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good morning, winter. would that i had skis to hand.

appleturnover

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good morning, winter. would that i had skis to hand.

2 days ago

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1/12

i pull myself away from the writing desk every fine afternoon, to collect the goats for a walk and to work together a while in the brush that dominates the garden along the pond, just beyond the goosehouse. we cannot wait to show you what we’re making.

everyone loves to visit the goosehouse. did you like the timelapse of watching us build it, in our short film? just now i’m editing the first film in my new series, the journal of small work. if you aren’t already on the mailing list, find it, and the appleturnover channel, linked above.

appleturnover

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i pull myself away from the writing desk every fine afternoon, to collect the goats for a walk and to work together a while in the brush that dominates the garden along the pond, just beyond the goosehouse. we cannot wait to show you what we’re making. everyone loves to visit the goosehouse. did you like the timelapse of watching us build it, in our short film? just now i’m editing the first film in my new series, the journal of small work. if you aren’t already on the mailing list, find it, and the appleturnover channel, linked above.

3 days ago

View on Instagram |

2/12

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the baby lemon tree is a small step toward transitioning to a brighter future. we love growing some of our food, yet it isn’t necessary to grow it all, all by ourselves, to soften our ecological impact. sourcing from local regenerative farmers reverberates through the community, relocalises food security, provides good jobs, and keeps currency circulating where we live. community-sufficiency. what we do grow ourselves can then be all about pleasure and economy both together. sometimes we choose to grow food that effortlessly provides everything we need — an apple tree, a bed of garlic, self-seeding perennial spinach, herbs, that sort of thing. and sometimes we choose to grow food because the impacts of importing them are just absurd. boxed 10,000 km lettuce comes to mind. kale, tomatoes, all the berries we can muster. then there are the foods that are just so special, or perhaps a bit expensive, or a faraway import, that we can simply bring home. so it is with the lemon. a protected spot on a warm sunny wall, with an overhang ideally, that’s it. if the temperature is set to drop below freezing as it is tonight, a curtain of row-cover and a few big twinkling winter lights give warmth enough. i did try pipe-warmer cable, as we like to keep the garden dark so even the tiniest nocturnal creatures can live a properly nocturnal life, but very sadly we couldn’t spot in time that it failed and the tree nearly died. it has returned in force, and gave us this rapturous lemon. the twinkling little lemon-security-lights across the garden are a compromise. i’m still new at all this. i want to grow unexpected* things— the tea camellia, i admit i’ve only succeeded in killing so far. ginger, quinoa, i’ve yet to succeed at but our islanders do. the pomegranate’s a baby, as is the persimmon. i dream of avocados. but the citrus, which want only a little babying to give us staggering flavour in a much simpler manner than our overcomplicated and wasteful food system, i am devoted to. now if i could grow my own chocolate. growing some of what we eat is part of the small work of living in ways that make more life, which is the subject of my upcoming films. subscribe ★彡

4 days ago

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3/12

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it isn’t that slow living actively seeks out inconvenience. yet there are moments when the children of the microwave generation, as you may be too, recognise this: slowing down and simplifying the sheer complexity and volume of objects and systems in one’s life is anything but convenient. when a solution presents itself that at once gracefully sidesteps complications and embodies a gratifying simplicity, i am there. so it is with the humble enamel cup on the wood stove. we were, if i recollect, late adopters of the microwave in my original family. friends would look on bemused at our old fashioned methods. a feature of life from then on was the zapping of cold and neglected coffee forgotten somewhere in the course of a busy day. i doubt my younger sister remembers life before it. nothing on our wood stove ever beeps at me. my over-stimulated mental state rejoices. yet i will discover my tea, left behind half-drunk-up when i scarpered at choretime to milk the goats, or became sidetracked by laundry beeping (ach, the beeping!) and with hanging it up on the pulley airer. or any distraction in between. one doesn’t really want to wash up a whole pot (why would it be waiting, clean and at the ready?) just to warm up the neglected tea only to wash it up all over again. i tell you, there are limits. so when i spotted an enamel tea cup warming on the wood stove of a long distance friend’s cosy home (yes! the one who wood-stove-dries fruit on a baking rack! wise, practical being*) i had what can only be called a eureka moment. you practiced campers out there will be smug, i know it. some of us take time to work it all out again after microwave popcorn and instant noodles and frozen tv dinners disrupted the long ancestry of skill in a single generation. so i give you the enamel cup, quietly conducting heat around my beloved earl grey, occupying very little real estate on the high-traffic surface that is december’s wood stove, practically zapping my coffee. i like an easy pause in the chaos like my parents before me, while hearkening back to a simpler time. what else can we simplify, in every sense? this is a peek at my upcoming film series. subscribe ★彡

