My family has had rare breed dairy cows for a little over a year and a half now which has totally transformed our family life. Cows have many great qualities but perhaps the most significant one is their presence. They create such a grounding and nourishing atmosphere that just being with them fills you with a deep sense of wellbeing. Given these turbulent times characterized by malice and incompetence, it has been a wonderful haven for our family to be able to milk our cows and then process that milk into a variety of foods.

Below are links to a three part video we posted on YouTube of a quiet morning milking on our mountain homestead. This milking was particularly peaceful and we wanted to share that experience the best we could.

I want to briefly write something about my family’s positive experience with our cows. Like many people in our country, my wife and I have long been concerned about the food system here in the U.S. The food supplied in grocery stores is grown in a way that is disrespectful to both the environment and to the humans who are supposed to eat it. This agribusiness approach to the food supply leads to many health difficulties as well as economic dislocation. One of the solutions my wife read about for years was Raw Milk (another link). Raw milk, or perhaps unprocessed milk is a better name, is fresh whole milk that has been neither pasteurized nor homogenized. Unprocessed milk is living milk where pasteurized milk can only be called dead milk. Unprocessed milk from healthy cows is a vital living substance filled with a multitude of living organisms, enzymes, etc. As such it is a wonderful growing medium and so needs to be handled cleanly and delicately. The conditions of large dairies full of drugged up, grain-fed cows pooling all of their milk together to ship on its long journey to market would pretty much guarantee contaminated milk. The solution currently in place that protects profits is to kill everything in the milk by pasteurizing it. The solution never seems to be to change the unhealthy and unnatural practices of the industry. So that is why our stores are filled with dead milk that is nevertheless laced with contaminants.

In response to these conditions and the laws that keep those conditions in place, my wife has long wanted us to obtain dairy animals of our own so that we have a way to provide unprocessed milk to our children. When we were finally able to purchase a house on 3 ½ acres, we quickly bought a rare breed Nigerian Dwarf goat doe and her two kids. We didn’t manage to milk the doe very regularly at first so the goats were more like pets for a year or so. Then my wife found a family who was milking a dairy cow and looking to unload some of their excess milk. We got unprocessed milk from them for 4 or 5 months and loved it. They decided they wanted to sell their cow and her heifer. We did not feel particularly ready to start milking a cow but we did not think an opportunity to have people help us get started milking a cow would come along again so we jumped at the opportunity. We threw up a straw bale cowshed and began milking our cow. We later purchased an older sister of our cow three weeks before she had a pretty little heifer. Since then, in search of better conditions for our cows and therefore for us as a family, we moved from our central Virginia home to rural Floyd county in the mountains of southwest Virginia and an old farm house with a lush pasture.

So we are hand milking two cows that with their two heifers form our small herd. We have slowly weaned our cows off of grain. They are entirely grass fed and we give them a flake of protein and mineral rich alfalfa hay during milkings. Grain is not a natural food for cows. It adds unnecessary weight. It is harder for cows to digest and so adds to the methane gas problem (i.e. global warming) as grain-eating cows burp more and they burp out methane. Feeding grain to cows creates conditions for the proliferation of harmful e-coli as well. Furthermore, feeding even a very small amount of grain to cows immediately and significantly decreases the nutritive value of their milk.

So we are now getting gallons of vital, grass-fed, unprocessed milk which we turn into various cheeses, butter, kefir, yogurt and puddings. Our food bills have gone down drastically, our allergies and other health problems improved and our six children are always full which is a first for us. We are also very happy to be less dependent upon the current system in terms of food.

But having unlimited access to an important health building food turns out not to be the only benefit to having a family cow. What for us has been the most unexpected benefit is that our Dutch Belted cows are really great companions. They are very intelligent, gentle and generous beings that have a very calming and serene affect on one’s home environment. They are grounding. When they are chewing their cud, they look like they are meditating on their own bliss. They epitomize the generosity of nature herself. Often after interacting with them, we experience a deep sense of well-being.

