Some days are a lot better than others. I had the opportunity to visit one of my long-time readers yesterday. I met with gardengirl (aka Michelle) at her home near UMass. It was a quite amazing to see just how much diversity in food production one can achieve in a fairly small, urban lot. Chickens (lots of chickens) and rabbits (lots of rabbits) goats and gardens; it was really inspiring. I drank home-dried peppermint tea while warming my buns by the heat of her Glenwood stove and enjoyed GG’s general business and enthusiasm. She’s smart and beautiful and just fun to be with.

This would have been good enough but there was much more to come. Sharon Astyk came by to drop of some buck goats. Fences were moved, dogs were corralled, children were tied up (not by us but by each other) and pizza was consumed while non-stop talk about gardens and goats, rabbits and religion kept us all entertained. Sharon is also beautiful and generous, brilliant and kind. With women like this to inspire and educate, we all have a much better chance at creating the world we need to live in.

I feel like an infomercial. But wait! There’s more! After lunch we hopped on over to a sustainable agriculture class at Umass and spent two hours talking about our lives and visions and listening to the questions and concerns of these young adults. I sometimes worry about our young people. So many seem so disconnected from the world outside of tech land and celebrity world. They too often appear to be consumed with consuming and live to be entertained. Not so in this group. They were bright and articulate and ready to walk the walk.

For a change, I rode home without the chatter from NPR or Willie Nelson’s Greatest Hits keeping me company. I spent the time making plans and dreaming dreams. Rabbits and hutches are high on my list of “gotta gets”. Goats-not so much.

Because one should always have dessert, I returned home to two beautiful seed catalogs, the first of the season. The forecast was gloomy but the fire was warm, the days lessons still fresh. I didn’t do any prepping today. I accomplished nothing and everything. On the list of must-have items, friends are number 1.

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