Land

Today we tilled new rows in a hillside to become a 1/3 acre raspberry bed. It was an oddly lovely feeling to be participating with the land this way. Not just planting and growing in already established areas, but rather watching the growing space expand down the hill. At first it was strange to be tilling up open space, but as we moved down the hill with each new row, it felt right to be using this farm land for food production. It felt like the right thing to do.



In the morning before we tilled the new beds, we went to a neighbors farm to help plant trees in his stream restoration project.

An honored mentor of ours once told us that one of the great challenges of our generation will be to rekindle the difference between land and property. As I approach my 25th birthday, I feel swept up in the tide of my peers looking to buy houses. As Joe and I consider when in the not so many years we might have a child we dream of a yard that we can dig up and grow things in. But as I live on a piece of land that supports 5+ households and is the stomping ground of 4+ lovely young children (and 10+ lovely less-young folks) I feel even more compelled to find a way to nestle ourselves into this community for more time. To be part of this land. To raise a child as part of this land.

Being on this land reminds me that our sense of place is not about ownership. It's about how we relate to the space around and beneath us. Whether it's prepping space for growing, or planting trees to protect salmon habitat.