Ropes and vegetables
My hands are still dirty when I grasp the sisal rope.
I was planting celery at Red Hook Farm. The dirt was dark and loose and full of freshly harvested compost. The girls doing most of the digging and planting were high schoolers but at the farm they were Youth Leaders, this was their job. They live in the projects a couple of blocks from the 2.75 acre farm and it was clear they loved getting their hands dirty too. Between conversations punctuated with giggling and teasing, they carefully placed seedlings into each shallow hole, surrounded the baby plant with soil, and patted down the earth with bare hands. All around us other young adults and volunteers waded through rows of lettuce, hills of potatoes, blocks of spinach with buckets full of weeds or wheelbarrows full of mulch. New York Harbor is literally a stones throw away and that olfactory cacophony of saltwater and diesel and hotdogs fills the air but on the farm you can also smell wet earth and the trace of nightshades as you brush past. It is a challenging neighborhood and it is nothing less than amazing that a farm exists between an Ikea, old warehouses, and the projects.
I look down through the hole in the fire escape. There is no longer a ladder, just this rope. It is knotted at two foot intervals. My hands grasp the uppermost knot. I look at my friend nervously. "You want some shoes? Let me get you some shoes." he says. I have kicked off my boots and they lie on the porch 15 feet below. He brings me trainers and somehow they fit perfectly. My hesitancy, my shifting of hands and feet on rope has made us both more nervous. It's a long drop. Once I skooch off the grating will I be able to lower myself down? If not, I most likely won't be able to pull myself up either.
This is not a big deal.
But if I fall it is.
R. says he will spot me. He swings onto the rope and lowers himself down. "I'm all upper arm strength," he says.
"Yup, I'm not," I say.
He's down there, I'm up here, I hold onto the rope and position my feet on a knot.
I drop off the fire escape and am swinging in the air above a porch behind a brownstone in Brooklyn. A few seconds later I have shimmied down the rope without a problem, my new trainers landing softly on the plywood below.
No big deal.
And its not. But R. and I are super excited about our little challenge and grinning like mad. I am proud of myself for not using my fear of heights (falling) or my muscle weakness as an excuse not to do it. Everyday we face little challenges and they can be as satisfying to conquer as climbing a mountain or winning a hotdog eating contest.
My hands have strands of rope sticking to residual dirt. I think about where I was a year ago. I came to New York last summer and volunteered at Eagle Street Farm in Greenpoint. I learned how to properly pick kale and to shake as much dirt as possible off of the roots of plants to be composted because hauling tons of dirt onto a roof is hard work. I was looking into internship programs and had just heard about the one at City College in San Diego. I hadn't lived in San Diego in almost a decade and wasn't sure what the year would bring. I jumped in anyway.
I now know my brassicas from my solanaceae. I know when to use a digging fork or a hula hoe. I have eaten better, fresher, greener in the last year than ever before in my life. I am slated to return to San Diego to actually work at the farm that has brought me community, knowledge, opportunity.
I am anxious. I hope that I know enough, am strong enough to lead.
In a week I scooch off the edge of my travels and shimmy down into the dirty life of California farming once again.
Like growing vegetables on an urban farm or in pots on a windowsill, like seeking knowledge and a healthier life in the middle of a socially depressed urban center, like climbing a rope off a fire escape: whether the challenges are big or small, jumping into the unknown is just about always worth it.
I was planting celery at Red Hook Farm. The dirt was dark and loose and full of freshly harvested compost. The girls doing most of the digging and planting were high schoolers but at the farm they were Youth Leaders, this was their job. They live in the projects a couple of blocks from the 2.75 acre farm and it was clear they loved getting their hands dirty too. Between conversations punctuated with giggling and teasing, they carefully placed seedlings into each shallow hole, surrounded the baby plant with soil, and patted down the earth with bare hands. All around us other young adults and volunteers waded through rows of lettuce, hills of potatoes, blocks of spinach with buckets full of weeds or wheelbarrows full of mulch. New York Harbor is literally a stones throw away and that olfactory cacophony of saltwater and diesel and hotdogs fills the air but on the farm you can also smell wet earth and the trace of nightshades as you brush past. It is a challenging neighborhood and it is nothing less than amazing that a farm exists between an Ikea, old warehouses, and the projects.
I look down through the hole in the fire escape. There is no longer a ladder, just this rope. It is knotted at two foot intervals. My hands grasp the uppermost knot. I look at my friend nervously. "You want some shoes? Let me get you some shoes." he says. I have kicked off my boots and they lie on the porch 15 feet below. He brings me trainers and somehow they fit perfectly. My hesitancy, my shifting of hands and feet on rope has made us both more nervous. It's a long drop. Once I skooch off the grating will I be able to lower myself down? If not, I most likely won't be able to pull myself up either.
This is not a big deal.
But if I fall it is.
R. says he will spot me. He swings onto the rope and lowers himself down. "I'm all upper arm strength," he says.
"Yup, I'm not," I say.
He's down there, I'm up here, I hold onto the rope and position my feet on a knot.
I drop off the fire escape and am swinging in the air above a porch behind a brownstone in Brooklyn. A few seconds later I have shimmied down the rope without a problem, my new trainers landing softly on the plywood below.
No big deal.
And its not. But R. and I are super excited about our little challenge and grinning like mad. I am proud of myself for not using my fear of heights (falling) or my muscle weakness as an excuse not to do it. Everyday we face little challenges and they can be as satisfying to conquer as climbing a mountain or winning a hotdog eating contest.
My hands have strands of rope sticking to residual dirt. I think about where I was a year ago. I came to New York last summer and volunteered at Eagle Street Farm in Greenpoint. I learned how to properly pick kale and to shake as much dirt as possible off of the roots of plants to be composted because hauling tons of dirt onto a roof is hard work. I was looking into internship programs and had just heard about the one at City College in San Diego. I hadn't lived in San Diego in almost a decade and wasn't sure what the year would bring. I jumped in anyway.
I now know my brassicas from my solanaceae. I know when to use a digging fork or a hula hoe. I have eaten better, fresher, greener in the last year than ever before in my life. I am slated to return to San Diego to actually work at the farm that has brought me community, knowledge, opportunity.
I am anxious. I hope that I know enough, am strong enough to lead.
In a week I scooch off the edge of my travels and shimmy down into the dirty life of California farming once again.
Like growing vegetables on an urban farm or in pots on a windowsill, like seeking knowledge and a healthier life in the middle of a socially depressed urban center, like climbing a rope off a fire escape: whether the challenges are big or small, jumping into the unknown is just about always worth it.
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