Sad sad sad...

The garden was perking along. We were fascinated by the potatoes, which were growing vigorously, white blossoms breaking out on the ones that would grow white spuds, and purply ones on the reds. We couldn't wait to dig them, though it would be months before the new potatoes would be big enough.

The eggplants and tomatoes were racing each other to produce the first fruit.

The peas were so good we stood in the garden eating them off the vine, even though they were still quite small.

The beans were making bean blossoms, and those were turning into baby beans...

And amidst all this joy in the garden, and the fulfillment of much planning and waiting, and despite all the sweet little buds growing into real little beans and peas, 

And right there where the baby goats entertained us, and tried to reach the tiny crabapples starting to form beneath the beautiful and abundant pink flowers...

I woke up one morning with an all too familiar feeling, and before the day was out I had had another miscarriage.

Two in a row was bad news.

My doctor generously proclaimed that I would never have another child.

The object of my every thought was no more.

And without children - an infinite string of children - what was the point of the farm? All this work was for the long-term, for EVER. And suddenly the end of the road loomed up and stifled the very purpose of all our hard work.

Well, not all. We had a 7 year old son. A 9 year old daughter. Another son who had just turned 11. We were very blessed.

But my arms felt empty, and my heart more so. I could enjoy what I had, but my whole vision of eternity - endless increase - was stifled.

It was a sad sad sad day. .  .   .     .       .

Disbudding and other removals

Goats are born without horns - good thing for the moms - but little bumps begin to appear soon after birth. Especially in little bucks, who may show points breaking through when they are only a day old. 

It's really quite stirring to realize how well equipped baby goats are to survive in the wild. They can run at their mother's side by the time they are a couple of hours old, and within days can and do turn their little heads toward an attacking foe (farmer's son for example) and lower their heads. Those little horns would not do much damage during the first few days after they appear, but by the time the kid is only a month or two old, he is capable of presenting a formidable shield - albeit on his head - to his enemy.

On the other hand, it is devastating how well equipped baby goats are to get tangled in fences, beat down doors, and poke innocent visitors. 

So it is considered good practice to remove the horns before they get fairly started. 

Before the little horns erupt through the skin, they can be felt in the form of little buds. If these buds are removed when they are small and unerupted, the goat will be hornless and safe.

To disbud a kid, the procedure must be undertaken for little bucks within the first week or less after birth. However, since little bucks may in actuality be little burgers, it may not be necessary to go through the disbudding procedure on them. It depends on how long they are to be kept.

For does who are destined to be milkers, it is possible in some cases to wait a little longer than a week. But once the little horns erupt, the whole process becomes more challenging.

For one thing, the bud is bigger, and for another, the disbudding tool will not fit neatly over the horn and be able to remove the base of it. And if the base, or bud, is not gone, the horn will grow.

Even a small piece of bud left on the skull of the goat will result in horn growth, certainly not into elegant horns but instead into lumpy pieces that may break off and bleed.

So it's best to get right to the disbudding.

Disbudding irons are like soldering irons: there is a handle at one end, and a hot steel rod at the other. In the case of the disbudding irons, the end of the rod is designed to fit around the unerupted horn bud: it has a recessed center, with a ring around the outside.

When the iron has been plugged in and becomes hot - very hot - it is time to capture the kid. Holding his head firmly - this may be a multi-person job - the brave farmer ascertains the exact location of the horn bud by feeling for it, then presses the rod over it.

How long to hold the iron in place is a matter of practice, so the first time the new farmer disbuds the new goat may be a nerve-wracking experience. For both. If the iron is not held down in place long enough, the bud will not be encircled and killed, and the whole process will have to be repeated or the goat will end up with ugly horn-bits. If the iron is held in place for too long, it will burn through into the....

Well, new farmers usually don't cause dire damage, they just usually end up not doing enough. 

The ideal result is that the horn bud has its blood supply cut off by the encircling rim of iron, and can be plucked off bloodlessly. 

There is a lot of smell of hair and screaming of goat, but it's over with in a minute or two. Per horn. Then the baby's head is dusted with antiseptic powder, and he is let back into the kid pen to tell his little brothers and sisters what is in store for them.

We don't love doing it. But it is far better than horns.

And it is also far better than converting little bucks to the genderless sweethearts they must become if they are to escape the butcher knife. This conversion process involves tiny robust rubber bands the inside diameter of which is the size of cheerio holes and rubber band stretchers and once positioned the rubber bands cut off circulation and end the process by which bucklings become big smelly bucks. 

So the early life of little goats is not all play. But then they forget about these things, and go on with their bouncy little lives.

A flood of milk, a wheel of cheese

And so the very warm days of May saw us committed to staying home and enjoying the life we were putting together on the farm.

