Johnny Ortiz

Words + Photos

<p>I first learned to say thank you when picking something from the wild from my mother, Julie, when I was a child. She would take us to find cota flowers, spring water, s<span data-mce-fragment="1">taurolites, and many other things. </span></p>
<p><span data-mce-fragment="1">As I grow older my analytical brain kicks in more and I realize a part of the beauty of saying thank you is that it is a seed for yourself. Each time in that small, quiet, moment of reverence you are structuring your own mindset to be thankful for more things. </span></p>
<p>Each time I pit fire my clay I start the firing in reverence. I offer dead juniper branches to call the good spirits, ground blue corn to say thank you, mezcal for us and our ancestors. I kneel by the fire as the juniper branches catch fire, close my eyes and offer a quiet prayer. </p>
<p>"Thank you mother earth for all the magic you provide. Please help me in firing these vessels made of you, so that I may share your beauties with the world. Ta-ah (thank you)"</p>

Full moon firing prayer

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<p dir="ltr"><span>Johnny posts a picture of a room built from the very land it sits on, with twelve seats at a candlelit table. Through this image, I am transported back to the /shed recoleccion (dinner), where connections were nourished, and </span><span>I could imagine a return to the most essential parts of my community, myself, and eternal time. /shed is more than a dinner, it is an offering to forge our ways back to our own source. </span></p>
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<p dir="ltr"><span>To understand eternal time is to recognize our relational position within the infinite. /shed creates a critical moment to experience this connection through the ceremony of sharing a meal.</span></p>
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<p dir="ltr"><span>Dinner began with a simple yet profound action: Taos spring water. Without water, we cannot exist. By presenting this, /shed opens the threshold, giving the space its own life for the night. This is intentional, as Johnny and Maida express that each dinner is created and dismantled, allowing us to naturally become part of the cycle that is revered within the /shed ecosystem. Taking a seat at this table, I found myself wanting to honor every lifecycle that contributed to this dinner. As I was taught in my own Pueblo, I quietly offered a prayer of gratitude as Johnny introduced the first dish: smoked trout with chokecherry-dusted watercress, served on lava rock along with a glass of “perennial”, by Hiyu. </span></p>
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<p dir="ltr"><span>Our local environments truly have everything we need; we have to tend to them to see that. For example, lava rock is abundant in New Mexico and has been used to build our Pueblo hornos for centuries. I had never once thought of it as a vessel to serve food until that moment. The power of /shed lies in its ability to cultivate a space to witness, to practice, to return, and to create. </span></p>
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<p dir="ltr"><span>It has been months since I attended the /shed dinner, yet every detail of the experience hums in my memory, inspiring new thoughts and actions. I reflect on its connection to my work in restoring balance to our local and global ecosystems, and am comforted by how much of the practice aligns with my own community’s ancestral teachings. I feel fortunate to be part of the parciante membership, witnessing the alchemy of /shed extend into projects like Juliette and siempre* design, and I eagerly await the beginning of the next cycle.</span></p>
<p><b>-</b></p>
<p dir="ltr"><em>Danielle Lucero (Pueblo of Isleta/Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa) was raised in the Pueblo of Isleta and currently lives in Brooklyn with her partner. In her work, she supports local and global initiatives that are deeply responsive to community needs, advance food sovereignty, protect water resources, and strengthen health systems. You can learn about some of the work she contributes to at <a href="https://www.restorebalance.world/">restorebalance.world</a>.</em></p>
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Reflection by Danielle Lucero

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<p class="p1">The beauty of the high desert Northern New Mexico is not unlike the people that have inhabited it and that have generated the culture that we all love. The terrain though sparse and rugged, offers up sweet abundance to those of us willing to put in the work. </p>
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<p class="p1">At the turn of the last century Northern New Mexico was still a largely rural territory, and many communities were still fully self-sufficient, with families cooperating during harvest time. One of my neighbors once told me in our conversations; “We were poor, but we didn’t know it”.</p>
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<p class="p1">I was born before the turn of this century, and growing up I could still catch glimpses of this old way of life. My paternal grandfather's house on Taos Pueblo, had a dirt roof where grasses and cactus grew and when it would rain we would have to catch the drips inside. The house was modest, a place to rest between all the outside work, but outside of the house was a beautiful small and neglected orchard on its way out. His wife, by common law not marriage, and her siblings lived in town and never drove. They would all walk to work, cook and eat together. </p>
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<p class="p1">These are some imprints that undoubtedly helped craft who I am now and the life I want to live. </p>
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<p class="p1">At the very bottom of it all we have externalized our power and happiness, both things strongly connected to the food we consume. For me, farming, foraging and hunting is a way to connect to mother earth as we were intended to; an invitation and practice of internalizing my power to live a connected and meaningful life.</p>
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<p class="p1">Farming, foraging and hunting is also a means of remembering. The food we see on Taos Pueblo, where I come from, as traditional, are only a fraction in age to the village and culture itself. Through the long process of acclimating to the modern world we have lost more than we know. However gloom this may sound, the things that my ancestors would have farmed, foraged, and hunted, mostly the latter two, can still be found in the wild. I may not be able to truly know what the traditional food and drink of this place and its people was, if "traditional" can ever be stagnant, but I can still catch a glimpse of what they ate and begin to create new traditions, that like a thousand years ago, was based on what could be found in the terrain we inhabit and husband. Always present, just waiting for us to notice. </p>

Farming / foraging / hunting - (thoughts for the Harwood show coming December)

<p class="p1">Each month as the moon becomes full and sends it's light towards us, I generally prepare to build a fire to fire vessels, especially in the colder months. Firing this way has been part of the practice since almost the beginning. We are all electrical beings, and everything we interact with is an electrical event, and it would be naive to believe we are unaffected by her light. How exactly though, I won't pretend to know, but I'm always excited to get closer to knowing. Nonetheless, the energy that comes together between my actions, the fire and the moon have been hard to ignore.</p>
<p class="p1">I'd like to think that by this point I have figured it all out, but more and more I am realizing that working with wild clay and fire in this way that I will spend the rest of my life in pursuit of learning. One of the hardest things in this practice isn't all the steps and the sanding my fingertips off, but the fact that with all the wild variables at hand, inevitably one or a few pieces will come out having popped or cracked. Sometimes this is expressed in a subtle way, and sometimes more drastically. I never know going into it which pieces this wild nature will be expressed though, so I put in the same love to each piece regardless, often times the piece given the most time is the one to be affected. </p>
<p class="p1">In exploring these expressions with a dear friend and incredible artist Marc Baseman he shared these sentiments:</p>
<p class="p1"><span style="color: rgb(64, 64, 64);"><em>Every culture has a similar proverb (first I heard it was African) that scars are proof of a life fully lived. People. Pots. Same thing. So it goes. Kintsugi, the Japanese practice of honoring the imperfections, and celebrating the beauty of broken things was an idea Kenny Price was very familiar with: while lowering a large flat stone outside of Kenny’s and Happy’s bedroom window it cracked- he laughed with the crew saying it’s a good thing,<span class="Apple-converted-space">  </span>it’ll let the evil out! Which is one way of acknowledging the flaw. Your pieces reminded me of the inverse notion captured in the refrain of Leonard Cohen’s tune,<span class="Apple-converted-space">  </span>Anthem: Ring the bells that still can ring</em></span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="color: rgb(64, 64, 64);"><em>Forget your perfect offering</em></span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="color: rgb(64, 64, 64);"><em>There is a crack, a crack in everything</em></span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="color: rgb(64, 64, 64);"><em>That's how the light gets in<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></em></span><em><span class="Apple-converted-space"></span></em></p>

To let the light in

<p>"You are what you eat"</p>
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<p>What we eat and what nurtures us has two distinct sides, the material and the energetics. We do a good job of materializing everything, almost to the point of digression. We reduce things all the way down to isolated compounds and disregard the rest, failing to realize that there is a complex system that likely works together. I have come to understand that the things we consume and surround ourselves with are energetic imprints in addition to the material, that send signals to our system that are equally important to say iron, calcium etc. </p>
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<p>With this thought it's hard to look at our food systems the same. While I actually very much admire the productivity and efficiency of commercial agriculture, you have to wonder what the energetic imprint of the material produced through that system communicates to our bodies. </p>
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<p>With cows for instance, what signals does a cow raised commercially send to your system? For the most part, meat you buy at the market comes from animals who were <meta charset="utf-8">likely harvested less then a year old, kept in confined spaces, fed grain, weaned too early, fed hay produced with chemical fertilizers, given preemptive vaccines and antibiotics, sometimes given steroids and chemical salt. </p>
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<p>To me this is not what I want to imprint my being with, even if chemically it is deemed healthy. What I want to imprint my being with is an animal that has had a good life, who has grown enough to have all their hormones, to have had babies, to have accumulated the nutrients from the food that they eat. This all is what led me to raising our own cattle in such a specific way. While it goes against the commercial model, we can't imagine it any other way. </p>
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<p>Here is a collection of the forage that is growing in our "vega" pasture situated at 7,600 ft elevation. It is the material and energetics that build strong healthy animals that go towards making us strong and healthy. </p>
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<p>Find meat from our landrace criollo cattle for pick up at our <a href="/bake-sale">weekly Saturday Bake Sales</a> until sold out. Generally available summer and winter. Or learn more about our cattle <a href="/criollo-cattle">here</a>.</p>
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Energetics of our food

