Ice world, Catskills

 

They seem alive, these icy wonders,
constantly melting and refreezing, morphing

covering rock, moss and fern

hanging in the air.

Downstream

When in the country the waterfall is the center of attention. It is majestic and loud and beautiful. It slows people down, they pause and contemplate. The stream it feeds into becomes an afterthought. So I've been trying to pay more attention to what goes on downstream. The smaller falls, swirls and eddies formed by rocks. The rocks themselves. Mossy, ferny twiggy things.

 Icy bits are starting to form.

Thanksgiving was an eclectic bunch of friends, everyone brought something. I  made my favorite applesauce cake. I boil apple slices in apple cider so it is very apple-y. Holiday lights went up in the little towns, a wonderful thing when it gets dark at 4:00. There were lots of leftovers, and Reader, I read Jane Eyre for the first time.

xo, Jennifer

Catskills, something new

Most of you who read this blog were with me when I had my little store in the Catskills.

Now, my family is starting a new venture. We've bought a commercial property
in the rural hamlet of Andes, New York, in the Western Catskills .

Over the years it's been a creamery, a lumber mill, and a feed and grain store.
It's right next to the old train depot, where in the early 20th century, cans of Andes milk
 from the creamery were loaded onto the train for delivery to distant places.

There's plenty of sunny land to start a flower farm or grow blueberries
or, maybe one day, have donkeys or goats.
Thanks to Delaware County's Right to Farm Law
you can have a farm in the middle of town.
(Read more about that here.)
Though at 3.5 acres we won't be doing any serious farming.
But still, flowers...(for the goats to eat?)

One day I hope to have a painting studio inside that door,

with a view of the rolling hills and changing seasons.

There are also two huge pole barns,
for tractors or square dances or art installations.
There are a lot of unknowns,
but there's plenty of space for dreamers to implement their dreams.

I'm a little nervous about it. It's a real, long-term commitment. Not something I expected or asked for, but it's a wonderful property, and I'm feeling some love for it. It's about five miles from the house where we've been weekenders since 2002. The Rail Trail is on one side, the Tremperskill Creek on the other, and it's two blocks from Main Street. The best part about having my store was the friends I made, of feeling like I was part of the community. This rural region of upstate New York makes my world a better place, and I hope we can return the favor.

a country weekend, autumn

 I rarely get to the country at the peak of fall colors,

always a little early or a little late. 

But this year it couldn't have been more beautiful. 

 Mesmerizing, inviting reverie and giddy moments,

fleeting glimpses of the profound.

Nature. Earth.

The backroads of upstate New York ablaze.

For the first time, I saw the changing color of the ferns, 

how lovely they are.

Our property is shady and damp, filled with ferns, 

so why haven't I ever taken this in before?

I could study this landscape for the rest of my life 

and never see it all.

a country weekend

Country weekends are much the same-- the frog pond, wildflowers, farmers markets, wading, moss, ferns...But it always feels fresh. There is less noise there. Cell phones don't work, internet is slow and shaky, there is more space to breathe and think and not think. When I was young I did a lot of camping, backpacking, hiking, sleeping outside. I've never once slept outside of our house in the Catskills, but lately I've been feeling the urge for a campfire and a night of stars. I'm too domesticated, I want to let things go.

a country weekend

After the four hour drive, up Weaver Hollow Road, then a steep plunge down to our house.

frog pond at dusk

 I walk the property, making sure all is well.

buttercups, rocks, lichen and brook

the blue hills of the western Catskills

forget-me-nots

 Water and wildflowers, wildflowers and water.

the waterfall

 Wandering, gazing, pondering.

frog pond by day

orange hawkweed a/k/a devil's paintbrush

Ferns, lichen, moss. Stones, bluets, blackberries. Every day in the same places I would seen new things, things anew. There were friends and family, lovingly prepared meals, country roads, farmers markets, my favorite used books store, a gallery opening for a dear friend. I exhale, take a deep breath, breathe.

watershed

 There are forests, rolling hills, small craggy mountains, barns and farmhouses galore,

but for me the centerpiece of our place in the country is the water. 

The waterfall and stream that are part of the watershed. 

From the top of those hills and mountains snowmelt runs into streams and,

 supplemented by rainfall travels on downhill, 

making its way into the Pepacton Reservoir. 

From there it funnels via aqueduct to New York City,

 in a surprisingly low-tech way. Gravity.

The Catskill/Delaware County Watershed provides 90% of New York City's water.

 This means there are lots of restriction on land use, 

and that the waters and surrounding lands will remain pristine and undeveloped. 

This very morning the water that streamed past as I hunted for wildflowers last weekend

could be pouring, unfiltered from the faucets of my sons who live in New York City.

a country weekend

We are climbing the walls around here, so it was nice

to escape to the Catskills for a weekend.

