soundtracks of our love in the hollows

He prefers the silence. I prefer music in the home. We take turns with these soundtracks of our lives in the hollows., but we always begin with the quiet of the forest.

We enter our homestead through a heavy-duty green gate placed as an ominous protection for the former cannabis farm operations that took place in sections of the 260 acres beyond. We’re taking down the hoop houses and creating gardens for artichokes, plant allies, and food. We are learning from the sun, soil, and life that lives here year-round.

It takes a four-wheel drive and confidence to maneuver the two miles and 400-foot drop in elevation to the trim house built by two generations of pot farmers, and now turned into a sweet cottage for me and my beloved. After passing the site of an 1850s homestead with shards of ceramic cups and plates, an iron sink, and their fruit trees as evidence, we travel through a high grass meadow with blackberries and raspberries growing alongside the road. I am in love with the view of 18,000 acres of protected forest of green conical and rounded tops. Really, truly in love with this home for Redwood, Madrone, Oaks, Firs, Manzanita, Horsetail, and so many varieties of mushrooms I have yet to discover.

The road dips and curves as it spirals downward like the Matterhorn ride at Disneyland with sudden turns around blind corners. We don’t see the abdominal snowman or sasquatch but there are sheer drop offs 100 feet long. Redwood fairy circles covered in shamrock green shaggy moss could stop your fall, or the fiery orange glossy Madrone trunks, Douglas Fir, Tan Oak or even more orchards of fig, apple, pear and olive trees. We’ve seen quail, deer, turkey, bear, mountain lion use the road and other trails in the tall grass and mud. The road takes a final dip then a quick ascent up a hill canopied by an olive tree and a series of madrone trees and we arrive at the now transformed and magickal cottage.

Solar-powered Edison bulb lanterns alight our path while we unpack clothes, food and the latest supplies to make our off-grid life a little easier, more comfortable: a home we are creating together. I brought all our fridge magnets, more face towels, and butter. I always bring butter. We brought our battery one-hundred percent charged because the late fall sun’s daily arc is so low on the horizon that it only occasionally peaks through the densely packed trees or over the top of the old lumber road. During the day we can place the solar panel to catch the merest of light, and when that fades, we are challenged to conserve and spend no more than 10 watts a day, including power tools and daily usage. I’m writing by candles and filtered sunlight while listening to music from my phone, which I’ll charge in the truck when we go into town for a post hole remover and to mail a Box of Magick giveaway to contest winner.

Upon each arrival, Joey turns on the access to well water, which is pumped at the top of the property and sent to us through a series of pipes and storage containers. Next, he turnson  the propane for the fridge and the stove, then he gets on the floor to light the fridge’s pilot light. I monitor the temperature of the house that we haven’t visited in 4-10 weeks by either opening windows or lighting the propane stove and candles, then unpack the groceries and stock everything we brought.

We are here in late November waiting for the arrival of the tractor so Joey can fix the road by widening the dangerous spots, securing hillsides that could erode, repurposing trees that have fallen or will fall with the next heavy rain in our garden, digging out French drains, placing culverts, creating garden terraces and walkways, and a myriad of other Tonka truck abilities. We have worked harder on the property than any visit in a very long time.

We completely dismantled one hoop house. We recycled plastic pipes and irrigation, bagged trash and dumped enough perlite soil to create one hundred square feet of garden for rows of corn, artichokes, chamomile, calendula, nettles – mass production space. Another hoop house is still intact alongside but we are dumping the bags and clearing the debris to create two sitting areas and a greenhouse to catch the sun as it moves.

Joey and I have stayed snuggled in the hollows for three days – working our bodies to their limits, clearing the slate so we can create a comfortable off grid, fully sustained life. I don’t know if this land will be our forever home, or simply a canvas that we work with in harmony to have food, medicine, and water for a time. We are learning from nature how to live with the seasons.  We balance the survival skills with comfort, like a soaking tub, surrounded by sweet smelling flowers and a view of a beloved forest with the full moon alighting the top of a tree.

Wintering

Compassion is needed most in winter - especially if your are snowed in for days on end. A record snow year has made travel dicey and the workload for CalTrans “plow jockeys” heavy. We Eastern Sierra locals joke that all this shoveling has been a free gym workout, but I’m pretty tired of carving tunnels through snow to get to the wood shed for kindling.

I long for the green hills of our homestead and the smell of the redwood forest and blossoms on the new peach trees. It’s still amazing to me that we have 44 acres to protect and live peacefully with all of life that exists here. I just can’t say the words that we own the land, even though that is the American legal term. We work with this land and relish in the latest adventures of Homesteading the Hollows.

