Get chickens and is it 2021 yet?

Not that I think it's gonna be a whole lot better but this year is just dragging.  It's like the needle is stuck and we are paralyzed; we just can't change that channel.  

Speaking of paralyzed........ 

Ethel in the back, Buffy (hiding) and Matilda. 

We just got done with a stretch of a well,  Sahara Desert kind of heat wave and drought, just spit'n sand and dust 24/7.  The chickens were in a dust bathing frenzy.  Then one morning while dragging the hose around trying to keep plants alive; OHhhh and how happy am I that I transplanted every living thing on this half acre back in February and March, because now all that stuff is stressed, making me stressed.  Wait, back to chickens!!  I toss some looper (caterpillar) chewed kale and beet greens over the fence and the girls come running.  Whoo Hoo, greens!!  Except Buffy who is duck walking and can't make it over the step to get any greens.  Crap on hot brick I got a sick chicken.  Drop the hose and go into chicken catching mode.  Shouldn't be too hard because at best she is waddling.  But she shoots past me as I thrust out a too slow hand.  And then on a hot stinking, sticky, sweaty, fly buzzing day, I lay down and commando crawl to the back of the underneath coop to grab a duck waddling chicken.  Nope, she shoots by again and as I lunge I conk my noggin on the spider web encrusted rafters.  Let the cussing begin!  Now the top of my head matches my chin.  I back out, sit on my heels and wait.  Meanwhile, I gaze over at the gang of five, they are munching away and ill affected at Buffys distress.  Chickens are dinosaurs, they just are and it really is survival of the fittest.  They hold no attachment to each other or me or the dog or the cats because they are toothless dinosaurs that happen to taste like chicken.  She waddles past again and I thrust out a hand, grabbing a handful of tail feathers and she is mine and I am thankful she does not have teeth!  Round 3 goes to the old lady with chicken poop on her knees and feathers up her nose!  I tuck her under my arm and escape the coop.  Once I get her outside I pin her down for a quick once over.  She is filthy and carrying about 5 extra pounds of dirt.  This girl has dust bathed herself into oblivion.  I have had chickens before and I have never been aware that this could be a problem.  I snatched her up by her little yellow chicken feet and when she tips upside down a pound of dirt falls out of her pockets.  Now, I am just grossed out and yelling at a chicken; What is wrong with you?!  You are supposed to shake yourself off after you have a good roll in the dirt!  While she is upside down I run up to the house to turn on the hose.  And wouldn't you like to be my neighbor?  I am your neighbor, running around and yelling at an upside down chicken, named Buffy.  Perhaps quarantine has gone a bit too long.  Running to the way way back of the garden, retrieving the hose and with one hand, attach the power sprayer.  (Good thing I had a pack of kids at one time in my life, well just one in particular who shall remain nameless.)  Yes, I power washed a chicken.  Neither one of us was very happy about this.  Oh and wet chicken smells nothing like Channel No. 5.  After I could see pink skin, I carried her, dripping wet and still upside down as she was very calm upside down, into the studio where I burrito-ed her into a giant bath towel and gave her a good once over.  Is there anything uglier than a soaking wet chicken?  But happy to say I could find nothing.  Toweled her off, stroked her little head and she went to sleep.  Hey, could somebody stroke my little head and get me a drink?   Then it was time to toss her back in with her "friends". Who realized she was looking quite Verklempt!  The Gang of Five, followed her around pecking at her to the point I thought I was going to need rescue her again.  But as it was 100 degrees out (not kidding) she dried rather quickly.  She ate some greens, wandered around then settled in.  Walking fine and back to normal.  I'm not giving this chicken much hope as the was the chick who had pasty butt.  The chick who escaped the pen relentlessly and then freaked out because she was alone.  She is sort of shunned by the other girls and I really don't know why.  But she holds her own and hangs out with them when they free range.  

Life with chickens during a pandemic is good.  It gives you something to do other than watch CNN or the stock market (which makes no sense at all anymore).  They keep me on a schedule.  Up at 6 am and with Kirby, we roll out to the coop to release the Crack'n.  They tumble out and down the gang plank to fresh water and feed.  Usually a treat; a sprinkle of freeze dried meal worms, last nights leftover salad and some fruit. 

