her able hands

Thank you all for your encouraging words and for pointing out bits and pieces that I just might be glossing over. I spent quite a lot of time yesterday talking with several people, including Cheril, and writing down a list of my requirements and of what I’m looking for the next big adventure in my life to entail. When I got home I sat down with my neighbor for a bit and told him this:

We’re interested, but don’t like the space. We also feel that in order to open strong and memorably, we would want to have the menu focus on a few things and do them really well, and then leave room to add in other experimental items over time. We want as much organic as possible and to find a way into that niche. We recognize that it will be very challenging to develop a franchise using locally produced food, but still want to make that at least a tiny corner of the plan, where a monthly special uses a local, seasonal food item.

If he wants to do the sub shop in conjunction with the organic foods, we feel that’s just a marketing nightmare (healthy, whole foods and uh…submarine sandwiches!) and we’re not philosophically down with that. We’re two women in our forties who have worked hard to make other people wealthy over the years. We’re not doing that anymore. We’re ready to dive into work that is meaningful for us, and will be much more willing to put extra time into a project that aligns with our values.

I also said I’d done quite a lot of asking around (thanks Becca!) and using my own restaurant experience and my own fuzzy logic, I knew for a fact that his goal of opening his doors in three weeks (or his revised four) is absolutely unrealistic and way optimistic and is a recipe for disaster. And that his idea to have us hand over a menu and he take care of getting it all set up and just have us start when the store opens is crazy because we are the ones who know the food and would need to set up the line process, figure out the timing on everything and then train the staff to do what we do and to do it even better.

So if that’s his plan, he’ll need to find somebody else to help him with that, but we will joyfully provide him with cupcakes and cookies via our SugarBuzz home catering gig (our business cards arrived yesterday).

So it turns out he had a difficult afternoon with the man who owns the building, trying to iron out a lease that has quite a lot wrong with it. He’s having second thoughts and took in all I had to say and more. He said he loves our ideas but doesn’t know enough about the market and wants to do more research to see what the numbers are for health food restaurants. He also said that several other people have mentioned that it’s a bad location (a strip plaza with zero personality and a lease that states you can’t do anything to the outside of the building to make your store stand out from the others). He said “If I look for a place in downtown on Main St., would you be interested? If I found that space and turned you two loose in it to run with your ideas?”

Uh…yes. Yes, we would be very interested in a project like that.

So he went off to thinkthinkthink, and I went home to stop thinking and worrying about it for the night. And that felt so bloody good. It only took two days to go from white hot excitement to really seeing what is true for me. Phew.

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I’ve got nothing. Camera still sitting in bag with uncharged battery. The three photos I took last week came out too dark because it was so close to dusk and in the back yard. Things are moving fast around here and I’m sitting with a huge life-changing decision for probably one more day and then I have to give an answer. Yes, I’ll stop working here and come to work there, as long as it’s not a drop in pay—but understanding that I’ll likely be working more at least in the beginning. Or no, I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing for a little while longer.

See, my neighbor is starting a small restaurant in an old sub shop, a turnkey operation, and he’s looking for someone to help manage it. Two someone’s actually (Cheril and I are in talks and both weighing the load against our lives to see if we can carry it comfortably). It’s daunting because the desired goal for startup is fast (3 weeks!) and we have some requirements for what we are willing to put our energies into: healthy food (at least half vegetarian, fresh, seasonal/local on the menu, organic whenever possible, sustainable waste management and meaningful interaction with the community — beyond mere profit.

Those are all things much easier to do with a restaurant but his idea is to use this space as a testing ground and to build a blueprint that can be franchised. That’s a major challenge implementing even half of our philosophical requirements, but he seems to think we can make it work. We have to make our decision today and if its yes begin immediately working on a simple menu.

I’m at 99% yes even though I have some reservations about certain details. I think this will be an incredible opportunity for me to learn how to and how not to do things in preparation for me starting my own kitchen garden catering business in the future.

My biggest question this morning? Can I deal with likely having even less time to work in my gardens this year? And if that’s my most pressing concern, well, I suppose I’m ready to move on.

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It’s definitely spring because Tyler has used half a box of tissues this weekend. Poor guy gets allergies like his father does, long and brutal. I feel mine cranking up too in the form of a headache that’s hung out in my skull for four days and an ever-so slightly scratchy throat.

What a spectacular weekend. We all spent at least eight hours outside both days and managed to get a whole lot of work done. The new wood playground is now in place with the swing beam and both slides attached. It took us four hours to put that blasted tube/spiral slide together and get it attached to the top platform. But it’s done and is already the neighborhood play zone—ten kids made wild fun on it after the birthday party next door.