<p>Each spring, those of us in the high desert of Northern New Mexico territory eagerly anticipate the opening of La acequia madre after months of splitting wood and building fires to keep us warm. Now on any given day when passing through a small mountain town you can see the pastures glistening in the sun as they are flooded by diverted river water from acequia's (ditches) that were dug hundreds of years ago and that are still utilized by the communities. There is a hardly a sight that carries more excitement of all the possibilities to come than this one. </p>
<p>I am grateful to come from a place, for many generations, that still grasps a particular culture, <meta charset="utf-8">even if it's preserved in part because of poverty. It's not something that can not be created and comes largely from humans living for so long with mother earth so intimately. </p>
<p>Though the culture here feels more present than most places, I do feel like we are witnessing the end it, at least in some form or another. I always like to remember though, "Culture isn’t preserved, it’s created". It is an ever morphing embodiment of our spirits and actions. Each day, whether we like it or not, we are creating the culture that will come after us.</p>
<p>As I watch the sun start to awaken the world outside my window in anticipation to grab the shovel and to go participate in being one of those fields glistening in the sun I would like to share an article I came across on the acequia cleaning ritual that I am so lucky to get to be part of by Rudy Montoya.</p>
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<h1 class="entry-title">La Saca y la Limpia: Some Thoughts on a Springtime Practice, Ritual and Rite of Passage  </h1>
<p><span>La primavera brings with it the sights and sounds of work crews and officials walking the easements of locals acequias. The workers file into a line inside the acequia canal and the Mayordoma/o or </span><i><span>rayador </span></i><span>mark the individual work duties or </span><i><span>tareas</span></i><span>. The </span><i><span>peones</span></i><span> with </span><i><span>palas</span></i><span>, chainsaws and rakes clear debris and remove silt, sand, rocks, and cut back and burn overgrown grasses and </span><i><span>jaras</span></i><span> that have impeded the canal since last year. The purpose of this work is to have a clean and clear pathway so that the main diversion point headgate can be opened and water can be brought into the community. In some acequia communities this spring time practice is called </span><i><span>la limpia</span></i><span> which involves removing debris. There is also a more labor intensive form called </span><i><span>la saca</span></i><span> that describes the digging out of the sand and silt from the causeway of the water.                                                              </span><span><br></span><span></span></p>
<p><span>These work days on many acequias are traditionally understood as </span><i><span>tequios</span></i><span> or work days for the benefit of the community. The tequio focused on community cooperation and mutual aid. The word tequio comes originally from the nahuatl languages of mesoamerica meaning communal labor or tribute. In many NM acequia communities parciantes or members were expected to send laborers on the days of the saca. This was often seen as a rite of passage as it was often the first public job younger men were to take up in their community. It served as a rite of passage as their status into adulthood was marked by their work contributing to the wellbeing of the cohesion of the </span><i><span>placita</span></i><span>. If the family did not have kin who could fulfill this responsibility they could contract with a day laborer or </span><i><span>peón</span></i><span>. </span><span>Women also had the duty on these days of providing meals for the workers. </span></p>
<p><span>During the 1930s as men left New Mexico as migrant workers to the neighboring states of Wyoming, Utah, California and Colorado many women took up the management of the farms. They often were tasked to contract out peones to clean the main acequias. However, during this time, as the men were away, women often took up the responsibility to clean their own family’s lateral ditches or </span><i><span>enfrentes</span></i><span> and prepare and tend to kitchen gardens near the </span><i><span>resolana</span></i><span> of the home as well as in some cases the larger fields. In addition to these responsibilities the communal construction work of replastering which was also a tequio and structural maintenance on the home was often the role of women. The 1930’s saw a shift in gender roles on the ranchitos as women who did a majority or oversaw the management of subsistence agriculture as well as animal herding were known during this era prior to WWII as </span><i><span>las mujerotas</span></i><span> or strong women. Today many women hold positions within acequias as Commissioners and Mayordomas. In some communities, the space of the Limpia in some communities is becoming desegregated as women also participate in this springtime ritual. </span></p>
<p><span>Today the practice of the community limpia is waning as acequias with limited resources have difficulty contracting day laborers. In some areas the acequia officials have opted to commercially contract out this work to firms who use machinery such as tractors and backhoes. As this occurs the connection the community has with each other and to the natural world around them also wanes. The importance involved in the tequio is not only physical labor or economical, it also involves a communal spiritual practice which is essential for community health. Its key is to contextualize these practices as movement, cleansing, prayer as well as communitas and conviviality among neighbors as a rite of passage for younger members to contribute to the maintenance of the cultural commons and becoming adults on their way towards becoming acequia citizens or parciantes.                            </span></p>
<p><span>Typically, these practices happen during the same time that religious observances of</span><i><span> la cuaresma </span></i><span>or lent, where the community and individuals are focused on the preparation for Good Friday and Easter. Often it is a time of solemnity, fasting, purification and or cleansing. At the start of lent with Ash Wednesday rites we are reminded that our bodies are of the earth and will return to the Earth. Throughout the Americas as with many acequia communities beliefs and practices go beyond the orthodoxy of the Church and encompass aspects of animism that the natural world is understood as a living extension of the body. Acequias are seen as channels of life bringing energy. The limpia is a practice that clears away the obstructions and hindrances of the life forces that flow and bring substance to the people. It’s a preparation clearing the pathways for energy for rebirth.</span><span><br></span><span></span></p>
<p><span>It is interesting to ponder the parallel to the Chicana/o/x and Indo Hispano Religious and spiritual practices of curanderismo that also has a practice called la limpia. In this context la limpia is energy work grounded in preparation and clearing the channels of the individual’s body, mind and spirit of ill will, and negative energy. In the acequia it is the same as workers clear out the irrigation channel for the water, the lifeblood of the community. The acequia is an extension of our own bodies and the connection with the land and its body. It is in this aspect that the limpia has an important role in the cohesion of the community. It ties us together and as we work together we share the sweat of our brow with our </span><i><span>vecinas/os/xs.</span></i><span> In working together we are not alone as the dicho states, </span><i><span>entre más manos el trabajo es menos</span></i><span>. </span></p>
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Welcoming the water

<p>I begin working with clay while still running the kitchen at Saison in San Francisco in 2016 or so. Like I've probably mentioned in previous thoughts, this job was no easy task and I gave myself to it 100+%. The shift into spending off time, which was limited,  on ceramics came from the inner desire to begin creating what my practice was going to be in the future. It's sweet to look back on it as it's been almost 10 years now as it was seemingly a whole other life time ago. </p>
<p>A little disheartened with restaurants in general and their lack of intimacy with the narratives they had laid out in narrative to the public, I was eager to create something where I could have a hand in every aspect as possible. Something that possessed a single spirit. As the years go by and that spirit I sought to create exists, we add more and more to that list. We are closer than we have ever been, but also have a long ways to go still. </p>
<p>The first step in this to be project, was solidified with the idea of working with clay to make the vessels in which my food was served on. As the idea ruminated, I came across the work of Carole Neilson, who was making porcelain that was post firing smoked with organic material. She was a pioneer in this style, something you didn't see anywhere else, except now you do. Her work reminded me of the ceramics made from where I grew up, Tu-ah-tah (Taos Pueblo) but were drastically different. In meeting her I quickly asked if she would teach me and she quickly and enthusiastically agreed. We went on to spending many days off together working on clay and sharing a meal and delicious wines that her husband David would pick out. These memories I hold dear to my heart. While looking back, I can see all the seeds being planted for what would become / shed. </p>
<p>After a year or so of working on clay with clay I decided to leave the restaurant, start / shed, and move back home my brother Brandon had been working with clay also, but while I had only commercial clays he had been working with wild clays, especially micaceous which is the vernacular clay of where we grew up comprised of broken down mica, sandstone, rose quartz, and pink feldspar. After having the relization to work with the clay of where I come from, I never touched commercial clay again.</p>
<p>At the same time this all was sprouting, with the desire to grow food that I would be able to cook with I was reading a lot about agriculture from the likes of Wendell Barry, Rudolph Steiner, <meta charset="utf-8"><span>Henry David Thoreau, </span>and <meta charset="utf-8"><span>Masanobu Fukuoka. These souls impacted me deeply, or maybe rather resonated with my views already. However I found myself looking at everything through a different lense. </span></p>
<p><span>As my clay practice became more of a focus I begin to experiment with energetic components of the firings, firing on new moons for example. My firings have always been done in the traditional way, in a pit, and often to my detriment, but the shift into connecting with the cosmos was a big shift for me. </span></p>
<p><span>Me and my mother used to spend lots of time in nature, collecting Staurlites, hunting for cota flowers, or spending the day in natural hot springs. Of the many things she taught me, one of the more impactful was to always say thank you. It is something I have kept with me ever since and for the longest time I would do so without really wondering why, which I did about everything else funny enough. But as I begin to dig deeper into the energetics of a firing I begin to dissect it a little. What I found was that maybe the external doesn't hear us when we say thank you, but you do. We are energetic beings sharing and absorbing energies contently and in the practice of being thankful we are creating more reverence for the natural world in our every interaction, likely sharing that with those we come in connection with. </span></p>
<p><span>I write this in reflection on my latest new moon firing on January 13th 2025. Not only was it the new moon, but it was snowing for the first time in months, which felt like a blessing even though I usually try to avoid firing in the snow. I had made work for my friend Evan Kinori, and my wife Maida and daughter Flora were present as always. As I split cedar palitos and watched the coals build up the two of them collected dried juniper and ground blue corn we had grown to say thank you. As the snow covered the sky we offered our offerings and said thanks and begin the firing. </span></p>
<p><span>My 'thanks' or prayer, whatever it might be called, is usually said in private and is different each time. This time it was something like this: </span><span></span></p>
<p><span>Ta-ah (thank you in tiwa) mother earth for sharing your beauties with me, I am endlessly grateful to be a witness and steward of the magic you offer. Please share your magic with me tonight through this fire, into these vessels, so that I may share with others your constant and overwhelming beauties.</span></p>

New moon firings

<p>This summer felt like one of the quickest and busiest we've experienced so far. To be honest it usually always feels that way, but this year Flora Ines was in our lives and having a little less physical help from Maida made a big difference. This is all to say that this was one of the most, if not the most, beautiful yet, just not an easy one.</p>
<p>July is usually one of the craziest months for us and we had scheduled a few dinners in between processing hay and the hundred other summer tasks. Mid month we received a message from Ellery asking if we would be interested in a shoot with Tacovas for a short video series she was conceiving called 'A day in the west' where we would be the first video. The date they had proposed was just after a string of dinners and was on Maidas birthday, so we were reluctant at first, but felt really good about the concept so we agreed to spend a day around the ranch with the team. </p>
<p>The day started with sunrise coffee at our house where we got to meet the team and explain what tasks for the day needed to be done. We spent the day working and playing. We fed cows, fired some of my clay work, swam at our favorite swimming hole, picked clover and wild onion, y mas. </p>
<p>I can honestly say that day with these guys felt like spending time with old friends and we couldn't be more proud of seeing our hard work and intentions captured so beautifully. </p>
<p>Thank you Tacovas and the beautiful group of individuals you sent to capture a day in our life</p>
<p><span style="color: #ff2a00;"><meta charset="utf-8"> <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HklbhTT0Co" style="color: #ff2a00;"><span>→ </span>WATCH HERE</a></span></p>
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A day in the west with Tacovas

/ shed in MARFA TX

<div data-mce-fragment="1" style="text-align: left;" data-mce-style="text-align: left;">The Horno oven is an important tool of the desert southwest, vernacular to each location in style and material. Traditionally an horno is made of small mud bricks that are made of the earth where the horno was built with the addition of straw from grain harvest. Originally from the Iberian peninsula and adopted by the Spanish from the Moorish people and carried to all Spanish occupied lands, the horno made its way here to New Mexico and surrounding areas. It’s hard to imagine that the indigenous peoples of this area didn’t already cook in mud already, but the method of building and stacking bricks became the common practice. In New Mexico to this day you still see hornos of various qualities scatted through both old Spanish and Pueblo settlements, some still used, some turning back into the soil. </div>
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<div data-mce-fragment="1" style="text-align: left;" data-mce-style="text-align: left;">Henrietta, an elder at Taos Pueblo, my preschool teacher and a dear dear friend once described the horno to me as a woman. She spoke to how they all unique with different needs that need to be understood before using. To use an horno you must be intimate with her, no two are the same or should be treated the same and that it takes time to learn such needs. </div>
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<div data-mce-fragment="1" style="text-align: left;" data-mce-style="text-align: left;">We're honored to be part of this culture still and to keep it going through practices like building adobes and hornos from the soil we inhabit, especially for friends. This horno was built for Ballroom Marfa at Capri restaurant in Marfa TX using soil from Northern NM for the bricks and plaster and soil from Marfa TX for the mortar. </div>
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<div data-mce-fragment="1" style="text-align: left;" data-mce-style="text-align: left;">Some exciting news on us using the horno and the beautiful space at Capri coming soon. </div>
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<p data-mce-fragment="1" class="p1"><strong>↓ 35mm photos by Johnny &amp; Maida </strong></p>
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BUILDING AN HORNO FOR BALLROOM MARFA

