silver city

the song circle at javalina cafe in silver city (the locals call it 'silver') was a most pleasant way to be welcomed. one nice guy there said i could come to his place for the night if i didn't find any other accommodation. i had thought i would be staying in the tipi of a woman i met at winter count, but she had been overwhelmed with guests and suggested i try this place called 'the bike house'. i had been told by someone else from silver that i could probably stay there, and i thought i could get hooked up with this place through the local Bikeworks. i thought i'd swing by the food coop, maybe hit the library, and then head up there as they were opening up at 5 this evening. the coop was closed and on the way to the library i ran into the friends who i'd traveled with from tempe to fort apache, lauren and eric! they were on bike with two others riding in the opposite direction. their friends were leading a capoeira practice that i then attended. they agreed to give me a couch to sleep on for the night. i went and spent a couple hours 'parting out' a crappy bike at bikeworks with one of the young kids volunteering there. nice scene and i was beaming when i left. back at the house we watched the documentary 'dirt' and got to bed late.

the next day isaac contacted his friend at the bike house, who happened to be their landlord! they gave me the guest bed in the puppet studio loft for the rest of my stay in silver. it was a very cozy spot and some mornings i had this curled-up-squirrel feeling of comfort. i cooked a lot while there and enjoyed the wood stove a few nights. one night i made soup on the wood stove, a nostalgic activity i don't get the chance to perform much while traveling. one night the living room was filled with musicians of a band one of the housemates, tim, is in.
the night i arrived ben made this amazing batch of rustic european style sourdough bread. some of the best bread i've ever had. the last day there i made a batch of sourdough using his starter. decided to take a whole big loaf for travel food.

the day after my first night at the bike house i went back to isaac and alinna's place to see if i could help with getting their garden started. i helped build a compost pile and spade one bed for their first plantings of greens.

one thing that had attracted me to staying at the bike house was that it looked like they could use my help with the garden. what i ended up doing was just some tidying up on the side yard, where there was a mess of firewood, and rebuilding their compost pile, which was not being managed properly. the main problem was that dirt had been used in place of carbonaceous materials. this had led to anaerobic conditions, which was most apparent when i began digging through the pile to rebuild it. i layered in a bunch of leaves and dry skeletons of annual plants from last year with the anaerobic soil and food scrap mixture.
the leaves i got from a property on the corner of the block. the guy who was doing the pruning there said i could collect all i wanted of the dead ivy debris. he was taking prunings from this job to an arroyo, where they would be used for erosion control. i was pleased to hear that. so much of this stuff just goes to landfills. this guy andrew was happy about it too. he and i had a really good exchange. he seemed to dig what i was doing.

through ben i was connected with the guadalupe montessori school community garden. there i dug out bermuda grass for a few hours one day. the first thing i noticed when i walked into the school building was a sculpture hanging in the corner by the front door of a child coming through a hoop, with vines twining around the arms of the child and the hoop, connecting them. to me this was a strong support signal and i found it beautiful.

i did get around to checking out to coop of course, which was a nice, smaller store in the downtown area. alinna, who i stayed with the first night, works there. they had a pretty good selection of bulk and produce and provide grass fed meats in the freezer. i got some beef liver. i was even able to get straus milk, from which i made a great batch of yogurt cheese!