{"id":8727,"date":"2017-08-08T15:19:03","date_gmt":"2017-08-08T21:19:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8727"},"modified":"2017-08-08T21:55:50","modified_gmt":"2017-08-09T03:55:50","slug":"on-getting-reaped-at-lammas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8727","title":{"rendered":"On Getting Reaped at Lammas"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"large

The scythe of the gods \u2014\u00a0multiply by several thousands<\/p><\/div>\n

A friend in Poland has a small farm, and he has been teaching himself to mow the meadows with a scythe. We have email conversations sprinkled with words like “snath<\/a>” and “peening<\/a>,” which I know only from reading.((He is an American expatriate, but I suppose that he has learned the equivalent Polish terms as well. He says that his elderly neighbors think his scything technique is amateurish, whereas the younger ones wonder why he does not use a machine.))<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, we were scythed at\u00a0 Lammastide.<\/p>\n

On Friday the 4th, M. and I went to Colorado Springs for a “city day,” hanging out with my cousin at Coffee Exchange<\/a>, thrift-store bargain-grabbing, picking up her laptop that was being repaired, buying wine, visiting a bookstore,\u00a0 and also Nightingale Bread<\/a>, where an Orthodox Christian baker speaks of “the spiritual symbolism of death and resurrection cycles (a plant’s grain milled into flour and revived as bread) inherent in bread-making<\/a>.”((A hefty loaf made from organic Turkey Red winter wheat costs $8, which makes it an occasional treat, but it is very good.))<\/p>\n

Then we came home to destruction. The first clue was the piles of leaves on the road when we left the state highway. Then M. looked at her gardens and went into shock.<\/p>\n

Sunflowers\u2014decapitated. Beans and tomatoes\u2014blasted. Squash and gourd plants\u2014nothing left but stems.<\/p>\n

The corn looked as though though it had been machine-gunned. Many herbs were shredded. The nettle patch was reduced by half, while the woods were carpeted with fresh needles of pine and juniper, pruned from the trees.<\/p>\n

I found a broken panel in the greenhouse roof, and the crank-up roof vent on the camping trailer was shattered. The plants in the greenhouse, mostly tomatoes, were unharmed.<\/p>\n

All this just nine months since the last big forest fire and a week since some minor flooding on our road.<\/p>\n

In the car the next day, she said, \u201cDo you think we angered the gods?\u201d<\/p>\n

Who are \u201cwe\u201d? The people on our road, under the narrow path of the hailstorm, which was less than a mile wide?<\/p>\n

When you do anything agrarian \u2014 even vegetable gardening \u2014 that makes you vulnerable to weather, it is so easy to think that you are punished by some god when drought or insects or wind or hail wreck your crops. It is easy to think that someone is trying to teach you a lesson.<\/p>\n

So what is the lesson?<\/p>\n

\"Suillis

Slippery jacks. A little annoying because leaves and needles stick to them, but they *are* edible.<\/p><\/div>\n

This morning while walking the dog I found “slippery jacks” (Suillus granulatus<\/em>) appearing up behind the house under the pines \u2014 we see them only in wet Augusts, and this is one of those.<\/p>\n

So it\u2019s time to change and adapt \u2014 and look for mushrooms, while we hope that some parts of the garden will recover.<\/p>\n

After Lammas, it’s hunting-and-gathering time. So that’s the lesson \u2014 move on.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A friend in Poland has a small farm, and he has been teaching himself to mow the meadows with a scythe. We have email conversations sprinkled with words like “snath” and “peening,” which I know only from reading.((He is an American expatriate, but I suppose that he has learned the equivalent Polish terms as well. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[303,63,31],"class_list":["post-8727","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-herbs","tag-lammas","tag-mushrooms"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-2gL","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":698,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=698","url_meta":{"origin":8727,"position":0},"title":"The corner of the year","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 3, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"When is Lammas?Predictably, Lammas\/Lughnasadh postings popped up on Pagan e-lists and blogs on the 1st of August. But that is just what the calendar says. Astronomically, according to the online astronomical calculator, it comes at 1541 hours GMT on August 7.But I think it's when the hummingbirds start to leave,\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8151,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8151","url_meta":{"origin":8727,"position":1},"title":"In Praise of Harvest Time","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"July 27, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Some (Northern Hemisphere) Harvest\/Lammas celebrations, only not called that. This one, I think, is from Iran: This one comes from the island of Cyprus: And while we're in the mood, let's not forget Whitman McGowan's \"White Folks Was Wild Once Too,\" with video that is NSFW if you work in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"dance\"","block_context":{"text":"dance","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=dance"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":919,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=919","url_meta":{"origin":8727,"position":2},"title":"And the Corn Palace Too","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 3, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Victorian Slind-Flor puts the \"Loaf\" in Lammas, with photos of the Palouse region and, even closer to my heart, the sacred Corn Palace of Mitchell, South Dakota, one of the great Roadside Attractions of the northern Plains.A quick flashback to a 1980s cross-country drive with M.: camping in the Black\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Lammas\"","block_context":{"text":"Lammas","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=lammas"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":13722,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=13722","url_meta":{"origin":8727,"position":3},"title":"Step Aside, John Barleycorn","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 4, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"See the Shaggy Parasol mushrooms? They were not there two or three days ago. Yet Lammas comes and they burst forth, full of fungal goodness. Here just north of the Colorado-New Mexico line, August is the heart of mushroom season. You can find them at other times too, but your\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Lammas\"","block_context":{"text":"Lammas","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=lammas"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/shaggy-p-ground-level.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/shaggy-p-ground-level.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/shaggy-p-ground-level.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/shaggy-p-ground-level.jpg?resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/shaggy-p-ground-level.jpg?resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1927,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1927","url_meta":{"origin":8727,"position":4},"title":"A Ritual Against Hitler That Really Happened?","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 26, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Via the Pagan Newswire Collective (should I just have a dateline with \"PNC\" in it?) comes this link to a witchcraft ritual reportedly performed against Adolf Hilter and the Nazi regime in Maryland in January 1941, which is almost a year before the United States officially declared war. It was\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"England\"","block_context":{"text":"England","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=england"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7368,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=7368","url_meta":{"origin":8727,"position":5},"title":"Lammas, Wild Harvest, and “the Notch”","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 1, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Many of the Pagan bloggers are putting up their \"Happy Lammas\/Lughnasad\" posts. My archaeoastronomical friends who study mysterious ancient solar alignments point out that \"real\" Lammas is still six days away. But there is \"the notch.\" In 1986, when I moved to this part of Colorado, a friend told me,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Colorado\"","block_context":{"text":"Colorado","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=colorado"},"img":{"alt_text":"nibbled bolete","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/nibbled-bolete.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/nibbled-bolete.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/nibbled-bolete.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8727","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8727"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8727\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8747,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8727\/revisions\/8747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}