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<p class="p1">¬ I get lost, from time to time, wondering about my ancestors and all the things that have been built up from their time to now, and those that no longer remain. Things that have been forgotten like a feral adobe exposed to the elements. Times there are semblances of objects or memories that give me more info and paint a picture better. Sometimes it's just a curiosity that may never be fully understood. </p>
<p class="p1">I feel that my ancestors far enough back lived underground, in something like what we know of today as kivas. It seems to me, that maybe they’re seen as the sacred spaces because they were once our homes.  </p>
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<p class="p1">Regardless of that being true or not, the people I come from have been living from and in the earth they were on for centuries. One of the ways that has lasted and is still present current day is the use of making mud bricks (adobes). The history goes that the Spanish had brought the technique of forming the mud brick to the new world, something they gleaned while the moorish occupied Spain. Though the adobe is an original a ‘Spanish’ practice, many of the ruins pre-contact are made solely of stone -  the practice of building with mud is timeless.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p2">With the practices and ways of life and sheltering it that have been lost, the adobe remains. The smell of dry dirt, sifted and soaking with water to soon become a brick is still one of my favorite smells. It reminds me of the mud plaster and dirt roof at my grandfathers house after a rain, or witnessing my father build his own home of mud while I skateboarded around the concrete foundations. Being a child playing in fresh mud, or the taste of bread baked in a mud oven with a mud floor (horno).<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p1">Despite the countless memories and feelings mud of northern New Mexico bring to me, it's hard to overlook how beautiful this practice of building shelter of the earth is. Especially when that earth was shaped with your hands, each component set with intention.</p>
<div style="text-align: left;"><img style="float: none;" alt="" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/000006860003.jpg?v=1683905301"></div>
<p class="p2">Traditionally, while building an adobe home one would use the materials present in their location. Making their own bricks and plaster from what ever soil was present. In the village we live in if you look at each home with adobes exposed each one is different. Some have lots of rocks, some with sharper corners being mostly clay and lots of straw or wheat shaft, some with round edges and full of sand. Some of dark soil some of light, some with charcoal chunks.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<div style="text-align: left;"><img style="float: none;" alt="" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/000006860005.jpg?v=1683905321"></div>
<p class="p1">It could be argued that there is such a thing as a perfect adobe and that that should be the standard for building, but isn’t it endlessly more beautiful to think that each home could be made of the unique qualities of the specific terrain they are on. The same goes for the plaster, if the dirt was red and the mountains that surround it, so would be the house.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p1">I could wax on about aesthetic qualities and the feeling that mud structures bring me, but at the end of it all it's also extremely practical.</p>
<div style="text-align: left;"><img style="float: none;" alt="" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/000006860004.jpg?v=1683905351"></div>
<p class="p1">Mud breaths, allowing air to flow in and out, providing clean air flow. Being made of mostly clay, adobes are fireproof, biodegradable, non toxic, and remotely water resistant. If the walls are built thick enough the biomass will keep the house cool in the summer and warm in the winter with south facing windows/fireplace, while also providing sound proofing and blocking emfs. Most of all though, mud bricks are something anyone can make and the things built from them become an extension of ourselves. At Taos Pueblo, each horno is talked about as feminine and in a way that intimacy with your horno is imperative as they are all unique and need specific love.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p1">The bricks we are making in the photos are made all by hand of mud from the terrain we inhabit of northern New Mexico, with straw, and water, dried in the sun. I’m not at the point of building a structure quite yet, so we have been making two sizes and one will soon become the horno and the other larger brick will be used for our courtyard wall of our future dinner space. The bricks with indents are from our house lambs who love to jump all over the fresh bricks. </p>
<div style="text-align: left;"><img style="float: none;" alt="" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/000006860006.jpg?v=1683905367"></div>
<p class="p1">I'm proud each time I lift the frame from a batch of bricks and the bricks comes out smooth, honored to be able to take part of such a special practice the is intertwined with who and where I am from.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<div style="text-align: left;"><img style="float: none;" alt="" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/000006860008.jpg?v=1683905389"></div>
<p class="p1"> ADOBE SIZES </p>
<p class="p1">↓</p>
<p class="p1">TRADTIONAL HORNO - 4" x 5" x 7"<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p1">STANDARD - 4” x 10" x 14"</p>

ADOBES

<p class="p1">¬ We raise landrace churro sheep, and while great for meat, these words are in reverence of their fleece. </p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">Churro sheep, originally '<span data-mce-fragment="1">Churra', name meaning “scrub”, is more of a landrace ( mutt ) than a breed, <meta charset="utf-8">brought to the 'New world' in 1598 by the Spanish explorer Juan de Onate. They were brought with over other Spanish breeds because they were thought to be the  lesser breed, unlike the Merino, and we're willing to loose them. </span></p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1"><span data-mce-fragment="1">After being introduced, and over hundreds of years the sheep became the endemic sheep to Spanish and Native peoples of the desert southwest, despite deliberate attempts to eradicate the sheep. Through out this time the sheep adapted to the terrain and has become its own unique creature, and while almost losing them still persist. </span></p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1"><span data-mce-fragment="1">It's important to remember that when we label things we begin to limit our understanding of them. This is especially true for the churro, being a 'landrace' means that the complexities are vast and complicated. The label churro has warrant, but there are at least two groups of churros being raised and groups within those groups. The two main groups being the landrace churro &amp; the modern churro. There are a few distinctions between the two, but the main one in regards to the fiber they provide is the prevalence of 'kemp'.</span></p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1"><span data-mce-fragment="1">The landrace sheep carry a hollow fiber called kemp, found in the fleeces of the most primitive sheep around the world. It is a hard, brittle, opaque, medullated fiber (possessing a core of air filled cells<em data-mce-fragment="1">)</em>. It is usually coarser and much shorter than the wool fibers with which it is associated. After growing for a limited time, it is shed and frequently lies loose in the fleece. Being hollow, the fiber acts as an insulator that helps in protecting the sheep in extreme conditions, which is important for a sheep inhabiting the arid conditions of the desert. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span data-mce-fragment="1">Kemp while being a major tool to the survival of these sheep has also become looked down on because of the slight coarseness of the fiber, hence the beginning of the modern churro which is bred to have a 'softer wool' that has as little kemp as possible. We have actually found in specific genetics some sheep with high kemp actually have a high luster and soft feel. I can imagine a time where shepherds having hundreds of sheep and an intimate relationship with them could separate various textures of the wool for various needs. Soft of clothing, coarse for rugs, and so on.  </span></p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">"Nature isn't efficient, it is abundant." Anytime I look to a healthy ecosystem there is always diversity leading to abundance, and with the sheep it feels the same way. The non modern churro holds the stories of the past, and to us it is important to embrace that rather than try and change it to fit another need. For us the material always dictates the use, not the other way around. The fiber from these sheep are naturally colored that are extremely durable, insulate, full of luster, and adsorbing ( even when wet, feels dry ) </p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">May/June usually is time for us to shear the sheep as the threat of late frosts has past in our high desert village. Once sheared we take the wool to the only Mill west of the Mississippi in Mora NM to get spun and use the yarn for various projects. This year we will be offering a limited amount as yarn. </p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">LINKS:</p>
<p class="p1"><a href="/recuerdos/wool-processing-mora-nm" data-mce-href="/recuerdos/wool-processing-mora-nm">→<span> Past '</span>Recuerdo' on processing in Mora</a></p>
<p class="p1"><a href="/product/wool-yarn">→ Our wool available in our 'Mercado' </a></p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<div style="text-align: left;"><img style="float: none;" alt="" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/1_f021ad00-4050-4a22-a92d-eaa54dc7e3a6.jpg?v=1684462344"></div>
<p> </p>

Churro ( fiber )

<p data-mce-fragment="1" class="p1">In my early 20’s, after a few years of working at the restaurants Alinea in Chicago and The Willow's inn in WA, I worked in San Francisco as a sous chef at the restaurant Saison. I had joined the team as they were opening their brick and mortar space and in the span of 4 years time we earned three Michelin stars and a place on the top 100 list. To say it was hard work would be an understatement, though mostly self imposed, I was inseparable from the place.<span data-mce-fragment="1" class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p data-mce-fragment="1" class="p2"> </p>
<p data-mce-fragment="1" class="p1">On my days off, between the necessities, I would spend it exploring art, food, and the terrain of the coast. The concept of a dinner series came to me while exploring the de young museum seeing art broken up in series of works.<span data-mce-fragment="1" class="Apple-converted-space"> I loved the idea of dinners being unique to a series, unlike the familiar pop up style. </span>It wasn't long after leaving Saison I started / shed 'a dinner series' and was excited for all the possibilities.</p>
<p data-mce-fragment="1" class="p1"> </p>
<p data-mce-fragment="1" class="p1">This time in San Francisco was booming and there was abundance everywhere, especially in the food world. I loved the beautiful publications that were just coming out at that time and was inspired to invoke that spirit into my project. ( kinfolk, cereal, wilder, gather, y mas ). This is where the membership + sharing of information concept was formed.<span data-mce-fragment="1" class="Apple-converted-space"> I dreamed of making a 'journal' that would be in print and would share about each series and how I could tie that in with a membership model. An ongoing  sharing of the work and intentions behind it. Once starting / shed however, I quickly knew it needed to be back home in NM and I quickly made the move and put such things on hold. </span></p>
<p data-mce-fragment="1" class="p1"> </p>
<p data-mce-fragment="1" class="p1"><span data-mce-fragment="1" class="Apple-converted-space">Though this inspiration never took place as it's initial seed, it has been a driving force in the work that I do. / shed isn't a restaurant and it's impossible to capture it's ethos from merely a dinner. It's an ecosystem of forces that hide in the daily practices. Our subscription is an attempt at sharing and honoring these forces, and through it comes our first publication. </span></p>
<p data-mce-fragment="1" class="p2"> </p>
<p data-mce-fragment="1" class="p1">This book is an attempt at capturing our path to authenticity and words that guide our every action.<span data-mce-fragment="1" class="Apple-converted-space"> A book of 'Dichos' ( phrases ) that can be looked to daily. </span>It’s been years in the making and hours of printing and binding. We’re thrilled to finally share it with you all.</p>
<p data-mce-fragment="1" class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1"><a href="/product/ethos-book">→ 'ethos' - first printing</a></p>

'ethos'

<p>Brandon, our sister Allysa and I were lucky to grow up with two amazing parents, though young and relatively poor ( 16-17 years old ). We spent many of those early years moving from house to house. We lived in low income housing projects, mobile homes, in grandmas house, the women's shelter, and my grandfathers house on Taos Pueblo. My parents were together 12 years, and for my later childhood years we split the week between the two of them. All three of us were four years apart so in a way we were all close but also independent. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>I'm fortunate as the oldest to have witnessed the golden years of my parents relationship. Brandon being the middle child had a slightly different experience than I. Looking back, it has always felt like he liked being in the middle. He has always been the <meta charset="utf-8"><span data-mce-fragment="1">the empathetic one, the </span>peace maker.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>I have always been ultra competitive and <meta charset="utf-8"><span data-mce-fragment="1">Brandon unseemly so. He would always keep up with me. W</span>hen I moved away after high school is when he entered and joined football, becoming homecoming king his senior year. Everyone has always loved his ever present warm spirit. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>After leaving Taos I was engulfed in my work in the restaurants I was at and would see my family once a year for Christmas and that was pretty much it, maybe a call or two here and there. Brandon and I pretty much had very little connection <meta charset="utf-8"><span data-mce-fragment="1">after I left</span>. I was around the country working 16 hours a day in restaurants and he was pulling all nighters in architectural school.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>I moved back in 2017 and was making ceramics for a year or so before that and when I reconnected with Brandon we realized we were both working with clay. I was working with a friend who specialized in porcelain so that's what I was using and he had taken a class about wild clay so he was playing with micaceous clay which was the clay from our ancestors at Taos Pueblo. It flipped a switch in my brain and I never touched porcelain again. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>We both dig from the same terrain, and use relatively the same practice but our work is pretty different. It's so sweet to see how unique his work is to him and how much we have both evolved since then. We love to use his bowls for our dinners, at home, and to now offer them through the 'Mercado' ( market ). </p>
<p> </p>
<p class="p1"><a href="/product/da-kuh-neh-daily-bowls">→ Dah-kuh-neh 'Daily bowls </a></p>
<p> <img data-mce-fragment="1" alt="" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/Dah-kuh-nehbowl_480x480.jpg?v=1708962544" data-mce-src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/Dah-kuh-nehbowl_480x480.jpg?v=1708962544"></p>

Dah-kuh-neh ( Brandon Ortiz )

