The Garden in fall

Alas, we've finally cut down the cover crops and have gotten our winter garden in and the coop is almost finished and ready for hens. Soon, soon. We're already pulling cucumbers and carrots out slowly and new tomatoes are teasing us along with the cold nights. Still haven't frozen and my fingers are crossed as I leave town tonight...

From Saturday November 13th

Dreaming of the Maze.

Trip Index:
1214 miles round-trip from Tucson to the end of the road in The Maze at the Dollhouse.
6 hours one-way to drive 47 miles from Hite, Utah to The Maze itself.
5 miles of hiking barefoot hiking in 500 foot deep slot canyons, less than 50 meters wide.
I learned how to rockcrawl, or as I think of it now: I can hike with a truck.
Canyonlands is way out there, I mean, WAY out there.
I've woken the last two nights with the feel of warm smooth rock underfoot. My soles appear to have muscle memory.
It is hard to explain what The Maze is...I'm completely at a loss for words.

Here are some pictures and musings from way out there.

Maze Light

River scour, barefoot walk
For reference: the top of the red wall is 375 feet above the riverbed.

Further up canyon in the Maze

From above, looking down in
And yes, those are canyons in every direction.

In the land of standing rocks

The Dollhouse

The Dollhouse sky

Camp at the end of the road, The Dollhouse

The 10/10/10 poem

Sunrise over the river
Dollhouse crack high above
the sinuous tremble of rock
splitting into infinity
the fall of water in
every direction color
endless soft drops of form
of light, of birds calling
ravens cackling, jays shouting
the morning brewing
the light rising
the day beginning.

Downstream to Cataract Canyon, on the Colorado River

Brown Betty Rapids, Cataract Canyon

Overlooking Surprise Valley, the Colorado is barely visible to the left and 1200 feet below.

Drying creek bed

Goodnight Needles, a 100 mile view north to south

Dollhouse Moonrise

Yes, that is the road.
Actually, I only broke a single leaf spring and never scraped.
Did I mention that I love having a truck?

The Jardin grows...

Gosh, procrastination is fun. I need to be studying for my WFR...Here's the progression of the garden through the summer.

For reference here are a couple photos of the yard from February 17th, the first day we visited the house.




The first picture was from the 7th of May.



The second picture is from the 19th of May.



The third picture is from the 17th of June.



The fourth picture is from 1st of July.



The fifth picture is from this morning, August 5th.

The Kitchen Redux

Here's a short run down on the kitchen remodel I've finally finished. Yes, finished. It only took me two and a half months.

Starting with the kitchen and the house when we moved in:

The first step in the process was probably the most enjoyable. Yes, I am still a little boy in that there is never enough destruction of stuff.



Once I got the old countertop and wall yanked out, the next step required me to tear up the flooring. This was challenging in that you had to cut away each piece of flooring from the glue that cinched it to the floor individually and in as gentle a way as you could not to damage the one next to it. Admittedly it is fun to use a Skil saw to cut directly into the floor. The next step was to cut each plank to fit into the spaces I opened up and then ultimately thread them in one at a time. This was my first fail. Always use more glue that you think you need to get the flooring to completely seal onto the floor. I've got the smallest pockets that mean a light depression every time you step. So...lesson learned.



The flooring actually blended fairly well once it was laid down.


The next step was to move the peninsula into place and secure it to the floor a piece at a time. This is what it looked like stripped down but secure.



Once secured into place the process shifted to building the outer part of the peninsula. For this we decided on a product called American Clay but in order to finish the outside of the peninsula we had to first build the guts to support the clay. I settled on using a 3/8" wettable plywood secured to the back of the cabinets as the foundation.




To create a foundation on top of the plywood I used 1/2" hardware cloth secured with staples. This gave a substantial lip to put the first scratch coat on that I mixed up using 2 parts medium grain sand to 1 part cement. To build the curve of the countertop I had to frame out a separate piece that had a gentle curve, with gaps filled in by cloth adobe tape (it holds the best under moist conditions).



After this framework was built I began the process of mixing then applying the scratch coat using hand held trowels. I let the consistency of this coat be a little thick and sludgy so that I didn't have as much slump on the vertical surface. After applying this first coat to a generally smooth surface profile, I took a piece of hardware cloth and snipped it off so that I had a six inch long piece with little ends poking out every half inch. I used that to make the scratch coat. The scratch coat is the surface that the second coat of clay adheres to, so you "scratch" the coat to make it rough so that the texture gives more to hold onto.