Most milkings go well and we feel recharged afterwards and ready to start the day after the morning milking or ready to wrap the day up after the night time milking. We have been milking out in the open in our new mountain home for the past two month or so. We caught a peaceful morning milking on tape in the following video clips. I hope the videos grant you some of the same peace that we experience when milking our family cows.

Peaceful Morning milking Part 1

Peaceful Morning milking Part 2


Peaceful Morning milking Part 3

All the best,

Paul

I have started reading up on the history of Floyd County with the idea that when something is yours, you want to know everything you can about it. I found a tract at the library called The Beginning of Floyd County by Curtis A. Sumpter (975.5712 Sumpter). In the span of 14 pages, it gives some history of the very early years here. Towards the end (pgs. 11-12) I found the following information which I will paraphrase:

1721     Spotsylvania County was formed. It did not include any area west of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

1734     Orange County was formed from Spotsylvania County. At that time Orange County started where Orange County is now in central Virginia and extended through all undefined claims in the Colony of Virginia and on through all the way to the Pacific Ocean. From 1734 to 1745, then, Floyd County was a part of Orange County.

1745 - 1770     Floyd County was a part of Augusta County.

1770 - 1772     Floyd County was a part of Botetourt County.

1772 - 1776     Floyd County was a part of Fincastle County. (Fincastle County was abolished in 1776. The name Fincastle remains, however, as the name of the county seat of Botetourt County.)

1776 - 1831     Floyd County was a part of Montgomery County.

1831     Floyd County was formed from Montgomery County.

I was really struck by the geographic/political progression resulting in the formation of Floyd County because it is the exact same route we took as a family to physically move here from Louisa County. Louisa County was formed from Hanover County but it shares its long northern boundary line with both present day Spotsylvania and Orange Counties. I went to this map to double check all of this and to trace our route driving out here. Yes, we as a family and Floyd County as an entity followed the same route. We Romanos got here from central Virginia within hours by traveling along highways. Floyd County got here from central Virginia within years (110 of them) by standing still.

It is romantic to think that we and this county already so loved by us traveled the same route to join together. As is so often the case, that which has become “beloved” started out towards the destination long ahead of us and has been at the appointed spot waiting for us to wake up and show up.

Ah, home at last. We are so grateful.

From the beautiful mountains of southwest Virginia,

Leslie

We have appreciated Virginia’s fireflies in three counties now – Greene, Louisa and now Floyd. With so many young children in the house and two parents each with a personal bent towards wonder, cavorting with summer’s fireflies is a cherished family activity. For us, though, the fireflies of Floyd are special for a couple of reasons.

Part of the magnificence of Floyd fireflies comes from the fact that they are in, well, Floyd. The most beautiful gems are shown off in the most beautiful settings. Likewise one of nature’s most beautiful lights is shown off here in one of nature’s most beautiful settings. Our little piece of the county is also the best place we have ever personally had for seeing great numbers of fireflies as it is rolling pasture with forest off in the distance.

Reading Fred First’s column in last week’s The Floyd Press in which he wrote both lyrically and scientifically about fireflies reminded me of an experience we have already had here. In early June shortly after we had more or less moved in, my husband and I went outside for a breath of air one night after we had gotten the children to bed. It had just gotten really dark. Drawn by the sight of thousands of fireflies, we walked across the backyard to the pasture fence. As our eyes adjusted to the acres and acres of pulsing lights, we noticed in the distance our cows. When we moved, we brought with us to Floyd our rare breed Dutch Belted cows. Great big things they are with wide white belts around their middles. In Dutch they are called Lakenvelder which means “white sheet”. Well, those white belts of theirs glowed in the firefly light. Off in the distance the cows were, browsing on blackberry brambles. My husband and I were hushed by this discovery. We were actually getting a glimpse of our cows’ secret night life by firefly light.

My husband tried to catch this illuminating moment on video. It didn’t turn out, though. I think sometimes such hidden and ephemeral beauty is not meant to be captured permanently. Rather it is best tucked away in some quiet inner place where it can continue to shed its soft light and gradually reveal an inner secret or two. This is one of the benefits of observing nature, after all. It has the power to change us.

