mother maple
The weight of what’s happening has come nowhere close to settling into my brainspace. As I rest on a boulder, or scramble down a creek bed, or follow a fresh deer trail crosswise spring mountain’s backbone, the concepts of “ours” or “purchased” or “own” or “bought” are as foreign to my brain as the latin name of that bright red berry bush I’ve been debating on nibbling.
If anything, as I walk, and hike, and bound across the property, my thoughts are of submission, of humility, of wonder, of seeking, of inquisition, and of mindfulness. My meditation is the land. Like the old baseball saying: beee the baaall…just be the ball. And so, as I walk the land, I “be” the land.
These trees are great elders, and their collective wisdom and heritage is palpable as I traverse the woods. the momentum of my booted foot swinging down the hill comes to an abrupt halt as I arrive at the base of a five hundred year old grandmother maple tree—EUREKA--four massive trunks—so powerfully feminine--pulsating skyward and expressing fully with a beautifully scraggly maple leafed crown--I’m awestruck. Four sister trunks anchored into the earth--their beauty feels timeless, but at the same time so delicate.
I grow roots through the pads of my feet--descending earthward through the leaves and the humus--tangling her's, now, thirty feet deep under the earth's crust, and i breathe. I breathe my arms up towards her leafy crown, emulating her posture with every fiber in my trunk, my fingers branching up to the sun and I brreeeeaaattthhheeee.
I breathe carbon dioxide straight into her maple leafed mouth and she rains golden white plumes of oxygen-infused healing light and love through my lungs and my blood.
My breath, and therefore my life, are completely dependent on her ability to photosynthesize.
Her vibrations are heavy like a pulsating heartbeat pounding three stories tall, and I can feel the force of her spirit—in fact, if i look, and if i ask, I can see it.
The spirit of the property is immense. It’s magic—pure, vital and dynamic gaia earth bouldering and exploding up and down spring mountain—ancient trees, great pillars—vibrant green moss covering wood and stone like fleece blankets. she is rugged but fully accommodating. her terrain is extreme but always bountiful. We make tea from her bark, make snacks of her berries and acorns, and hunt for her fungi.
month one of a lifetime wandering these woods. Based on that lifetime ahead of me I inherently, at this point, must know ever so little. To my nothing this land is my everything—our future is its’ alone. wisdom, family, love, health, balance, patience, productivity—mother maple and these woods have already been a powerful teacher and healer.
And to me, what has become abundantly clear, is that these woods are true destiny. In 2008 her and I visited napa for a five-day vacation from the new york rat race. In and out-wham, bam, thank you m’am. This is the vacation that triggered a real brainshed moment in my life--one that divides before from after. I returned from that trip to napa in the autumn of 2008 and found myself depressed to be living "the dream" in the big apple. I wanted to quit my job, and at that time, I thought I wanted to go to culinary school. I knew not yet what I actually wanted, but rather what I didn’t want—which was to be living in new york city. Our visit to wine country was the true spark that ignited my desire to learn how to produce food.
Two of the vineyards we visited on that short trip have property boundaries that nearly abut the land we just purchased in present day. In our initial search for land we were open to all corners of the world, in theory, and certainly to all corners of this country, in earnest, and with all that land out there we ended up within walking distance of that 2008 vacation.
Spring mountain is our destiny, and it has been calling us here for nearly half a decade. I am so grateful for its’ wisdom, and its’ inspiration, and selfishly, its’ interest in us. Our task, as we see it, is to become one with this land--To grow roots into this earth and to sprout many generations of humans, and animals, and plants alike.
The mountain fruit must work harder, but it is almost certainly the tastiest.
I'm High On Cooking | in Environment, Farm, Health, hospitality
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