There's plenty of snow there too, but hey, it's country snow.

I haven't been in ages, because the pipes burst and

our kitchen flooded and had to be ripped out, too depressing to see.

But it's almost back together now.

The waterfall is frozen, which always amazes me,

the water rushes so fast I wonder how it stops in space and time,

what is that instant when water becomes ice?

Saturday we drove to Table on Ten for breakfast.

Conde Nast Traveler wrote about them in this article on food in the Catskills, 

which made me suspicious, but the article does a pretty good job of describing

the western Catskills, our neck of the woods.

And there were eggs with brilliant orange yolks

and fresh sourdough bread, and delicious treacle cookies.

Treacle! 

Saturday night we had dinner with friends,

and Sunday I made the rounds in Margaretville, where I had my store,

saying hello to friends and buying a few books at the Bibliobarn.

And then home Sunday night, to cats, books, and a pink quilt

that I am disproportionately fond of.

Remember the greenhouses in my last post?

I brought home some begonias. Touches of pink

brighten up the bleak late winter.

Thanksgiving in the Catskills

I felt like I was living in a Robert Frost poem.

Stopping By the Woods on a Snowy Evening was on repeat.

Dinner was at our friends George and Gerry's house.

( and their three Boston Terriers--see Louie, above)

It was an especially nice group of friends and family.

Everybody contributed to the meal.

 There was just the right amount of snow--

enough to be pretty,

but not a bother.

I often find holidays stressful, and have struggled to simplify,

to focus on what matters, enjoy the little things.

Tonight talking to my son about Christmas I said,

Just give me a tree with lights and some hot chocolate and I'm happy.

fresh, local, seasonal

My last visit to the country I spent a considerable time watching ice form.  The creek water is shallow; it tumbles over jumbles of rocks creating small waterfalls, estuaries and coves. The temperature drops, molecules rearrange, and moving water, ice crystals and icicles mingle.

I was sad to read about the disappearance of glaciers at Glacier National Park. It's overwhelming, all of it.

And I keep thinking about this piece by John Lanchester, A Foodie Repents, in the New Yorker discussing, among other things, his Irish mother's spaghetti bolognese, and how she, who was at one time a nun, learned to cook. Also working as a restaurant critic, food trends, and  the politics of food--how the choices we make about food matter at every level. To a point. The point at which we can't feed the world with our seasonal, local free-range choices. 

He writes, "If shopping and cooking really are the most consequential, most political acts in my life, perhaps what that means is that our sense of the political has shrunk too far—shrunk so much that it fits into our recycled-hemp shopping bags. If these tiny acts of consumer choice are the most meaningful actions in our lives, perhaps we aren’t thinking and acting on a sufficiently big scale. Imagine that you die and go to Heaven and stand in front of a jury made up of Thomas Jefferson, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Martin Luther King, Jr. Your task would be to compose yourself, look them in the eye, and say, “I was all about fresh, local, and seasonal.”

So now I'll tell you about the meal that my three boys and lovely daughter-in law cooked. They bought my husband a smoker for his birthday and came to the country to present it to him and cook up a storm. Our new kitchen was put to the test. They made pulled pork (from a Catskills pig), kimchi, pickled scallions, kale (cooked with gobs of Hudson Valley garlic), biscuits, mashed potatoes, and ice cream. A dozen eggs from our friend George's chickens were used. A meal made with love. And as much local food as we could find.

Autumn in (upstate) New York

A misty morning drive to Bovina for an egg sandwich takes me through this gentle upstate landscape. Rolling hills dotted with farmhouses, barns and the occasional Airstream, milk truck rolling down a country road…My crush on pink peonies and orange roses has given way to a deep love of russet, apple, pumpkin, the smell of woodsmoke, the sound of acorns dropping.

It's becoming an annual ritual for me to post this poem by Rilke. (2013, 2012)
The poem that gave me orchards in space.

                             Autumn

     The leaves are falling, falling as if from far up,

     as if orchards were dying high in space.

     Each leaf falls as if it were motioning "no".

     And tonight the heavy earth is falling,

     away from all the other stars in the loneliness.

     We're all falling. This hand here is falling.

     And look at the other one ... It's in them all.

     And yet there is Someone, whose hands

     infinitely calm, hold up all this falling.

                               -Rainier Marie Rilke (translated by Robert Bly)

The best thing about blogging is the friends I've made, and I'm not going to call you virtual friends either. I love that New Zealand Amanda's posts about spring coincide with mine about fall, and that when I am shoveling snow she will be sharing her peonies. It truly is a world wide web, both infinitely large and comfortably small.

xo, Jen