<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">Yesterday was a day dedicated to organizing and binding the / shed ‘ethos’ book, more on that to come soon, and in pretty full flow I hear the dogs barking outside, usually because someone is here. I go out side and find Sebedeo Chacon waiting to have a word with me. I greet him and he greets me back politely and asks if I have a chain he can borrow. They’ve gotten stuck in the mud down the road in Rancho de los Trujillos - pulling in to round up their bull that has been finding his way through the village and upsetting some neighbors. The bull had been kicked out of our field just a couple days before. I have a chain and I offer bring it and my truck to lend a hand.</p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">The stopping of viejos in front of our home to say hello is an unpredictable occasion. Often we find ourselves feeding cows, flooding our fields, cutting hay or some other outdoor activity to be stopped by some viejo who tells us stories, shares gossip, or asks for help. The time line of this generation is on a totally different pace than ours. We are always trying to finish everything as quickly as possible to get to the next thing, and when we can hear the loud truck or four wheeler coming towards us we have a hard time being totally excited for the chance of spending an hour talking about who knows what. Funny enough though I can’t think of a single time I’ve regretted it. The stories these guys have aren’t written or filmed, it is a culture that has evolved with and from the high desert terrain of Northern New Mexico that has been mixed with primarily old mother Spain and old Native customs, both of which make up me and Maida’s blood and generational DNA. I generally leave one of these interactions invigorated. It’s invigorating to actually be part of a community, not one fabricated or designed, but one formed solely by proximity and common practice. One where I don’t hesitate to ask for help, nor give it.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">This interaction with Sebedeo was particularly special.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">After offering a hand I went back inside, stoked the fire, put on my boots, and jumped in the truck. It’s still winter and though sunny is still cold, but today the sun felt more spring like. I drove down the muddy dirt road, perfect adobe mud, and over the old wooden bridge to see the truck and stock trailer stuck. There were two guys with Sebedeo that I hadn’t formally met yet, but we all recognized each other from driving up and down the same road. I back up to their truck and when going to attach the chain realize I didn’t have my hitch so the two guys scrounged through their trucks to find one. When they found one there was not pin so we found a bolt, put it on as much as we could and hoped it would work. We are at least an hour away from any store so you can generally count on someone up here having what ever could be needed on their person or land. Me with the chain, the guys with the hitch.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">I pulled them out easily and when I jumped out of the truck and Sebedeo said “that’s not a truck, that’s a caterpillar”. A compliment from this guys is a big deal. Sebedeo once told me, “nice fence. You’re the only one who knows how to build a fence around here.” And that one is still to this day one of my proudest moments. My job was done, and Sebedeo asked how much he owed me, I said nothing, maybe just a helping hand next time I needed one but he gave me a 20 anyway. I accepted and offered to stick around in case there was another issue. As the younger of the men was trying to back the truck and trailer up I noticed that our bull, we had been missing him for a few days, he was in with Sebedeo’s cows so we rounded him up also and took him back to our place.</p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">The younger man tried to drive back onto the bridge on his own accord, he jack knifed, rear tire almost sliding off the bridge. Sebedeo yelled some things in Spanish then asked if I would pull them back up, and I did. We stopped pretty quickly after hoping he could just drive forward again. I released the chain and got out. Right when the younger man started the truck Sebedeo yelled in his vernacular ‘norteno’ accent, “what are you guys thinking, put stuff under the tires!” Both guys didn’t seem fazed or to really listen. I joined and put cottonwood bark underneath. - He got out and then there was a debate, the older of the two men said “we’ll just come back tomorrow”, Sebedeo said “no were already here, we’re going to take the damn bull”. I suggested how about they drive back to the main road and come back in head first and that was what they did.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">While the younger of the two men drove it back I stood with Sebedeo by the corral. He asked me if I was selling any hay, and I told him I had just sold his brother a couple hundred and might have some still if he needed any. Then he asked if I wanted to buy a horse. We have been wanting a horse to add to the ranch, especially for when we have to push cows up and down the road. I asked how much, he told me $1,500, and I said maybe we trade for hay and he nodding his head intrigued. I said that I have been wanting a horse but haven’t gotten one because I don’t want to get the wrong one and asked about his and why he was selling her. He said he had too many and he’s getting too old. “I have 5 race horses and 2 mountain horses, this one is a mountain horse.” It’s interesting, I have never heard an older ‘norteno’ call an animal by their name, I don’t think they name them ever. It makes me think of a story in our favorite book ‘River of Traps’ - Jacobo didn’t name his horses because he feels their not his, they are their own being. He responds when asked “I suppose they don’t have a name for me either”.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">Sebedeo whistles to the older of the two men and says “get on the horse and show Johnny it’s a good horse.” And the man gets on easily and rides around with ease and starts separating the bulls while the other man backed up the the corrals.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">I jumped in to help and our bull came right up to me and in to the trailer, his followed, but because we wanted to unload ours first I pushed ours back out and locked theirs in the back. When I got out of the trailer our bull got spooked and jumped over the 5 foot corral. We all ran to get him back in, me in front, the older man on the horse and the younger man between the other cows. He went back in pretty easily and once we locked him in the younger man said “daddy" in a way that felt like his family has been saying it that way since they came from Spain hundreds of years ago, and I realized they were his sons.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">His sons moved trucks around and Sebedeo and I leaned against the corral talking. I said that I have been wanting to catch a wild colt from the mountains and train it and asked if he ever done that. He said “oh yeah, I have done a lot of that when I was younger. Me and my brothers used to get the job from the forest service to do it. Once I caught 18 in one day, I can’t believe I’m still alive. I used to run all over these mountains.” I asked about the horse he wanted to sell me and he told me all the guys who had owned her before him and that she was just a mutt from all the horses around here. I asked about his forest grazing permits and he started recalling to me all of the issues he had with them over the years and said “everyone thinks they are permits, but they aren’t, they are rights, rights given to use before New Mexico was even a state. The forest service likes to think they own them but they don’t they are ours. They are just the care takers” I ask about where his ‘rights’ are and he says “I graze my cows on that side of the mountain ( east ) and my brother Alfonso grazes his on this side ( west ).<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">His sons had loaded up and was ready to go and Sebedeo said, “you know this place is changing. Everyone here used to be a cowboy. Everyone used to have cows and horses.” We exchange a few more words and he heads to his truck loaded with the two bulls and Jeff the younger son comes over and asks me what kind of beer I like, I say commercially I like Budweiser, he says no what’s your favorite local beer, and I say La Cumbre Elevated and he says “Okay, next time I’ll bring you some of that, I like that one too.”<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">As we’re talking Sebedeo zooms through the field down the muddy turn and onto the bridge perfectly and Jeff says “they don’t make those 84 year old cowboys any more” and I chuckle and say “they sure don’t. It’s nice that you guys are keeping it going though” and he says “yeah, we’ll see for how long”. We shake hands and he grabs the horse and I get in the truck and head out while he closes gates.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">It’s an unbelievable honor to be part of and to witness this culture I come from and to aid in its continuance. It is at the same time sad they don’t make them like Sebedeo anymore, and that his sons are active in the life but don’t love it as he does. I love it though. Maybe that’s because I found it on my own, maybe it's because it's just in my blood.</p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">I chose this life and had to build it from scratch. Every day it takes work to maintain and with almost no financial return, but each day feeding everyone, fixing fences, cutting or stacking hay, moving water, random chats with the viejos, and all the other daily chaos with my family Maida and Flora, I wouldn’t trade any of it for anything.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">I use the phrase “Create the world you wish existed” and sometimes that means participating in maintaining and evolving the perfect one that already exists.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>

THEY DON'T MAKE 84 YEAR OLD COWBOYS LIKE THAT ANYMORE

<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">Ocote is New Mexico’s ‘palo santo’. It is a resinous pine, once struck by lighting or under some other distress, caused the tree to fill itself with resin to heal. Over time the tree dies and because of its resin does not rot.</p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">Yearly we make the trek to gather Ocote for fire starter and ‘inceinso’ in the deep mountains of Northern NM. I like to hike far, up rocky mountains far from roads to find the best and oldest logs. There are easier ways to start a fire these days, but we love to quote, "Your life is the medicine", and there just isn't much better medicine than gathering ocote in the woods, especially covered in snow. It is a quest in search of nature to sustain our bodies and spirits. The trek to find ocote is part of what makes it so special.</p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">If you have ever been to the Taos Pueblo Christmas bonfires you know the intoxicating, slightly sweet aroma that the black pitch smoke produces. If you haven't it is perhaps too hard to explain and you will need to experience it when you can. What can be explained though is that this wood, is as useful as it is beautiful. It can be used daily in the cold months to start your fire, in your survival kit, or used daily to set intention. </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1"><meta charset="utf-8"><small data-mce-fragment="1">→</small> You can find Ocote bundles and ocote holders made of pit fired wild micaceous clay in our <a href="/mercado">MERCADO</a>. </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1"><meta charset="utf-8"><small data-mce-fragment="1">→</small> You can also watch our latest process video of Johnny harvesting Ocote filmed by Maida in <a href="/recuerdos">RECUERDOS</a></p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>

OCOTE ( words )

CHASING THE BLOOM

<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1">As you might know Maida and I had a baby girl, Florá Inés, a couple months ago and the only way to describe the experience of late is pure magic.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p3" data-mce-fragment="1">I woke this morning exploring the thought of magic in my waking dream state, and thought I would write a little about it. <meta charset="utf-8"><span data-mce-fragment="1">There exists variations of magic, but the</span> magic I’m talking about is the infinite beauties beyond comprehension around us constantly, unlike the common view of magic that is of tricks and slight of hand.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p3" data-mce-fragment="1">As a young man getting interested in food I was enamored and blown away by restaurant’s like where I worked at, Alinea, who where creating magic in settings commonly reserved for simply having a meal. As a 19 year old in that kitchen it felt like I had joined the army, but I always felt surrounded by magic. I now wonder if it’s just me getting older or if restaurants have lost their magic. I haven’t been blown away by a food experience in a while and maybe it’s the situation of me knowing too much about the world itself, but part of me feels that the common understanding of magic and trickery has become how things are created these days. New things open that feel formulaic and variations of something else and I can’t help but think that there is a lack of seeing the magic around us.</p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p3" data-mce-fragment="1">When I think about why we go out to eat, I believe that at the very heart of it all we are looking for the feeling of being taken care of, like at grandmas house as a kid where you could have anything and everything. There is a reason grandma’s chile, or whatever grandmas make, always taste better. For me grandma Mary’s house was a place where in hindsight the objective and practical world didn’t exist, only  an ever flowing amount of love and magic.</p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p3" data-mce-fragment="1">/ shed wasn’t built on this realization, but has slowly been evolving in that direction. In all it’s stages though / shed has been a means of finding, creating, and sharing the magic of the natural world and specifically of Northern NM.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p3" data-mce-fragment="1">The key it seems is to be perceptive of the magic already present around us. On our ‘estancia’ ( a landed estate, cattle ranch, a place of rest ) we are bombarded with daily tasks that can quickly become daunting if we aren’t careful. There is always a moment where I stop and realize that despite the hard work at hand, how actually mind blowing it is that I even exist much less have the opportunity to do work that I deeply enjoy. The fact that the trees around us are breathing in carbon and expelling oxygen for us to breath, or that someone invented barbed wire and the tools to mend it and that I can drive to almost any town and buy a perfect role of it in itself is pretty wild. The fact that I can have a personal relationship with such beautiful creatures such as our cows, and that I can help the grass grow by diverted river water to feed them, and that when time comes they will nurture us. The list could literally could go on and on infinitely.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p3" data-mce-fragment="1"><span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1"> </span></p>
<p class="p3" data-mce-fragment="1"><span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1">Magic can't be rushed either. One of the natural magics I am most blown away with is the fruiting process. The mature tree who has survived and flourished starts with buds that will blossom when timing is right. Then the insects come at exactly the right moment and pollinate bringing pollen from another tree after which the flowers start their process in becoming fruits. In any stage of this process if you were to pull apart the bud there would be no flower no fruit. The fact that this whole process just happens is pretty fucking insane if you really think about it, not to mention the fact that there are infinite potentials after the fruit has been created. The magic is there, we just need to be present and patient. </span></p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p3" data-mce-fragment="1">The truth is that magic exists in an overflowing state around us if we see it as such. Just as easily it can become the opposite. Without the lens to see it, the magic of existence can become mundane. As I write this I am watching the sun rays move over our pasture as the cows follow to warm themselves after a cold night as they graze the freshly perked up grass. I realize that magic is a practice, and one that I hope to continue to get better at.</p>
<p class="p2" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
<p class="p3" data-mce-fragment="1">In a / shed dinner the magic isn’t about creating a fancy new thing, or tricking you to think anything is but what it is, it’s about putting this practice into physical form. It’s about sharing the magic we have found around us with different materials that are distinct to this terrain and our culture and sharing them with you.<span class="Apple-converted-space" data-mce-fragment="1">   </span></p>
<p class="p3" data-mce-fragment="1"> </p>
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MAGIC