Let’s see, what else? I’m not feeling particularly narrative this morning as I sip coffee in the dark and hope the headache will go away. I raked out half of the border beds and started a new lasagna bed along the back of the deck (more almost full sun). As I worked I thought about fruit tree placement around the property. I had originally planned to dig out the two ornamental shrubs on the south side of the house to plant the two pear trees as espaliers up against the house, but read in The Garden Primer that pears should not warm up too quickly in spring because of the risk of early buds and late frost damage. Apples might fare better in that spot. Thus the lasagna bed behind the deck. I can put four dwarf fruit trees along the back and espalier them, which will make a great living screen, but then, will also screen out the playground from the house, so maybe that’s not a great idea. Of course, it’ll be a few years before that’s fully filled in, so maybe it’s fine. It’s an ideal spot, facing east, plenty of sun, natural windbreak out of the northwest from the house, and in a dip in the property, so moist enough, but not too moist, it’s also very well drained.

I had intended to get some more seeds in the ground, but that didn’t happen. I’m going to leave work an hour early today and plant some radish, kale, collards, chard, turnips, rutebegas, spinach and arugala. The peas aren’t coming up yet, and I see that a bunch of the Fava beans got dug up by the squirrels. I really do need to fence.

Late yesterday, while all of the birthday party kids played on the swing set, and the parents hung out chatting, we moved the chickens to a new spot. I forked up the top layer of soil and dumped it on top of the cardboard for the new bed first so they had plenty of bugs. I need to get out there and take some pictures (have been so camera lazy lately). We have a huge new mattress of straw/manure bedding to work with—my next weekend project is to assemble a couple of quick and dirty compost bins with garden stakes and fencing. I want to be ready for the first lawn mowing when I’ll have some green to add to the layers of leaves and bedding and finally, finally get some real composting happening on the property. Instead of these random piles I have everywhere that seldom, if ever, get turned.

The chicken wire had rotted and we didn’t notice. When I went out across the back yard to bring some Sesame Noodles to the neighbors who recently had a new baby, I heard an incredible volume of rustling coming from the chicken tractor. They had busted out and were blissfully scratching in the dried leaves on the other side of the cage. Luckily they were so engrossed in their freedom, they didn’t really notice us corralling them and when we tipped up the bottom of the tractor, they all went right under. Chris cut new wire and attached it and now they’re on new ground with a fresh layer of straw and oats, some cracked corn the kids sprinkled for them, and I’m hoping they’ll start laying in earnest. This one egg every three days is just not going to cut it.

In other news, I had a conversation with a neighbor who happens to have worked for OSU extension up in Cuyohoga County, organizing community gardens in Cleveland. She offered to give me a hand if I need to do any grant writing. That same day we got another certified letter from the city about the senior village development. There will be another meeting the following week about an easement for the Residential 3 zoning, which calls for 30% open space with any building project. They’re looking to cut that in half to 15%. This could be a real opportunity for the city to put some sustainable building practices in place—to work on a model for land ownership, housing and community relationship building. My job this week is going to be to talk to everyone I can think of who might want to make this a pet project. I need to act fast because the first meeting is next Tuesday. People assure me that things in town move very slowly, but I don’t trust that.

We’re also talking to the homeowner who works for the housing developer who started this project five years ago. There are two lots still standing empty on the cul-de-sac and there has been zero interest in them for two years. He has made a proposal to the builder to put a playground/park on one lot to make up for the fact that the development will not be finished and the people who bought in with the promise of a community center and playground now have to drive to a park if they want to play like that (the yards are really too small). The other could be an excellent neighborhood garden. It’s wide open, graded, has water and electric. It would just need a shed and a faucet.

Of course, I also did a lot of thinking this weekend about the fact that most of these ideas I have will entail me being in a volunteer position. I really need to learn how to parlay this into for-profit work. I don’t need to get rich doing it, but I need to replace the paycheck I currently collect for my time in the cube farm.

More to say, but out of time. Must wake up the children and get ready for the day. Hope you had a wonderful weekend!

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The ice still clings to everything it touched and the stories of damage are starting to pile up. At the old house, the neighbor called to let us know that the whole hood and much of that entire region has been without power for almost 24 hours, and that the transformer and most of the power lines are on the ground by our house. I’m sure the basement is taking on water, but we don’t have anything stored down there anymore, so we’re just going to hope for the best and stay away until the weekend if they have the lines cleared up.