6 days ago

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4/12

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having wholeheartedly internalised aspirations to productivity in my youth, the inner capitalism doesn’t like to let go without a fight. luckily, many aspects of living regeneratively provide a yield as a side effect. just going about our day is productive, however else we may spend our time. what an expression. the thing is, conceiving of ourselves as wasteful and exploitative, a pox on the planet, really, depends on daily systems that reinforce this story through linear waste-streams. extract, manufacture, ship, sell, consume, throw away. yet the compost toilet captures human ‘waste’ nutrients in the ‘waste’ product of sawdust and transforms it through nitrogen-powered heat and microbial alchemy into rich soil to nurture a thriving, water-holding garden. we are always making organic matter. whatever else i did today, i made more life. so it is with biochar. the heat we seek to warm our hearth and home in the form of the wood fire produces wood ash, which we collect to feed the trees and shrubs that love its particular qualities. sifting charcoal chips from powdery ash yields pure gold. when we bury the charcoal in the compost, or in the deep litter* in the chicken run, it absorbs rich nutrients as well as holding water and like some kind of eternal sponge, it will release them to the land for centuries to come. more alchemy. and all we need to do is live. it’s a small shift, yet it means that who we are at a fundamental level is a productive, life-propagating, enriching part of the ecosystem. we’d like to engage more of these ancient cycles that create more life. to wear clothing from our fibre-shed that will compost back into the earth. to eat from our food-shed of farms that yield nutrient-dense, fresh, flavourful food while deepening living soil and sustaining people with good work. to capture rainwater to fill more ponds and grow more trees. to wear a path that makes it easier for those that follow us to live well into the future. this snippet is an excerpt from the first episode of ‘the journal of small work’, my upcoming film series that looks at building a continuously improving, compounding repertoire of ways to live regeneratively. subscribe 🔝

1 week ago

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5/12

becoming fixated on the weather is perhaps inevitable in climate emergency.

we grieve the disappearance of the persistent drizzle that marked my childhood on the northern-westerly coast of this enormous continent, the sort that might or might not allow you a proper summertime. it wasn’t dramatic, it was just perennial.

the high drama of the handful of years we’ve lived on this tiny island have shocked us with a pendulum of extremes. hurricane-force wind, apocalyptic skies, an unprecedented heat-dome, and lately, atmospheric rivers ready to sweep it all into the sea. it’s enough to induce a permanent edge of panic. and like the moment the sun came out between those endless drizzly days, we rush out into gentle weather as to greet an old friend.

i can find gratitude for intensity. unlike the decades of muted scientific reports and eerie silence from those in power, mad crazy weather has brought us vividly and indisputably into present awareness of ecological emergency. grief is beginning to flow. as rob hopkins*, beloved visionary of imagination and transition, links the process we’re experiencing with the five stages of grief as elizabeth kübler-ross articulated, i too see the denials, the anger making way for bargaining and depression, perhaps by turns.

bargaining about just where we’ve gone so wrong and what we must relinquish to move into a way of life in alignment with making-more-life. bargaining with those in power hasn’t gone so well.

if the stage we are moving inexorably toward is acceptance, let it be an acceptance of responsibility, of the ability to respond.

not just to sandbag the rivers and reinforce the dykes but to ask why we’ve had the hubris to fill in lakes and redirect rivers at all.

not just to vacuum the water from the basements but to ask how we might nurture surrounding soil and plant trees to hold water in living networks.

not just to hide away in air conditioned houses but to protect old growth canopies, restore cool understories, re-link networks of mother trees in continuous forest, nurturing an agriculture of regeneration.

we accept. what could life be like? my upcoming films look at just this question. join the list for more.