From the beautiful mountains of southwest Virginia,

Leslie

How many of us could creatively and competently provide food, shelter, etc. for our families in the event of a massive emergency or even the gradual breakdown of our specialized and “expert” oriented economic system? Who of us could shake off our learned helplessness (also interesting discussions here and here) and proceed effectively? One of our primary goals as parents here at Pockets of the Future is to raise our children to have the confidence and experience necessary to care for themselves, their families and communities in a deeply uncertain future. Feeding, clothing, sheltering, educating and guiding our families are primary occupations now and always will be no matter what happens. When our system goes through its inevitable profound change, who will the new leaders be?

Leslie and I got an incredibly motivating boost a week ago Saturday at the Matthews Living History Farm Museum. When we first arrived, we met a man who was making Appalachian brooms by hand. After greeting us and talking a bit about how to make the brooms and how he learned to make them, he turned to Will, age nine and the oldest of the four of our children who were with us, and asked “Everybody makes something. What do you make?” Will who is usually immediately outgoing and talkative stopped and thought for a moment and then quietly replied, “I make barns.” Our children do quite a bit of farm work as well as the occasional arts and crafts. They also spend a tremendous amount of time building with things like Legos, Wedgits, Building Cards, Construction Cubes and assorted interesting building systems from high end toy stores. So it was a very striking statement that with all of the many things he builds, Will thinks of himself as a barn maker.

Leslie and I both felt something I cannot fully describe at hearing our 9 year old identify himself as a barn maker. It was a confirmation that our vision is starting to manifest. At the homestead in Louisa from which we just moved in May, we built two straw bale barns. All the children helped substantially. The homesteads themselves were and are a family project. Our children contributed to building the barns and all of them helped mud the walls with mortar. Will particularly has also helped me put in around 1600 feet of fencing over the past couple of years. He and I made several trips together going ahead to prepare this place for our move. On one trip in May, he and I put in 800 ft of fencing which is captured to some extent in this video. Here is another video of all the kids helping with homestead building and here is another of a family project on the 4^th of July.

The economic and societal system under which we are all now functioning is breaking down. While it might not break down altogether, radical change is inevitable. In view of this, it is important to prepare the future generation(s) for what is likely to be their world. For example, parents in the 1980’s who prepared their children to use computers were preparing their children for the future. Based upon our spiritual practice and long study of the subject, Leslie and I believe that what is coming for our children and grandchildren and great grandchildren is not so much about a change in lifestyle as it is about a profound change in people themselves. People of the future will look inwardly for guidance. They will be more natural, be more connected to all of nature, have few desires and in general have a more harmonious and balanced approach to the physical world.

To encourage this future orientation in our children, Leslie and I have striven to maintain their innocence by minimizing their exposure to our current culture and we have created a natural home environment in which they help maintain and run our homestead. Just this morning after milking our cows, we all drank a glass of kefir made from kefir grains and our cows’ milk. Then while I was writing this post, Leslie made pancakes prepared the Nourishing Traditions way of soaking the grain overnight in kefir to aid digestion. Anna, age 8, flipped the pancakes as Will (9) and Andrew (5), were out picking blackberries to serve on top of the pancakes.

Living this way has been extremely rewarding for all of us. We have seen a great deal of growth and bonding on all levels of our family life. Best of all, our children are growing up with all of this and so identify themselves as barn makers and cow milkers and so on. Most importantly they identify themselves as people who look inwardly for guidance and have the confidence to carry out whatever they are inwardly directed to do. They are starting out far ahead of where Leslie and I started. They are not pretending to be spiritually driven, natural life type homesteaders. They are not trying to be spiritually driven, natural life type homesteaders. Rather they are very simply becoming spiritually driven, natural life type homesteaders.

 All the best,

Paul

I love living history museums - especially living history farm museums. I find visiting them refreshing and inspiring. I always leave with an adjusted perspective, a deep sense of appreciation for the health of the old ways and a strengthened commitment to our family’s developing homestead.

