September 17, 2021 ~ For Nikiko
It was so wonderful to end my work day seeing and speaking with you and My-Linh. Thank you for allowing me to be me and letting me re-format the hell out of our gDoc tonight. I loved that I am starting the weekend having the conversation that I did with you two. Tonight, I’m trying to wind down. I ended up grabbing dinner with my neighbor. We caught up on our work weeks, laughed a lot, and exchanged thoughts about one of the television shows we’ve been watching (Ted Lasso, just in case you might be wondering). I’m not the biggest television show watcher, but having to balance between work, writing, research, and teaching, well, I feel I owe myself some serious decompression and an escape such as comedy.
Since the start of the pandemic, I’ve actually watched a lot of stand up comedy because it’s the thing that keeps me grounded and laughing at life and all of the curve balls it throws my way. You want to know a secret…the more I joke around and laugh, the more nervous I am. There, I said it. I admitted it. I think it’s my way of loosening myself up because I know I can be quite serious sometimes. All of this time on my own has given me some serious perspective on how I want to show up in the world and the work I do. I guess that’s what I so deeply admire about you. You are a force of nature, but you’re able to hold such a wide arrange of emotions and feelings and meet everyone with such compassion. I feel like I have to work really hard to get myself in a state of calm and ease before I deal with, well, anything in my life. There is so much more for me to learn and you’re certainly one of the people in my life that has given me so much inspiration.
I know I keep telling you that I want to talk about your poetry, writing, and performance. I couldn’t stop thinking about the National Farmers’ League (NFL) piece you performed for your TED talk. I was so deeply moved to see how much you channeled the energy of your loved ones, kin, your grandfather, your family, and just all of the things you want to see change and happen in the world. There’s also a line in one of Alan Pelaez Lopez’s poems where they write about needing farmers in the future. I believe their poem is also about recognizing that we need them now. We have and always will need farmers. I think, perhaps, this is why I’m so fascinated by your creative practice, but also your rituals and meditations of daily life on the farm and how that all shows up in your storytelling.
From seedling to fruit, you see cycles in a way that I can only begin to imagine! Here I am thinking about the life cycle of objects (yes, as in hardware, I know, I know, my mind just goes there automatically due to the nature of my work) and started pondering the software and hardware of life itself. You remind that everything I need to know is hardwired in the soil, the fruit, the vegetables, organisms, and animals that allow for cycles to even exist! I also think about the genetic code of each piece of fruit and how it wills itself to grow and blossom in concert with the weather conditions and soil you and your family (and grandfather) have committed to stewarding since your grandfather first stepped onto the land you care for and love. I marvel at how many bellies have been filled with peaches and nectarines from your family’s hard work, patience, love, care, and intention. You know, there’s a project by artist Melanie Hoff called Digital Love Languages where they ask participants to imagine a world where the people making the software we use loving us.
Admittedly, my mom has encouraged me to think this way in relation to the life cycle of things and objects all around us especially with living things such as food. It’s difficult, sometimes though, to think about a stranger loving us. But is it, really? I mean, you embody that in your life as an artist, writer, poet, and farmer. You and your family help make things grow season after season with so much care and love that you MUST love the people, places, and things that enable for the cycles to continue. I don’t want to assume, but it just seems that everything you do operates from the tenant of loving all the aspects of what you do and how that love goes beyond the soil and boundaries of the farm. I’m such a hopeful romantic, you know? I love imagining that your stone fruits are going into a family’s pie for special dessert. Or being shared between a parent and child on a sunny day spent at the park. Maybe, a best friend is making a peach cobbler for a friend whose heart has been broken. I look at stone fruit SO differently now that you’re in my life. Your actions provide healing, nourishment, and sustenance beyond the edges and contours of your home, beyond the orchard. How loving and amazing is that? Thank you for reminding me to love beyond the bounds and through my actions. You remind me that there are ripples (in all we do). Sending you so much love, my dearest friend.
On the digital thread of the time-space continuum, here is a post from September 17, 2011.
