Moonlight in the woods
by Anton Zuiker on January 8, 2020
Back from a meeting of the science writers book club (we discussed Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants, by Robin Wall Kimmerer) I checked in on my daughters, and found Oliver and Erin already asleep. I went around the house shutting off lights and locking doors, and stepped outside to unplug the string of lights that hang in the carport. It’s not too cold tonight, clear, and the moon will be full soon. It’s bright outside, and so I pulled on my boots and took a walk.
I walk our land as often as I can, in the early mornings or during the day or as dusk settles, always looking for turtles or antlers or snakes or ferns. I love the woods beyond our house. Tonight, and a few nights last month, I walked out in the moonlight halfway down the slope, and stood still for a few minutes, just enjoying a new way to sense the land around me, and marveling at the moon shadows dappling the soft carpet of fallen leaves.
Happy hens
by Anton Zuiker on January 4, 2020
Fresh wood chips for the chicken yard.
My plans for an early Saturday run were canceled by the rain falling at 6 a.m., so I rolled over and fell asleep, and woke again at 8. In the kitchen, as I drank a glass of orange juice, I could hear the hens squawking in their yard. I put on my green rain coat, I pulled on my work boots, and I walked outside to check on the chickens. It was clear they wanted out of their pen. On weekends, when we’re outside working, we open the door and let them out to scratch under the trees. But the pen was a muddy mess, and I didn’t want to be out in the rain, so I promised them I’d be back.
I got into the truck, drove to J.V. Brockwell Trucking in Calvander, and paid $15 for a yard of wood chips. By the time I got home, the rain was mostly mist, and the chickens still clucking loudly, impatiently. I opened the door to let them out, and they went silent as they stepped beyond the pen. I collected five eggs inside the coop, and then used the wheel barrow to transfer the chips to the chicken yard. Within an hour, the sun was out, and the hens had come back inside their pen to explore their clean, tidy yard.
Garden report
by Anton Zuiker on November 14, 2019
An arctic blast reached into North Carolina this week, but the chickens up on their roost inside the coop survived the freezing nights. Right now the temperature is hovering above 32, and there’s a cold rain falling. The growing season is finished.
I wanted to spend more time in the garden this summer. Even so, Erin and I were able to keep it watered, and it had plenty of sun, so the tomatoes did well, and I gathered enough cayenne and habanero chiles to make a couple of batches of hot sauce. The roselle grew tall and I made syrup, which the family enjoyed mixed with soda water. The herbs spread out in their box, and I’ll have thyme and parsley and sage to put into next week’s stuffing. The watermelon vine snaked around and flowered all summer but gave no fruit. A bean grew up the wire wall.
Soon I’ll start to plan for the spring, sketching out the boxes to arrange the plants differently and ordering seeds from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.
Chai and my matai mortar
by Anton Zuiker on November 11, 2019
Mortar and pestle from New Zealand
I stopped drinking coffee in early August, and started drinking tea again, though some days I get to early afternoon and realize I have had no caffeine, and what I really need is a cup of cold water.
At home at night I’m back to making masala chai, following the recipe I read long ago in Saveur Magazine. To smash the cinnamon and cloves and cardamom and peppercorn, I use the mortar and pestle, made of matai wood, that I bought in New Zealand when Erin and I vacationed there in 1999. (That was during our Peace Corps service in the Republic of Vanuatu.)
I miss drinking good coffee. I stopped drinking it to save money and to change up my daily routine—not visiting Gray Squirrel every morning gets me to work earlier, and home earlier, and into my running shoes earlier—but I imagine I’ll come to a day when I realize the trusty mortar and pestle will still be here if I give chai a rest.
The slope out back
by Anton Zuiker on November 9, 2019
Today began as a crisp, clear Saturday morning, the first of the fall to start below freezing. Last night I’d shut the door to the chicken coop to trap what heat the hens on their roost might make. Now I stepped into the day and let the hens out into their yard. The early sun was sideways through the trees, and I stood looking across the property, seeing more clearly than ever the way our land slopes to the northeast. I went walking that way, down among the white oaks and yellow poplars and red maples and pignut hickories that have dropped most of their leaves. Liro, our cat, followed, and one squirrel saw him coming and scampered away. A silent morning, and cold, so I returned to the house and the warm bed inside.