Dottie watches the May pole dance from atop Casey’s shoulders.
When was the last time that you sang and danced with other people to celebrate some part of our shared human experience? Perhaps you are like many Americans (I have observed anyway) and cringe at the very thought of public singing and dancing! Or, perhaps you are like me and can say: Oh yes! I have celebrated in that way very recently!
Last week, the kids and I got to dance and sing with friends multiple times. Our homeschooling group hosted a folk dance teacher at the library for a very fun afternoon of dances from around the world. They were mostly very simple so that even the youngest kids could participate on some level, but there was great joy to be had even in those simple dances done together with friends. Even just holding hands in a circle can feel so magical.
The resulting woven pattern on the pole!
Then, on Friday, we hosted a little gathering of friends here on the farm for an early May Day celebration, including a May pole! Actually, we had two May poles: one for the little kids who really just wanted the joy of waving a ribbon around in the air without any direction about how to dance, in what direction, or whatnot. Then, we had a larger pole for the bigger kids and adults, who very carefully learned the simple weaving dance and then danced those ribbons into a beautiful pink and green pattern. I loved watching the delight on the faces of everyone as they danced cooperatively in the evening light (graced by a rainbow, no less!). How often do we Americans get to experience our relationships in quite that way?
To me, it feels that our natural opportunities for such exuberance are limited in American culture today. Even within some places of worship (which are the last bastion of regular singing in America), truly communal singing has been replaced more-or-less with spectator appreciation of a musical show on a stage. Certainly there are still communities of singing and dancing — people can sing in choirs or join square dancing groups even here in McMinnville. But these feel like sub-cultures that people must actively seek out. And, on some level, the participants generally have to start with a sense of confidence about their singing or dancing. How often do we hear people protest that they just cannot sing or dance?
Ah. Of course, we cannot do what we don’t do. No doubt!
But within the context of human history (and prehistory), our culture is an anomaly. If we travel outside our narrow band of time and space, we find that humans interact with each other and with their places through song and/or dance — to worship, to celebrate, to mourn, to pray, to connect. I think that the magic of song and dance is that they can bring a larger group of people together into a single purpose. Certainly, there is no way for 16 people to have a truly meaningful conversation that involves everyone. But, when those 16 people, ages 8-40+ join around a May pole, they can each hold a ribbon and interact with each other in a way that builds bonds and has fun and is quite egalitarian! Connection happens in a way that is different than our normal day-to-day verbal communications. Some people might say it transcends simple human conversation. I’m not sure I’d put that value label on it, because we still need other forms of connection too! I just think that as a whole our society has lost sight of the community building that comes from these kinds of activities. Watching a beautiful performance can be transformative in its own right, but I think we also need to be part of groups that make music, sing or dance too at times. I think it’s an important part of being human and connecting with each other.
The human body is an instrument. We weren’t born an instrument in order to just perform for each other; we are born with this beauty inside our bodies so that we can connect with each other.
Why write about singing and dancing in a farm blog? Because, for me, it is all related. We started this farm ten years ago this spring primarily because we wanted to connect. We wanted to connect our bodies and spirits to the land, to work, to our food, and to people. Those drives are still here, inspiring everything we do. And as the years have gone by, I’ve worked intentionally to keep pushing on those values, seeing how much more fully we can embrace and live those ideals. And, for me, these turnings of the seasons have always called for celebration. For observance. For marking. It’s part of why I write this blog, to document the daily ordinary and extraordinary that happens here on the farm as we walk through each season again and again.
But all along, I’ve also wanted to sing and dance those stories too. That wasn’t part of my upbringing — our family didn’t go to church or sing as a part of our family culture, although I sang at camp and at my private Catholic school. Living at Holden Village was an early inspiration to Casey and me as well, since it is a community that celebrates daily worship every evening and incorporates song into many other parts of life as well (all of it in the context of an amazingly beautiful and profound mountain setting!). But how does one make such things happen in places where they are not? (Which is most places these days.) That was a question in the under-current of my mind. It was a longing buried well below many more urgent questions, such as How Do We Start A Farm Anyway? But before we left Bellingham a decade ago, I ran across a little book about celebrating festivals with family, and I bought it, not really even having a clue how to implement such ideas in my own life.
It has taken me more than ten years to begin to answer this question. Ten years of growth in so many areas of our life here on the farm. But I had had enough experiences to want to keep seeking more of them. Experiences with vulnerability and beauty in community — people reading poetry by firelight, contra dancing after a wedding, singing Christmas carols with friends. But, I’ll tell you what — it probably won’t surprise you at all to learn that sometimes getting folks to sing or dance can be really really really hard. Again, so many of us are completely out of touch with our bodies as instruments of beauty and connection. We have come to see these activities solely as performances, best left to the professional and gifted!
I have realized in the last ten years that in order to get my friends to sing and dance with me, I had to grow a lot in my own confidence in my body as an instrument of connection. Certainly, some of that was just getting to be a more competent singer (thank you McMinnville Women’s Choir and its director Betty Busch for helping with my humble growth in this area!). But, just as much, I have had to watch carefully as other people create safe places for activities and lead others into those connections. Again, at choir, but also at places of worship and other community events (including the homeschooling folk dances!). (Teachers also do this important work every day as they ask groups of students to grow in their understanding of concepts through discussion — another vulnerable type of sharing activity!) What simple activities can lead us beyond our initial nervous “cringing” into the beauty of connection! For me, the May day gathering was the culmination of ten years of growth into a role where I can make a vibrant community vision come alive.
We need more people to have that vision and more people to grow in that role. Many more. I’m not sure what kind of impetus it would take to lead a large scale revival of group singing and dancing in America. Even just half a century ago, people still sang and still danced. And now … not so much. (Especially not on the secular west coast. I think pockets of musical culture still exist throughout the country.)
