Kids are on vacation. We’re laying low, playing board games, eating way too many leftover Christmas cookies, visiting the Oakland Zoo lights, and watching Elvis movies. (Who knew “Jailhouse Rock” was such a kid-pleaser?)
I wasn’t planning to be on the blog at all this week. Then I read a book I enjoyed so much I had to tell you about it in case you’re sitting around on your vacation, hemmed in by snow or rain, looking for something uplifting to read.
“Farm City: The Education of an Urban Farmer”, by Novella Carpenter (Penguin Press, 2009), is a memoir about the author’s experience starting a “squatter” farm on an abandoned 4,500 square foot plot of land in the middle of the urban ghetto.
I don’t know Novella Carpenter, but her farm happens to be 30 blocks south of my own urban ghetto house. It turns out she went to the same journalism program I went to, although we missed each other by a couple years. I only heard about her book when I was visiting family back East and my Aunt Kate gave me her copy. I’m so glad she did!
Novella starts her farm with vegetables and bees. Next come the chickens, (the “gateway” animal for urban farmers). With the chickens come ducks, geese, and two turkeys. She slaughters one of the turkeys for Thanksgiving dinner, with all the misgivings that any city dweller would have about this activity.
Later she gets rabbits, and for the grand finale, two cute little piglets that quickly grow into giant, stinky, lumbering, voracious pigs. You have to marvel at how much work she puts into feeding these animals. While searching through the dumpster of a well-regarded restaurant in Berkeley looking for free pig slop, Novella befriends the head chef, who teaches her the art of making salami.
The book is about Novella’s adventures learning to take care of these animals amidst the prostitutes, the drug addicts, and the drive-by shootings, and eventually, learning to eat them. It’s also about finding happiness through community, good food, and a sense of purpose. I found this story wildly hopeful. Like Shannon Hayes, whose book I wrote about a few months ago, Novella Carpenter is a radical homemaker, rejecting materialism and the conventional work-a-day life in pursuit of a life well-lived.
I find the urban farmer life strangely seductive. Yet, I have three children to care for; that’s all the livestock I can handle. (Novella doesn’t have kids. I found myself wondering how her story would change if she did.) There must be a middle ground there, somewhere. Surely being a parent doesn’t mean you have to give up on friends, good food, and basic environmental values, does it?
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
im also off work this week and reading, Bad Mother by Ayelet Waldman – my dad got it for me for Christmas. Its a good and funny read so far, although im only half way through. the week off though has reminded me, once again, how the balance shifts when you are “at home”. Im amazingly productive in the 6.5 hrs i work a week in the office, but being at home (granted its vacation) just paying the bills seems like a major accomplishment. the basic tasks of changing diapers, doing dishes, laundry and of course- playing (!!!) take up most of the day. i forgot how the uninterrupted quiet can be so precious!
Anyhow, to your question – totally don”t think it means giving up – its just where you draw the line (similar in a way to how we think of our lines as good vs bad moms). While we didn’t grow veggies this summer – we did join a CSA and enjoyed a ton of biodynamic organic food – i guess that’s one step towards supporting (urban in my case) farming?
I’m with you. Being home with the kids this week makes me appreciate how much I get done when they aren’t around. I have to remind myself constantly to slow down with them, play a board game or read an extra book at bedtime.
I think making this sort of thing work has to do with with your values being so important that they dictate the way you want your life to be. I keep meeting women (and men) who do the urban/suburban farming kind of lifestyle. Many of them have families, some large families. I find their lives inspiring. I want my life to be more like that, I’m just really bad at it, my chickens died in the first week and my garden just. . . doesn’t. in the small ways that I’ve moved in that direction I think that the movement is in an attitude of “this is the way it’s going to be and there aren’t other options.” You build things into your lifestyle and then you stop questioning them. Basically the only fairly notable thing I’ve done is stop eating processed foods, I cook several hours a day. And I think it’s great, it’s a ton of work. But I just don’t even question it anymore, it is the way we are going to live and eat, period. What I find weird is that people are highly criticle of others who do manage radical change in their lives. I don’t understand that. Someone the other day hinted that the sacrifice I make in preparing homemade stock for my children isn’t justified since I’m not spending that time directly interacting with my family. I didn’t really know how to respond to that, since I so completely disagree with the sentiment.
why do I only find my spelling errors after I post?
People will find any reason to judge your parenting. It’s ridiculous. If you WEREN’T making you own soup stock, someone would say you’re not feeding your family right…On another note, I made my first homemade soup stock last week, and I’ve been cooking all week with it. It’s sooooo good!
I loved this book too! Thanks for writing about it.
By the way, Novella is speaking at the Commonwealth Club (SF) on 1/25 for you Bay Area folks. Info here: http://tickets.commonwealthclub.org/auto_choose_ga.asp?area=2