Once that was finished we topped the peninsula with a three-quarter inch plywood as a base, followed by a 3/8" cement backer board secured down with screws.



Once the scratch coat was set, we began the process of applying the clay. American Clay is actually recycled marble and clay that is pulverized and turned into a wall coating. You can actually use it for regular walls, but in our case we decided to apply it thicker and give the appearance of a larger clay surface.


The mixing is easy with a paddle mixer for your drill.



And the mixed product is smooth like a milkshake.



Then the application is just a slow process of using an adobe hawk and trowel to slowly smooth it onto the wall. We ultimately used two coats to get the best surface.








During this whole period we had been going back and forth about what countertop to use. We actively considered using recycled douglas fir that had been finished with a blackened ebony finish, but ultimately the price scared us away. We settled on tile. We got the tile and I worked my way through laying them all out and slowly but surely cutting every single piece and laying them out on the countertop.




After they get laid out, then they are affixed with mastik using 3/8" spacers to maintain appropriate grout lines. This process is really time consuming but there's no replacement for that... Ultimately the curve proved to be problematic but in the end fewer pieces was better. I think and approximate curve is just fine rather than a perfect one.




Another angle on the tile work prior to grouting.



Finally, we picked the grout we wanted and after cleaning up, we had a beautiful new kitchen. At one point, I spent a day repainting the kitchen and the color we chose actually helped to bring all the colors and textures together and have made the whole look really beautiful.

Open Letter to Gov. Jan Brewer

Dear Governor Brewer,
I am writing to you today because I feel you are not being very representative of the reality of the border. I just watched your ad spot on the border (6.30.2010) and am writing to tell you that your political ideology is flawed in several ways.

First, I think that you are representative of a significant nativist ideology that does not like immigrants and seeks to vilify them at any cost. Second, if you are so concerned about the safety of the border region, why do you insist on suggesting such stupid falsehoods as "all immigrants are smuggling drugs". You know that is a lie. It does nothing but vilify the poorest among us: the majority of immigrants that seek their only hope in the United States. Have you not seen the lure of billions in remittances back home in estado de Veracruz or in DF? What person in this world does not wish to build a home for their family or lift them from poverty? Is that the person you wish to lump together with all the genuinely bad and evil motherf--kers that are smuggling drugs and people? The poor migrant, the migrant we have always embraced as a nation? Will you go pick lettuce in their stead?

Governor Brewer, I am certain you are an honorable person. Everyone around me is my countryman and woman, I seek not to tell you that I do not like you so. But I feel that you are wrong in your assessment of the what's at issue with the border. Governor Brewer, the real process of securing the border is about learning to recognize and build a healthy relationship between the immigrant community and the nation that needs them. Governor Brewer, the idea that all immigrants regardless of those that seek a better life in this country are to be referred to as "drug smugglers"? This is nothing but an effort to divert attention from the reality of your budding police state (for certain races) here in Arizona. It is also disrespectful to all those genuine people who come to the United States seeking only a part of the life that you and I are privileged to enjoy.

I can hear your reply that they are indeed doing just that, smuggling drugs. My reply to you is this: you know very well that the people who are smuggling drugs are the drug smugglers. And they are the people you have to deal with. You create humane and sensible immigration policies and the flow of immigrants drops–immigrants want the same humanity and prosperity that we all enjoy. This is the only way you can separate out the people who genuinely want to work in the United States and those who are bringing the violence of drug war culture in Mexico to our land.

Securing the border under the terms of your vision will only serve to increase violence. It is imperative that you set aside your narrow nativistic ideology toward immigrants and deal with an appropriate immigration system first and foremost. Only then you will be able to 'secure' the border in any meaningful way.

Sincerely,
Steve Buckley

The Lesson of the Fox.

