Sylvia Jorrin's November 2005 Farm Story

November 2005

The day has turned mysteriously and suddenly into night. Fall back. Spring forward. Why is it always to be greeted with confusion? What time is it, I asked? I ask? What time is it really? That is more certainly the question. What time is it really? I don't quite know. Is it the correct time on this clock or that? On my watch, or on the answering machine, or on the little French clock in my studio, or in my mind? I who live by the sun more often than not find that abrupt arrival of darkness so early in the day disconcerting at best.

I do know it is time or rather the season to start the fires, both in the fireplace and the delinquent kitchen stove. But what I also know is the day has turned warm and my kitchen is now ninety degrees, after a few days when the ground was warm enough in which to sit and knit while talking on the telephone. Too cold in which to sit and write, however. I am now in front of the living room fire.

The foundation to the house began to collapse one day a month or two ago. It has now been dismantled and awaits "the best mason in two counties" to come and rebuild it. He is the second mason I have hired. The first mason ordered the stone wall to be torn down. Had me hire a man and a back-hoe to dig it out. And, after asking me to buy bricks with which to reline the fireplace, disappeared. My apparent misfortune, however, has led me to someone whose reputation for doing fine masonry exceeds all others. He has captured my confidence and is expected here soon. The cellar is now open on one side to both all elements and northwest light. I am reluctant to close off that beautiful light. Two small windows shall be replaced. A wall I had installed shall not be. That will allow two large rooms in the cellar to become one. A big one at that, with, to one side, a small wooden store-room, a root cellar of sort remaining. It is a pretty little room. Ernest built some slatted shelves in it for storing apples. I have always loved that room. It has a very nice light fixture in it, a little Art Deco light fixture, inappropriate as there was no electricity in this house in the thirties. The slatted apple shelves were inspired by some in the English Country Living Magazine. Classic. Simple. Beautifully made. Ernest did me proud with them. I'm soon to have a sort of laundry room as well built into one corner of one of the cellar rooms. It shall be of rough-cut tongue and groove lumber which I may whitewash, and shall have as its entrance an old vinegar painted door. With the exception of the recent changes in the living room, adding French doors and side lights to an exterior wall, I've not, until now, made any essential changes. The projects in work are, in some ways, simply maintenance and repair. In the cellar, I am simply reversing a decision twenty-seven years old by opening it up. However, the prospect of creating another room interests me. Shall I stencil the new wooden wall or vinegar paint it. Whitewash it? Or leave it be to blend in eventually with the root cellar?

I am looking, everywhere, for the memory of the dream I had when first coming here. The prospect and realization of an endless palette was what enchanted me in the beginning. Being able to go into the endless recesses of imagination to find inspiration. The house, barn, carriage house and land offered their own encouragement as well. And for that palette I have, at times, sacrificed comfort and certainly, security.

The one place where aesthetics, comfort and security blend, and by force have to become one is in the barn. In that one place, all things have to be in perfect balance. It is the only instance where pleasure in function is also pleasurable to the eye. I take immeasurable joy in perfectly balanced gates enclosing the lambing jugs that is unequaled in all other instances. There is now the face of a keyhole feeder in the barn waiting to be attached that I have wanted for many years. Thirteen sheep can eat hay there at once. And waste shall be dramatically reduced. If I can convince my carpenter to refashion the hay chute as well then my life shall be remarkably transformed. I will be able to drop hay down from the mow without running downstairs after each bale, to re-position it and break it open. With a combination of luck and design the chute can be made to allow the hay to fall relatively in place. And I shall save a half an hour a day of work that allows me to pay attention to sheep rather than struggling with jammed bales in the drops. I seem to have someone to repair my windows both in the barn and the house. That shall make an impact here as well. The massive project here on all fronts has set me back from getting ready for winter. Tomorrow is the first of November. November is like August. Hurry. Hurry. Hurry. For what is not finished now directly affects my life and its quality in the winter. I've always loved the winter. And yet I forget, summers quite how much and fear and anxiety live at the fringes of my mind.

I was born in the winter. Just as the days grow longer. A wonderful way to awake to each new day. I credit whatever optimism lives in my soul to that. When I was a baby, it was the fashion to be put in a carriage, on the porch, all bundled up and secure in the cold, to sleep. Fresh air was the dictum of the Victorians. And my mother, born and raised on a farm, was years behind city fashion and prejudice. A good thing. Probably the other mothers of her acquaintance, whom I know were far younger than she, and "city girls", did not adhere to so rigid a custom. I know when I had my children, no one thought to open windows every day winter, to let them "air out". And taking babies out side was a necessity rather than an injunction. We simply had the grocery shopping to do. And I had laundry as well. Although we are not supposed to have memories of our earliest days, I know when I achieve a balance of warmth and cold, when my jacket and boots and gloves and all of the rest of the winter's paraphernalia have created perfect comfort, and the air is crisp and clean, and sharp, I have a sense that always comes as a sudden sharp surprise. A sense of security and well-being that I never experience any other time.

Life here is in an intensity that has never been present before. Too many projects, all affected by weather and unforeseeable complications, are in play. I wrote a list yesterday of everything I needed to accomplish before the day ended. It was impossible to complete what seems reasonable, or spend four hours a day on your projects following the men in theirs, has, to date, been impossible. A door, recently installed, begs to be painted. A window whose storm has been taken down, begs as well. The newly hung enclosure for the front porch demands I wash its window. And, if the day is warm enough, also asks to be repainted. I organize housework in ten minute units. If every room is addressed for ten minutes, nothing will get out of hand. Or will it? Every room. Twelve, as a matter of fact. Two hours. That seems reasonable. But it isn't within reason. In order to write this story, I am paying someone, for part of the time, to do my chores. That is even more unreasonable. But I don't know any other way to do it. What I do know is that there is a chance here, albeit slim, that this winter shall be better than last. Not saying much. Last winter was one of the worst I've ever known. But there is a chance. If I don't weaken.