<h4 class="p1">Native hops ( Lúpulo )<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>
</h4>
<p class="p2"><i>humulus lupulus var. neomexicanus</i></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">As summer seems to start to fade and warm evenings and mornings become cool we near the end of our hay season. The season we always look forward to and always slightly resent. The end of hay season signals the start of apple and hop picking, among many other things, but two of the things we get the most excited to pick. Both of which have less room for things to go wrong and far less physical demands than making hay.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">Each year, almost as a vacation, we venture south to the spot I have been picking hops at for six years now. It is a valley like our own, but instead of hops here and there, there are seemingly infinite fragrant little neon green flowers, strobiles, sprawling all through the foliage that boarders the spring creek.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">Neomexicanus hops, or Lúpulo by the old Spanish speaking folk, are native to New Mexico and are considered completely separate from the European varieties. Like those of us from NM for generations, lúpulo is hardy, unruly, and unpredictable, but more the interesting because of it. Lúpulo hasn’t really been commercially grown because they grow differently than commercial species. Instead of always growing tall and up, these plants grow all over the place, mostly found sprawling and crawling through the willows. The flavor and characteristics of each plant vary, seemingly to what they are growing with. Fresh, they smell to me of pine and garlic, some more in one direction or another. The unpredictable flavor also leads to an undesirable attribute in commercial growing and brewing.</p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
<p class="p2"><span class="Apple-converted-space">We like to pick at the end of August and as the stobiles start to turn brown on the edges. After they're picked we dry them in our sun room on a drying rack and </span>use  to make beer shortly after with some reserved dried for later use in cooking and in our <a href="https://www.shed-project.com/recuerdos/honey-soda">‘honey sodas’</a>.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> Despite the interesting flavor and aroma <meta charset="utf-8"> <span data-mce-fragment="1">lúpulo has, the plant is known to be a remedio plant that is used as a sedative and for all uses </span></span>anti microbial. </p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
<p class="p2"><meta charset="utf-8"><span>Luckily for us, lúpulo in the wild can be found in pretty large numbers, but not enough for commercial use and just enough to reward those of us who are willing to venture out to pick and who are happy to let it grow exactly where and how it wants to.</span><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
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<p> </p>

Lúpulo

<p class="p1">On Friday 7.21.23 at 8:05 am Maida and I, mostly Maida, brought Florá Inés Juliette Branch Ortiz-Concha into this world and we couldn’t be more over the moon!<br><b></b></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">Generally I don’t hear birth stories from the masculine perspective. This is slightly that. Birth is probably the most potent expression of the feminine, yet like all things it is really about a balance of the two. While I wasn’t the one giving birth, I was there the whole time making sure Maida had anything and everything she needed, whatever that meant. Sometimes that meant solitude in the cave of our bedroom, and sometimes that meant holding her lower back telling her how great she was doing and that she could do it.</p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">My parents had me while they were young, mom was seventeen and my dad was barely nineteen and growing up I always thought I would wait to have children, maybe twenty two or twenty three I thought. Now ten years later than I thought, it is finally a reality. When my mother ‘Juliette’ was my age, thirty two, I was already fifteen years old. There was a certain magic involved with growing up with my parents even though I’m sure it wasn’t easy for them. Julie at some point after her and my father, Johnny Sr, had split up, had three kids part time, was going to school part time and had a full time job. Anytime I hear anything about how hard life is going to become after having a child I think about Julie and how she loved us more then anything, and while things were hard it was never a compromise.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">The truth is everything changes everything. Of course things are going to change, but I couldn’t be more ready or excited for it.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">When we first got our milking cow we were told of all the things we were going to have to do and how our life was going to change. A few years later and I can’t imagine life without her. However this is in part because we disregarded everything we were told. I usually don’t like to talk in absolutes, but I’m pretty certain we disregarded EVERY SINGLE THING.</p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">It’s been a philosophy of mine to build my own systems, ones that work for me and that are based around my ideals. I don’t want to milk a cow twice a day, once a day already is a 45min commitment, but it turns out milking once a day yields less milk, but yields more fat, which is what we are after anyway. If I would have become disheartened initially I may never have made the leap into having a dairy cow. Instead we got her, adapted her to our lifestyle and both of our lives are better for it.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">This same mindset goes for birth also. Maida and I had decided we couldn’t imagine bringing a child into this plane any differently than how we expect our sheep, cows, dogs, et cetera to give birth. This type of birthing mindset is usually referred to as ‘free birth’ which really just means natural birth. The same way humans have been giving birth for centuries before the rise of western medicine and the destruction of our own trust in our own bodies and health. It is something I believe any expecting mother or couple could do, but only if they believe that themselves. We tend to look for a savior in hard situations, with free birth you are that person through and through. If you have one foot out the door, odds are you'll probably take it when things get hard. </p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">I’m somewhat jealous and grateful that giving birth is something I will never experience in the same way that Maida did. The closest I can say I have ever got to that was a backcountry hunt in WA a couple years back. I had no idea exactly what to expect as I was with a guide who, unperceived by me, was taking me to get a ‘trophy’ Rosevelt bull. The hunt started at 5 am each morning where we would get to our destination and hike until dark until we found a bull worthy of taking home. It was December and it was cold and wet. We spent three days hiking for hours until we finally saw a bull heading up the hill to the north of us. It was mid day and we knew time was running out so we set into another gear and went around the hill from the back to where we imagined he was heading. We got to a zone and looked around but couldn’t see him and decided to go lower to where we thought he was going to be and half way there I realized my phone had fallen out of my pocket, so we turned around and went back up. Luckily the phone was right where I thought it would be so we picked it up and headed right back to where we were initially headed. A couple miles later we started to descend a steep rocky hillside where we saw a few cow elk and theorized the bull was sure to be around, so we sat down, trying to communicate but staying as quite and still as possible, and got ready for him to come after the cows. This was muzzleloader season so you would need to be within 50 feet, which you can imagine is pretty hard to do in the first place. A few moments later just like we had hoped for we saw the bull slowly approaching the cows directly in sight. We both raised our muzzle loaders and once he presented himself we both squeezed the trigger. Nothing happened. Our gun powder had gotten wet from three days of treacherous hiking in the rain even though we had the open vulnerable points wrapped up. So we scrambled to load the guns with powder again, the whole time the bull remained, looking at us even. This process took minutes and I swore were had missed our chance, but he remained. The guide I was with even broke something on his gun and so I was going to have to shoot alone. I aimed, took a deep breath, and fired. I shot him straight through the heart and he passed from this plane almost instantly. At Taos Pueblo where I am from, it is an old belief that when hunting you ask permission ahead of time and when the time comes the animal will present themselves for you, and that is exactly what happened.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">It was getting dark at this point so we hiked down to him and took out his guts where we would leave him over night and hiked back out to our truck getting back after dark. We came back the next morning, day 4, and hiked a couple hours in. Who knows how many miles we had hiked, but we hiked up and down old logging roads until we got to him. We were glad no bears had found him in the night before we got back. An hour or so later we had broken the animal down and packed in our first round into our packs, hung the parts we didn't pack and hiked back out. We did this four times over two days with 100+ pounds of flesh and bone on our backs. I only weigh 135 pounds so it was almost like I was carrying myself for hours through the wet cold up and down logging roads to the truck. I remember the last couple times needing to stop every 30 seconds or so because I felt like my hips were about to pop out of place or that my legs wouldn’t hold me up any longer, I remember praying to who or whatever that a random park ranger would drive by and offer us a ride, because I swore I couldn't do it anymore. This was by far the hardest thing I have ever done in my life, and likely the closest I will ever know to giving birth.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">I find it interesting on how my closest experience to giving birth involves death, and I realize how closely connected the two actually are. We talk about it sometimes mindlessly as if it is some universal truth, but experiencing it so potently is a whole other thing all together. In truth, being present for the birth of Florá Inés felt exactly like being with my mother in her final days on this plane in her struggle with breast cancer. The way I was there for Maida was exactly the same as it was with my mother. Both of them so strong and graceful in their journeys despite the pain involved. </p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">My experience of this birth I helped initiate and see through has taught me some things, but also solidified existing beliefs. Maida and I spent 5 days, the same as my hunt, in varying degrees of labor, where I saw Maida in what seemed like more pain then possible, that in an instance was alchemized into pure joy once Florá came spiraling out and on to the bathroom floor. There was a moment in the birth where Maida started to worry maybe something was wrong because it had taken so long, and at one point I remember her saying “I don’t think I can do this anymore” and I knew it was about to happen.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p2"><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p2"><span class="Apple-converted-space">In truth I feel like we should welcome long births. It's like trying to force open a flower, it never works the same. Give it the proper environment and time and it will blossom all on it's own. </span></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">Wilderness hunting or free birth aren’t for the faint of heart, though I do believe any of us could do them if we set our minds on it. You have to believe in what you are doing and believe that you can do it whether someone or your own subconscious say otherwise. It is a reflection of your fears and comfortabilities that must be conquered. On my hunt if I had a cheat code where I could take the meat out by vehicle I would have taken it in a second, however it wouldn’t have been as meaningful to me now. I wonder about that with pain, whether in life or death. If we avoid the pain will the reward be worth the same?<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p2">When Florá was born the first person I wanted to tell was my mother. I don’t know what I think about the after life, but I know she is always with me, and that I am still learning from her. It's wild to be able to welcome death with my mother, and to welcome life with Maida, but despite it all I am better because of them.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> What a gift to be able to experience life from both ends. I've never experienced such magic as as being part of a 'free birth' with my favorite human. </span></p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
<p class="p2"><span class="Apple-converted-space">Now it's time to revel in the reward our hard work and convictions which is, </span><span class="Apple-converted-space">and will always be Florá. &lt;3</span></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p1">↴ NOTE</p>
<p class="p2">If more interested in free birth, it's worth it whether just to learn about life or to learn more about having a free birth yourself :</p>
<p class="p2"><a href="https://www.instagram.com/bauhauswife/">bauhauswife </a></p>
<p class="p2"><a href="https://www.instagram.com/freebirthsociety/">freebirthsociety</a></p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p1">↴ <span class="Apple-converted-space">PHOTOS </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="Apple-converted-space"><img src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/000005860010_480x480.jpg?v=1690732398" alt=""></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="Apple-converted-space"><img src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/Flora_sleeping_480x480.png?v=1690732744" alt=""></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="Apple-converted-space"><img src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/Flora_laughing_480x480.jpg?v=1690732585" alt=""></span></p>
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<p class="p3"><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>

BIRTH

PICKING WILD ASPARGUS

<p class="p1">¬ Each year as the days start getting warmer but the mornings are still cold we participate in the centuries old tradition of cleaning and squaring off our acequia.</p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">Acequias are channels of water diverted from the river up hill to then flood pastures, gardens and orchards in turn to each parciante for an allotted amount of time based on the size of land they have. Acequias are said to be the oldest systems of water management in the United States, and while true in the fact that they are the oldest ‘documented’ form, I can’t imagine that is actually true. Water had been managed pre contact in many different forms, however the acequia system as we know it now has shaped the landscape of Northern New Mexico and continues to live on.</p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">The acequia system is so special because it has been practiced in almost the exact way as when they were initially set up, with minor differences between communities and with modern approaches as time has gone on. In the northern mountain village we inhabit the acequia is said to have been started in the seventeen hundreds. Some sections of our acequia are over ten feet tall with cedar trees so thick and old you can hardly wrap your arms around them. </p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">Acequia in arabic means ‘water carrier’ and were brought to the ‘new world’ by the Spanish ( half of my lineage ) but taken or learned from Northern African. The Spanish had a book called law of the indies which was essentially a guide book to colonizing a new land. That book has negative connotations, but I can’t help but admire the way it has shaped the land I am from and continue to inhabit. Part of this guide book explained how to settle a new land, and essentially it said to build the acequia first, and then the church. To simplify the method of digging a new acequia, you would find a new land and walk up the river as far up as you could until it closes up and then go back on the highest point. This would be where you would dig the ditch and everything below that would be delegated to pastures and the growing of food, everything above would be the dry land where the home would be built and where the animals would be kept. It’s hard to stand in the ditch and to not think about all those that have dug and cleaned it up to that point. I can’t help but admire how hard it must have been to dig a ditch along rocky mountain sides moving water up hill.</p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
<p class="p2">I grew up with an acequia running through my grandfathers property on Taos Pueblo where my siblings and I grew up. It hadn’t been used since my grandfather had used it, which was around when I was born, but being a communal system the water still ran. We got to play in the cold waters of fresh snowmelt that flowed though the property and spring/summer and hide in the willow groves that surrounded it. Because the acequia was and still is all dirt the water seeps through and nurtures the wildlife around it. At my grandfathers there was more fruit than we could ever or ever did eat. ( plums, chokecherries, apples, apricots, sour cherries ).</p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">As I’ve gotten older I have grown a deeper appreciation for the bounties the acequias bring and all the sweat that has and will go into them. The grass grown on our pastures are all watered by the flooding via the acequia and are cut, dried, baled, and stored to feed our cattle and sheep through the rest of the year. Besides that inherent value of hay produced, the acequia system is rewarding in the way that is largely a community operated system. To be honest I am a pretty independent person and like my autonomy, but I also like to be part of the community that is where I live. This communal system ties everyone together in a way that nothing else does or can. All winter we will spend weeks without talking to anyone in the village, but once the acequias open its rare to go a day out without speaking with at least one neighbor.</p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
<p class="p2">Where we live almost every person on the acequia uses the water from it and this means that if anyone neglects their portion they are spoiling the bounty for everyone else or making others take responsibility for their neglect. The parciantes, those participating in the system, keep each other in line. If someone steals the water, they are stealing from everyone else, so most parciantes respect each other by sharing the water as each person is allotted.</p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">Now beginning of April, as I post this, the community gathers in the morning and heads up to ‘la presa’ ( head-gate ) where the water is diverted from the river and participates in cleaning out the acequia from the beginning to the end. Before this ritual, each parciante is responsible for cleaning their own portion, so when this time comes the mayordomo can let loose a small portion of water as each parciante with their tool of choice, usually a pitch fork, can help each other in removing any debris or rocks that may impair water flow. This stage, the ‘sacar la acequia’, is about strength in numbers, but also makes each parciantes hard work transparent to all the others parciantes. To me this portion is the part that keeps each member from neglecting their section as everyone can see if they are neglecting their portion during the walk.</p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">Acequias are many things, but for me at this moment, they are a reminder that culture is preserved and perpetuated through participation and not in externalization. We can romance the acequias and write or share about them, but what keeps them alive is our participation in them.</p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">This task is one we look forward to all winter, and one that when it finally comes we are excited for it to be finished.</p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">You can watch a process video of the preliminary cleaning of our section below:</p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">PROCESS VIDEO </p>
<p class="p1">↓</p>
<p class="p3"><a href="https://shed-project.com/Recuerdos-videos">‘SACAR LA ACEQUIA’</a></p>
<p class="p4">Video work: <a href="http://maidagoods.com/">MAIDA BRANCH</a></p>