The paw prints appeared suddenly, as though the fox suddenly decided to move up the trail through the snow. It might have been running, whether from Chris and I, or after another animal, only the icy wind and the snowflakes that drifted by, knew. The clouds shifted across the sky, obscuring the sun. The prints raced ahead of us up the trail, following the path with an uncanny sense of ease. From cairn to cairn, the prints dashed along the trail, deviating only as the fox darted across the boulders with ease, where we huffed and struggled to step over to cross the icy rocks with our big packs. A small step here, a stretch, an angling over and bending to grasp the rock, stepping around and tenderly on a rock slanting down perilously toward the open canyon, over and over again we moved quietly through the morning. The diffused sun warmed the snow, pocking the white landscape with the vivid hematite red of the Coconino sandstone mud. Chris stopped ahead of me to kick his boots against a rock, a clump of mud and snow fell from his boot, and the fox prints kept darting up the trail. We hiked on, until the prints suddenly swerved and as quickly as they were there, vanished.

The idea of a long walk is nothing new. The pilgrimage humans have made through time, walking the long road, stepping away from the habits we accumulate to embark on a journey we hope transformative, if only in some small measure. So it began for Chris and I, four days prior. We dropped off the rim of the Grand Canyon in knee deep snow, descending swiftly through hundreds of millions of years of geologic time in the span of several hours. Four days we had walking, the constancy of rock crunching under boot, of the tense skin that soon bubbled my heels in blisters, of the ever present muscular pain, the sore back, the rest that finally came in a wave each night. The long night of the silent expanse, the jets that continually passed back and forth with only a murmur above the vast darkness. We walked to the bottom of the Canyon with the end always lurking there in the uncertain future, but the present moment crunched away underfoot. I trained my attention on every step as best I could, trying to squeeze out the drops of mindfulness from the chattering that went on and on in my skull.

The prints appeared again. As quickly as they had disappeared, the fox prints materialized and dashed on up the trail. We picked our way down and across another rock fall, the boulders covered by just enough snow to hide the crevices waiting for a sliding foot. Slowly we made our way along the narrow trail, down one arm of a side canyon, up another. The prints dashed out ahead of us, following the trail far more faithfully then we were able. As the trail seemed to be disappearing the prints dashed on ahead with a lightness, an almost playful quality of follow me if you can. We crested a hill and the prints swerved under a tree and up the hill. "The fox went that way," I said to Chris. We walked around the boulder to the right instead of the left, following what we thought was the trail. My eyes trained on Chris as we walked ahead twenty steps, stopping under a huge juniper where the trail vanished. Looking up slope I could see a small break in the low shrubs that poked out of the snow. I walked up to the trail to see the fox prints, racing away up the trail. They danced away except for a small rock that sat right above the juniper, where the fox had darted out, appearing for only a moment to pause and point out our flaw. On up the trail the prints darted. The fox kept on the trail for another twenty feet, then as before, were suddenly gone.

The blisters had begun on the second day, growing quickly from quarters, to Susan B. Anthony's, to the Kennedy fifty-cent piece by the third day. Blister on top of blister in my new untested boots. My attention swung quickly from the immediate anxiety of being in the canyon to the burning that came with every step, renewing attention on every step. Subtle adjustments that came with each step, as we went up and down, then slowly up and up. Along slopes that crossed above steep cliff faces, not so much trail, but instead a six inch wide track that sloped toward the cliff. Then down steep drops of streams deeper into the rock that shelved out twenty feet above the stream bed. Off came the packs, slowly shimmying them down cliff edge to the one below, until they rested at the bottom. Still, the heels burned as the blister patches wore off and shifted with the heat of my boots, opening new frontiers. Still the attention was on the immediate step, the attention paid to a boot shifting on my foot.

The prints reappeared as we picked our way across another difficult section of trail, curving around the final arm of the canyon that led to the head of the canyon that terminated the Redwall limestone. The fox kept on the trail, faithful as always. Growing tired as we trudged ever upward, the fox was leading us on, drawing us nearer and nearer the goal, the end. The question of the goal had never left me since we dropped in four days earlier. The tension between wanting to survive, to get out alive, always tightly competed with the reality of the place. With the Canyon, the question of impermanence, of cliffs falling apart in the darkness and freezing air as the night came on and the temperature dropped, was a constant presence. The only constant was the walk, as each step went deeper and further and yet closer to the end. That dynamic tension was playing out in each little two inch print that led us up and up. Fox assisted ascent, we playfully called it.

