This past weekend was busy with activity. On Fridays I show up at the Permaculture garden on 18th and Rhode Island and have been mostly harvesting produce. We are running out of food to harvest there and we will have to wait until the things we recently put in the ground grow until we can get more produce. That garden has a plan that seems set in Permaculture stone and it seems the philosophy behind it is to be mainly a site for teaching the principles of Permaculture rather than having as a goal producing a lot of food (while educating the public at the same time). I think it is similar to the goal of the Hayes Valley Farm, to be mostly an educational site with growing food being secondary. To be honest I am delighted and inspired that we have planted so many trees there (perhaps as many as 72) and can’t wait until they start producing a lot of fruit (there are peaches and apples on some trees already and a pepino dulce fruit). However, I am a bit frustrated that we haven’t planted more quick growing food annuals like lettuce and greens everywhere.
It was also a dramatic Friday because the bees there had swarmed and it is truly a wonder to see the bees forming a ball around a queen hanging on a branch of a tree. What a magnificent thing.
After two hours on Potrero Hill I made it over to Treat Commons Community Garden. What a difference between the two sites in terms of physical design. A lot of food is grown in the boxes at the community garden and this year we are starting to pull together a good team of gardeners there to work in the common beds.
On Saturday the work day at the Free Farm was great, though I was pretty busy trying to make sure everyone had work to do. Three or four women harvested 80 lbs of collards, stir fry mix, baby gem lettuces, and lettuce lawn mix. The labyrinth is getting filled in with herbs and beans and our seedling operation is going full blast. We have grown a lot of seedlings, we also got a lot of seedlings by working with Jonathan and his Feel the Earth non-profit that held the Seeds on the Streets event last month, and Justin who teaches gardening at USF gave us some beautiful kale seedlings. Karla and Zach came by to pick up some of the seedlings for Zach’s backyard. Karla is helping organize a group of people that help people put gardens in their backyards. I think it is a terrific project because that is where a lot of great land is in the city to grow produce to feed ourselves and neighbors. If anyone needs seedlings come by our farm on Saturdays and Wednesdays. Saturdays 10am-2pm or Wednesdays 10am-6:30pm (we for now have some volunteers who are keeping the farm open longer on Wednesdays during the summer). Talking about expanding hours, we are going to start working with Temple Emanu-El who ran Pea’h Garden for fifteen years in Home of Peace Cemetery in Colma, and they will be opening the farm one Sunday a month from 10am-noon starting June 6th.
Pancho and Mike and Sara picked up some donated soil and then went out and picked up a load of manure, one of our greatest needs, since we are growing soil as much as food. They dropped off the manure after the fundraiser for Welcome that was held at the farm after the workday. I was busy picking up produce so missed the event, but heard that it went well.
Sunday was another beautiful sunny but windy day at the Free Farm Stand. With eight boxes of hecka local produce I was very pleased and as always I meet a lot of nice people and neighbors. One of the eight boxes of hecka local produce was filled with gigantic lemons that the beautiful Stanford Glean crew dropped off at the farm on Saturday. One neighbor came by with 5lbs of produce from their garden. Antonio taught his last garden workshop in the series that have been happening at the stand and we look forward to another series in the future.
our one artichoke with a halo from 18th and Rhode Island garden…I don’t know who got it
As much as I am trying to promote food growing as a way to deal with hunger and food insecurity in our neighborhoods, I like the idea of rescuing local organic produce from the dumpster or compost. I also like giving away food to people that can use it. Recently I was contacted about the year old farmers market in the Stonetown mall on Sundays that doesn’t have anyone picking up their produce at the end of the day. I have been trying to find someone that can pick it up on a regular basis and bring it to the stand on Sundays (I think pick up time would be at 12:30pm). I think they have 25-35 vendors. If there are any reliable people out there that could pick up this produce on Sundays please let me know. Also, I may be able to come up with a truck or vehicle if someone can pick up but doesn’t have a vehicle.
I have been keeping up with a lot of the free projects that are popping up everywhere. A lot of things are the pay what you can model or the gift economy style of free. Though I remain a hard core free person, it is inspiring to see more of these attempts at moving away form our current model of economics. Here is one example that is familiar to me because I have visited one of these stores in the midwest: http://www.dailygood.org/more.php?n=4125. I just this morning heard about a woman in the East Bay who is going to start a “gift economy tiffen service” delivering free vegetarian or vegan meals to people. Are we back in the sixties?
This leads me to my latest manifesting efforts. I get restless with projects I start and often my mind starts to wander into daydreaming activities. I remember a song by Neil Young who sang ”if you follow every dream you may get lost”. I do think about that, but still I dream and then I try to follow my dreams, like trying to catch up to a friend you haven’t seen for a while that is walking down the street ahead of you. My dreams are usually familiar to me. I am back to day dreaming about community and living with people communally. It is really the next step in sustainability and keeping our work going in the long haul. People need to learn to live together in community, share income, share common dreams and visions, share common service work, meditate and do yoga together. I imagine a day of hard work together with friends like we did on Saturday and instead of at the end of the day going off in different directions, going home together and sharing dinner with each other , sharing the great experiences we had together in the communal home setting. And maybe bringing home a stranger or a person that is in need of a meal or a place to crash for the night. I am sensing this dream of communal households rising up next to our city farms may be the next thing coming around the corner. Maybe as soon as the economy collapses further. Someone suggested to me that while we are building a greenhouse at the farm (another dream I am trying to manifest), we build a house connected to it to shelter the farmers who would live together communally and prayerfully and no-till the soil together.