It always happens when we take visitors to the H.A.Wood. My rose-colored glasses slip off and I see what is real: our raggedy little orchard with “trees” hardly deserving, yet, of the name. Slash piles from the downed oak. Invasive knee-high Astoria bent-grass thriving everywhere not crushed with the power company’s truck tires. Mud. Broken oaks, only just leafing out now, and so it was on Sunday when I took Margie and Angie to see our farm.

Margie is Allison’s mom, and the woman with whom I happily share some grandkids. Angie is Allison’s sister, newly moved to Portland. Margie was helping Angie settle in to her new digs, and they were happy to take the day off for an excursion to Corvallis.

It was a beautiful spring day, and any landscape would be pretty gorgeous in the Oregon White Oak Savanna on such a morning. To prove it, here are the flowers down along the creek (be sure to click on the photo):

But before we could walk to the creek, I thought I’d have to turn off the electricity to the fence. Unfortunately, the rancher was using an unfamiliar system this time, and I was unable to turn the bolt securing the wires to the battery. I walked back to the top, where Margie and Angie were admiring the copse. Margie casually holding onto the “hot” wire. Not getting shocked! What? I cautiously tapped at the wire, knowing that it was still connected, and nope, no shock. We were astonished, and then even the more cautious Angie reached to touch the wire. She got zapped. Huh? What was going on? We determined that it must have something to do with rubber-soled shoes, but I later began to think that such a situation would have been a good way to diagnose witches, back in the day. Margie and I? Guilty.

So we proceeded, using a shoe to hold down the lower wire, a stick to elevate the upper, and we all successfully crawled through the fences engineered to keep the cows here, but not there. Mark, Cow Guy, had been there to fence the animals out of the copse, so now the wild flowers will be able to grow and set seed.

I saw the mass of animals in the lower field begin to lumber up toward us, a little threatening to City Slickers, so we escaped into the copse and up to the homestead. On the way back to our car, we heard gun shot. All of us unfamiliar with the sound of ordinance, we guessed we were hearing a rifle. Then a huge boom. Like a cannon? Shooting at elk? Hmm. Enough excitement for the day, and we went to Flat Tail in Corvallis for lunch.

But here’s the fun thing: Margie has been doing some farming, too, down in Pasadena where she lives. Like us, she lives in an urban condo, with little opportunity for growing vegetables. But Margie, retired development director for the L.A. Master Chorale (a very big deal) feels as I do that having all the free time in the world isn’t enough unless you find something challenging, exciting, useful, to do with it. So she and a friend are engaged in a Pasadena Community Garden project. This organization identified a lot, cleared it, navigated all the city ordinances to provide a source of water. They built (I think) 70 plus raised beds, each 4′ x 20′ (again, that’s a guess), wrote a lot of governance rules and accepted applications. Margie and Howard secured a plot and are busy raising, well, what? She says that’s the question everyone asks. Better said, what aren’t they growing? Tomatoes, for sure. Carrots from seed (they didn’t succeed, btw) an artichoke, don’t know what all.

We talked about the latest water difficulties in her California. Margie is passionate about working toward a sustainable, organic, food policy nationally and puts her feet on the ground to support her beliefs.

So it was a good day. I have my rosy glasses back in place and am looking forward to Wednesday, when Larry and spend another day at work on the slash piles. I’ve heard from Paul, who will do the orchard mowing, that he hopes to do the job this week. I will feel much better when we can begin to civilize the lumpy, weedy little site. Even the lilac will look better, although I have to hope it’s emergence from the surrounding grass won’t attract the hungry deer.