tao1776

 

Unseasonably warm New England days are guaranteed to give way to cool nights. An open fire in my 1977 Vermont Castings Vigilant wood stove warms and brightens the mood and the room. It may be that when I leave here when the home is sold, I will also make provisions that the stove will go too. Over the years it has been tradition to scavenge for as much wood as possible; often as a supplement to the cord wood required to heat a house winter after long cold winter. As wood shops, kilns and pallet re-builders became scarce I had about given up on a steady supply. A little networking reconnected me with someone that I have not seen since high school. Almost forty years ago! He operates a casket making company that uses a variety of wood. Beautiful maple, oak and select mahogany. Pieces unsuitable for wood overcoats are shelved for the absent actual owners who also use them to heat their own homes tucked away in the hills of Vermont. Luckily for me, he's been able...

 For thirty years I have accompanied my friend Dairy Jon, to northeast farm and dairy meetings where everything "cow" is scrutinized, evaluated, scientifically measured, analyzed and recorded. It's sole purpose is to provide the dairy farmer with the best information possible enabling the farmer to achieve maximum milk yield while producing a healthy herd for the greatest amount of profit. And with every passing year I been witness to a declining industry and way of life. Farmers and particularly dairy farmers are a breed all their own. The demise of herd after herd and farm after farm is barely noticed.  I've watched while companys such as Genex  and dairy improvement businesses have reorganized, merged and downsized just to stay economically viable and only somewhat afloat. Having grown up in a region where cows were once just a part of the landscape, I am reminded of the thousands of factories that once dotted the New England landscape and that now exist...

Our eggs are spoken for before we have them! I could easily sell many more dozen than the chickens can supply. Early Spring and fifteen chickens = tens eggs a day on average. We are hoping to increase our little village of ladies to twenty five. Now, with this house going up for sale, where we end up is being hinted at but all is not certain. A new and improved TaoSpring is on the horizon. It has miraculously appeared. And as is often the case, when it comes to the miraculous, it is more than one could dare dream or hope for. So you sit quietly and hold your breath hoping that you don't somehow jinx it. You ever feel that way??  - Last night, remember that it is only mid-March and we are in New England, there was a rain storm with summeresqe lightening and hail. This morning, the world seemed scrubbed clean and this was the first time in 2012 that the early morning birds were out! All of nature seemed to be welcoming Spring. I could not help but go off to work wi...

  I'm relaxing with a large cup of steaming Chai hoping that the effects from the Solar Flare Geomagnetic storm are over.   Taoists, who practice the Drawing in of Heaven and Earth and who actively work with the Wei Qi Field as it moves around their bodies, find their        Qi disrupted and very susceptible to large weather disturbances such as heavy lightening, high winds or solar flares.   Must be a real bitch for those practicing Taoist alchemists who find themselves living near the Northern Lights, that's all I can say! For how else am I to explain the foul mood of the last few days?   I know that I have little patience for the American people, feeling them to be at best, sheep and dolts. And my prospects for moving beyond the border are few. And where would I go? America is the greatest country in the world! I should be drinking cow's milk and eating those mass produced, stream lined, art deco, loafs ...

"It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change."

Gaia Girl (seen here) settles into the lowlands of that grand State of Vermont and partakes in a little ritual of "Pass the what?" Pine resin incense. Known as a purifier of homes. Used to heal, balance and clear energies: does it work? What do you smell? How do you feel? What do you think? It is amazing when you stop and think about it. We are surrounded by more plants than we are people (well, out here anyway) and they (like us) all have a story to tell; something to say, something to teach us. And Gaia Girl is being taught to hear and to listen. And she is the perfect student. I've never known anyone as eager and as ready and as able as Gaia Girl is for this and at this moment. And  that I am witness to it is exhilarating. And what is even more interesting is the fact that her teacher is good. Very good. A true purveyor of plants and herbs, providing a hands on approach in every sense of the word. She is a natural. This is not a class and she is not a teacher - It...

Gaia Girl has begun her nine month odyssey into the world of herbal plants and healing. This weekend marked the beginning of a one weekend a month immersion into the Sacred Plant Medicine Apprenticeship that will continue on and into the month of November. In my reviewing of the course syllabus I am impressed; and that is a rarity for me. Gaia Girl will undoubtedly experience a transformative 2012. And the herbalist school will be only one portion of the changes that are to come. Of this, I know. The present day TaoSpring, with it's raised bed gardens and happy chickens, home of the Karmann Ghia, and the blessed home of the best porch sitting experience known to man; is going up for sale. Divorce does that. I am not saddened by this but I am aware of an under-current of apprehension. Sort of like walking on ice. 2012 will see more change for me - and for Gaia Girl. But that is the talk of looking forward mind - and that gets little credence...