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becoming fixated on the weather is perhaps inevitable in climate emergency. we grieve the disappearance of the persistent drizzle that marked my childhood on the northern-westerly coast of this enormous continent, the sort that might or might not allow you a proper summertime. it wasn’t dramatic, it was just perennial. the high drama of the handful of years we’ve lived on this tiny island have shocked us with a pendulum of extremes. hurricane-force wind, apocalyptic skies, an unprecedented heat-dome, and lately, atmospheric rivers ready to sweep it all into the sea. it’s enough to induce a permanent edge of panic. and like the moment the sun came out between those endless drizzly days, we rush out into gentle weather as to greet an old friend. i can find gratitude for intensity. unlike the decades of muted scientific reports and eerie silence from those in power, mad crazy weather has brought us vividly and indisputably into present awareness of ecological emergency. grief is beginning to flow. as rob hopkins*, beloved visionary of imagination and transition, links the process we’re experiencing with the five stages of grief as elizabeth kübler-ross articulated, i too see the denials, the anger making way for bargaining and depression, perhaps by turns. bargaining about just where we’ve gone so wrong and what we must relinquish to move into a way of life in alignment with making-more-life. bargaining with those in power hasn’t gone so well. if the stage we are moving inexorably toward is acceptance, let it be an acceptance of responsibility, of the ability to respond. not just to sandbag the rivers and reinforce the dykes but to ask why we’ve had the hubris to fill in lakes and redirect rivers at all. not just to vacuum the water from the basements but to ask how we might nurture surrounding soil and plant trees to hold water in living networks. not just to hide away in air conditioned houses but to protect old growth canopies, restore cool understories, re-link networks of mother trees in continuous forest, nurturing an agriculture of regeneration. we accept. what could life be like? my upcoming films look at just this question. join the list for more.

1 week ago

View on Instagram |

6/12

the four-season potager is our refrigerator, our greengrocer. from middling-autumn through to winter’s end nothing much will grow yet they hold steady as living storage in this mild climate. to harvest our vegetables fresh throughout the dark side of the year is a pleasure and a convenience we’d not willingly give up.

with roots and their microbiotic villages spending a quiet season contentedly holding the soil through deluge and frost alike, these plants are sweetening and vividly alive. anything imported cannot possibly compare to the freshness and flavour and nutrient density of our immediate harvest.

the one challenge of the winter potager is the habit of harvesting. while nothing need now fester neglected in the back of the fridge, neither can we just throw it open at dinner hour. adapting a life to daily combing of the garden for ingredients, preferably within the brief hours of light and between rainstorms, it’s an art. i like to pair harvesttime with my return from the barn, milk pail on my arm, an egg in my pocket, or balancing an armful of firewood.

the winter kitchen garden otherwise suits my lazy winter body. i needn’t water, nor weed, nor sow or plant. if the slugs pester the veg i invite the ducks in for a feast around the edges, brief enough that they don’t eat the plants themselves. i should mulch more.

i’ll get round to it before heavy frosts batter anything. the more delicate lettuces, though themselves hardy varieties, get to sleep in the warmth of the old coldframe. but stoic kale and stout cabbage, leek, mizuna, perennial spinach stand out come what may. brussels await solstice, broccolis will hit their stride with longer days. carrots, parsnips improve, sage, rosemary, thyme, calendula persist.

it’s been a tough year, but anything in the winter potager is money in the carbon bank. trains may get stuck, roads get washed out or snowed in, fuel may be rationed, shelves may be emptied. the potager needs no shopping, no refrigeration, no trucking, no ferrying. preserving has ebbed and these good ingredients just hang about living their good long lives.

my upcoming films look at just this sort of resilience. join the list above.

