy was doing puppets.

The orange thing is a portable hot tub. You heat the water by burning wood which heats up the coils. Very cool, but very expensive. I think it looks like a giant tea cup.

Back home, we called a local name on the list of approved vendors. He was very nice. But, when he came by, he told us our roof needed to have southern exposure. The south facing part of our roof doesn't get sun since our front yard is FULL of trees!!! I did a little research just to make sure he wasn't shining us on and he is correct. So what do you do, cut down trees so you can have solar power? That doesn't make sense. What we can do for electricity is mount solar panels on poles in the back of our property (how ugly is that!) but tht doesn't work for the water. So we have to investigate other options. Does that suck or what!?!?

Where’s the Rap Station? & Pitch Black!

So Mark has been working in Montpelier (the state capitol) the past couple of weeks renovating a 1700s two family house. He walks to the main drag to get lunch from one of the food carts. One day, he sees this Black guy shuffling along toward him. This guy has his hat on backwards and is wearing slouchy pants (that's all the description I could get from Mark). So this guy looks up, sees Mark, starts grinning, and jogs toward him. He greets Mark warmly and says "Hey man! You are the first Black person I've seen in months!" Apparently this guy is in some kind of program (that's all the information Mark got). Mark advises him there are a couple of Black folks around, but not many. This guy had never been to the Northeast before and hates it. He then asks Mark "where can I find the Rap station?" Mark laughs and says, not around here. If he was a little closer to Burlington he would get a mixed station that occasionally plays top 40 hip hop. The guy was deflated after this news. He was from California and was familiar with my home town in the Central Valley (which is very small). So I told Mark we should invite him over for dinner, or go meet him for drinks or something. But Mark didn't get his name or number or give the guy our contact info. Mark just shrugs and says "I know where to find him". We'll see…

 

Then last Friday night, Mark takes me to his friend's house. I've been hearing about this friend Bart for a couple of months. I've only met him and his girlfriend once. They seem like a nice young couple. Yes, they are white. The stories Mark tells about them are very interesting. Apparently Bart modified a truck by taking the back and sides off the bed of the truck. They bolted a couch (yes a sofa/couch) to the bed of the truck with seat belts. They go up further in the mountains, gleefully going through mud and rocks, with the truck and someone strapped to the couch in the bed. One time they flipped the truck. Fortunately, because the guy was strapped in, he didn't get hurt. Another time he and Mark went quadding in the mountains. The truck stalled and wouldn't start so they had to walk back. Mark said it was pitch black and Bart just said "follow me, my house is right over there" while he points into the pitch black. Mark was doubtful but had no choice but to follow Bart. Guess what, Bart was right, thankfully.

So, we went over Bart's for homemade chili that he and his girlfriend made. I wasn't sure what to expect with all the stories Mark told me. Plus Mark warns on the way over, that they are very county. I had seen the outside of the house only. I saw two cats and two dogs inside the house when we got there. They interacted with the animals a lot. I decided if they didn't wash their hands that I wasn't going to eat. Well, they washed their hands before serving us. And the chili - It was pretty good. Bart's brother and several friends stopped by after dinner. We had a great time chatting. Bart's brother entertained us with stories of his cows getting into the college cornfield and raising and butchering 400 chickens this past summer. He's about to start milking cows on a farm this fall. Every morning at 4am… I can't imagine.

So when we left it was pitch black (no street lights in the country). Got me thinking about those scary movies where for someone unknown or obscure reason people are in the middle of nowhere driving in the dark and get attacked by some alien/monster/maniac. Guess who's always the first to die… Black people! I don't think I spoke on the way home because I was praying to the good Lord not to let us have some mysterious car trouble. There is no way I would walk the several miles home or the several miles back to Bart's or the several miles to the nearest gas station. Plus there was no way I was staying in the truck in the pitch black by myself. Thank goodness we made it home without incident. I was not interested in being in the headlines as the petrified Black woman who perished under mysterious (or not so mysterious) circumstances on a pitch black country road in Vermont…