Joey visited our place over President’s weekend while I attended a writer’s conference in San Diego. The heavy rains created a multitude of obstacles from landslides to a 40ft Douglas fir tree that fell across the road. He called upon our neighbor Mike who brought his brother to clear the roads. I love that we have found another community where neighbors help neighbors. It really makes me wonder how we think we can thrive without each other. The wisest among us know that we are meant to lean in towards each other and lean on each other to share the load.

Joey bought and planted two peach trees and two nectarine trees in the existing orchard among a smattering of century-old pear, apple, olive, and fig trees. I am so excited to visit my new trees and be there for the harvest of the trees that have been growing on this land since the 1800s. On another adventure of mushroom hunting, Joey found edible black trumpet mushrooms and the water bottle I had abandoned along the trail we traveled through the redwood forest three months ago.

The pictures of the herb garden and spiral to the firepit almost break my heart with longing for my herbal allies. The garlic in the raised beds that Joey and Kobe made are sprouting. The poppies lining the spiral walk are coming up. Maybe when I next drive down into the Hollows, the poppies will be a field of brightest orange over the leach lines, aka our sewer system.

I miss the hollows because being off grid reinforces my connection and awareness to the web of life. We have a battery storage that shows us how much energy we use. The toaster takes an amazing amount of power - a lot more than charging the phone. If the clouds cover is heavy and the sun can’t power our solar panels, then we conserve our energy and light the candles instead of turning on the string of overhead lights. I like being conscious of and responsible with the energy I take for my daily life.

Buffered by the suburban life in pleasant southern California climate for most of my life, I never knew of my true footprint on the environment or nature’s potential impact upon me. That disconnect never sat well with me. Unfortunately, I have harshly judged the arrogance in thinking we can beat or make nature submissive; obedient to human progress.

I live my life by the adage from the Course in Miracles: “The holiest of all the spots on earth is where an ancient hatred has become a present love.” I crave going to the Hollows because it grounds me, injects compassion for “not knowing” and teaches me how to drop into a deeper, ever evolving connection to all of life. Meanwhile, my SoulCollage cards told me I could calm my heart by chanting “Namo Guan Shi Yin Pusa” meaning “Everyone is born with a pure heart.” I am learning how to be patient with others who are not striving to be sustainable or are blatantly toxic to Mother Earth. I am still learning. We all are.

Tabla Rasa Casita: Our House

"Life used to be so hard but everything is easy cuz of you." That was the line from the Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young Our House song that had me running out the front door to hug my Joey as he made me a huge garden bed of redwood, madrone and oak tree trunks and branches. I made him dance with me as the song played out. "I'll light the fire. You place the flowers in the vase That you bought today." Except I was getting two raised garden beds equivalent of sixty by ten feet, a side garden and spiral for wildflowers. (The picture on the left is what the yard used to look like).

Only a few songs are downloaded onto my phone and one that repeats often and fits the sweetness that I feel in our homestead. Tabla Rasa means blank slate and that is the suitable name for our little house, the grandness of the untouched acreage around us and the brand new community welcoming us so warmly.

I gave a Ritual Herbalism with Cannabis workshop for Self-Care Saturday, an Plant Shop event organized by my friend Rita where I met and connected with Talia, a fellow massage therapist. After visiting family, Joey and I took the long route home along the coast. We stopped off at Maple Creek Winery and ran into a couple who graduated same year from same school. We also became members - three hours of drinking later. Back at home, we repurposed crates as cabinets. I love the ingenuity and intimacy of these small homemaking acts.

“Staring at the fire
For hours and hours while I listen to you
Play your love songs all night long for me
Only for me

Come to me now (Come to me now)
And rest your head for just five minutes
Everything is done
Such a cozy room (Such a cozy room)
The windows are illuminated
By the evening sunshine through them
Fiery gems for you, only for you”

The blackberries had just begun to ripen. This year the bears will get most of them as we won’t be returning until after Labor Day. I still need to figure out what the periwinkle star flowers are, but when Mori Natura, a symposium sister, came to visit, she identified the pennyroyal growing everywhere. After snacking, she interviewed me for Positive Fantastic podcast and invited me warmly into the “Mendo coven.” Be still my witchy heart.

Joey and I visited our only neighbors, Mike and Liz, who shared an organic bottle of Frey Wine, which is owned by Mori's family - such serendipity, such Magick! Ann, my friend from the Waldorf days and whose house I moved into when I first began divorce proceedings in 2008 came to visit. We caught up on weeks of our lives and then listened in awe to the falling of Madrone leaves. We went to the Willits Farmer’s Market where I bought a Baba Yaga bowl. The next morning, Joey found two hollowed eggs. The Goddess wanted the dried calendula leaves and the joint too. On our last night, Talia and a few other symposium sisters showed up a party we were invited to by Kay, our real estate agent.