Sacar la acequia

PATROCIÑO BARELA 

Ranch visit with Stefan Junir

<p class="p1">¬ My Paternal Grandfather Lupe Concha of Taos Pueblo raised cattle. I was born too late to witness it, but that is what I hear from those that knew him. Now all that remains of that life now are some old haying equipment buried in plum trees and corrals that are barely hanging together.</p>
<p class="p1">I became engaged with food after learning from my mother that Lupe used to eat the wild roses, and found my way to having cattle through food. If I had to make a map of my life, the spirit of Lupe would be in the legend. Though I was never witness or taught to these ways of life, they seem to have found a way in regardless.</p>
<p class="p2"><img alt="" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/GL_480x480.jpg?v=1684463710"></p>
<p class="p2">Lupe Concha </p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
<p class="p1">The last few days have been corralled with sorting our cattle. Deciding who might become meat, who will stay in the herd. It’s a strange thing to be playing god in this way. Tuesday was all about sorting out the two herds then pushing them down the road to our second property where they will remain until spring. There they have access to the river and if it doesn’t get too cold, will be able to drink water as they please. Back at the field where we were pushing them from we would have to haul water almost each day, which now that winter has finally kicked in becomes too frequent and difficult.</p>
<p class="p1">My sister Allsya, who now lives in Lupe’s old house where we grew up and her daughter Meia came out to help. When we had finished sorting out the two herds Maida drove the truck with a bale of hay weighing close to a thousand pounds on the back with the cows trailing close behind. Allysa and Meia drove behind the cows, and I walked between the making sure the cows wouldn’t stray into the hills. This isn’t the first time we’ve pushed them between fields so they were pretty good about it. After unloading the hay and turning the truck around we drove into a badger hole in the field buried by snow. If it were easy it probably wouldn’t be any fun.  Eventually, I pulled the truck out and we carried on with feeding, watering, and sorting. This task took the majority of the day. When we finished we all shared a meal together.</p>
<p class="p2">The following day, Wednesday, we got up at 6 and made coffee as the sun starts to light up the sky. We made our fire and started the trucks and tractor. Maida was heading to get our dog spayed and I had to load the two cows that were two years of age that I would be hauling to Tierra Amarilla to have processed for our Meat Share. As I started the truck I glanced at the thermostat which read six degrees. The the tips of my fingers were already stinging from the cold.</p>
<p class="p1">As the morning warmed up slightly so did I, slowly sorting out the small herd and loading the two cows. We inherited our corral not of my grandfather, but of someone else's when we bought our land. A distant relative of mine in some way or another from the Chavez linage. This corral isn’t much better then Lupe’s and when a cow notices whats going on they could brake right though. So I take it slow, taking a step here and there, gently guiding them where I want them. After an hour or so of this, and a few situations of mayhem I manage to get the two cows into the trailer. These tasks are much easier with a second person, and I wished a time or two that Maida and I hadn’t tried to divide and concur, but I managed.</p>
<p class="p1">I finally got on the road and in my hour and a half drive to the mantanza I have time to contemplate life and death and why being connected to the cows life and death in relation to my own is so important. It’s not an easy task by any means raising cattle, emotionally or physically. You need trucks and trailers, tractors and water tanks, barns and corrals, land and forage, fences and ditches, strength and tenderness. When you look at the numbers and try to imagine how it ever is worth it, you either become overwhelmed or remember that this as anything else in life. It isn’t a means to an end, just a constant means. This practice and how it feeds our life is incalculable. We might lose money if we put it down on paper, but the land and our lives are better because of it.</p>
<p class="p1">We could raise 6 head a year, 1 bull and 5 cows and have 4 calves each summer. This would make our life easier, but it would also be only for ourselves. As we look toward the years to come it’s nice to think about creating systems that benefit us, but also that benefit those in our community. We have 22 head at the moment, and on the drive back instead of contemplating life and death and further, I delve into our systems and how to make them better, maybe one day having it sustain itself monetarily. With the task complete I get excited for the tasks awaiting me as I return home.</p>
<p class="p1">My niece Meia is close to two years old now, and she loves pushing the cows with Allysa, sitting on moms lap while she pretends to drive. I think about Lupe and what it would have been like if I would have been around while he was active, and thinking on it I must be something like this. Maida and I are having a child this summer and I’m excited to have meat from cows we raised, who are loved and nurtured to nurture us and this new family. I get home and spend the rest of the daylight hauling water and chopping wood.</p>
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<p class="p1"> </p>

SORTING CATTLE ( reflection )

ALINEA CIRCA 2010 ( relection )

TOMO dinner ( buds series )

<p><img src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/OSH_480x480.png?v=1684463030" alt=""></p>
<p class="p1">¬ Oshá root, or bear root is the root part of the plant Ligusticum porteri found in parts of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocky_Mountains">Rocky Mountains</a> and northern <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Mexico">New Mexico</a>. Oshá is in the lovage family, sometimes called wild celery or porters lovage. At the pueblo in Taos it is called bear root because when the bears come out of hibernation they immediately dig up the root to consume and rub it on themselves.  </p>
<p class="p2">Oshá is generally thought of as one of the most medicinal plants of this terrain and I would have to agree with that. While we tend to think of things in a vacuum, I don’t think it is ever that simple. Medicine is a tricky word and has many meanings. I love the quote “your life is your medicine” and I feel the medicinal qualities of a plant, or anything really, are embedded in the thing itself but also in everything that surrounds it. For me part of the medicinal qualities of oshá root are embedded in the journey to it, the drive into the mountain with a purpose, the loved ones in the vehicle, the air around it being expelled by the trees, the mycorrhizal soil soaked into my skin while I dig, et cetera. These facets of the plant can’t be bought or sold. Every time I catch the intoxicating scent of oshá, it brings me back to the journey. </p>
<p class="p1">Generally the medicinal qualities thought to be in oshá are used in a variety of purposes. It is used as a tea or tincture to aid in sickness of all kinds or for sore thoughts, chewed in large amounts to induce sweating, smashed into a poultice to help aid wounds, placed in gardens to inhibit cutworms and other larvae, used to ward off rattlesnakes, and many more depending on who you talk to. My paternal grandmother Maria had diabetes and one time she had heard I had just picked oshá and asked for some to put in her sock to help with an infection. </p>
<p class="p1">Part of the ethos of / shed is not separating food, or life in general, and medicine. Eating is our fuel and the thing that sustains us, the main foods of sustenance for me being meat ( wild or from our animals ) and secondary eggs, fats, fruit, and honey. Plants make their way to my plate often, however I don’t ever think of these as sustenance. Oshá being in this category fills the place of providing me with micronutrients and the with small amounts of the medicine when my body desires it. If I begin to feel unwell oshá is the first thing I reach for. This is not to say that I think everyone everywhere should immediately order oshá in some form or another. I feel that as part of nature itself we, or at least myself, should be thinking more about what is around us and using those things to nurture and heal. Maybe the power of bear root is strongest when you are closer to the trees that the root itself needs to grow next to.</p>
<p class="p1">In picking oshá, it’s important to be familiar with the plant for it very closely resembles poison hemlock. Despite almost looking identical to one of the most poisonous plants oshá only grows in the higher elevations ~7,000-10,000ft ( in NM ) and when dug from the ground has an unmistakable intoxicating aroma that the hemlock or another root for that matter doesn’t have. Oshá is like the ginseng of NM and with it’s mystical powers the desire has grown exponentially and there is fear of the possibility of over harvesting so it is important to to harvest responsibly. Each plant grows and has a series of taproots, so if you take some and not all the plant it will continue to grow. </p>
<p class="p1">We harvest our oshá in the late autumn when everything is on fire with red and gold everywhere you look, before the ground is frozen and the plant has had a chance to seed and send it’s energy back to it’s root. This is important for us because we’re not only after harvesting for flavor but for it’s energetic properties, which in my opinion go hand in hand. </p>
<p class="p2">You can watch our process video now of our annual journey to harvest oshá root. </p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
<p class="p1"><a href="/osha-harvest">→ OSHÁ ( harvest ) process video</a></p>

OSHÁ ROOT (  thoughts  )

<p><img alt="" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/SHEER_480x480.png?v=1684461814"></p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">¬</span> Ever since I've had sheep, which is going on six years now, I've been taking my fleece to the wool mill in Mora NM. This journey to the mill is one we always look forward to. It’s a journey through friendly mountains, which we usually only get to visit for this purpose. Each journey always includes a stop at Teresa’s tamales before or on the way out. The Mill is in the heart of downtown Mora with a store front that has a small cafe and gallery for all things wool. Just up the road is the old adobe gristmill where folk would bring their wheat harvest to be ground by stone powered by water diverted from the river. If you have never been to the Mill or Mora in general, and are in the neck of the woods it would be worth stopping in.</p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
<p class="p1">The Mill in Mora is the only commercial wool mill west of the Mississippi and is a conglomeration of various Mills from around the state that have gone out of business at one time or another, with equipment ranging from small to massive. The spinning machine was built with seats for over twenty people, now it would be rare to see more than two. Though at a glance at the processing facility it might be disheartening to think of all the potential and the time when this equipment was used at full capacity, the space is still radiates with life.</p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p1">It’s hard to think of the dwindling nature of the wool industry, and those that make/made it up, which has been in slow decline since the army stopped using so much wool and sheep herders switched to cattle. It’s one of those things like the railroads, that seems on the verge of becoming obsolete. If you were to speak to any older norteño about borregos likely you will find yourself on the other end of a story rooted in hardships, solitude and beauty. Almost everyone here in Northern New Mexico either had sheep or worked with them in some way or another. A relative of mine tells stories of how he would be sent out with a horse with a riffle into the woods to graze the flock as early as ten years old. Unlike cattle, sheep are constant prey with almost any flesh eating creature is their predator, and really only man as protector. Raising sheep is hard work. More so when large flocks were grazed public lands. The reward that comes from such work however makes it all worth it. For us, the sheep we raise provides us a nice supply of natural and very warm fiber as well as a great source of food and the joy of carrying on a tradition that made us who we are today. There is a sweet film called ‘<a href="https://www.amdoc.org/watch/sweetgrass/">Sweetgrass</a>’ that shows one of the last pastoral shepherds in Montana on the last few years of their operations. </p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p1">The Mill is ran by JD who is a shinning light, both in the world of wool but in general, that makes this process such a joy. JD and his very small team are one of the few threads to the past of New Mexico’s culture of raising borregos we have left. We’re grateful for him and his team that keep this special place going, and we’re happy to be able to be a part of it.</p>
<p class="p3"> </p>
<p class="p1" data-mce-fragment="1"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/p/Mora-Valley-Spinning-Mill-100066515572134/">→ Mora mill</a></p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">↓ PHOTOS</p>
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Wool processing ( MORA NM )

