Feeling Revived

January 25th
     I made my way to Miami yesterday. It was the first time I had gotten out of the farm space (farmers markets exception). I road my bike about 15 miles into an aggressive wind that seemed to make me earn every inch to get to the Metro. I bought an all day pass for five bucks and hoped on the last car with my bike. I headed to Coconut Grove. Coconut Grove is a "bohemian" area traditionally with a lot of yoga, Ayurveda (traditional Indian medicine) medicine shops, cafes, tattoo shops, and bike shops. I found a little Mediterranean restaurant called Alladins and sat down to my first meal out in a few weeks. I had the typical meal, vegetarian pita w/hummous, and talked about Dearborn's Arab population with the waiter. He told me that Alladin's had its roots in Dearborn.
     Soon, I was off, to a local bookstore just to check it out, or so I thought. I ended up buying a play called A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams for, I can safely say, the sole fact that it was placed in New Orleans and as you know is where Im headed. Its the story of two sisters from the prim and proper south. One of them has moved to New Orleans and lives with her abusive and controlling husband, yet seems to be satisfied when her sister comes after losing the family home to the banks. It takes place in the 1950s and gets into the masculine and feminine dynamics of that time. It was a quick read and I think Ill read it again to catch more in the realm of language and underlying themes.
     As I made my way back to the Metro, I decided to go to downtown Miami and venture to a beach, as it had been weeks since my last swim and I was anxious to get back to the ocean. I began scaling this monstrous bridge across toward South Beach. I saw the cruise ship loading docks and instantly was taken back to the days when I was fortunate enough to travel aboard the luxurious titanics of our times. I descended and found my way to another bridge that took me right to the beach and it was glorious. It was warm, not hot, I found a comfortable place to park my bike after receiving a pair of nice complements of my looks by a few transvestites. I was soon undressing to my boxers and walking towards the water which I went out towards where the three or four foot waves were breaking. I enjoyed the thrusts of water meeting my lunges into them as if I was a running back diving for a touchdown into a fierce and burly offensive line. I was whistled in and left prematurely to my desires.
     I stood on the beach just drying off and doing some balancing exercises, then went to the bathroom and got the sand off my feet. Soon I was back on my bike and traveling towards the bridge. I was amazed at the Miami traffic at rush hour and felt "a God among mere mortals" as I quickly made it through the bumper to bumper traffic at twenty miles an hour as people stood outside of their cars dumbfounded. Apparently there was a shooting of a police officer and their was a gigantic funeral in which all the officers in the city had to parttake. I approached ground zero of this event and would swear that the whole city of Miami was a bunch of narks (police). It felt like flying.
      I arrived back at the farm about an hour or so later after the subsequent metro and bus ride. I made some dinner, drank a beer, and finished Streetcar.
     Today was a great day. We only worked from 8 to 930 and then went to Little Haiti in Miami for a field trip. There is a former intern from Bee Heaven, where I am, who started her own CSA on this quarter acre plot. It was cool to see her scale and see how manageable it looked. I have been feeling discouraged about farming as I have been here because of Bee Heavens 419 member CSA, but this woman had only eleven members. It definitely gave me a nice perspective and reinforced the idea that I could infact start something of this nature. Anyways, we then went to a farm called Earth n Us. This place was wild! It had three story treehouses where one of the women their was raised in. It had an assortment of goats, chickens, chinese chickens, pigs, Emus, turkeys, and geese all living togeather in this fenced off area, but seeming rather content and docile. There was an emphasis on permaculture here. Permaculture, as I was being told, is the methodology of creating less work. It emphasizes perennial herbs, plants, and self seeding plants. It was really cool, with just years and years of carpentry and energy just pulsing from the site. It was also in Little Haiti.
     We left and again went to the beach where I got to go swimming and yet again, be called in by the lifeguard. We drove home and I crashed in the front seat, then we go arrived and I was able to get in a bike ride before dark. I made some nori rolls with brown rice, radish, a homemade bean dip, avacadoes, and sesame seeds with some oven roasted potatoes for dinner. It was dank. I am feeling good and looking forward to another day in Miami tomorrow at a farmer's market.
Well, if you've made it this far, I salute you.
Cheers,
     Tommy