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the four-season potager is our refrigerator, our greengrocer. from middling-autumn through to winter’s end nothing much will grow yet they hold steady as living storage in this mild climate. to harvest our vegetables fresh throughout the dark side of the year is a pleasure and a convenience we’d not willingly give up. with roots and their microbiotic villages spending a quiet season contentedly holding the soil through deluge and frost alike, these plants are sweetening and vividly alive. anything imported cannot possibly compare to the freshness and flavour and nutrient density of our immediate harvest. the one challenge of the winter potager is the habit of harvesting. while nothing need now fester neglected in the back of the fridge, neither can we just throw it open at dinner hour. adapting a life to daily combing of the garden for ingredients, preferably within the brief hours of light and between rainstorms, it’s an art. i like to pair harvesttime with my return from the barn, milk pail on my arm, an egg in my pocket, or balancing an armful of firewood. the winter kitchen garden otherwise suits my lazy winter body. i needn’t water, nor weed, nor sow or plant. if the slugs pester the veg i invite the ducks in for a feast around the edges, brief enough that they don’t eat the plants themselves. i should mulch more. i’ll get round to it before heavy frosts batter anything. the more delicate lettuces, though themselves hardy varieties, get to sleep in the warmth of the old coldframe. but stoic kale and stout cabbage, leek, mizuna, perennial spinach stand out come what may. brussels await solstice, broccolis will hit their stride with longer days. carrots, parsnips improve, sage, rosemary, thyme, calendula persist. it’s been a tough year, but anything in the winter potager is money in the carbon bank. trains may get stuck, roads get washed out or snowed in, fuel may be rationed, shelves may be emptied. the potager needs no shopping, no refrigeration, no trucking, no ferrying. preserving has ebbed and these good ingredients just hang about living their good long lives. my upcoming films look at just this sort of resilience. join the list above.

2 weeks ago

View on Instagram |

7/12

what if we abandoned holiday gift-giving and turned toward the gift economy? toward reciprocity?

we know the gift economy very well, though it quietly plays its critical supporting act, invisibly, unacknowledged, unpaid. we don’t often see it clearly, because the dominant system does not value it, yet exploits it. it has always been there, receding as traditional culture recedes yet maintaining our well-being. maintaining life itself.

the gift economy is in being born and nursed and held in our family’s arms. it’s in learning to walk. in learning language. it’s in every meal made in our kitchens and eaten around our tables. chances are our clothes are clean and mended and our homes too, because of the gift economy. it’s there in the conversations and rituals that culture daily life. it’s what family and friendship are founded on. without it, all other economic models would fail tomorrow. it is, in a word, essential.

gifting, on the other hand, that obligatory exchange of a tremendous excess of stuff, is part of a problem so enormous as to be crushing the life out of this planet. what happens if we just stop it with the presents, with the assumption that all of us should buy everyone a gift?

then, maybe, we can value the true gift economy that sustains life. the one that is not separate from what we call nature, but of it. to recognise, acknowledge, respect, show gratitude for the abundance of life that ought freely to be given to all. fresh air, clean water, living soil, thriving plants, singing birds, contented animals, stable climate.

we can protect the giving planet now only by recognising our limits. if you and all of yours, like me and mine, already have enough, this may be the moment to turn to the earth and give to it. all our devotions will no doubt be reciprocated exponentially.

this holiday like the one before it, we will be celebrating with music and traditional food, and merry time together. it is more than enough.

the small work of slowly changing culture toward one that sustains the living world, starting at home, is the subject of my upcoming films. those are gifts, and so is joining the list, above.

appleturnover

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what if we abandoned holiday gift-giving and turned toward the gift economy? toward reciprocity? we know the gift economy very well, though it quietly plays its critical supporting act, invisibly, unacknowledged, unpaid. we don’t often see it clearly, because the dominant system does not value it, yet exploits it. it has always been there, receding as traditional culture recedes yet maintaining our well-being. maintaining life itself. the gift economy is in being born and nursed and held in our family’s arms. it’s in learning to walk. in learning language. it’s in every meal made in our kitchens and eaten around our tables. chances are our clothes are clean and mended and our homes too, because of the gift economy. it’s there in the conversations and rituals that culture daily life. it’s what family and friendship are founded on. without it, all other economic models would fail tomorrow. it is, in a word, essential. gifting, on the other hand, that obligatory exchange of a tremendous excess of stuff, is part of a problem so enormous as to be crushing the life out of this planet. what happens if we just stop it with the presents, with the assumption that all of us should buy everyone a gift? then, maybe, we can value the true gift economy that sustains life. the one that is not separate from what we call nature, but of it. to recognise, acknowledge, respect, show gratitude for the abundance of life that ought freely to be given to all. fresh air, clean water, living soil, thriving plants, singing birds, contented animals, stable climate. we can protect the giving planet now only by recognising our limits. if you and all of yours, like me and mine, already have enough, this may be the moment to turn to the earth and give to it. all our devotions will no doubt be reciprocated exponentially. this holiday like the one before it, we will be celebrating with music and traditional food, and merry time together. it is more than enough. the small work of slowly changing culture toward one that sustains the living world, starting at home, is the subject of my upcoming films. those are gifts, and so is joining the list, above.