The fox left us finally at a point immediately above the Redwall limestone. The fox led us directly to the precipice, directly to the base of what proved to be our true climb. For as the fox prints swerved off one final time, we took the opportunity to pause and eat and drink, to keep our energy strong for what was yet to come. As we started up the hill, the snow grew deeper and deeper, and for the next five hours we struggled to keep not only the trail in sight, but the larger goal. The difficulty of walking straight up a sixty degree incline in hip deep snow is difficult to convey, but exhausting it is. In the crux of our climb, at what proved to be a critical juncture at which we retreated back to where we lost the trail, my anxiety grew too strong to ignore. I was saturated, from sweat on the inside and from snow on the outside. At times my fingers were numb, at others I was shivering and getting progressively worried as the day wore on and the temperature began to drop. One step, another, another, another. We would get out.

The lightness of the fox reminded me of floating, as though it was not real, but instead a figment of my imagination. The reality of my aching legs, of the weight of my backpack, of struggling as I slid deeper into yet another drift, these moments were not the lightness of the fox. These were the unbearable lightness, as Kundera called it, of having momentarily touched the void, of having tapped into the elation that came with simply walking. The fox led us precisely to what we were expected to see, what we were expected to experience. No matter how prepared we were, no matter our physical shape, no matter our gear, or hydration, it was simply a measure of luck that brought us back. After all the time and energy, what happened to us in reality hinged on sheer chance.

Of seeds and non-attachment

There is apparently a universal feeling of dread that accompanies the crashing of computers. The experience is certainly not universal, in as much as some peoples' digital life can be retained, some cannot. You lose the accumulation of your whole digital life, wiped away as though it is simply drops of water on glass. So it was with me, my digital life wiped away with a short clunk. I had been paging through photos on the internet, when the computer froze. I restarted it to nothing. Macs have this lovely little feature of the folder with a blinking question mark on it. It signifies the loss of connection to the drive, the loss of startup instructions. In my case it was definitive.

Losing my digital life has been hard. With each hour I tally yet more that had gotten onto that little platter and nowhere else. I have learned a wicked lesson in multiple sources of data, of backing up my data. Eased by thoughts of not having a dissertation on that disk, of no pressing deadlines, of having gotten two of four field guides off to others before the end. Counting small victories in the face of overwhelming loss. I imagine what the last speaker of a rare indigenous language feels. Only it is not a matter of life and death for me, nor my heritage, it is a hiccup at best, a long drawn out reconstruction. In the language of my life, it is the most personal restoration I've ever engaged in.

Our minds store so much information, yet they too have this fickle recall capacity, so unlike the computer with its tidy folders and exacting replication. I struggle with facts of disappearing field guides, of lost designs, photos, music, endless files of organized research, and all my writings from the last two years. It was as simple as snapping your fingers and it was over. The process of compiling the vestiges of our lives, of bringing our knowledge into a single drive, into a single location. As though the process of bringing all that knowledge brought it all to a vanishing point.

Part of me feels like I am grieving at the loss, part of me is just mad at my stupid complacency. Macs are as fallible as any other machine. No matter how much we humans engineer our machines, they fail. Like plane crashes and dam breaks, unfortunately they tend to fail catastrophically. It is the idea of failure that has captivated me in the last two weeks. Where I work at home, in our little back office I look out on my garden, and specifically the little nursery where I am continually trying to grow plant starts. When my computer first failed, my reaction was one of such shock that I ultimately came home after doing all I could to get it on the road to being fixed and could do nothing. All I found that I could do was endlessly fill two by two inch pots for seed starts. I ultimately filled eight trays before I snapped out of it. My computer failing had brought me back to the ground and to my seeds.

A few days later, sitting under the falling leaves of my hackberry trees, I slowly put seeds into every one of those pots. I planted grasses, jojoba, chard, broccoli raab, beets, agave, sotol, and even kale. As I did, I began to think about knowledge, mainly about all the knowledge that I had lost. It was certainly in my head to a degree, but it was not a replicable knowledge. Sitting under the trees that grew from seeds, the thought of the knowledge that was in each of the seeds in my hands was suddenly real and speaking to me. When you compare the knowledge that is encoded in a seed, to germinate and grow and provide seed and food, it really changes the way you see knowledge. Human knowledge is like us, fleeting. Seeds are enduring and ancient. I planted another row of grass seed as I thought about my loss. In the broader scheme of things, it is meaningless. In my life it is devastating, but temporary, fleeting. Data is not always knowledge.