The baby goats had been nibbling hay from the beginning but now they were really enjoying it. The result was that we had more milk for ourselves. Lots more milk. Streams and rivers of milk.

So it was time to start in earnest preserving it for the winter ahead, and that meant making cheese.

Each day, we would put what was left of the the morning milking, after the babies were fed, into half gallon bottles for us or those who were buying from us. And we would put what was left of the evening milking into a pot to make cheese.

The coagulant for the cheese was rennet that we bought at the drugstore. The bacteria to ripen the cheese and give it flavor would come from the air. 

We brought the milk back on the stove to a good temperature for the coagulant to work, about 110 degrees, then added the rennet dissolved in a small amount of water. Within a half hour or so the milk would begin to separate into curds and whey. By morning the separation was complete, and we'd cut the curd into inch cubes so even more whey could escape.

Meanwhile the bacteria were beginning to grow in the milk, changing its character in a way peculiar to each type of bacterium.

As long as we worked with meticulously clean pots and stirrers, and with fresh milk, we found only wholesome bacteria growing. But under less ideal conditions, the milk could produce yeasty or foul cheese. And sometimes if conditions were just right, we produced just curds with little bacteria and hence little good goat-cheese flavor.

After the curd was cut, it was time to put it in the collander. We used several layers of cheese cloth to retain even more of the curd while it was straining.

The mass of curds needed to sit for a while in the collander, usually several hours into the new day. Then we transferred it to a cheese press and cranked down on it. 

The press was a tube about 6 inches in diameter, with a disk that fit into it. A heavy wood screw could be cranked and made to press on the curds. Whey could leak out the bottom.

The harder we pressed it, the better it would keep and the harder texture it would have.

We made an effort to get most of the whey out of the curd. When we decided it was done, usually by the next morning - 36 hours after the process had begun - we took the wheel out of the cheese press, salted the outside to help preserve it, and put it in a plastic bag in the fridge. For many months we were able to produce a wheel a day.

Some went into the freezer. The texture was a bit crumbly after freezing, but perfectly good for a topping for spaghetti sauce or hot veggies.

At times we also left wheels out on the counter, and watched them closely for spoilage, rubbing salt on them each day as a preservative. If the cheese ripened at room temperature, or the warm temperatures of summer, they could ripen to a delicious flavor and smooth, firm texture. But the spoilage rate was high, and mostly kept it in the fridge to ripen.

We had plenty to eat, and plenty more to freeze for the winter ahead.

First camping trip, part 2.

The morning after Bobby Kennedy was shot, we packed up our things again and headed toward Yosemite, which was still a very long day away, if not two. It all depended on how well the babies did with traveling, and of course how the car held up and so on.

The car actually turned out to be a problem. We pulled into a service station to get gas, the attendant checked under the hood, and then reported the dire news that we had developed a leak in the transmission line and we had no transmission fluid left. And no mechanic was on duty. But we could come back tomorrow and get it fixed.

We were worried about burning out the transmission, so we found a campground right there in Bakersfield California, and set up our tent. It wasn't the setting we had envisioned when we had set out: our ears were glued to the radio to see if Bobby Kennedy had died; we were camped on a bed of dust at the base of a major highway; and we were hardly in a place where we could go for a hike or see wildlife.

Actually, we did end up seeing a bit of wildlife: wild-colored jays kept stealing our food. The little ones took delight in it. Until one bird came out of nowhere and stole a graham cracker out of VJ's hand.

We spent a long day there, dreaming of Yosemite, still so far away.

The next morning I got up early. The ground was hard, the light bright, the temperatures warming rapidly. The babies were still asleep. Bobby Kennedy was dead...

I made oatmeal and sat in the car waiting for the others to start the day. Finally everyone was up, fed, wiped clean; the car was repacked, then the children added. Off we went to the service station.

The day crew checked the transmission fluid and the line was full. It had been an error.

So we drove to Yosemite. We made it that same day. We put up our tent and got out our stove and lantern and put the sleeping bags in the tent and blew up the air mattresses. Then we walked around just breathing the sweet air. The skies were blue, only a few clouds to the west. We gaped in awe at El Capitan and washed clothes and ate a meal in the village. And I eyed the horses that were for hire, thinking how much I had enjoyed riding one horse one time when I was about 14. Maybe, just maybe we could afford a trail ride.

John had no interest, so I volunteered for him to stay with the babies at the tent. We made the reservation for my ride for the next afternoon and I looked forward to it eagerly. Meanwhile we cooked on our little stove, took walks, and generally felt free and easy in the pleasant openness.