2 weeks ago

View on Instagram |

8/12

at dawn, a peek through the groves at the undercroft and its new set of barn doors. this is one of those modest but impactful projects that retrofits the home we have to function for a reimagined future.

to shift a space from carport-for-one to bicycle-port-for-four, from blustery, dusty, rusty damp space to a haven. our pattern language loves these transitional spaces because our lives thrive within them. they are neither outside, nor quite inside either. no free-ranging chickens, ducks or geese allowed, and no goats, as much as we love them, but the cat-flap reigns. the sort of place for splitting kindling and grabbing an armful of wood for the wood stove without stepping into the downpour. to pump the tires and oil the chains. to collect a fresh compost bucket and sawdust for the bathroom. to find a tool where it’s been neatly put away, and make something, repair something. to manage the flow of objects in and out through the mudroom and perhaps slow it all down and simplify it. a filter.

and all for a well-made door and some glass reclaimed from the old single-glazed sliding doors we’d replaced a while back. would you like to see more sometime, when our friend the carpenter is finished?

for now, i’m finding any spare moments to make the new films, on just this sort of small, impactful step towards living more lightly on this good earth. join the list above for the journal of small work.

appleturnover

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Follow

at dawn, a peek through the groves at the undercroft and its new set of barn doors. this is one of those modest but impactful projects that retrofits the home we have to function for a reimagined future. to shift a space from carport-for-one to bicycle-port-for-four, from blustery, dusty, rusty damp space to a haven. our pattern language loves these transitional spaces because our lives thrive within them. they are neither outside, nor quite inside either. no free-ranging chickens, ducks or geese allowed, and no goats, as much as we love them, but the cat-flap reigns. the sort of place for splitting kindling and grabbing an armful of wood for the wood stove without stepping into the downpour. to pump the tires and oil the chains. to collect a fresh compost bucket and sawdust for the bathroom. to find a tool where it’s been neatly put away, and make something, repair something. to manage the flow of objects in and out through the mudroom and perhaps slow it all down and simplify it. a filter. and all for a well-made door and some glass reclaimed from the old single-glazed sliding doors we’d replaced a while back. would you like to see more sometime, when our friend the carpenter is finished? for now, i’m finding any spare moments to make the new films, on just this sort of small, impactful step towards living more lightly on this good earth. join the list above for the journal of small work.

2 weeks ago

View on Instagram |

9/12

what could it look like to use what’s necessary and no more?

what could it look like to value the labour of our own bodies over efficiency, speed, over some idea of time being money?

to have enough, but not too much.

in the electric bicycle we find a vehicle for the future. on our farm it’s a small horse to help pull things up the hill. it gives assistance, but not too much. in too many instances, all that horsepower serves only to save us from movement we actually needed in the day and will have to seek elsewhere in a gym workout. or not at all, as the case may be. speed, power can make us arrogant, able to fell whole forests in a day, drive miles for cheaper goods, fly away to relax, ship goods there and back again just to exploit labour.

the bicycle embodies the principle of helping us move into efficiency, just enough, not too much. so do the scythe, the rake, the wood stove, the clothesline, the sewing machine, the coldframe.

appropriate technology. maybe eliminating labour, making things convenient, was never the right goal.

what if we only used what we actually need, stepping up with our bodies, valuing our time not as a commodity but as a worthy moment of providing for each other?