Also, one of our big oak trees lost a limb and it landed on our out-back neighbor’s brand new glass top patio table, shattering the glass and spraying it all over the back yard, and bending the table into a 4-legged V. So we’ll be buying a new table and chairs set, as well as paying to have some more tree-trimming done this spring. Thank goodness it didn’t hit their house, and it happened in the winter while everyone was safe and warm inside, not gathered around that table for a summer meal. Phew.

The potential better news is that we may have a buyer for the house—a land contract deal, but they have money to put down and good jobs. We’ll know more next week, but hey, if you’re feeling like you have some extra mojo to spare (I know, I keep begging your mojo, but I know all of those good vibrations have been building up into a wave and the wave is about to hit the shore, and my horoscope this month says this is it…this is the month the house will sell) thanks a bunch for sending some our way.

::sucks in air then apologizes for the really long sentence::

The also good news is that the storm didn’t discourage voters from turning out in record numbers for a primary in Ohio. While standing in line (for an hour) I overheard a vast majority of voters say that they are registered republicans but wanted to cast a democratic ballot. Several asked if they would be able to still vote republican in the general election. Spoilers abound, but that’s the game, right. So many lines get crossed, so many layers to so many issues, it’s all so hard to keep straight on top of the daily to-and-fro. But honestly, this is the first time in my adult life that I’ve felt anything other than deep cynicism. Don’t get me wrong, that’s still there too, but there’s also a vibration of encouragement, of dare I say hope? Well. I don’t know if I hope. Maybe I dream. But I played my part and cast my vote for Barack Obama, then slipped my way up the walk to the house and stayed put and warm for the rest of the night. Went to bed way before the results were in, with higher hopes than perhaps I should have had, but then, I’m seldom in the majority with anything I think or do. Especially in Ohio.

When I got home tonight, after a very long, very busy day at work, I grabbed the camera and skated around the yard to capture a few impressions of the storm.

I sure do look forward to having that barn up so we can get all of our tools and supplies under a roof. It’s a bummer to buy straw, then have the tarp blow away and have it ruined by the rain and ice, no matter how pretty it looks all bedazzled like this. As I walked around I counted more than 20 little piles of crap that need storage, and getting them under cover will certainly get rid of the hillbilly feel our property has taken on since we moved here. Things like chairs, rolls of fencing, extra windows, garden tools, bamboo poles, t-poles, stacks of empty cat litter buckets, hose reels, sleds, a seed spreader (ancient)—just to name a few. Cleaning it up and replacing those piles with plants will make me endlessly happy.

I can almost remember the feeling of this railing on the deck with the hot sun beating down on it, the warm smell of wood and grass and pollen in the air. Walking up from the garden with a warm colander full of beans and cherry tomatoes, maybe a wart-covered yellow crookneck and a stack of neat lettuce leaves and arugula balanced precariously on top, my bare feet slapping where those icy foot prints wait. The kids love to run up these two steps, across the deck, back down the other steps by the back door and then around to do it again. And again. Chasing, laughing, picking up dust and wearing themselves into a stupor that only a popsicle in the shade, swinging in the hammock, can cure.

I’m encouraged to remember that the spring is coming, that the ice may slow it down, but if I also slow down, come down out of my busy mind to look closely I can see that it’s best to just trust that the earth knows better what must come next—that she hasn’t forgotten. The sun is higher in the sky, maybe not high enough to melt this prismatic glaze, but high enough to awaken the senses and pull me out of my long winter slumber.

But not quite yet. Just a little more cold and shadow, just enough to make me bend into it so I can see what’s waiting.

* Steven Wright

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For weeks, since the last round of massive, bloodletting layoffs at work, I’ve been playing around with ideas in my mostly addled mind. What to do for work in the future? How to parlay my passions into cash, connection with my community and a sense of fulfillment. Today I read this thought-provoking post at one of my favorite garden sites, Garden Rant.

Of course, I want to write. I’ll always want to write. But the idea of being stuck in front of a computer for eight hours a day anymore just gives me a massive headache. I need to be outside, too. My three passions: writing, gardening and food. I spend a lot of time explaining how to do the the gardening and cooking to other people, and am finding that more and more people say to me, “I wish I knew more about it, but I just don’t know where to begin.”

So this post at Garden Rant suggests that those of us with the know-how start pimping ourselves around our locales as Garden Coaches. Now I only know a lot about a little part of gardening. My main thing is the edibles. From seed to stomach, that’s my specialty. I’m learning more about the perennials, flowers and trees, but wouldn’t consider myself a go-to person for someone just starting out. But you want to put in a vegetable garden, maybe enough to do a little canning and freezing? Pick my brain. Oh, and hey! How about you pay me, too?

Hmm. Food for thought, indeed.

Kelly Ferry, Urban Homestead Coach

That would be an unusual shingle to hang out front.

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