Gradients
June 16, 2025
Gradients
Jack Kittredge
Walking down our road this Spring has reminded me of the sense I had when moving to Barre with Julie years ago, that life here was a little more analog, flowing, not jerky. There are still seasons, sure, like in the city. But they seemed to change more imperceptibly: trees starting as bare black outlines, sprouting faint yellow flower halos, minutely greening, slowly darkening, and swelling into fullness. Come their time, one by one, the leaves slide oh-so-subtly into gold or brown or crimson before drifting down on the wind.
Graphic designers do something similar with colors – change them progressively, but by so little each time that you barely notice. I think they call it using “gradients”.
I find myself doing that with time, too.
Perhaps it’s the countryside, perhaps just age. But the more I see familiar things – crops, buildings, favorite tools, certainly people – I don’t see them simply as they are right before me. There is a history, a wholeness, too. The ripe berry patch veils an earlier, faint flower halo in the background; on my way upstairs in the house, I’m also stepping into the gaping stairwell hole that was there during building, 40 years ago. Seeing my big chisel sometimes reminds me of making tricky barn mortices. When with my adult son, to this day, I also see him at age 8, in the glow of finally catching a leaf on the way down.
I think gradients help me see better.
Gratitude
This week’s gratitude goes to Devra, who came to us as a rank beginner farmer with very few of the practical farming skills that are needed for the hundreds of small and large judgment calls on the farm each day. Last week, through a lot of effort on both of our parts, but mostly on Devra’s, we came to a place where Devra has found a way and means to flourish here at MHOF, and has quickly moved to being a very integral and needed part of the fluid, multi-talented farm staff. Looking ahead two or three steps and offering to be part of the next project, fastidious about putting things away, be it dishes or tools at the end of the day, learning the ropes of quick but careful seeding of flats, being the main eggplant potato bug picker (they are not yet out of the weeds), and being ever gracious, she has found her niche, and I suspect it will be ever-expanding. Thank you, Devra.
Check out the set of that jaw!
2025 MHOF CSA
Slow, slow, slow is all I can say. This will be another limping week for produce, though I am hopeful that by the week of June 23, we will be having a few more things to eat.
We will have:
Lettuce
Cilantro – new item
Chives
Green onions
Garlic scapes – this week and next week
Spinach came back – there will be a good taste of it
Mint of one variety or another
That’s it – back out to the field to plant, hoe, hill, cut hay, rake hay, mulch, and do a little more picking.
Volunteering at MHOF
Thanks, Luke, for a wonderful prepping of beds and planting of things. It was such a treat to work with you all day on Tuesday.
Jennifer’s Recipe for the Week: Strawberry Mint Salad Dressing
Strawberry Mint Salad Dressing blends sweet, cooling strawberries with fragrant spearmint and light apple cider vinegar, creating a soothing elixir for summer’s heat. The natural acidity of vinegar stimulates agni (digestive fire) without aggravating Pitta, thanks to the cooling nature of mint and the sweetness of strawberries. Olive oil offers grounding unctuousness that balances Vata and adds richness without clogging Kapha. This dressing is especially supportive during hot months, helping to cleanse and hydrate while gently stimulating the digestive system. Perfect for leafy greens, quinoa salads, or fresh fruit medleys, it brings harmony through a balance of taste and temperature.
Get the Recipe at Jen Zen Living
Some Farm Videos From This Week
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Farm Doins
Tuesday started out rather depressing with the loss of about 60 of our young layers – 20 in a pile outside their house and the rest gone. My fault – I had gotten lazy about stationing the dogs out there, slightly overwhelmed as I was with Jack’s broken shoulder. I was particularly aggrieved by the seeming wanton slaughter aspect of it all.
We have been planning the big pig pick-up for a while now. We buy our certified organic piglets from Misty Brook – Katia and Brendan. For over 20 years, when they lived in Hardwick next door, it was a slam dunk. Now they are settled 3 ½ hours away, in Maine, but it is still worth it to buy the best (and perhaps only certified organic) pigs we can find. Jack and I were going to make the trip a week ago, but then he broke his shoulder. Marge reappeared in our lives and pinch hit for him. We spent all of Thursday driving up and back to get the pigs; thanks, Marge. And then Dan, who is the other essential human connection, met us at the end to unload them. Luckily that all went without a hitch, and they are safely locked into their forest home that Matt so thoughtfully and thoroughly set up over the past two or so weeks. Today, Monday, we find out whether they will stay in their fenced yard when we go all hands on deck to let them out and help them “test” the electric fence with their very sensitive noses.
Aside from that, much progress on the big job of weeding, hilling, and mulching the potatoes – 6 beds down and 4 to go. We planted celery, celeriac, parsley, cauliflower, broccoli, cucumbers, squash, soybeans, and replanted some tomatoes in the hoophouse. We weeded and mulched older celery, carrots, beets, winter squash. And mowed two big sections of hay and got some of it picked up. The farm is running on all cylinders right now.
Happy Solstice, which will arrive this week.
Julie
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