The next day dawned gray and threatening. When the time came for my ride, I decided to go even if it rained - I might not get another chance, since our time at Yosemite was about to end. So we drove to the corral. I was surprised to find I was the only trail-rider. I climbed on my assigned horse eager to be off, and fell in line behind the leader.

I waved goodbye to my amazed two year old and long-suffering husband, and as we rode off it started to rain. The leader put on his raincoat. I didn't have one.

We rode down a long one-horse-wide trail into the woods. The rain was getting heavier by the moment, but in the woods it was a little lighter. Except for the drips from the pines.

The ride was to last for an hour. I was getting cold and the adventure was quite different from what I had anticipated. He and I tried talking but the noise didn't carry well, so we just rode on in silence.

I was cold and chattering and wondering at my unique folly - no one else had ventured out! And I began to wonder how much longer the ride would last, at the same time feeling guilty for the thought because we had spent good money on the ride...

As we walked along, I was lulled into a peaceful state despite the wet and cold.

It was then that I saw movement up ahead and the leader pulled his horse back abruptly. A mother moose stepped out of the woods and crossed his path, followed by her baby.

The leader pulled his horse back to mine, and exclaimed in such a way that I was amazed at his obvious fear. He explained that a mother moose with a baby is dangerous even to a man on a horse, and he had never seen one before, nevermind one crossing his path a few feet from him. He felt we had been very lucky to avoid a conflict. I had just seen a lovely wild beast and she had hardly seemed dangerous. But then I was new at riding a horse in the woods.

Eventually we got back to the corral. The horse was in as much a hurry as I was. The family was waiting in the car, and John had my jacket for me. I put it on but couldn't get warm. We went back to the campsite. It was heavy gray, dark and rainy outside, but probably not much past four p.m. I crawled into my sleeping bag and shivered, while John got supper under the protection of the tent flap. I couldn't get warm. Finally it was bedtime. I fed Margo, then fell asleep. In the morning I had a horrendous cold.

It was time to head home, and then once we got there, time to pack up all our belongings and move to Massachusetts. As we drove through central California, I realized how I would miss it. I had lived there for three years, John for four. It had taken me nearly all those three years to come to grips with this strange land we had been living in: it was not the least bit New-Englandy. But I had grown to love it after all, and now we were leaving.

So it was a bit of a sad trip, but we vowed to go back. Back to Yosemite, Bridal Veil, ruggedness, woods, mooses, and camping with our kids. We had camped, we had fulfilled our dream at last, and we were ready for more.

A trip... part 1. Error and shock...

The basement was huge, and the kids had enough room to roller-skate down there when the weather was rainy. We also had a washer and dryer, a freezer, and lots of left over space. In one corner we had built shelves to store things on. 

And on those shelves, just within sight, was our camping equipment. 

One hot summer day after I had gathered up the laundry and was carrying it to the washer, I noticed it sitting there idle, and memories came back of our very first real camping trip. 

The red sleeping bags, the blue tent, the green camp stove and lantern... BIG SIGH! We could not figure out how to get away with everything that needed taking care of. 

So the memories came flooding back with great poignancy.

John had finished his dissertation, and soon we would be driving East so he could take his first job at MIT. In between we had a couple of precious weeks and we knew just what to do with them.

That is, we knew we wanted to go on a real camping trip. The question was, which of the many great sites in California would we visit?

We picked Yosemite. It was a name from our childhoods and the name alone flooded our minds with magic and mystery.

It was a long two days' drive with a 2 year old and an infant, so we decided to spend the first night with friends in Pasadena. We drove up the 'back way' from San Diego after a difficult day of packing clothes, disposable diapers that we had just heard of and were trying out, food, and all the camping equipment in our old Pontiac Catalina sedan, and leaving room for a car seat and a car bed. 

(In those days there were no car seat laws, and we always traveled with the baby of the moment lying loose in a car bed that was made from the pull-out body of an old baby carriage. A baby carriage is - never mind. The image makes me cringe.)

We left late, and arrived after dark in Pasadena and fondly greeted the friends we didn't see very often. We would be sleeping in their house that first night, and John carried things in from the car while I fed the babies, nursing Margo and getting VJ some supper they'd saved for us.

John came in from the car after carrying in most of our needs for the night with a puzzled look on his face. After looking around and going back to the car several times, he said that the clothes box was missing.

I could just picture it where I'd been adding small shirts and shorts, on the far side of our bed. I could just see how it could have gotten overlooked...

We couldn't go on without it. The thought never entered our minds to buy new clothes for us all. Instead, John suggested that he go back to La Jolla, pick up the box, and return in one big round trip. It would take him till past midnight...

I thought hard about alternatives but came up with nothing. 