I read in last week’s The Floyd Press about family events scheduled at Matthews Living History Farm Museum for this past Sunday. There were going to be people there teaching skills we are particularly interested in learning about so once we figured out where Galax was, we headed down. It turned out to be wonderful for us and more than worth the hour drive.

The 21 acre site itself is nice with “a farm house, barns, garden, field crops, livestock, functional spring house and a restored 1851 log cabin on the grounds.” All of this including the non-hybrid veggies and herbs in the kitchen garden are from circa 1900.

What made it all come alive for us as a family were the artists and crafters who were there. John Alexander warmly welcomed us at the entrance and showed us how to make Appalachian brooms. (Here are two neat sites about traditional and especially artistic broom making.) Next to him was James Foley, a traditional wood worker, who was shaping the handle for a red oak pitch fork while we were there. Handling his pitch forks is wonderful. The subtle contours of the handle feel so pleasant sliding through your hands. He only had one left for sale which was snapped up right before our eyes. (Pictures of wooden pitch forks on the internet are hard to come by it seems. Here is one from someone’s collection of agricultural implements. The ones Mr. Foley makes are more interesting and artsy looking than this one.)

For a long time I have been wanting to learn how to cook in cast iron over an open fire. I have read that food cooked over fire has a wonderfully (and by now long since forgotten) different taste than anything we cook on modern stoves and ovens. Plus I want to be able to cook outside when it is hot and whenever we lose power. Trish Hash was at this Heritage Event giving cooking demonstrations. She poured the batter for apricot cobbler into a heated and buttered Dutch oven and we sat down for a detailed chat about outdoor cooking. She had so much information that I literally took notes. By the time we took a breath in our conversation, the cobbler was baked and ready to share. There was enough for our whole family and then some. It was hot and delicious. Here is a recipe for the traditional “cuppa cobbler” Trish made.

The restored cabin was used to demonstrate a variety of fiber arts, including quilting, basket making, spinning, embroidery on paper and braiding rugs. Eileen Elrod was braiding a rug for a fair. She spent a great deal of time with two of our children showing them how to work her rug and letting them actually work it. She was so generous and enthusiastic with them that I have ordered them each a braiding needle which they are breathlessly awaiting so that they can start their own rugs immediately! At one point, our 8 and 9 year olds were working a braided rug, our 6 year old was being tutored on how to make decorative curls for baskets and our 5 year old was patiently punching holes for a pattern for an embroidery on paper greeting card. Boy, I am definitely going to have to set up a craft corner in this house for these busy children.

The Matthews Living History Farm Museum web site notes that “those involved in preserving this cultural heritage are seeking to preserve this legacy because it remains critically important for the future.” We here at Pockets of the Future wholeheartedly agree with this idea and share their commitment. Their next big event is their Third Annual Quilt Show and Fiber Arts Expo on Saturday, September 8th. We will definitely be there! Hope to see you too.

From the beautiful mountains of southwest Virginia,

Leslie

Yesterday my five year old son and I climbed into our 21 year old pick up truck and drove through the winding mountain roads of our new home in Floyd, VA. As we passed a mountain peak, my son asked, “How did that mountain get here?” I do not know very much about geology but answered him anyway saying that I thought there were only two ways in which mountains are formed, either by volcanic action or through two land masses slamming into each other. As I thought about these two rather powerful possibilities, I began thinking about how our illusions of safety and stability.

When I observe our present political and social predicaments and all of the anger being generated by all of us in response to them, it occurs to me that the anger is mostly about not having control. We were raised on the idea that America is the most powerful nation on the planet even to the point of being indestructible. With our military might and our technology, it is believed that we can bend both nature and the other societies to our will. The past six years have all but shattered that illusion and people are livid.

