a man and his hoe

every day is a good day

Author: theMan

  • Happy New Year!

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    Happy New Year! The calendar says New Years is still eleven days away, but today is the beginning of the new year as far as I am concerned. This morning, at 2:44 am Pacific Time, you could hear the earth creak and groan as it decided it had slept enough and it was time to start waking up. For those of us north of the equator, and especially those of us who live closer to the north pole than the equator, the days will start to get longer. Spring is just around the corner.

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    Today, the shadows in the northern hemisphere are longer than they will ever be. Longitudinally, I live closer to the north pole than from where I grew up, which explains why the length of day and night didn’t make much of an impression on me as a boy. Now I have a sense of sadness when the summer solstice arrives in late June and the days start to shorten. That is six months away, and until then, it’s time to be happy, happy, happy and enjoy the lengthening days. There are 193 of them to come. Plenty of days to build up enough happiness to last all the way through to the next winter solstice.

  • Whole Wheat Anpan – A World First?

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    Hmm, the an, sweet bean paste, I made brought back memories of a staple of my childhood, anpan あんパン, buns stuffed with an. Anpan are always made with the whitest, fluffiest dough imaginable.

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    What would anpan made with 100% whole wheat dough taste like? Let alone with the 100% whole wheat levain dough I have rising on top of the refrigerator? I’ll never know if I don’t try.

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    Less than a hour later, the whole wheat levain anpan are ready to try. Wow! They turned out much better than I thought they would. The slighty tangy levain bread blends well with the sweetness of the an. They turned out good enough that I have a bowl of adzuki beans soaking to make more an tomorrow. If you look closely, the beans look like they’re smiling.

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  • Pastures of Swans

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    The swans are on pastures by the hundreds. Here a flock, there a flock, everywhere a flock. Swans are constantly moving in small groups from one flock to another. What is that all about? Is the grass better over there? Is the gossip juicier? Watch a flock of swans for any length of time and the questions flow nonstop.

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  • On a Gentle Snow

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    A gentle snow fell all morning. As I watched the snowflakes fall, I thought about the stories that each flake could tell. In their short lives, snowflakes have a lot of excitement. One moment they are tumbling tens of thousands of feet in the air, watching jet planes shoot by. The next moment they are swirling by flying crows’ feet. In the end they are drifting softly to the earth. What could each snowflake tell us about the sights they have seen?

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    The chickens are staying indoors more than not. The rosemary stems curl to stay warm, waiting for a warmer day.

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    Last night we watched a touching movie, Sweet Bean. The Japanese title is あん, pronounced, “An”, the sweet bean paste usually made with adzuki beans.

    In the movie, 76 year old Tokue 徳江 describes how, when she is boiling adzuki beans to make an, she keeps her ear near the pot to listen to the beans. “Everything in this world has a story. You can even hear what the shadows and the wind have to say. Listening to the beans, I imagine the wind, rain, and sun the beans saw as they grew. What kind of wind blew the beans? I listen to the story of their journey,” she says.

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    There is a lot of truth in those words. Through the spring and summer as I tend the vegetables, it may look like nothing much is happening, but every plant that grows has a rich life. There are worms and tiny critters tickling their roots. At times they must tickle so much the plants want to laugh and scream. All day long, bees, and flies, and spiders, and thousands of other tiny insects drop by for a visit. They experience cool mists, gentle rains, and downpours. Blazing hot sunshine beats down on their leaves.

    So when we take a vegetable and put it on the cutting board, there is a deep richness of experience, a long, full story for us to listen to. We just need to be open to hear it.

  • It’s a Small World

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    Impressed with the Shimonita onions I saw on TV, I ordered some seeds from Japan. They arrived yesterday: Thunder Emperor 雷帝 Shimonita Onions 下仁田ネギ! Much to my surprise, on the back of the package, it says that they were made in South Africa. According to various web sites, farmers in many parts of Japan have tried growing Shimonita onions, but they don’t taste the same as those grown in the village of Shimonita. I’ve read on some websites that once you get a few miles away from Shimonita, they taste different. So I was surprised that the seeds came all the way from South Africa.

    They seeds were made by Sakata Seed Company, and they have operations all over the world. The description on the package says that the onions have a sublime, melt in your mouth sweetness. We shall see.

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    While I wait for spring to plant the Shimonita onions, there are chicks to attend to. The Dark Cornish and Silver Laced Wyandottes are six weeks old now. It’s hard to believe that the Franken-chicken grown for the supermarket meat shelves are nearing butchering size at six weeks. A normal chicken is just a fluff ball that easily fits in one palm at six weeks.

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