There is Chicken Blood on my Pants (and No, I'm not a Witch).

It is quite humbling to catch a chicken, hold her, pet her, attempt to calm her, pass her off to Steve, and look her in the eye as the axe comes down. Then after plucking feathers, and knifing away the vitals, I carry it on ice to my freezer. I did that today.  I caught a bird that has lived at Ferncliff much longer than I have, and helped end her life.

This article is about killing chicken.  I thought you should know that here before you decide to keep reading or not.

There was a bright vivacious red color blood.  There were feathers--lots of them. There was a small child calling at his father, "please don't kill it Dad."  There was slimy smelly guts. There was skin. There were feathers we missed. There was yellow fat.  It smelled like a dead animal, it did a lot of twitching.  It bled on me. It's smell lingers in my arm hairs hours later.

Picture of me removing the chicken's crop and cutting the organs away from the neck bone. Photo taken by Molly DeWitt copyright 2014

Today I am brought back to the earth. I am reminded how the life thing works. I must kill to eat--be it a bird, a mammal, a plant. I must cut open the earth to plant, cut off the leaf or root, cut off the head, or in some way consume another's life to sustain my own. We humans are pretty destructive if you think about it.

Today I am brought back to the earth. I am reminded how the life thing works. I must kill to eat--be it a bird, a mammal, a plant. I must cut open the earth to plant, cut off the leaf or root, cut off the head, or in some way "cut off" and consume another's life to sustain my own. We humans are pretty destructive if you think about it.

Continual sacrifice, death, and dirty, smelly, labor are required to continue our lives. This is real. This is food. This is life.

Jesus' sacrifice gives us life.

All food comes at a cost of life.* It makes me think of James Cameron's Avatar in the scenes when they hunt.  The blue girl Neytiri, teaches the blue guy Jake Sully to respect the animals he hunts.  A few times you see her approach the animal she has attacked and fatally wounded.  She says.  "I see you"  "I thank you."  She has a brief zen moment with it. Then she slits it's throat to kill it.  Jake does this later while hunting.  That movie has a lot about "knowing" the other animals on the planet with the jellyfish tentacle thing from their hair that they touch each other with. I don't have one of those things in my hair (that I know of) but I appreciate the concept--A truer empathy and understanding with other people and other species even.  What if we had that today.  I think it was more prevalent a few generations back.  A lot of adults here talked about butchering chickens with their grandparents.

In the real world how much of our food do we see? How much do we thank?  How much do we want to see?  How much of it are we thankful for? 

My thoughts taper off into trying to empathize with the bird.......

I remember Steve said today, "I don't think God intended for us to enjoy it."

With chicken blood on my pants, and a chicken's blood on my hands, I realize more fully, I must inevitably leave a mark (or a pile of feathers) behind if I am to continue.  I am a heterotroph. I must consume energy from something. I cannot generate it on my own. 

I did this to some quail at Nu Beginning Farm a few years ago.  It hasn't made me vegetarian, but it's made me realize someone for a job has to get bled on every time we order meat.  It's made me remember that an animal had to die to make my dinner.  This has made me very comfortable having meat only once or twice a week, or sometimes less than that.

Many people I know, both living and dead have made a mark on me while sustaining their own life. In an inspirational since knowing that I will damage things, or at least leave an impact, I guess I should make  the most Christ-like impact I can.  I must steward that time and life for God since it is a gift from God.  I must see, and thank myself with the same respect Avatar and chicken killing has taught me for other animals.  The chickens that died today left a mark on me, and I will say some words about them.

(Placing my hat over my heart...)

While living, these birds put many a egg in a campers hand, they were the first animal many a child ever held, and they were used to teach many how to farm. Even today while dying 7 people from ages 7 and up were taught "how we eat chicken," how to kill it, and get it ready for your kitchen. They became part of a meal for the YAVs and the Americorps team.  I thank you dear bird.  I held you, I see you, I smell you, I thank you. I'm also sorry, it was kind of rude for me to move into your home and help kill you soon after.

Alex's Butcher benediction: 

May all birds have the chance to give such light to the world. 

May our human lives and deaths be a blessing to all who hold us. 

And may there always be good soup!

*Idea:  In the author's opinion, arguably fruits and eggs do not cause death to anything living.  Most edible fruits are like gifts the plant wants you to take so you spread it's seeds. (so plant a few of them once and a while-pay it forward)  It doesn't damage a plant to pluck it's fruit in the same way tearing a leaf or cutting off the root literally tears cells apart and damages the plant. Unfertilized eggs will not develop into chicks so we might as well eat them since they are there, right? Nothing dies there because it wasn't really alive.  On the cellular level fruits and eggs are viable, organic cell matter that are essentially "eaten" by our cells but I don't consider those alive in how birds are alive.

Americorps, Swimming, and Winter

Last Sunday a team of nine Americorps NCCC volunteers stationed in Denver arrived at Ferncliff.  Water 7 is their team name.  NCCC is the Americorps branch for the National Civil Community Corps.  They will stay here and several other places all across their region for 6 weeks at each place.  They have certian hour requirements here at Ferncliff, and a certain number of required hours outside of this project.