This dumb little mistake was to put him in time and space at almost the exact point of an historical event that will forever be part of the history of our nation and perhaps humanity....

While he was gone, we watched TV with the family. Bobby Kennedy was speaking in LA. The speech was inspiring! It fired our young spirits with hope for justice and peace.

Then, when it was over, and he left the podium, and the news crews were tying up the broadcast, suddenly the cameras switched to the kitchen, where on the floor lay...

This was June 4-5, 1968. Bobby Kennedy lay dying, and we sat in shock. John was still gone and I wondered if he'd have the radio on and would have heard about it. Finally he arrived, an hour or so after the shooting. He had come up the coast instead of the back way, and had gone through LA. He reported that he had heard and scene much commotion, sirens and police lights...

No such thing as a free goat...

As we went to goat shows and saw the truly beautiful animals being shown there, I began to appreciate the elements that made up that beauty, and I began to see what 'dogs' our goats were.

Of course we just wanted goats for milk, so what did it matter?

What we had failed to appreciate in the beginning was the small issue of the need to breed milkers every year so they would continue to produce milk.

The normal cycle was annual: Starting at a year, a young doe had her first kid. That meant she was bred at 7 months. She would produce milk for the next 10 months, the last three of which were when she was pregnant with her next batch of kids. After that her supply diminished to almost nothing, and her owner would dry her up and give her a rest for the last two months before the next batch of babies was born a year after the first. 

Let's say she has her first kid or kids on March 1. She is then in milk until the following Jan 1, and gets a rest until the next March 1 when she has a new batch of kids. She would have been bred on Oct 1.

Some few goats can produce for more than 10 months, but the rule of thumb is that they need to be 'freshened' every year. 

The by-product of this freshening is baby goats. One the first year, two or three or four or five thereafter. 

In a dairy with 5 milkers, that would mean something like 15 babies, half doelings.

Newborn does can be raised to make more milkers, sold to someone else for that purpose, or eaten. Newborn bucks generally must be eaten, though some are sold as pets.

Leaving aside the unfortunate young males, there are usually still more little does than a dairy needs to replace the mature milkers, who produce well for at least 5 years.

So they need to be sold. And if the dairy is a business, they need to be sold at a profit, or at least at break-even.

So this is the situation we faced: we had many small does, and it would have been great to pay some of our bills by selling them. 

And of course our goat-people friends were trying to do the same thing.

And that's where shows came in. It was a place to show off one's gorgeous goats, and it was a place to get ribbons that proved the goat was gorgeous.

And after a few shows I realized we did not have gorgeous goats. Nice ones, milky ones, but not good-lookers. 

It could be argued that the looks of a goat have nothing to do with the ability to produce milk. But it's not so: each aspect of a great-looking goat has to do with the ability to produce. These traits define dairy-goat beauty.

So when we didn't win ribbons, we didn't sell goats.

A lot of our first goats were very low cost, or FREE. They made good milk. They didn't win ribbons. They made as many babies as other goats, and they ate as much as other goats. We just couldn't sell their babies.

And that's when I realized there's no such thing as a free goat.

Interlude: John gets a job

John had a big decision to make and then we could go on our first camping trip.

We had owned the equipment for 8 months or so, and had yet to get away and really camp.

Meanwhile Margo had been born. Then it was winter. Then the final typing (with a typewriter!) of the dissertation, all the while waiting for word about jobs and our future.

The offers trickled in over the Spring of 1968. The first was from JPL, Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, NASA's lead center for planetary exploration. A great job! We decided to go to Pasadena and see if we would thrive there as a family.

Then came an offer from two departments at MIT, back in home turf since we had both grown up in the Northeast. The Chemistry department and Geology and Geophysics put together a joint offer that would cover all his areas of expertise.

And then an offer came from the University of Oregon to found a new planetary sciences department with colleagues already established in space sciences. The offer involved the geology and chemistry departments and the Center for Vulcanology, and some involvement with the astronomy department. 

Our trip to Pasadena helped us eliminate JPL right away. The smog was intense and we found ourselves lying on the floor with no energy. JPL's offer included the most money, but we rejected it for reasons having to do with our ability to stay alive in that environment.

(Smog in those days was a much bigger problem than it is now. A pall of chemicals rested over most of the major cities in those days, especially LA.)

So it came down to MIT and the University of Oregon. One established, the other growing. One with a huge reputation, the other striving for one. One with an urban/suburban flavor, the other in a big small town. One home, the other away. One without a touch of wilderness, the other right in it.

We could go camping as soon as he decided. Everything that happened in our lives after that would depend on the decision. It was a decision that would affect John's profession and who we all became over the next 60 years....

We put our heads together. And in the end, he chose MIT, and then we went on our first big camping trip.