Accepting my life as a farmer in part, means coming out as a farmer. It is more than just posting cute pictures of my chickens on Instagram, it is a slow and messy way of life. It means having knowledge around more than how trauma is stored in the body (which is some of my favorite kinds of knowledge to know) but it is also about letting myself become familiar with the intimate workings of a chicken’s digestive system — it means becoming friendly with the mundane and profoundly essential elements of life. This does not always appeal to an academic crowd and it is still a taste I am letting form in my mouth.

Those of us seeking this life of farming, homesteading and rural living — perhaps we are all seeking to be so pulled out of our heads and into the present moment that we cannot resist it. The movement toward living outside of cities and in rural communities is growing. More and more of my clients are talking about it, more and more of clients are beginning to live this kind of life. Those of us who are farming and learning how to farm, are learning so much more than how to take care of chickens and put up electric fences. We are learning how to hold responsibility again. We are learning how to become containers. I think we are wanting something to be required of us. We are hungry for it. We feel empty when there is nothing asked of us, nothing needed of us. And on a farm, every ounce of us is needed: 0ur energy, our bodies, our input, our questions, our emotions, our soul. The farm is simply the vessel — the tool for the beckoning of life.

It seems that we get our animal friends delivered in a very quick fashion around here. We thought we had more time before the bees arrived but all of a sudden, they were in Taos and we had to go and pick them up. Last night I was ravaging YouTube, watching bee videos (most of which were terrible) on what to feed your bees and how to get them into the hive. There is a lot of terrible bee advice to sort though and when you know nothing about bees in the first place, it’s hard to tell which advice is bad. If anyone needs a deeply reliable bee resource, Jack’s good friend hooked us up with this amazing spot in Virginia. Apparently, I shall now be attending monthly bee lectures and Q + A forums. I have a lot of questions about the bees.

Y’all, there has been so much happening here on the farm that I am finally now getting some time to tell you about it — and there is much to tell. I am quickly realizing that nighttime on the farm is a good time to write. The sun goes down and the chickens are corralled and I smell vaguely (or maybe a lot) like chicken poo and I have some time to write. First of all, I have to introduce you to our newest and dearest friend, Jack. Jack came to us all the way from Australia and is here to help on the farm and grace us with the best Australian accent. I am learning all kinds of new phrases and most importantly, saying “bugger” a lot more which I greatly enjoy.

If I’m being really honest, this whole farm endeavor is really triggering my anxiety. I’m not agoraphobic — I have no problem leaving the house and in fact I enjoy leaving the house. I am not anxious in large crowds or at a county fair. I do not get anxious riding on a Ferris wheel but will if I stand on a very tall roof. My anxiety is mostly the result of not knowing how to spend my time. I have existential anxiety. My anxiety says, “You have free time right now. You never have free time. You better use it wisely. Do something productive because death is imminent.” My anxiety wants me to be productive and produce things. My anxiety wants me to finish projects.

The snakes are back. We knew it could be a possibility that they came back when the weather warmed up. It’s been 70 degrees here the past few days and guess who woke up out of their slumber? The den of rattlesnakes living underneath our porch. Sadly enough, (although I’m not that sad about it) I believe we killed and removed the snake parents this past fall when we moved in. We cut one of their heads off with a shovel (or more accurately I should say that the crew of men who have been helping us on our property used the shovel to behead one of the snakes) and the other snake parent, well someone drove him off to the forest while he was duct taped inside of a PVC pipe.