I’m not the first nor the last voice to rally for a revival of regular group singing and dancing in America. At the end of the 20th century, folk musician Pete Seeger joined up with music educators to put together two books titled, Get America Singing … Again! As music programs get cut from school budgets and more and more parents raise their kids without singing in the house, how do we revive what is a core of our human experience? Where does one begin?
Of course, as 21st century Westerners, there are so many ways in which our daily lives deviate from all those who came before. We also are some of the first generations to have a profound disconnect from the source of our food, from the daily work that is needed to sustain our bodies. I’m sure one could argue that it is all connected — we are out of touch with the earth which nourishes our bodies which are the instruments of beauty and connection.
I feel grateful every day that Casey and I are not disconnected from the earth or our food. In today’s era, the work we do seems somewhat unique (although less so than when we started the farm), and yet harvesting food is the work of humanity. We are doing the work that our ancestors did centuries into the past. In this sense, producing food is not something to do because it is our unique calling or fulfills our identity or whatnot — it is what we do to be human. Certainly there has been some liberation to follow other pursuits for people as we’ve needed fewer humans to be involved in the production of food. But for millennia, daily human life focused on food — and then responded to and supported that work through art, music, crafts, spirituality, and ritual. Whether we want to be farmers or not, I think those ancient experiences are still inside us — in our DNA or our spirits or some other part of the human that we don’t even have words to describe.
I think that in many ways, my strong inner desire to sing and dance is a response to these experiences on the farm. They are natural responses to living closer and closer to those shared, ancient experiences of being human. To see spring awaking and want to gather with friends to celebrate every beautiful thing about this new season! To use the physical metaphors of song and dance to live in those rhythms in an intentional way. To respond with active gratitude to the daily gifts of beauty and sustenance that surround us on the farm.
Again, I don’t know what kind of sea change could lead a whole society back to a culture of singing and dancing — this is a bigger question of how we do or don’t physically connect in a digital age! But I know that I can do my part here in my family and community, to join with others who are like-minded or who are willing to stretch themselves and grow. Who knows what is possible if we each follow our inner longings to connect in positive ways? (And of course, I’ve only addressed one level of connection that has been neglected in our society, but there are many others too!)
And, today I have two opportunities for you to connect with your community. First, come join the McMinnville Women’s Choir for our spring concert this Saturday, 7 pm, at First Baptist Church. Tickets are $5 at Oregon Stationers or $8 at the door. And, yes, this may technically be a “performance” of sorts, but our choir sings primarily for the sake of singing together each week (it’s in the mission statement!). I think that this community joy comes through in our concerts and wraps up the audience in that glowing love too. Plus, you may be inspired to join us!
Second, come connect with the earth by planting potatoes here on the farm! I put more info below. After planting, we can connect some more by sharing a delicious potluck meal (a wonderful way to connect that it seems we are very good at here in Yamhill County).
And, for now, enjoy this week’s vegetables!
Your farmers, Katie & Casey Kulla
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Potato planting party on Monday, May 16! Come join us on the farm between 4-6 pm to plant potatoes. This is fun, easy work that most people can do (the work is easy, but please be aware that the ground in our fields is uneven). Kids are welcome to come help (with parents, of course!). After we’re done, join us at our house for a potluck supper! Bring a dish of food to share and a plate and utensils for yourself to eat on. We won’t make you sing and dance … not much, anyway. (Ok, just kidding — no singing and dancing this time.)
Directions to the farm from McMinnville: Take HWY-18 to Dayton. Drive straight south through Dayton and stay on Wallace Rd / HWY-221 for about seven miles. Turn RIGHT onto Grand Island Rd. After the bridge, turn RIGHT onto SE Upper Island Rd. Our driveway is the first one on your LEFT. We share the driveway with our neighbors, so please park on the RIGHT side of the driveway.
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Next payments due by May 19! I emailed statements to our CSA members this week to remind everyone that the next payment is due by May 19. You can bring a check or cash to us at pick-up, or mail us a check to: Oakhill Organics, P.O. Box 1698, McMinnville OR 97128. If you have any questions about your balance due or your account, please ask me! I can answers questions at pick-up, or you can email: farm (at) oakhillorganics (dot) com.
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Meet this week’s vegetables: (Wondering about carrots? We’re all done with the winter storage carrots and now waiting for the first of the spring-sown carrots. But, here’s an interesting piece of info — we had 40 continuous weeks of carrots before we ran out!)
- Apples
- Sugar snap peas — I feel silly even giving suggestions on how to eat peas, because — um — they’re so good to just eat out of hand! BUT! We have lots of them this week, so here is another of our favorite ways to eat them: roast them! Spread them in a pan without any overlapping with some butter and roast at a higher temperature (425° works for our oven). Stir a few times, and roast until they are beginning to brown and getting crispy.
- Broccoli — Broccoli is another favorite of ours for roasting.
- Fennel bulbs
- Zucchini
- Kale
- Chard
- Winter squash
- Potatoes
- Green garlic — Still wondering how to make best use green garlic? Think it as a giant garlic-flavored green onion or leek and use it the same way. Chop the stalk all the way up to the leaves (then peel the leaves and chop more stalk!) and add to the pan with butter to sauté before adding your cooking greens. Or, for a real treat, lay whole stalks of green garlic on a pan when you roast broccoli or peas. The green garlic will roast up to be soft inside and crispy outside, and you can eat the whole thing!
And this week’s extra goodies from the farm:
- Eggs — $6/dozen
- Bratwurst! — Artisan-made without any added nitrates or sugars. $12/package (one lb packages).
- Pork — We have a few remaining roasts and shanks for $8/lb. We just sent more hogs to the butcher on Monday! And more beef and goats will be heading that way in June.
