Spring has sprung

Well folks, it's been a while since my last post. I've been keeping plenty busy....we've has ASB groups and visitors galore, I've taken on some new responsibilities, and Farm Day has come and gone, but that's for another post.

Right after my last post I ran the Baylor Bearathon, a half-marathon that winds through Cameron Park. It's known as one of the toughest halfs in Texas due to the hills. Let me tell you, it lived up to its reputation. The event was actually canceled the morning of due to lightning. It was in the 30's and raining when the race was supposed to begin. After they announced the cancellation, they gave out t-shirts. I got my shirt and felt like I was cheating myself by not running the race. I had trained for 2 months and wasn't going to let some cold weather get me down. I wandered around asking if anyone would be running the course. I found a veteran (he's actually run every Bearathon) and we were on our way. Without him, I would have been completely lost. The chalk they used to mark the course was washed away and there was no one out to direct runners. We finished the race in 1:49:00, better than my goal of 2:00:00.

One of my favorite parts about living here is the visitors that find us. We had a group of people from Jesus People USA (JPUSA) come by for a few days. JPUSA is a Christian living community in Chicago. The guys that came were really awesome and had lots of skills to share. One was from Canada, one is a Chicago native with a strong love for bikes, and one has lived with the Hopi Indians and grew up in Kentucky. They fit right into our community as they're used to it. There was another group that came from Wichita, KS. They live in an intentional community called the Orchard. An intentional community is a group of people that share a common belief and decide to live together. They all read "The Irresistible Revolution" and decided to try it out. The Orchard currently consists of 3 couples but they're looking to expand and let more people in. They're thinking about starting a community garden so the garden is where they spent most of their time. Each group learns from us but also brings their own knowledge; it's a very symbiotic relationship.

We had our last ASB group come through from Cornell College in Iowa. They were a very active group, taking chances when they could to take responsibility; in the mornings they took care of rabbits and fed chickens. As far as the college is concerned, Cornell is interesting in that they're on a block class system. They take one class for almost 4 weeks, have a long weekend, and start a new class. Apparently they're one of three schools in the world that works on this schedule. It was fun getting to meet them.

My garden has been growing and is now producing! I should note that this is an experiment for both my partner and I as we haven't ever grown anything on our own before. We have harvested radishes and now have potatoes, carrots, beets, and turnips all poking up through the soil. Neither Brad nor I had ever seen a potato plant before so we were struggling to know what to and what not to weed. Our beets aren’t having the best of time coming up. We have about five that made it and the rest are surrounded by ant beds. Ant beds in your soil say something about your soil biology. It is bad if the bugs and bacteria you want aren’t fighting off predators such as ants. In order to stop them we used neem 45, an organic ant repellant. It smells awful and looks like snot….no wonder they leave. We have carrots coming up but they’re not very big. I talked with one of the garden interns and was told that carrots will grow as deep as you water them. In English, this means that the more you water them the larger they will become. Just getting the surface wet is not enough. Also, when measuring how moist your soil is, you test at the first inch not the surface. With all this being said, we will definitely be watering a lot more.

Speaking of gardens, we had our first CSA harvest last week. The garden was off limits for the weeks leading up to this so everything was nice and full. We invite our CSA members to help harvest to see the work we do and become familiar with where their food comes from. One of our members, Roy, took us up on it. Having extra people is always helpful as we have 61 people to harvest for. We harvested spinach, swiss chard, beets, kale, and some herbs. As great as it is to have customers, my favorite part is the leftovers. Wednesday lunch is always green.

Last week there was an interesting group that rolled through Waco called the Equality Ride. The ER is a bus of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered (LGBT) people that are traveling around the US to universities with a negative outlook on LGBT people. As I've mentioned before, Baylor is a Baptist university. On Monday night there was a pot luck that I attended with a lesbian couple that live here on the farm. I met a lot of really cool people including a Jewish girl that attended Baylor for 4 years and is now a guy. There was a transgender panel after dinner that allowed a minority in the world to discuss issues that plague them. It was interesting to hear how each one feels about the social implications that comes with their life. Surprisingly, only one said that they constantly question why there're in the body they were born into...most of them thought about it for 10 minutes and moved on. Tuesday they gathered at Baylor and talked to students about any issues they wanted to. That afternoon there was an off-campus 'rally' where anyone was welcome. It was rumored that student groups would come and be obnoxious as to distract them from their agenda. This didn't happen. There was one student that came out. This is a big deal in general but at Baylor this is even more daring. If you come out, you are sent to a psychologist to be made straight and can even be kicked off campus. This can happen to LGBT allies as well. All of the other LGBT students sent their responses via email that was then read by an ER rider. What kind of a world do we live in where people can't express themselves in a country as 'free' as ours? At any rate, it was very cool to hear from people that are comfortable with their sexual orientation. They are about half way through their ride and I hope they can bring peace to campuses that fight the LGBT community.

I was looking for a part-time job out here and finally got one with the Census. I am a clerk on the weekends at the Waco office. It's fun working with people who have not yet been brainwashed by the government (meaning they're understanding). I've also been learning how to knit. This is a very useful skill to have. I'll be posting about Farm Day soon. It's good to know that Spring has finally arrived.