Thirst

Last Monday, it rained.  

As I stepped out onto the front porch to feed the kittens, I looked down toward the homestead.  The wind picked up and the sky began to darken, almost as if my gaze awoke the elements.  The field corn directly across from our house began to bow beneath the rush of air and I saw rain on the mountain.  It was coming.  Despite my desire to stand in the downpour and open my mouth wide Shawshank Redemption-style, I went inside and waited eagerly like a child on Christmas morning.  The rain didn't last long, but it was just enough to save us from irrigating for a day or two.  You know you live on a farm when a desperately-needed half inch of rain makes you reconsider religion.

August is here and it feels like we are working the summer away.  It's good to keep busy, but some days it feels like that's all we've been doing.  Lately I've been trying to find a balance between baking orders, helping with field work and trying to can, freeze and preserve as much of our produce as possible.  Laundry, house cleaning and even good hygiene on certain days has fallen by the wayside.  Just kidding.  Not really.

​Nearly everyday, the take-away from interactions with my husband is, "Don't squander all that you have."  Even when his mind is strained, his body tired, even when he is being weighted down by a thousand different tasks, my farmer finds the avenue of laughter and is able to bask in small moments of joy.  The other day as we washed and dried our dishes from lunch at the sink, he looked at me.  With clothes covered in dirt and damp from struggling with the irrigation pipes, he said, "I'm just so happy.  I finally have a reason to keep going."  The thought of being anyone's reason to live and to work hard is the most humbling feeling I have ever known.  Moments of confessions at the kitchen sink are what satiate me: to hear that my farmer now has this thirst to live more inspires me to make the most of what we have.  There's a simplicity to what we're striving for, a life built on the significance of little things.  I think my biggest challenge is, and has always been, to savor those small joys, to live inside the task and not beyond it.  To take this action now and hope the insight will follow.

​Although we are busy little bees, I think now is more important than ever to have moments of pause.  The fast pace of farm life can easily get away from you and become too difficult to reign in.  If there are no rests, no periods of calm, there can be no reflection.  For me, it is not an option: I must have time to think.  I must have time for the rabidness of work to settle so that I can refresh and start anew.  Writing this blog helps me to do that in some ways.  It has no longer become a task really, but a ritual.  A ritual is really just a routine that has become sacred somehow.  This is the place where the beauty that exists in the disarray is revealed to me.

Cucumber Lemonade
Makes about 1 quart
Barely adapted from Deb Perelman

I fell in love with this recipe last year when I was trying to come up with creative popsicle flavors that utilize produce from the farm.  It seems like we always have an over-abundance of cucumbers and this year is no exception.    This version of lemonade with its slight cucumber background is so refreshingly clean and sweet, it is sure to quench your thirst on even the hottest of days.  Not to mention, it is a fantastic way to use up larger cucumbers that are too seedy for pickling.  
​I only wish the lemonade was this good at the county fairs...

Ingredients
​
1 pound cucumbers, peeled and cut into chunks
1 cup fresh lemon juice
3/4 cup sugar
​2 cups cold water

Method

Place a fine-mesh strainer over a bowl and set aside.

Add the cucumber chunks to a high speed blender and process on low until the chunks of cucumber are broken down.  Increase the speed and blend until super smooth.

Pour the cucumber mixture through the strainer to separate the cucumber juice from the solids.  Discard the solids.  You should have about 1 cup of cucumber juice.   Alternatively, you can process the cucumbers in a juicer.

Add the fresh lemon juice, sugar and water to a large jar or container with a lid that is big enough to hold about 4 cups.  Add the cucumber juice to the mix, screw the lid on tightly and shake.  Let the lemonade chill in the refrigerator; the sugar should dissolve completely after about 15 minutes.