Clearly no one is in control. The most recent culminating event was President Bush’s act of commuting Scooter Libby’s prison sentence. For the Bush administration this marked a complete failure in its ability to control the fallout of its actions. All abusers and bullies grab power and control by forcing their will on the world. Few bullies rise to the level of President or Vice President, of course, but even the President cannot force his will on the world forever. Bush did not want to be in the position of having to commute Libby’s sentence but after losing control of the message, the war, Joe Wilson , and his administration, and to save himself he did what he promised six years ago he would never do. As a matter of fact, he pledged to clean up the presidency. After six years of failure, he was left no choice but to declare himself a fraud, commute Libby’s sentence and go even further into hiding.

For Progressives and Democrats of all kinds, Bush commuting Libby’s sentence represents the cherry on top of what has become a constitutional embarrassment of a complete breakdown of our system of checks and balances. Unfortunately there is no counter movement of sufficient strength to at least balance the incompetence, abuse and criminal activity of the Bush administration. He has lost control of his presidency and we have lost control of him. And really except for a few screaming voices only apathy and the clicking of the remote control as the channel is changed can be heard across the land.

For the past six years we have seen our “indestructible” nation successfully attacked by just a bunch or radical guys, not even another nation. We have seen our military bled dry by just of bunch of guys, not even a true national military. We have watched part of our country be submerged under water and seen the survivors going without water, food and shelter. Our health care system is in shambles and getting worse as is our food system. We are running out of fuel and we are contaminating the environment, altering it for the worse with the little fuel we have left. Socially we are becoming more and more selfish and entitled, consuming despite the consequences to ourselves, our neighbors and our children. Our system is breaking down.

For most of us our houses seem strong, safe and stable. But as my five year old son pointed out, even the large mountain peaks weren’t there some years ago. Deserts people inhabit today were once under the water. Mountains were once plains. Our planet is in a constant state of change and motion. For the past few generations Americans have been blessed with unbelievable wealth and stability. We have nurtured an illusion of indestructibility. Well now that veil is being removed. We have entered a tumultuous time and the people who bragged of being able to deliver control have let us down.

However, in this time of change is hope. Hope is always linked with change. Knowing that things have changed for the worse allows us to believe that things can change for the better.

I turned 43 today. Sadly I had to use a calculator last night to subtract 1964 from 2007 to figure out my age. A neighbor came over last night to let us know he saw one of our cows break through our fence and head into another pasture. This morning as I was gathering what I needed to fix the fence my wife said, “If someone told you ten years ago that on the morning of your 43^rd birthday you would be out fixing fencing to keep a cow in with materials you already have on hand ….” The unpredictable turns I have seen in my life, most of which have eventually been for the better, have led me to the understanding that change is good. It is as least natural.

So with all the anger that is going around, we can find some refuge in the certainty that things will change again. One of the great ideas from the spiritual philosophy my wife and I are guided by is that the human being is the most highly evolved being on our planted SO FAR. “So far” implies that we will continue to evolve. We are, in fact, evolving now. So when we are faced with the ugliness of human life and with the incompetent bully who represents our lower nature, we have to be steadfast in the knowledge that we are all a part of an evolutionary path by which such lower qualities will eventually find extinction.

Today is what we Americans fondly refer to as “Independence Day” and a great deal of noise is associated with its celebration. It is typically a day of food, drink and sunburn rather than a day of introspection, appreciation or action. Neither my husband nor I have generally enjoyed the Fourth of July because it tends to be so thoughtless and even hypocritical. However, we now take a deeper meaning for this day which has made it become a treasured holiday on our family calendar.

Most people of our time experience inner dependence and independence just backwards from the original human state. In general, we are dependent on the outside and independent (read “isolated” or “fragmented”) on the inside. Everywhere we look, we see people who are dependent on outside society for what to think, what to eat and wear, how to fill up their houses, how to relate to spouses and children. They are dependent on society at large to supply material comforts and objects of every imaginable sort and dependent upon prevailing societal norms for navigating family life, work life and whatever passes for inner life. Outside expert and specialized advice is sought for every aspect of daily life. One result of this is that both families and individuals are fragmented and vulnerable. If tomorrow we lost electricity or burgeoning grocery store shelves or magazine articles about how to raise children or what to do with our money, most of us would be lost.

