Tuesday 26th – a flower day so I don’t get to mess with the vines till tomorrow after 7am. This biodynamic stuff is pretty precise and its actually really interesting. I’m now tuning into the energies in the field and practising listening to them and I’ve just found a load of resources that I’ve downloaded –a whole course actually – which sadly gives me another reason to not have time to learn Bulgarian! Time is so weird here –I do actually wake up at about 6 and usually go to sleep around 11 – in between there is so much to do that sometimes its hard to know what to do next. I spotted a plum tree yesterday that I hadn’t seen before –it was previously in disguise as a green tree – now its bright yellow! So today I went up to pick plums – followed by 2 dogs and a sheep. I was there a couple of hours and picked masses and also discovered a new part of the field. There’s a lovely little flat bit at the foot of the hill that’s actually in shade till mid afternoon. I sat there for ages just looking at the field from a different direction and tuning into to the energies. That was a lovely way to spend half the morning but what I have realised over this last month when I’ve been working this place on my own, is that it needs people. Its fine enough having volunteers but sometimes it’s a very frustrating thing when people say they’re coming then they don’t confirm and then you don’t hear from them again and meanwhile I’ve said no to other people. I have been really lucky with the volunteers who have been here – they’ve all been wonderful and I’m very grateful for all their work but organising it all is a hassle.
But I was thinking about Jorge and Vasilka next door – there are three of them and usually Vasilka stays around the house, gets the food together, makes jam and stuff like that while the guys are off doing the field work. When there’s just me, I have choose which of those things to do. Its wonderful having so much fruit, but will I have the time to pick it all and them do something with it?
I need a couple of other people to come and live here on a longer term basis. That means people could take a bit more responsibility and I don’t have to make all the decisions although, to be fair, all of the volunteers who’ve been here so far have taken loads of responsibility.
Wednesday
Had a visit yesterday from three 16 year old girls from the village – one of whom speaks very good English. We had afternoon tea on the lawn – they loved my tea pot and they all want lessons in scone making. They gave me an idea for getting rid of Alan – periodically people drive around in a car with a loudspeaker and offer to buy things – so I’ve just got to get it worked out what I need to say and run out next time I hear them. But it’ll be sad to see her go – we’ve kind of got used to each other but she really is a hassle.
I’ve never really been an animal person – except cats of course and all farm livestock has always seems to me to be a big hassle – correct on that one!
There are fireflies around at night and last night there was one in my bedroom when I switched off the light – it was lovely watching it. I captured one and watched it through my little magnifying glass – fascinating and thank you Eden for the glass.
Saturday –full moon. Two Scottish people have just moved into the village – their house is up the other side of the village and they’ve got loads of work to do on it. They’re not much interested in the land but I’m sure they will be eventually however, they are interested in Alan and they have a whole field for her to eat. So maybe that’ll work out.
I have just been for the most incredible walk – I need to just gush about this for a minute – I walked up the back behind the house but didn’t go into the woods. I wandered along the goat track then came upon miles of the most beautiful wild flower meadows. I was walking knee deep in glorious colours – a whole field of white with tall yellow flowers dotted about then loads of pink and masses of different purples and blues…. and hundreds of butterflies – I lost count of the different types, sizes and colours. I wonder if there places like that still in the UK? How sad if there aren’t but I can’t remember ever seeing so much wild beauty in one place. I walked for about an hour in the flowers and of course there was no one there – just me and the dogs. It was quite stunning – it’ll be really interesting seeing those meadows at different times of the year.
Then I came back to another interesting hour – there was a strange scratching sound coming from the water barrel – I looked in tentatively hoping I wouldn’t have to rescue a rat! But there was a bird – quite big, white and black speckles and quite stuck! I lifted it out and it was too heavy with water to fly so I sat it on the vines where it obligingly sat while I got the bird book out. I really wanted it to be a baby falcon but it wasn’t even in the book – I think it was a young wood pigeon.