Today, my sister Megan sent ladies in our familia the message that we are in the Lion’s Gate Portal. I love that we share these things together. Now is the time for manifesting. Think of the things that you want. Say them aloud three times. Make your dreams come true! You are the Magick!

Making Gardens

I love to plunge my hands into the dirt - especially in summer. Every morning I wake in Willits, I drink a leisurely cup of coffee listening to the forest birds singing. I pour the water and leftover grounds onto the garden and greet each new leaf or flower with deep affection. Each trip to the Hollows brings a new adventure. This time we tried out a new battery storage, hung out with Kobe and created gardens.

On Father’s Day, it was sweet to watch Joey and Kobe tetra a burned-out redwood bark to create a terrace for the small garden that I salute every morning. Joey had cleared away a huge patch of poison oak so that we could grow lavender around the cottage to keep the ticks at bay. We’ll see if it works! So far we are growing rosemary, holly, lavender, calendula, chamomile, and rose geranium. I’ve asked Mama Earth to stay wet in this shaded spot while we are gone and made sure to welcome the multitude of elementals and faeries to this garden!

We removed irrigation and weeded sixty more grow pots. The soil is still in most of the pots because we need to terrace hill for the vegetable patch and herb garden. My menfolk gathered fallen trunks of Douglas fir, Madrone and Oak and made a raised bed. Oh how I ached to put in some plants but since our plan is to visit for a week every month, and this garden is in full sun, I decided to wait. The plan is to make five more boxes here from what the forest provides.

Our new power station is a game changer with two 110V plugs and two chargers. This Yeti by Goal Zero only lost 25% of its charging capacity in five days with three people using it. Loved it. Now we have energy for longer stays.

We froze water in a stock pot at home and transported in a cooler to keep the food cold in the icebox. Unfortunately, the water hadn’t frozen solid so we had to buy ice blocks again. But the road has to be fixed by winter so that’s where we will invest next - culverts and rocks before a propane refrigerator. Sigh. Homesteading requires such patience. I’m certain its good for me.

There is a beautiful spring on the property that I thought I would bless with crystals, statues and prayers. Then Joey put up a trail camera and we discovered that the bear, mountain lion, and deer visit this place daily. This water is already made sacred by Mother Earth’s children.

Kobe and I spent Summer Solstice in Fort Bragg - just 45 minute drive through the redwood forest. We have the best conversations, especially under the trees. We found connection, healing and laughter on the longest day of the year. I delivered signed copies of my books to eclectic shops and independent bookstores in Mendocino and the following day as we visited Ukiah. We hung out in the cannabis lounge at the Plant Shop where I will be teaching my Ritual Herbalism class for their Wellness Day on July 30. On the final night of our stay, Kobe stepped up to sing and play guitar for five original songs he wrote at open mike night at Shanachie Pub in Willits.

Happy Summer!

My Happy Place

“Why did you come to Willits?” asks the bartender at Diggers, a bar named thusly because the owners also own the Willits cemetery.

“I am a forest witch and I want to eat fresh fruit, attend festivals and hang out with my people.”

“You’ve come to the right place,” the bartender smiles and slides me a frothy IPA. I clink beers with my man and then he proceeds to win four pool games in a row, but how we laughed made it all worthwhile.

I am in my happy place when I am snuggled into the Hollows. Life feels closer, more real. Our home is 800 square feet on 44 acres with a coastal breeze and a southeastern view of 20,000 acres of privately own forest. We watched a bear from our kitchen window while drinking coffee one morning. Later in the afternoon, we found the bear den in a burned-out redwood tree. I thought the Fairy Ring of ten or so redwood trees could be my ritual spot, but the place is already holy ground.

In this visit we have tackled an amazing amount of projects:

1.       We removed plastic nets and the dowels, held by eye-hooks from the ceiling that the former owners used to dry Cannabis. This 400sf back room is now our bedroom/living room. Joey put in two windows that look out onto a fern grotto because our first two visits felt like we were sleeping in a gambrel-styled container, except for the bad drywall job that I have covered with tapestries. You could not see your hand in front of your face and had to trust the motion detector light to go on before you ran into the wooden beam in the middle of the room. (I’ve covered the beam with a scarf to soften the blow in case of the accidental collision). Next is a sliding glass door onto a deck. I am so excited about this! 