Many who step onto the path of spiritual pursuit and/or simplicity begin to experience correction in this area of dependence and independence. In fact, I believe that in the distant future an all encompassing inner dependence on the Self, God, the Divine, the Master – whatever word you want to choose – will be so natural that it will be the foundation of life for everyone.

Virtually every message our society gives us from childhood through adulthood leads us forcibly away from what is natural. In fact, the force of societal instruction as it now exists creates a lifelong dependence on things and ideas that are unnatural and heaps scorn on natural ways of living. However, what sweet wonder awaits us when we come to depend more and more upon the clear vision and unwavering instructions we may hear from within. The more we grow to depend upon our “inner dependence”, the more we will see that our previous dependence upon “society” has only been leading us away from the Divine and, therefore, away from ourselves.

One of my long standing interests as a wife and mother with regards to my share of shaping family life is discovering what I happily call “Natural Holidays”. With each passing year, for each holiday that seems appropriate for our family to celebrate, I search for deeper meanings of that particular holiday and look for ways for us to celebrate it that will yield growth for us as a family. The very first holiday which came up for adaptation some years ago was Independence Day. Every year on this day, we now do something which fosters independence from outside experts or purveyors of goods. We might learn a new skill in the kitchen or the garden or the barn or the sewing room that allows us to do one more thing for ourselves. We might give up something we don’t really need or make a substitution that is simpler (one year we gave up AOL!). It is really fun choosing something each year and it is invigorating achieving just a little bit more independence from worn out, unnatural ways of life.

This year we have many things to celebrate on this Independence Day. Our move to Floyd is the biggest one which I include because it is recent enough and of such great magnitude in our progress as a family. One of the big reasons we moved here, by the way, was to have more ready access to hay for our cows. Amazingly it worked out that today we purchased 58 bales of good quality hay from our next door neighbor. So easy! And having a start on a winter’s worth of hay in the barn is a wonderful feeling of independence for us who always had to scramble from month to month to find enough hay back in central VA.

In addition, Paul and the children have spent the last two days putting in a board and welded wire fence across part of the front yard and down one side. Eventually the entire front will be fenced but as of today, they finished enough fencing to let the cows graze in this area. The grass here is wonderful and full of clover and just the thing for our recently grass-fed only dairy cows. Ah yes, independence from grain together with all of its expense and deterioration of the nutritional value of the milk is a valuable step in the right direction.

Today in the kitchen we made pounds of butter, ghee (our main cooking oil) and mozzarella cheese. Those are by now familiar ways of acting independently. However, what is new for this year is that we are about to go out and pick ripe blackberries and black raspberries from the newly discovered (old) berry bushes that line the old fences here. I have long wanted to grow enough berries to feed the family. Now magically I have a big head start on this aspect of self-reliance or independence.

To finish off the day, we are going to watch Juliette of the Herbs. This is a documentary about Juliette de Bairacli Levy, a grand dame of herbalism and a deep listener to nature.

As fun as taking another step towards outer independence is each July 4^th, it is the subtext of what Independence Day really is for us that fills us with quiet contentment. Employing a little word play, we might say that taking something away from the outside and placing it on the inside where it belongs takes us from “independence” to “inner dependence”. Removing degrees of dependence on the outside world has its greatest value in how it reveals the true dependence in the inside world. So July 4^th here in the Romano household is dubbed Inner Dependence Day and is celebrated as such. It draws us together as a family as we constantly search out natural and Divine laws and celebrate that on this day.

We experience that shifting attention away from false dependence and on to the true inner dependence brings us into a more natural and flowing state. Building a family in which the adults navigate by their inner dependence on the Self and the children are raised to do the same by model and by precept creates a deeper, sweeter bond between family members and brings family life into a harmony that could not otherwise be enjoyed.

May we all return to our original human state of inner dependence and may all families be restored to the loving harmony that naturally flows from that. May simplicity reign over all.

Happy Inner Dependence Day!

From the beautiful mountains of southwest Virginia,

Leslie