They are our new friends: Billy, Michael, Jocelyn, Kindra, Steven, Luke, Kevin, Sasha, Josh, and Jessica. Their main project is demolishing the old swimming pool.  It has some beautiful artwork which I hate to see go.  One of the dining hall staff was chatting with me about that.  She's been here for 19 years. Camp used to have the kids swim in the lake and use the old cabins with no air conditioning.  Now they have air conditioned cabins which they don't even carry their trunks to, and they swim in a new swimming pool with a splash pad, beach entry and water umbrella.  The old pool is becoming the site of a new dining hall more centrally located so guests don't have to walk as far to eat.  This lady told the same words of progress I heard from camp executive staff in a tone of an older lady wondering why the world has changed so much.  Camp staff is proud of the growth, and she wondered "what's wrong with swimming in the lake, and cabins without air conditioning, isn't that what camp is?"  I could empathize with her.

Back at Nature Camp we don't have air conditioning, we swim in the creek, we don't use computers, we don't even use electric pencil sharpeners.   We once had camp for a week without electricity after a wind storm.  Electricity only powers lights, the refrigerator, fans, and hot water.  Where do you find the sweet spot at camp? How do you equally balance the preferences of a changing generation, modern practicality, and experiencing the natural world? Everyone has their opinions. I think Ferncliff has a relatively good balance here.  

This year we're constantly thinking about what camps should be as a ministry of the church.  Everyone's got opinions.  I think the new pool is a little bit closer to Disney world than camp, but they've got a straw bale building, goats, chickens, tree houses, a labyrinth and a stone chapel to bring visitors and campers quickly back to the center of what's importan. They span the whole gambit from rustic to awesome adventure to fancy-modern.  To Ferncliff's credit the air conditioned cabins use a "Geothermal" HVAC unit which uses the lake water as the heat sink, so it is more efficient than a typical air conditioned cabin.

Americorps is using most of the wood from the pool house to become a storage barn on the other side of camp.  They'll start building it this week.  And part of the old pool foundation will become foundation for the new dining hall. They re-use as much building material as possible.

The old pool and pool house as it stands Nov. 17 halfway deomolished by the Americorps team

Ferncliff's new pool.  Photo from Ferncliff Facebook

Americorps Water 7 has also been helping us YAVs with some work.  I had a handful of Americorps people helping me winterize the Eco Center. We had our first frost the first week of November so I got the woodstove going but the summer ventelation system was still working to cool the building.

The building is cooled by a solar chimney made of two large black pipes on the roof.  The black metal heats in the sun causing the air inside to warm, become less dense, and rise.  As it rises it draws air from the building and creates a draft.  The idea is that enough air flow inside can keep the humidity down.  The thick straw bale walls can keep the heat out and that is how it stays cool.  The major design flaw is that the humidity stays high on cloudy days inside.  Even though it may be 78 inside on a 95 degree day, high humidity inside can make that 78 unbearable to sit through.  We're working on it, but I'm glad camp just tried it and we're going from there.

Eco Center Photos property of Ferncliff Camp Copyright 2013

So during our cold nights hot air from the building was escaping out the solar chimney and keeping the building at 55 or cooler in the wee hours of the morning.  We had a group staying there in a few days so I had to fix this.  No matter how Eco-friendly the group is I doubt they want to wake up in a drafty 55 degrees when they are paying for it.

Some Americorps volunteers helped me caulk some cracks, block the cieling vents, and spray-foam-insulate cracks around pipes.  I discovered it takes a little bit of work to get other people to do your work for you.  Most of these Americorps kids are 18 and just out of high school so they don't have as much hands on experience as I.  Don't get me wrong I'm pretty useless, I got plenty of good ideas and I know how things work but I can't do all that much on my own with tools.  Out of the five they sent me, none of us, even I had more than a day's experience with caulking, so we accidently destroyed two bottles before we realized you need to punch a hole in the foil inside the front to let it come out.  We also learned don't sniff it or don't get it on your hands.  Luke and I had similar debacles with the spray foam.  It was very fun, a little messy, and minimally stressful.

I got a few people blocking ceiling vents with cardboard.  I gave them what I thought was good instructions, and the necessary tools and left to run an errand. I came back 20 minutes later and they were in the same place I left them.  They were still figuring out how to best get the vents back on.  They were slow and deliberate, and they got it done, but it surprised me how long it took. It gave me insight into what my supervisors might feel when they leave me alone on a task and I get stuck and make less progress than they thought.  This is pretty much every day for me.  It gave me insight into the frustration Don felt when I was doing mudding and sanding in NYC with PDA and he'd come back and I'm still sanding the same section of wall he saw me sanding the last time he was there.

Lets face it volunteers have heart but maybe not the hand skills to get everything done.  The people with the skills are out there using their skills making money, and they cost money so non-profits might settle for volunteers.  So if you are a skilled professional you would be the envy of volunteers, and a much needed volunteer.  I'm realizing a big part of this volunteer world is doing what we can together, and getting the right leadership to get these tasks done without professional help.

This is my volunteer contribution so far:  It took me a week to weld a weather station pole together, five weeks to make signs for features of the Eco Center, four weeks to plan out a landscape project, three weeks to vacuum rice hulls and weevils, three days to connect one solar panel to the golf cart and two hours to clean just four golf cart batteries.  I gained some great experiences and fun stories along the way.  But someone who knew what they were doing could do all that in a day or two.  The learning and the stories are what makes this experience what it is.

So whatever you are doing on your own, for your supervisors, or for those you supervise. Do it well, learn something, teach something, tell a story, and make a story.  I'd love to hear it.  Thanks for the stories Americorps Water 7!