<p class="p1">¬  The valley we inhabit is starting to smell of native plum blossoms. The smell reminds me of fresh ground pueblo white corn and honey, one of my very favorite aromas and one that helps mark the coming of spring. We live on the northern most section of the valley and it will be a couple more weeks untill our fence-lines of the farm will burst too with these blossoms. It’s always an anticipation of what’s to come driving the road north watching mother earth bloom as we gain in elevation. </p>
<p class="p1">I’ve been raising bees for the last few years now and I’m sure they are as eager for the blossoms to open as I am. Each year, as I get excited for this moment of fruition, I soon remember that winter will come and test us all again. Each hive that makes it through the harsh months, will ideally be stronger for it. I like to think it’s the same for us.</p>
<p class="p1">Though each year we lose a few hives, I like to think of it was an investment. That in my lifetime we can have hives that in their DNA can thrive in this terrain, and the honey we may be able to consume from them will help us do the same. In so many ways our bees are a lot like an accumulation of our ethos, a balance of freedom and restraint. Despite if we like it or not, the bees know better than we do on what they want, or need, and I try and respect that fully. Each spring as another hive or two disappear or die it’s hard to know which side of the scale is unbalanced. It seems though, that each year it is getting better. Each hive will swarm off and inhabit our terrain, if not collected, and will be the most resilient that they could be, eventually lending those genetics, and ideally, that resilience to the more domestic hives in the future. </p>
<p class="p1">Last year my mother past away at the age of 47. It always seemed to me that she was always on the edge existence on this planet, and that in her passing she would be closer to each of the children she raised so diligently. In a way her job had been accomplished. I felt this the day after her passing in a swarm of bees from our hive that swarmed off to the closest piñon tree in our yard. This could just have been nature doing it’s thing, and me seeing something in it, but it’s sweet to think she's around, if not, at least that the life that I now have is only possible because of her and that as beautiful things happen she in alive in again in my thoughts. </p>
<p class="p1">I was able to catch the swarm and it now resides at the farm as the “Julie hive”, despite a hard winter they survived and will soon be out getting the nectar of our fruit trees and wildflowers. </p>

Bees ( thoughts )

<p class="p1">↓ THOUGHTS</p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
<p class="p1">It is a beautiful thing to realize that the things that end up in your orbit become, in some ways, a reflection of yourself and your choices. I feel grateful each day to find in my orbit some of the most beautiful and tenacious humans. </p>
<p class="p2">RETRATOS is an ongoing collection of portraits of our community shot on film. You can see them at the link below.</p>
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<p class="p1"><span>↓ LINK</span></p>
<p class="p1">→ <a href="/retratos">RETRATOS ( portraits )</a></p>

RETRATOS ( portraits )

<p class="p1">↓ LINKS</p>
<p class="p1"><a href="https://zoom.us/rec/share/4TACd-pzBZ56_8IvkZZbjXDFjOcJmylboaZczXAGxQfgxjrl9yGPOXQfn-Z9HdOA.xqoD4GqG-MUVjaUq">→ Conversations with Ron Boyd //</a> Passcode: SBC-CFE2021</p>
<p class="p1"><a href="https://www.instagram.com/greenfootl/">→  Ron’s instagram</a></p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
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<p class="p1"><span>↓ </span>THOUGHTS:</p>
<p class="p1">I honestly can’t remember the first time I met Ron, he is the type of person I feel has always been in my life. That a kin to a tio, but also at the same time a peer. I feel our paths are parallel and that anything I am interested in at the moment, Ron has knowledge pertaining to it. I’m grateful for him in my life, and all that he shares with me, but also with the world. </p>
<p class="p1">Each year we gather apples for naturally fermented hard cider for / shed dinners. Our goal is to find landrace apples planted by the Spanish that have no names but are unique and that have a character that can’t be found anywhere else, and we press them at Rons. Ron also presses his own apples and makes his own hard cider. I long for the day we’ll have our own press, but I cherish the days spent pressing at his farm. </p>
<p class="p1">Last year Ron and his wife Debra took over Debra’s mothers horse ranch and are expanding their beautiful touch onto 100 acres. ( You can now stay at their farm, <a href="https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/51769489?source_impression_id=p3_1647788086_2nrJIuZhihJQmJk8">La Vallita Farms</a>. </p>
<p class="p1">Each year when I get to see Ron there tends to be an underlying theme, this year it was corn. Each day this past fall, when we finished pressing at his farm, we’d cheers with some cups of cider he had pressed from the year before, and after wed’ sipped and talked a bit, he’d get back to listening to the radio, shucking and cleaning corn, piles of blue all around him, humbly sitting as if on a throne with beautiful corn mother encouraging him along the way. He told us this is a nightly activity for him through fall, time consuming - but like everything Ron does on the farm, he treats as a gift and blessing and often mentions how lucky he is to live a life doing work he loves and feels honored to do.</p>
<p class="p2">Growing up on Taos Pueblo, corn has always been a big importance in my life, and it keeps becoming more so. It is the main thing we grow on our farm and it is something Ron is growing more of on his and something we are working on together. We recently had a recuerdo about <a href="/corn-ash">corn + ash</a>, and the corn we have been using was Ron’s glass gem flint corn from a couple seasons ago. </p>
<p class="p1">I’m glad to have so many beautiful humans in my life, and Ron is one of those humans. I was honored to carry on our conversations while at my Chef in residence program at <a href="https://www.stonebarnscenter.org/">Stone Barns Center</a>. The link above is that conversation, and if you are interested in the others you can access them all at:</p>
<p class="p1">LINK <a href="/talks">→ talks</a></p>
<p class="p1"><img src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/1_d4429cc7-2e52-4029-8492-1b24cbcabb20_480x480.jpg?v=1683999078" alt=""></p>
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<p class="p1"><span>Ron’s rio grande turquoise corn // 2022</span></p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
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<p class="p1">Our “Taos Pueblo blue corn” // 2021</p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1"><img src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/3_0b9848c3-bffe-4c48-babe-0404fa1c5e40_480x480.jpg?v=1683999109" alt=""></p>
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<p class="p1"><span>Ron’s rio grande turquoise corn // 2022</span></p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1"><img src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0685/9653/1485/files/4_b7ff24d7-c622-4978-8fc1-69af086a1937_480x480.jpg?v=1683999123" alt="Corn mother bowl // fired full moon of 3.18.22"></p>
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<p class="p1"><span>Corn mother bowl // fired full moon of 3.18.22</span></p>

Conversation with Ron Boyd

<p class="p1">LINKS: </p>
<p class="p1"><a href="/talks"><span class="s1">→</span> TALKS ( video links ) </a></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">→</span> FOOD ( photos )<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">→</span> FIRING ( photos )<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">→</span> BEHIND THE SCENES ( photos )<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p1"><a href="https://www.maestroeats.com/post/johnny-ortiz-in-residence-at-stone-barns-pocantico-hills-ny"><span class="s1">→</span> MAESTRO EATS ( article )</a></p>
<p class="p1"> </p>
<p class="p1">It has been exactly one year since I arrived in Tarrytown NY at <a href="https://www.stonebarnscenter.org/">Stone barns center</a>. Months before I had received a text from an unknown number that said maybe: “Dan Barber”. I wondered if I knew a Dan Barber, I obviously did, but maybe I knew someone else with that name also. I was chopping wood when I saw the message come in so I waited to open the message until later that evening and it was in fact the Dan Barber ( chef of Blue Hill ) I knew. He wrote to ask if we could chat about this residency project they were putting together, <a href="https://www.bluehillfarm.com/">Blue Hill restaurant</a> + Stone barns center. I spoke with him but felt weary of committing due to trying to finish up my own space, and to make a long story short I refused the offer a couple times before finally saying yes. It was one of those moments that a no really felt like the right answer, but in reflection, and honestly after I said yes, I was so glad I did. </p>
<p class="p1">It had been a few years since I have been in a professional kitchen running an entire team, but this would be the first time I would be doing that with my own menu, not to mention with a team I have never worked with. I was second to Josh Skenes for 3 years running the kitchen of <a href="https://www.saisonsf.com/">SAISON</a> so this wasn’t too foreign, and I started / shed in 2017, where I have been creating my own food since, but with / shed I touch almost every detail. To jump from that to a whole team was special to witness. It was nice to witness that I could still do it, kind of like riding a bike, but more so I thrived. I loved it a little too much and found my self standing at the pass towards the end of the residency thinking to myself I could do this all the time. The thing is kitchens are largely fueled on adrenaline, and I thrive on that a little too much. In starting / shed I had the intention of being more grounded and to have a lifestyle a traditional kitchen couldn’t offer. </p>
<p class="p1">After agreeing to be the chef in residence no.3 back home I started to make vessels both for the future dinners and for an exhibition with <a href="https://object-thing.com/">Object &amp; Thing</a>. I had the idea to make a horno ( mud brick oven ) to do most of the cooking in. So much of my cooking is terrain based and in doing this residency I wanted to carry that ethos to the new terrain. Having an horno would be a through point in everything we cooked, passing on a sense of home in everything. My idea initially was to send a guide to making adobes to the Stone Barns team and having them build the adobes with their mud before I arrived. It would be sweet to think that though it would carry the ethos of home, but it would also be from their terrain. In discussion with the team they were intrigued by the idea and after a few more discussions had decided it would be too much, the ground was still frozen, their soil was mostly sand, and they were worried it may mess up the courtyard where I wanted to build it. I almost gave up on the concept, but last minute I decided it was imperative to have, so <a href="https://maidagoods.com/">Maida</a> and I loaded up 50 old adobe bricks from a wall we took down in our future / shed space onto our flat bed dodge truck and Arkas and I drove them out to NY from NM.  </p>
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<p class="p1">In arriving I was immediately met with the warmest and most welcoming souls. We spent the morning yesterday catching up with Irene who was such a force in making magic happen while I was there. Thinking back on all of the said warm and welcoming souls, there are too many to mention but it was beautiful that a place with so many people could have ingrained into it a culture of warmth and excitement. / shed is really an ecosystem and a culture and Stone Barns was the same in a lot of ways, just on a larger scale.</p>
<p class="p1">The next four weeks to come were filled with excitement and explorations. Some of the the most exciting things to come out of this experience were talks with individuals I chose to have conversations with over zoom. There was no underlying conviction in conversing with each of these individuals, aside from that they have had some importance in my life or are on the same path as me, or ahead of. I loved getting a chance to share with a new group of people my love for the desert southwest, and to speak with some amazing people I had recently met like the head farmer of Stone Barns <a href="https://www.stonebarnscenter.org/staff/jack-algiere/">Jack Algeire</a>.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
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<p class="p1">As for the food, I thought I would be compromising my ethos going to a place I knew less about and not cooking all the food myself, but the kitchen staff besides being great humans were excited to learn more and this felt like a moment for us all to explore and learn. We did trials of any corn the team could find cooked in ash from the horno, of every wood from the property, for corn tortillas and posole. We found local salts and used only those. We made “oven bread” like at the pueblo with grains from Stone barns center and nixtamalized corn. We made a beer with <a href="https://hudsonvalleybrewery.com/">Hudson Valley Brewery</a>, with nixtamalized corn and New Mexico native hops. ( humulus neomexicanous ). We used almost every wild thing we could find. We used as many parts of the cow as possible, even the manure to fire plates.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
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<p class="p1">I can’t believe it has already been a year, it doesn’t feel like this all happened that long ago, but looking back over it all it makes me miss being there. I learned a lot in my month being at Stone barns and taking over the kitchen of Blue Hill, and largely it was learning more about myself, my relationship to food and terrain and it’s importance, I was also affirmed that with / shed I was on the right path. Maida, Arkas, and I drove back more excited then ever to be back home, excited to continue to put in the energy to be able to host dinners in our terrain again. </p>
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STONE BARNS residency