then our requirements, just to live, might drop to a sustainable level. without the market we provide, many unsustainable practices might simply cease to exist.

if we only need a bicycle to shop for food, how many cars are unnecessary? if we already grow all the greens we need, what need do we have of imported plastic boxes of them? if we grow wildflower meadows or have animals around who love to graze, what need do we have for mowers? if we like to knit, or sew new clothing from old, what need have we for fast fashion?

with appropriate technology, i extend my reach just enough. it is slow, but it needn’t be fast. fast was only ever profiting a few, at great cost to some living being, some place.

human paces, human powered, with just enough tools to assist, a gear, a small battery, it downshifts our speeding world to an appropriate pace for life to make more life. and when i ride my bicycle, i am always happy.

join the list for my upcoming films on slow living.

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what could it look like to use what’s necessary and no more? what could it look like to value the labour of our own bodies over efficiency, speed, over some idea of time being money? to have enough, but not too much. in the electric bicycle we find a vehicle for the future. on our farm it’s a small horse to help pull things up the hill. it gives assistance, but not too much. in too many instances, all that horsepower serves only to save us from movement we actually needed in the day and will have to seek elsewhere in a gym workout. or not at all, as the case may be. speed, power can make us arrogant, able to fell whole forests in a day, drive miles for cheaper goods, fly away to relax, ship goods there and back again just to exploit labour. the bicycle embodies the principle of helping us move into efficiency, just enough, not too much. so do the scythe, the rake, the wood stove, the clothesline, the sewing machine, the coldframe. appropriate technology. maybe eliminating labour, making things convenient, was never the right goal. what if we only used what we actually need, stepping up with our bodies, valuing our time not as a commodity but as a worthy moment of providing for each other? then our requirements, just to live, might drop to a sustainable level. without the market we provide, many unsustainable practices might simply cease to exist. if we only need a bicycle to shop for food, how many cars are unnecessary? if we already grow all the greens we need, what need do we have of imported plastic boxes of them? if we grow wildflower meadows or have animals around who love to graze, what need do we have for mowers? if we like to knit, or sew new clothing from old, what need have we for fast fashion? with appropriate technology, i extend my reach just enough. it is slow, but it needn’t be fast. fast was only ever profiting a few, at great cost to some living being, some place. human paces, human powered, with just enough tools to assist, a gear, a small battery, it downshifts our speeding world to an appropriate pace for life to make more life. and when i ride my bicycle, i am always happy. join the list for my upcoming films on slow living.

2 weeks ago

View on Instagram |

10/12

it is particularly novemberish to find the goats loafing in the barn of a drizzly morning. not bleating for their breakfast, not peeking round the door with a mouthful of hay. determinedly loafing and reluctant to get up. good to know it isn’t just us.

the ducks may wake raring to go, rushing up the path with wings outstretched, the geese may take a noisy arc of flight, but even they spend more time, bill tucked well under wing, loafing.

everyone loafs. the chickens, in the driest corners, the cat on the hearth or daybed or porch. the wild birds in the trees pause their foraging and loaf in the branches.

i hope that you are loafing enough. us northern dwellers are moving toward hibernation, though we resist it with electric light and ambition. turn the lights low and sleep longer. let the day go earlier.

in a conversation on the ‘small work,’ the subject of my upcoming film series, a friend reminded me of just this.

rest is productive.

yes. the trees grow dormant. this season agrees. sometimes it is enough simply to be, to rest, to restore.

join the list to hear when the new films are out.

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it is particularly novemberish to find the goats loafing in the barn of a drizzly morning. not bleating for their breakfast, not peeking round the door with a mouthful of hay. determinedly loafing and reluctant to get up. good to know it isn’t just us. the ducks may wake raring to go, rushing up the path with wings outstretched, the geese may take a noisy arc of flight, but even they spend more time, bill tucked well under wing, loafing. everyone loafs. the chickens, in the driest corners, the cat on the hearth or daybed or porch. the wild birds in the trees pause their foraging and loaf in the branches. i hope that you are loafing enough. us northern dwellers are moving toward hibernation, though we resist it with electric light and ambition. turn the lights low and sleep longer. let the day go earlier. in a conversation on the ‘small work,’ the subject of my upcoming film series, a friend reminded me of just this. rest is productive. yes. the trees grow dormant. this season agrees. sometimes it is enough simply to be, to rest, to restore. join the list to hear when the new films are out.

