Now? I'm doing repetitive tasks every day, however instead of numb, I feel alive. I'd rather use the word groove, doing something over and over again so many times you sink into a beat, a meditative zone, following the numbers into your body, out through your breath, one more, one more.
Numbers have always been a struggle for me. For someone who learns by seeing or doing, numbers have always melted away into space. They have no meaning to me. On the farm we use a ton of numbers, that are sometimes changing, and always necessary to remember.
When we have harvest days - and so far it has only been wholesale orders (we supply food to local grocery stores, restaurants, and farming education programs in the area) - we are counting all the crops we pick. Today we harvested 8,070 turnips for an educational program called "Harvest of the Month" for Sierra Harvest, who brings fresh food to school cafeterias and for education tastings. We were in the field pulling turnips, cutting off the greens, and counting to 400 turnips. Have you slowly tried to count to 400 while thinking of 300 other things and hearing other people say numbers and come and go and get in front of you? It's fucking hard!
This doesn't even include washing and re-counting those turnips into groups of 30 about 269 times. I did that a bunch too.
Groove. Feel that word and let it sink in. My groove got me excited today as I transformed the repetition into a glorious song. As my body aches from bending, I remind my stomach to tighten and support me. I try as hard as I can to sing through the pain of my knees hitting rocks when I kneel to do a task. If any of you have sat meditation you know you must breathe through discomfort. The monkey mind is distracting and constantly yipping in your ears. TO breathe through the pain and distraction is a very difficult thing for me to do most days, however in this job, during these times, I have found peace with my monkey mind. At least for now...
Thanks for reading so far my loved ones!
