WORKING WITH THE LAND

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This is where taking one's time with buying land pays off. Talking with neighbors and observing what is growing (or not growing) in people's gardens/yards would be smart advice before buying.

WE AREN'T THE ONLY ONES LIVING HERE

The best way to learn the ways of nature is to live in the middle of it. Our previous interest in natural studies blossomed once we were able to step directly into nature every morning, or hear it all night long. This awareness broadened our understanding of the forest, but it also opened our eyes and ears to the interchange, both good and bad, between that dividing line we refer to as the domestic and the wild.

One can come to think while gardening that all of nature's food addicts are hiding just out of eyesight, waiting for you to go to the house so they can gobble up your work of the last three months. But paying attention to the more subtle sounds and activities around the garden will show that some of those critters just happen to be on our side.

We all know about ladybugs, mantises and other such beneficial insects. They are slow and visible. Many more gardeners' friends live out there, some almost undetectable. Recently I found a saw-whet owl in the garden. A certain amount of pocket gopher and mole control is available free if you're in proximity to decent owl habitat. Most of the smaller owls and the larger barred owl prefer to nest in cavities in dead trees or live trees with heart rot. A couple other examples of hungry garden are partners song sparrows that annihilated the crop of beetles on our asparagus and sapsuckers that eat aphids on our fruit trees.

Use careful observation and field guides to understand the subtle interactions inside and outside the garden/orchard. State wildlife agencies and cooperative extension offices can be very helpful, as can neighbors who are doing similar horticultural activities.

MAINTAINING COMMUNITY CONNECTIONS

As energetic 20-somethings, we somewhat understood the importance of access to town. But as aging progressed and the bambinos appeared on the scene, distances were much more noticeable. We discovered "independence" is a relative term. Living in a city provides a kind of independence from expensive transport, a freedom to be close to friends, the list goes on. Life in the country comes with more personal space to run

John Stuart and his family outside their vertical log house.

the chain saw at 5 a.m. and have some relative quiet at other times.

But humans are, by definition, social creatures who exist within the framework of the larger society. We all have to go to town, and transportation is expensive when living out in the boondocks. We rediscovered what my grandparents, who were farmers, knew long ago. Rural communities come to be only through social interaction. The country is not a place to run away from people but to find a differ ent way of building community. It is based on common land uses and common land problems and is an attempt to have our jobs and social lives in the same place. But the friends made and the human connections maintained are a big part of life, no matter what the location. All the material self-sufficiency in the world will never replace the laughter on the dance floor or the neighborhood kids' game of flashlight tag on a summer's evening.

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