2 weeks ago

View on Instagram |

11/12

all-or-nothing ways of being get me into trouble. instead it’s in the partial, semi, the small step, the stages, where most transformation happens. our homemade yogurt is glad to illustrate.

wood stove cooking lends itself to long simmering stews, kettles boiled for tea or washing up, slow flipping english muffins, drying raisins. but our wood stove is too living-room for messy cookery. i cannot face scrubbing milk-boiled-over there.

yet i can start things off. when the fire’s low and slow, the enamelled cast iron takes its merry time to raise the milk to that temperature, that moment when the structure alters, lifts, rising on its way to a froth that would soon boil. this is the temperature we’re after.

yet rather than miss the key moment, or overheat the room trying, the nearly-ready pot on the battered old electric stove finishes the task. it’s ok. a partial process is functional.

then, as i potter about, flowing on tasks that arise in the course of a varied day i stir that pot, cooling the milk. not too much! wash hands, gingerly test the temperature again. the indicator now is my finger, immersed comfortably for a few seconds. this is no sterile industrial dairy and it needn’t be. all or nothing doesn’t apply to the home dairy.

when the temperature is right everything else pauses. the culture— storebought this time, yet good enough— is dissolved, mixed in with a diving-and-rising wooden spoon. the lid clinks on.

in the crate beside our low fire, local wool felt tucks right over the cosy pot, thickly insulated to hold a steady temperature for hours. this is hay-box cooking*, like the comforter my omi and opa would tuck a pot of just-boiled grains into, to slow-cook in bed til evening. high efficiency, expressed humbly. homemade use-what-you-have solutions link our past and future.

as we take ourselves to bed i set the pot out on the chilly porch to cease culturing. in the morning we remember it. oh!

i’ve rarely tasted yogurt so glorious. my daily milking devotions, the goats’ foraging from this good land, are properly honoured.

enough really is as good as a feast.

this thinking forms ‘the journal of small work’, my upcoming films. join the list.

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all-or-nothing ways of being get me into trouble. instead it’s in the partial, semi, the small step, the stages, where most transformation happens. our homemade yogurt is glad to illustrate. wood stove cooking lends itself to long simmering stews, kettles boiled for tea or washing up, slow flipping english muffins, drying raisins. but our wood stove is too living-room for messy cookery. i cannot face scrubbing milk-boiled-over there. yet i can start things off. when the fire’s low and slow, the enamelled cast iron takes its merry time to raise the milk to that temperature, that moment when the structure alters, lifts, rising on its way to a froth that would soon boil. this is the temperature we’re after. yet rather than miss the key moment, or overheat the room trying, the nearly-ready pot on the battered old electric stove finishes the task. it’s ok. a partial process is functional. then, as i potter about, flowing on tasks that arise in the course of a varied day i stir that pot, cooling the milk. not too much! wash hands, gingerly test the temperature again. the indicator now is my finger, immersed comfortably for a few seconds. this is no sterile industrial dairy and it needn’t be. all or nothing doesn’t apply to the home dairy. when the temperature is right everything else pauses. the culture— storebought this time, yet good enough— is dissolved, mixed in with a diving-and-rising wooden spoon. the lid clinks on. in the crate beside our low fire, local wool felt tucks right over the cosy pot, thickly insulated to hold a steady temperature for hours. this is hay-box cooking*, like the comforter my omi and opa would tuck a pot of just-boiled grains into, to slow-cook in bed til evening. high efficiency, expressed humbly. homemade use-what-you-have solutions link our past and future. as we take ourselves to bed i set the pot out on the chilly porch to cease culturing. in the morning we remember it. oh! i’ve rarely tasted yogurt so glorious. my daily milking devotions, the goats’ foraging from this good land, are properly honoured. enough really is as good as a feast. this thinking forms ‘the journal of small work’, my upcoming films. join the list.

3 weeks ago

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