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This morning the chickens looked, well, morose. Maybe it’s all the social distancing. Maybe it was the frost. Maybe they are still incredulous over the fact that they molt and look bald just as it starts to freeze outside. Maybe they miss laying eggs during this molting season. Maybe they are still in shock over […]
According to the vegetable garden, summer’s over. The squash plants look like they got cooked, and the parsley looks like it fell asleep. Secretly, the frosting and subsequent toppling over of the garden is a big relief to me. I worked hard all spring and summer figuring out how to get plants to grow. (As […]
“This place is like a second home to us,” a guest said to me recently as he and his family were getting to leave after another weekend at Spirit Hill. I asked him what he liked best about the place, and he told me it was how it made him feel. “It’s so Zen here,” […]
The best thing happened last weekend: we had a teenage guest who loved to bake and she got to make the most of the kitchen here. And then something topped even that: she brought me a bag that had not one or two cookies, but more! I opened the bag and ate one and was […]
What Happens When Pulitzer-Prize Photographer Anthony Suau Stays at Spirit Hill Farm? First of all, he falls in love with the chicken coop. Who wouldn’t? (One day soon it might even have a chandelier inside. The chickens are going to have to learn to say please and thank you first or at least pretend to […]
I have a dream. I want to write a book called My Year at Spirit Hill Farm, and I want my friend Laura Foote to do the pictures. Why? Because just look Spirit Hill Farm. Just look at this chicken. My most favorite piece of writing is Annie Dillard’s essay Living Like Weasels. I like […]
Everything was set. I even hired an extra gardener to come and rake the walkways. We’d come through the fire scare, and I wanted to thank the universe by celebrating Spirit Hill, giving it a big thank you shine. We had guests arriving Friday afternoon to celebrate a major birthday, and so I paid special […]
You need to be careful what magazines you look at when you’re a farmer-in-training. If you look at magazines that have recipes, for example, this could end up being a lot of work for you and mayhem for your poor, unsuspecting already-established plants. I was reading the Spring 2020 issue of Edible: Marin & Wine […]
“When one has tasted watermelon, (s)he knows what the angels eat.” ~Mark Twain
I had no intention of falling in love with the chickens. I try to be a good person, but I have to tell you that I think chickens are weird. If I’m totally honest, I think I was partly scornful of them because they are my shadow selves running around freely: easily frightened, scared of […]