Friends, Farms & Food
And fire, always fire....
We have been spending time on the West Coast, thanks to the generosity of our longtime friends and family. I love love love spending time with my people: hearing about their lives and enjoying our conversations that happen organically when we are together. I miss this easy time when we are living elsewhere. I also cherish some quiet time to reflect, and always, the opportunity to soak up some summertime dry weather.
We are currently staying in Santa Barbara which has been unseasonably cool and foggy, although we are not complaining. Much of the rest of the West Coast is in extreme heat, and we are absolutely loving the perfect 70s F weather (mid to upper 20s C). Seattle, where I visited earlier, is now in the upper 80s F. These two cities are perfectly reversed in their average summer temperatures.
This is yet another indication of climate extremes that we are sadly learning to live with around the globe. Linked to this is the stability of food production. One of the joys of time spent in California is seeing the abundance of growing food as we travel throughout the state. We have been supporting Farmer’s markets as often as we can and are eating basketfuls of raspberries, blueberries, strawberries, as well as watermelon and all the stone fruits. Plus avocados and corn, to name just a few of the bountiful items we have enjoyed. I am so thankful for the hard-working farmers who make this abundance happen, here and at home.
Last week we visited Apricot Lane Farm, which I mentioned in an earlier essay. This farm is featured in a film about a couple who created a regenerative organic farm from an over-farmed, wasted bit of acreage. It was quite a hot day, the hottest day I’ve experienced on this trip, but the farm itself provided an oasis of cooler temperatures, higher humidity and vibrant vegetative life within the surrounding landscape of drier and hotter land. It really illustrated the value of focusing on healthy soil first and thoughtful deliberative nature-first methods for our food production. If more of our farms were able to transition to this way of growing food, we might not be facing the extremes in climate we are coping with now.
Towards the end of the tour, I noticed a plume of smoke coming from a far-away ridge of hills. Because any sort of fire makes those of us who have lived in the dry West edgy, I told the guide during a break in his talk. He looked where I indicated, and then assured me that we would be fine and that someone else would have already attended to it. Now a few days later, I am sitting outside (under a canopy) with a weird hazy sky: part light fog, part smoke from an ongoing fire a few valleys to the east (yet another much larger fire, sadly). There is light ash gently drifting down from the sky, dusting everything, including my laptop screen. Always there are indications of fire season, climate change, and our future.
A quick update to two of the three elections I mentioned last week:
In the UK, 14 years of conservative governments has been soundly voted out, with a labour government now in place. The conservative government came into power a couple of months before I arrived to live in the UK, so living with a labour government will be a brand new experience for me.
On Sunday in France, there was a very surprising result to their elections: the far-right party ended up in third place, after a surprising coalition of greens and liberals attained the most votes. They were followed in second place by the centre-left party aligned most closely with President Macron. France now has to figure out how to form a working government. No pressure (!) because within a couple of weeks they will be hosting thousands of athletes and their fans for the summer Olympics.
Thank you wonderful readers for being here. I always appreciate your time.
Wishing you a lovely mid-July week ahead and look forward to seeing you here next week. Your comments and thoughts on any topics mentioned here or otherwise on your mind are always welcome!
xx Sabrina
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As a Californian who has lived overseas for more than 30 years, the annual fire season there (also elsewhere in the west) is a particularly galling development. Like you, we usually have visited our family and friends in the Bay Area during their summer, so smoke in the air and fires have been an increasingly common and unpleasant feature of our trips. Hence, what a joy it was this past April when we visited California, including the coastal mountains and Sierran foothills in the midst of a wet spring. The hilly landscapes were a lush green and strewn with wildflowers, the air crisp and cool and utterly clear. Not sure what my point is, only that I had almost "forgotten" about this facet or face of the landscape we both love.
Regarding upcoming election, as a fellow expatriate I watch our native country with intense interest and disbelief. I vote and I hope that best in human nature will somehow prevail in the end.
Thanks for your article!
I drooled reading about those wonderful foods of our home state. Farther up the coast on our trip, we indulged in white peaches and let the juice drip down our chins (couldn't help it actually), apricots, strawberries, and blackberries. These are some of my favorite parts of the west and edibles I really miss.
Thanks for more literary manuevering with the concise election coverage. I was elated for the results in France and I hope it portends well for our own country.
Wonderful images and descriptions in this post to bring me right back home.