Work, Play, Connection - Quail Springs
Earlier today I sent an email back to our home office, with the following as the opening paragraph:
"I'm sitting on a comfy couch in the beautiful new office space at Quail Springs. The room on the western end of the big strawbale building, with sinuous, three-toned earthen walls, and a dark earth floor with little bits of straw in it. The students are outside singing "Let Your Little Light Shine". The sun is out, and there is snow on the hill across from me right above our tents. I think today will be hot. So much has grown since we were here a year ago and they have a lot of projects for us to work in."

Later, as I sat on a hill with sagebrush and juniper I watched the hum of the "village". That is what this place feels like to me. Open and warm. Restful and rejuvenating. A place to work hard with your hands doing things that are elementary, sustaining, and beautiful in the process and the product.

Even later in the day I spoke with Matt, one of the students. He shared that until this afternoon he didn't understand why we were doing this long road trip, or why we were traveling all this way to learn about permaculture. After all, what does permaculture have to do with naturalist studies and survival skills? This is a great question, and one that we don't always answer before the trip. In part perhaps because it's hard to really capture the feeling of it to those who haven't experienced at least a little of both, but also because it seems like you have to just experience it anyway in order to know at any level beyond the theoretical.. and we're all about hands on learning. But perhaps I jump ahead too far...
This morning (as I sent emails back and forth to Duvall) the students had an orientation with this place from Warren, one of our hosts here at Quail Springs. He shared stories of connection with this land and the people here, as well as the history of this land stretching back in time. He told of some of the wounds caused by overharvesting of trees and water in this region in the past and present, and showed us some of the ways the people here are learning again to live on this land in a careful way, both increasing the productivity for human use but just as importantly building the habitat of this land for all of the non-human beings that live here. One big web, all connected.

So much of the work here is about water. How water moves on the landscape. Why water tables fall and how they can be brought back up again. What leads to erosion and what can be done to remedy or prevent it. How to store water in the soil. From habitat creation at the edge of the pond, to stream restoration designed to raise the water levels, to the building of swales to utilize minimal water efficiently in the garden, so much of the work here centers around water.

This afternoon we went to work. Some of us helped with the fence that is being put up around the labrynthine garden below the main building. Others made bricks out of rammed earth for a natural building project (there are both cob and strawbale buildings on the property). Some dug a trench for irrigation, while others dug swales and planted fruit trees in the food forest. Apples, apricots, nectarines, pears, and mulberry.













So to revisit the question of permaculture, I'm not sure that I can explain why except to tell you what we did today. We looked at the land and visualized water - both the times of lack and the times of deluge. We got to know the earth by putting our hands in it, getting it all over our clothes and under our fingernails. We found bugs by accident, and made homes for the lizards and other creatures that make the garden their home and keep things in balance... things like bugs. We worked with each other (have you ever experienced a different level of conversation happening when you are doing hard work with other people?). We learned how to make things from the land right here that nourish us and house us. As a group, we are more connected to each other and to this land than we were this morning, and that's the point.

And now, it is late and I'm exhausted and sore in a really good way. It's good to be in this place called Quail Springs, built by hand. Ready to hold us as we sink into rest.