2.       Our sweet cottage is at the end of a two-mile dirt and gravel timber road that Joey is repairing with the wisdom of 25 years at CalTrans. We have whacked the weeds growing in the middle and sides of the road before they become brush, a dangerous fire hazard to drive over in summer.  He piled the big rocks over the potholes filled with rainwater, then the little rocks on top so the water drains better. I did the same thing to create a step off the front porch. Joey improved the old timber road for nearly quarter of a mile with French drains, ditch lines, and rock bridges. I never knew road maintenance could be so sexy until I watched my man haul the tenth wheel barrel of dirt and rocks, all glistening. 

3.       Over the last three trips, we unplugged the irrigation, removed t-bars, pulled weeds, and turned over the soil from 60 grow pots. This trip, I shoveled dirt from the majority of the pots which we raked into mounds for a garden of wildflowers and formed a spiral path to the center where we will make a stone-built firepit.

4.       We discovered that it takes about a gallon of frozen water per day to keep the icebox cold. Joey is going to create a container that perfectly fits the shelf for ice because one large block holds it temperature longer than one-gallon jugs.

5.       We painted the door turquoise and created a sweet garden right off the porch that I can easily tend and feed the morning’s coffee grounds. Last visit, we planted rosemary, calendula, lavender and chamomile. I was thrilled to see that had all grown in our two-week absence. We added holly, rose geranium and red clover to the garden and they all got a good raining so I am hopeful they will do well. The plan to plant lavender all over the house to keep the ticks away.  I’ll transform the hill I look out upon from kitchen window or porch from grow pots into a vegetable and herb garden. I will forest bathe every day.

I returned to our cottage one afternoon after weed whacking a path in the tall grass to my chair where I get one bar for morning texts. I sat down on the deck and a tick fell onto my writing desk. Joey said we had to kill the tick or it would jump on us and he described the whole bloody mess. He told me how to roll my thumbnail over the bug until I heard a pop. I couldn’t do it at first, but then I thought of a Waldorf mom who had gotten Lyme disease and was afraid to go outside afterwards. So, I rolled my nail over the tick and literally screamed when I heard the loud pop of the bug’s protective shell cracking. Then we laughed.
My happy place is always where love and laughter live.

Living off grid

Living off grid is an invitation to truly understand the impact of our choices. I hesitate to use that word “understand” because there is a definite feeling that this word still carries it’s original use of the late Middle English (around the 15th century) to mean to stand under. In today’s climate of revolutionary individualism, there is little that is more abhorrent and outdated than “power over” suggestions.

However, when you live offgrid without the convenience of power or electricity, understanding my smallness, the impact of my footprint and use of natural resources becomes of utmost importance. I am now intimately aware of how much power I use, rather than waiting 30 days for the bill. I ask myself what is more needed: charging my phone when I don’t even get reception or the string of LED lights that will illuminate the dark house at night. Do I turn on the propane heater or put on a sweater? Do I carry the battery operated tea light to the bathroom in the middle of the night or trust the motion detector light to turn on before tripping in the absolute darkness? Do I start collecting candles? Will four gallons of frozen water jugs in the icebox really keep our food cool for an entire week? What is the most earth-friendly way to reuse the pearlite soil in the grow pots?

We brought a generator to charge up power tools to cut a new window into the 400 square foot trim room so we can get light and air. It was nicer to use the generator to pump air into our camping mattress, but so loud in the silence of these woods. The extra power will run the weedwhacker to cut down the Russian thistle that could be fire fuel this summer. I would prefer to have goats on the property and have begun to ask around with fingers crossed.

We fill the well’s water tank at the top of the property so there is plenty of pressure for the shower in our little cottage (which is nestled in the hollows 400 feet lower than the well). We turn off the water at the house when we go back to the Eastern Sierra, in case of a flood. For the first time in my life, I understand how the septic system works: waste and water drain into a large tank, bugs eat the poop, and the rest drips into underground leech lines (cement pipes perforated with several holes). I have weeded and dumped the soil of thirteen grow pots onto the leech field. There are fifty more pots to go in this section alone. We cannot park on the leech field nor plant food. But we can seed California poppies.

Does it distress you, as it bothers me, when people offer apathetic, arrogant responses, such as “the earth has been on fire and froze in cycles, no different than now.” We are speeding up climate change through our convenient distance - not everyone has this option. It’s not easy to live without the comforts or to keep trying when there are so many people who would rather never know what happens to human waste, water theft, or plastic bags in the ocean. I used to believe that my positivity and example of “doing good” could awaken others. The speed of consciousness is slower than I hoped and curtailed by the powers that be and corporate-sponsored media that changed the connotation of “awakened” to mean something completely the opposite of what we light workers were aiming for when we first embraced personal transformation attuned with nature. And yet, I will never stop trying to awaken my deepest spiritual self within this human existence to live in more equality with all of life each day.