By the time I get the girls settled the dog goes missing and I wander the backyards quietly looking for Kirby.  Thankfully he has a muppet tail that can be spotted from a mile away.  Herd him back to the yard, get him inside for breakfast and put the coffee on.  Head to the underworld, empty the dehumidifier (working double time), check the mouse traps and troll traps and head back to middle earth where the smell of coffee punches the air.  WE'RE GONNA LIVE ANOTHER DAY!   

I walk around the yard and decide what gets watered and what is worth letting go.  The kale gets yanked and put in the freezer.   I pick the last of the peas, a few gooseberries and my first 3 cucumbers.  Dill is always picked.  Pick some flowers for the house because by 6 pm they are gonna be toast.  

We are almost in high holy canning season.  I am only doing warm ups for now.  I picked 10#'s of tart cherries and canned them up.  

Made sweet cherry BBQ sauce and canned a bunch of sweet cherries up too.... because we will not see bing cherries for $1.59 a pound again this year.  

My blueberries were good this year too......

Canned up flame roasted peppers .... that story will be left for the next blog.

Ran out to the blueberry farm, a few miles away and picked 13 pounds for the freezer.  

Going back on Wed. as I know I need 30 pounds to get me through one whole year. 

The heat, drought, pandemic, political bull shit is starting to take its toll and I am finding myself weary.  In the heat of the day I head to the studio but I am not feeling very creative.  Functional work is about all that makes sense right now.  For the first time in 35 years I am struggling in the studio.  It's so weird, this year is so weird, one big fat WEIRD.  But I love throwing and it is the one comfortable thing in this wobbly world right now.  I've made 100 mugs and had time to study profiles and foot rings.  Think very hard about bowls and what goes in those bowls and how they sit on the table or cradled in your hand to slurp soup or how the round of the spoon scrapes the bottom of the bowl..... and so it goes. 

I've also had a couple insights as to why I am struggling.  I am marveling and scratching my head at some of my dear pottery friends who have not skipped a beat during this time.  They carry on, fire kilns, make work and have shifted to online sales pretty quickly.  

Not me, I am keenly aware that the paradigm has shifted, the world has changed, my world has changed.  On this deep level of change how can my work not change?  I cannot keep making the same stuff as I have changed on very deep level.  I have long been bothered at how static my work was.  It just sat there waiting for you to dust it or put food in it.  I started weaving and started making rims move but I still wasn't "there".   

In the past I have always been able to work in the garden and have stuff kick me in the ass to make sense.  This year the garden the is just struggling, kind of like me.  But the garden is not static and forever changing.  And it's why I can't seem to get enough.  It ticks all my boxes, even this year. 

  This area is usually so think you need a machetè to hack your way through, not this year.  

                                             2019                                                                                 2020

Sweet peppers have wilt, pests are insane this year, birds are eating everything in sight.  It really feels like war this year.  Usually I toss seeds in the ground and everything grows.  Every thing has bolted; swiss chard, kohlrabi, kale, beets, broccoli, lettuce, spinach and the list goes on.  I have replanted beans three times!  Basil is struggling and I don't think I can survive without pesto.  But some stuff looks pretty good, native perennials. 

And through all this I read the people of Pakistan are experiencing 125 F temperatures and they don't have air conditioning.  Is there going to be an earth left for any life to matter.  Get the environment under control, it should be a number one priority.  AND YES, every thing we are protesting and signing petitions about is important but when did science take a back seat?  I am passionate about Choice, women's right, black lives matter, and getting the orange idiot out of the oval office but these all seem like flies buzzing around the big pile of crap on a hot brick and that is the climate.  How long until the insurance companies go bust because you need to rebuild that house on the beach in Florida?  I am not opposed to rebuilding but not in the same place. How about on a hill or maybe a bunker?  

We keep looking for a place with more acreage, although this half acre is about to kill me, and we can't find anything better than what we have now.  We live on a hill and we have good access to water and we have sandy loam for soil.  And by GOD we have chickens and it's 7:00 pm and this what is waiting for me.......

Hey! It's 7:09 pm and you are late lady!  We got stuff to do!  So I open the door and the storm troopers assault the neighborhood! 

My neighbor sits on his back patio and plays his guitar.  The chickens love it and off they go.... 

they will be back home by the time the street lights come on and we will do it all again tomorrow. 

And that is why I know we will get through this.  Very changed and hopefully much wiser.  

Be safe, wash your hands and for god sakes wear a mask!