Day 3

Today I dealt with more animals in the morning. First milking and egg collecting, then feeding animals. My favorite to feed is the little calf (Ushi) who was just weaned from her mother. After milking, we bring her back a whole gallon of her mother’s creamy, fresh milk and she slurps it down in a few seconds. Then she spends a few minutes with her head stuck in the pail trying to lick the last drop from the bottom. After her dose of milk we toss her a flake of hay and she stares at it in disgust. The other calf (Betty) who is two weeks younger, is already proudly starting to eat hay with her mother (Mapache).

The afternoon was spent mostly pruning. Despite the frost that withered all the leaves, the lemon verbena is pungent as ever, almost as good as the wreath room (!).

After the aromatherapy session with the lemon verbena, I spent a few hours in the greenhouse sorting hot chili peppers with the crew. Spending time with them I can really notice how rusty my Spanish has become. I find myself stuck on some vocabulary words that have over the years snuck back into the deep recesses of my brain. (How do you say "hinge" again?) I love their company though -- they know so much about the different scenes of farm life and about the vegetables and fruits. Most importantly, we get to share an integral part of farm life, listening to terrible Mexican radio together.