we don't hoe shame here

So the bid to give the corn plants a slight advantage over the weeds, while still protecting them from deer/crows/everything else has begun.  Last night I hoed one more than half the rows.  All the while watching for purslane so that it can have the chance to grow and feed us too.

And I would hoe a bit (really sharp, specially angled, convex shaped hoe), stand to look for purslane and ease my back (despite trying to be an ambidextrous hoer, I am not really still) (I try this, about as unsuccessfully, with the industrial brooming of the hall at the barn too), and think about this.  It is certainly a form of yoga, or maybe crossfit.  It is certainly a meditation, a here and now.  There is that dirt that we've brought offerings of all sorts to for years, and it had me thinking of how I would time bringing the manure to it this year.  There are the little corn plants, some with water still in their funnel (corn funnels water to itself, you may not have known this).  There are the weeds:  the burdocks just with cotyledons, the stink weeds biggest, a few morning glories, ragweed, spurge, agrimony, milkweed, pigweed, and at least one of everything else no doubt.  Watching for the purslane the whole time, sparing it, working around those tiny little things, wondering several times if I forgot then and cut it down anyway.

And I would watch my husband who was shovel hilling the potatoes and I would think about how "real skill" this is.  People think anyone can hoe corn, anyone can hill potatoes, anyone can grow food.  Haha.  But I would also think about how "entertainment budget" it is.  I mean, we don't go to the beach: we might get a new hoe and then use it the next 20 years (or more).  Or we might spend a Saturday morning after chores going around the flea market and we might buy a pair of shoes, some socks, a hoe handle, an ax handle, and a piece of iron cookware.  Entertainment budget.

And I thought about this blog.  And I thought about what I write and why.  And I thought about what I think about what other people do and don't do.  No skin off my nose.  I thought about how good this is.  I thought about this quote: 

I don't know why people don't do this.  It is a very nice thing because it doesn't demand perfection, but you *can* be as anal retentive about it as you want to be.  It is a very nice thing because it doesn't care if you are male or female or gender neutral; black or white or striped; able bodied or crippled (because you just do things different ways, or different things, what you ARE able to do); it doesn't care if you are rich or not because it doesn't actually cost much and having money doesn't get you anywhere but distracted and in need of your meds; it will make you sore every night and enable you to appreciate being sore; it is important and it will highlight the things that have no substance to them.

I do know why people don't do this.  It is hard.  It is demanding.  It doesn't give a sh*t.  It isn't performance art.