Words are alive and have power to create.

Our choices do matter.

Be stronger than your excuses.

Homesteading the Hollows

It all starts with an idea… living off grid, happy and self-sufficient with my beloved.

My honey Joey and I starting looking for a community to invest in this January. We brought out the map of California. I still believe whole-heartedly in maps. As I drew my finger over highways that meandered the forests of Northern California, I asked the Universe for a town with an independent bookstore, brewery and coffeehouse. I imagined an old main street that would be close by where I could find a farmers’ markets, small movie theaters, festivals and pancake breakfasts. But I always saw myself tucked away, deep in the woods - yes, a Witch in the Woods with my man was my plan.

We had an agent’s number but didn’t know where to tell him to start looking, so we scoped out a swath of communities via Zillow from Potter’s Valley in Lake County to Boonville, home of Anderson Brewery and a place that had my vote, to a sweet craftsman house in downtown Willits but next door to a school and church. We drove through other neighborhoods and I felt boxed in. I worried that living in rural Eastern Sierra town of Crowley Lake, California (pop 980), had ruined me for such proximity of so many people.

Then, on what I thought was a whim, we drove to a 44-acre property on the Highway 20, just six miles from Willits and 25 miles to the coastal towns of Mendocino (wine) and Fort Bragg (sailors) along a rode that wove between towering redwood trees. It had been an old pot farm with four leveled out places where three brothers had grown cannabis in four huge hoop houses, plus another 200 plants in grow pots with irrigation in front of an 800 square-foot trim house. We had the well tested and the water came out clean. We went back and forth, but with Joey just over a year away from retiring, he needs a new hobby and I need more hippies. Plus every time we thought of this property, a smile of happiness reached across both of our faces. We can do this, we told ourselves. We can reach for our happiness. He will plant artichokes and arugula and sell his produce at a farmer’s market (behind the old Rex-All in Willits every Thursday.) I can write and be near so many of my Northern California Herbal Symposium gals and other friends I’ve known for years. And we can visit the coast.

So, we scrambled together a cash deal and on April 27, 2022, Joey and I (with a little help from sister Cindy) became the new owners of this amazing 44 acre off-grid property with about twenty-five century-old fruit trees of fig, pear, apple and olive. I’ve found red clover, poppies, nettles, plantain, and so much more. There are bay trees - good medicine for the poison oak that follows the waters next to berry patches. Young redwood trees that surround the cut down old growth trees that were harvested after the 1906 San Francisco fire. Sprawling oak trees look like pretty awesome places for tree forts. We are southeast facing a 18,000 privately owned timber forest that will not be cut because the trees have not yet come of age.

The land spirits and Fae folk are powerful here. A sweet fawn came by to say hello on first day, a very large bear has made several appearances leaving huge scat and paw prints behind. The wild Turkey that flew over my head was a symbol of my abundance. Although Joey says that’s dinner - but last week 444 copies sold of The Book of Spells and that’s a very Witchy number and really made me feel like the universe has got my back. In fact, all three businesses that I hoped to find in my new hometown are on the same city block - in the old school part of Willits-gateway to the redwoods in Mendocino County. The Book Juggler bought two copies of The Book of Spells (I carry them around) and put the book on the front page of their website. We went to Northspur Brewing Co. twice but the second time met up with Joey’s CalTrans’ buddies (who don’t known it yet but will help us get gravel and pipes to fix the roads on the property) and Brickhouse Coffee features local artwork that blows my mind and their breakfast sandwiches are calling my name for a long morning write.

As per request from my dear friend Helena Pasquarella I am starting this new blog about the adventures of learning how to be a homesteader making medicine, jams, magick, festivals and a home. We have spent two days on the property, cleaning the outside (only six bags of trash off to our new dump), and scrubbing and blessing inside our new little cottage. We’re making lists of what we need or want.. a cell phone booster, fruit tree expert, off grid solar system, fridge, cob benches on the best views, poppyseeds, solar pathway lights, new shower curtain, more seeds and trees. We need to fix the road, figure our most efficient energy system and what we’re going to plant in these hoop houses. For now there’s a sweet cottage for us to doll up. Eventually we’ll build a cob house and a bath house with a garden just for herbs to soak in.

The reason this blog is called Homesteading the Hollows is because the cottage where we are making a home is at the bottom of the property, two miles from the highway and 400 feet in elevation down into the woods. This land is filled with meadows and forests, but for now our heart and home will be in the hollows. Our next trip back to Willits will be after Mother’s Day, when we’re bringing in furniture and home décor - I am so excited!