Corn + ash

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<p class="p1">¬  As I go back to the village ( Taos Pueblo ) where I grew up I see remnants of haying equipment, each year becoming taken over more and more by the plum trees and various weeds that creep in as worked land becomes feral again. On one hand these remnants remind me how little importance we actually have, no matter what we build nature will always take over if we neglect it, but on the other hand it lights a fire in me to work harder, to reignite the flame that was once lost.</p>
<p class="p1">These remnants were my Grandfather’s ( Lupe Concha ) and are scattered around the property I grew up on, but by the time I was born Lupe and family had already stopped working the land. I was never able to learn how to farm/ranch from him, something he learned with/from his father and so on, but like a seed I can feel that knowledge in me somewhere. </p>
<p class="p2">When I decided to move back home to Northern New Mexico from travels around the US cooking I knew I wanted to have my cooking connected directly to what I could produce / harvest from the wild. While harvesting wild, endemic plants to cook with is the primary practice of food for / shed as well as a connection to my hunter/gatherer ancestry of Tuah-tah ( Taos Pueblo ), being able to tend to the land I am on was just as important. As the years back home went by I slowly inched myself closer and closer to having a place like Lupe’s where I grew up.</p>
<p class="p1">I found myself in a mountain valley of Northern New Mexico not too far from Taos as the crow flies, that feels like where I grew up, where now my partner <a href="http://maidagoods.com/">Maida Branch</a> and I take care of 20+ acres of land, raise landrace churro sheep and criollo cows, among all the other creatures. We have these animals for many reasons, their history to this terrain, their connection to my ancestry, for our livelihood, for dinners, to nurture loved ones, and to aid in the regeneration of our land, for materials like leather, et cetera. For all these reasons, like all creatures ourselves included, their food is imperative. The hay that we start flood irrigating off the Acequia ( diverted river water ) at the end of winter and will eventually cut, rake, bale, and store will be the food source of these creatures for the cold months. </p>
<p class="p1">It’s hard to explain, but this work is unbelievably rewarding. It also, is unbelievably frustrating. You are racing against nature ( or working with ) to cut, rake, dry, bale and stack before the rains hit it and diminishes its quality all while the low autumn sun beats down on you, a process that takes us at least one whole week straight. As you ride the tractor trying to keep the wheels on track, while looking back to make sure everything is going as it should you can see the yellow leaves falling one by one off the cottonwoods with the slightest breeze as the hawks circle above , and coyotes below, to snag one of the snakes or field mice that got caught in the machine. The air is thick and you get to spend your days alone in nature in the  climax as everything is getting ready to go into the cold months. The moment the sun goes down the temperature drops drastically and it's time to go inside and start a fire. </p>
<p class="p2">This year we cut our 22+ acres, Arnold Gurule’s 16, and Ernie Giron’s 4. This means we moved 40~ acres of grass from the fields to the barns. Each bale weighs roughly 65 pounds and we ended up baling roughly 800 bales ( a slightly below average amount ) meaning in the course of two days and at least 20 hours of moving Maida and I moved ~52,000 pounds of forage twice, once from the field to the trailer and once for the trailer to our barns. This is also ~52,000 pounds of organic material that will nurture our animals and after going through their digestive systems will end up back on our fields. Providing nutrition to the soil for the following years as winter’s snow blankets everything which then slowly breaks down  the organic material below for all the creatures under the soil. </p>
<p class="p2">We have some help time to time, this year our friend ( who I grew up on the pueblo with ) Midnight Lujan joined in for a few loads as well as one of the locals who has been in this valley his whole life Gene Martínez, who drove the truck for us as we threw each bale off the field onto the trailer. While we all forked out last years hay debris from the barn Gene recalled to us how he used to have to help his father and grandfather rake the hay from the fields onto horse wagons and into barns. There was no tone of romanticism in Gene’s voice when he said this, only an objective recollection. Remembering this makes me feel so grateful to be able to move ~50,000 pounds of grass from our land that we day in and day out tend to. After we unloaded the load into the barn Gene and Midnight went home and the next morning Maida and I got out at first light to start this process all over again. It was going to rain the next day, which it did, and we felt the push of time against our skins.</p>
<p class="p1">The village we are part of also bales a lot of hay, besides firewood and cattle, hay is probably the thing most folk up here produce. On the field next to ours our neighbor Rudy Jaramillo and his son Juan Jaramillo also decided to cut. It’s fun to have a community where everyone has the same things to do, and mutual understandings of the consequential beauties and hardships that come with it all. At times I would look over and try to race them. There were times it seemed we were in the lead, but this was a race we could never win. The Jaramillo's probably have more than 200 acres to cut and have been doing this year in and year out since they were kids. They now have newer equipment, including a bale wagon, which you drive through the field and with hydraulics picks up each bale that then stacks it into the wagon. Watching them drive the wagon to collect all the bales while we manually drive around and load each bale by hand we couldn’t help but think “must be nice”. While it must be nice, it also is nice that we are young, strong and healthy and that we get to do ours all by hand. We are pretty much the gathering hay by pitch fork folk in this modern world baling our hay into small bales with equipment made in the 80’s.</p>
<p class="p1">“Your life is your medicine” and moving ~50,000 pounds of feed for your animals is some pretty strong medicine. </p>
<p class="p2">Besides the weather, the list of frustrating components is endless. As each hay season ends and a year passes I tend to forget all the things that went wrong and get excited for the following season yet again. How I can flood the field better, how I can rebuild the compuertas better, graze better, et cetera. This year the tractor I rebuilt with my neighbor and dear friend Olin Christy a few years ago after sitting over winter decided to give me a run for my money. Each day as I raced against time something else, like clockwork, would go wrong. I would think maybe I should call Olin to help, but knew he was too busy to come help, but he would, so I would take a deep breath ( or maybe kick something ) and get to work. All the issues that happened over the course of these 7 days I had diagnosed and solved by myself, either properly or with some wire laying around. It’s like magic. And now that it is all over I couldn’t be more grateful about it. This is the way that my grandfather learned and his father and so on. By doing the things and having a tenacious mindset. Each year I learn more and more and get closer and closer to the impossibility of perfection I know I will never achieve, but nonetheless is always the goal.</p>
<p class="p2"> </p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">↴</span> PHOTOS ( from the year prior 2021 )</p>
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HAY ( thoughts and photos )

<p class="p1">¬ I am from the terrain of the red willow people, tua-tah. This is the terrain that shaped me, and those before me. The same way the land holds memory, I feel in me a memory of all my practices.  </p>
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<p class="p1">I started my journey in food and clay as a young boy who ate terribly most of my childhood. I remember walking down the dirt road to my grandfathers house with my mother and her showing me the wild roses, and sharing how my grandfather used eat them. Every summer I would walk from school with my classmates and as we darted off to go hand fishing, build wood forts, or snag some pu-la-lu ( wild plum ) pies from the shops inside the pueblo, I would stop and eat a handful of rose petals. Everyone thought it was crazy and I would dare them to try it, usually with little to no luck. Being this picky kid I thought that these rose petals some how were magical, almost as if they were the only “food” found in the wild.</p>
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<p class="p1">My grandfather passed away early in my life. He was a Concha, my connection to Taos Pueblo. Lupe Concha was a farmer and came from a farming family, the last at the pueblo to raise cattle. All this was lost on me as a kid, though we grew up in his house in the midst of his orchard that looked up to the south end of the village. Even though I got to spend some time with him, he had already let go of his practices of working with the land at that point. His house had three rooms, a bedroom and what was  added on just before I was born, a bathroom and kitchen. The floor was mud and so was the roof. I helped my father take off the dirt from the roof to fix it from leaks and the stress the weight of the earth put on the beams…he would put in it’s place a modern pitched roof. I remember though the spirit of that initial roof, a terrain of its own holding weeds and cactus.  </p>
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<p class="p1">As a teenager we spent more time in town as the pueblo didn’t have a high school and my parents had split ways. For some reason, while at high school in town and I’m still not sure why to this day, I decided to join the culinary arts class and started to become enamored by food, a feeling I never shared for public schooling or schooling in general. After high school, I dropped out of college and decided to move to Chicago to learn cooking through working. I found myself as a nineteen year old in the kitchen of Alinea restaurant, the youngest hire at that time. That year they won three Michelin stars and sixth best restaurant in the world award. Being eager to learn as much as I could I spent a morning once a week before working twelve+ hour shifts at Alinea at a local butcher shop. Despite the allure of such an amazing kitchen, I was still eager to learn as much as I could and later moved to Washington state and San Francisco to work at The Willow’s Inn and Saison. Looking back I don’t think I could have picked any better places to learn. They all were operating at the highest levels, but all had completely different ethos. This journey, which took seven years became my initiation into manhood. Something that is important to those of Taos pueblo, but something that I never had because of my father making a conscious effort to distance himself from the culture. My initiation however, was no less important. It was the separation from familiar, the self responsibility, the self generated action and the learning who I was and who I wanted to become. I always knew I would come back home, I just never knew when, but after what I now look back on as my initiation, I knew there was nothing that would keep me away from it.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
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<p class="p1">In this transition back home I created my project / shed with the hopes to conjure my own voice but also to shed for myself all that I had learned from others on my journey. I always loved the concept of shedding, the way that when a snake sheds it loses a part of itself, but in the process becomes more of itself. Thats the process I wanted to generate.  </p>
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<p class="p2">The project started as merely dinners, in which I wanted to feel fully authentic, something unattainable in a restaurant. I started to learn about clay and making my own vessels, most the food was foraged, and I would cook and serve a small table of ten on a table I had built. Now five years later / shed has molded more to its underlying ethos and has become a whole ecosystem of practices, many of which are vernacular to this place and terrain. A contact point between the past and future and a blurring of the lines between life and work.</p>
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<p class="p2">Like in nature, there is  abundance in diversity. The ecosystem of / shed and my life, is parallel and is based on a diversity of practices that are imperative to the whole. Each practice involves an intimacy with our terrain and the culture created by those living the same way. The ecosystem is all imperative to the whole and looks something like this.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
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<p class="p2">¬ Terrain ( participation )</p>
<p class="p1">¬ Ecology ( connection )</p>
<p class="p1">¬ Land and animal husbandry ( agriculture / horticulture )</p>
<p class="p1">¬ Remedios ( foraging )   </p>
<p class="p1">¬ Dinners ( gathering )</p>
<p class="p1">¬ Clay ( vessels )</p>
<p class="p1">¬ Generating ( culture/education )<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
<p class="p1">¬ Mercado ( making )  </p>
<p class="p1">¬ Recuerdos ( remembering )</p>
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<p class="p1"> My practices which all build up this ecosystem, and which in fruiting body are dinners, revolves around the season and my terrain which are the tempo kept by the dinners. As I delve deeper into the meaning of cooking, these dinners take the shape of a ceremony or prayer, with reverence for everything that makes up a dinner.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
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<p class="p1">Where I spent my formative years, at the pueblo, though rare these days, is the mentality that there is no separation between spiritual practice and the daily practice. I always found this beautiful, the idea that an action like chopping and stacking wood can be done with such reverence and even more so, with mastery. I move about my practices with the same ethos. I aim to do my work, no matter how mundane or basic, with the same reverence and pursuit for authenticity as if I was doing a dinner.</p>
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<p class="p2">I grew up on the outskirts of all these practices, people where I come from only a couple generations back used to be self sustaining, and all of that that  continues to bleed into norteño culture of modern day. I never got to learn from my paternal grandfather about farming and ranching or how to flood irrigate a field with the acequia or how to hold a seed in your mouth to help with germination, I never got to learn from my maternal great grandmother how too cook or how to harvest food from the wild, I never got to learn from my paternal great grandmother how to work with clay or how to plaster with mud and tierra blanca, but I can feel it all in me, all the way to my bones. The same way a seed holds memory from those before it. The ancestral knowledge embedded in my DNA helps inform me and the ways in which I move about the world. I’m grateful to have been able to hear it, and to continue to be able to draw from it.  </p>
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<p class="p2">While thinking of mastery, I realized it is something deeply important to me, and seems to be a word or thought that seemingly has many variations of meaning, but at the heart of it, and for myself, I find that it is the overwhelming pursuit to understanding something wholly through experience. It is something completely unattainable, to know everything about anything, but the desire to spend the time to learn and to have the reverence for the process has been my pursuit of mastery in all the things I do.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></p>
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