* * Harvesting the turkeys

(Cross-posted in the Montgomery Messenger)

I drove to Floyd County this morning on a crisp, gorgeous November day where cows fed lazily in green pastures, birds flew across an azure sky, and all seemed right with the world. I was seeking to find where my Thanksgiving dinner was going to come from.

John Paul and Rainey Houston and their eight children run Sweet Providence Farm, seven miles outside of town. They are involved in a variety of farm activities from raising cows, pigs, chickens, and turkeys to growing Christmas trees and running a retail country store. The store is a beautiful timber-frame structure filled with gifts and foods, mostly from local sources. I parked and then walked a hundred yards behind the store down a muddy lane to the killing fields.

A flock of a couple of dozen white birds clustered outside a covered pavilion, where the production task of rending live birds into cookable meat occurred. Ten or twelve people, many of them Houston children, handled the various tasks. The process went like this:

First, a young man literally chased down his target bird, catching it by one or both legs. He held the legs together and inserted the bird head-first into a large funnel-like apparatus hanging by a rope, under which was a bucket to catch the blood. Another man reached inside the funnel opening and grabbed the turkey’s head, stretching it through the hole, and in a quick moment slashed its jugular vein. Blood gushed, and then dripped into the bucket. The bird thrashed for a moment and then expired. Moments later, he removed the dead bird and then slashed off its feet. He then dropped it into scalding water for a few moments to loosen the feathers, that were plucked by hand and by a machine that resembled the agitator of an antique washer. From there, the neck was cut off, the insides were gutted (keeping the heart, gizzard, and liver and disposing of everything else), and the bird was washed and bagged. 

Eldest son John William Houston told me, “Yesterday we made apple cider from apples grown in Calloway. We’re involved in a variety of food products. We also make apple butter at a community cannery. Yesterday we produced 42 gallons of cider.

“We do not breed turkeys. Baby turkeys are called ‘poults’ and we buy them from a grower in Pennsylvania. They are literally mailed to us through the U.S. Mail in boxes, and they arrive around the first of August. They’re only a couple of days old and are about 4” tall. They survive with minimum mortality for a few days with no food or water, living only off the nutrition contained within their eggs.

“We give them food and water and within a couple of hours they get really happy. They actually seem hardier when they’re only a few days old than when a week or two has passed. Then they become very sensitive to their surroundings and can overheat or suffocate, crowding each other. After about four or five weeks, they’re outside most of the time and they seem to handle cold weather better than the chickens.

“The turkeys graze the grass much like cows. We’ll rotate them over ground the cows have grazed and each will eat what they want. They will eat almost anything we give them, like grain, grass, old pumpkins, and apple scraps. On a farm, nothing goes to waste. We compost their feathers, heads, entrails, and blood and use it for fertilizer.” He pointed at a green area in the field. “We’re growing turnips to feed the hogs on ground fertilized by turkey byproducts.

“We’re having trouble now with hawks and eagles eating our layer hens. These raptors are protected by law. I can’t imagine killing a bird of prey. So we live with them and we adjust what we raise.

“Most of our turkeys are pre-sold, mostly at the food co-op in Roanoke. Because of the expense in growing them, we like to know how many will be bought before we raise them.”

I asked if his turkey tasted better than industrial products. He said, “It depends upon how you cook it. But it has to be better quality if a bird is foraging on the ground rather than being kept in a cage.”

I drove home with a fresh, farm-grown 12-pound bird, eager for the holiday meal!

* * I'm back!

For several years ending early this year, I was a regular contributor to the New River Current edition of the Roanoke Times. Contributions from four writers were discontinued, leaving me no local public voice. That changed recently when I agreed to provide similar material to the competitive newspaper, the News Messenger. This is my first submission for them, cross-posted with permission from the publisher.

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Hi! I’m back. I’ve missed you! Actually, I never left. Let me explain.

My name is Michael Abraham. I wrote regular columns for the “Other guys” for over four years until they discontinued the column. The new publisher of the News Messenger, Connie Brockenborough, has invited me to write here instead, an opportunity I’m glad to have.

All my writing is motivated by something someone once said to me about us locals. “We think culture is something somebody else has.” In my definition, culture is two things. First, it is the best a society can give us: the best food, music, art, and dance. Second, it is everything about how we live our lives: how we brush our teeth, how we use our dining utensils, how we court and make romance. We become so immersed in our own culture that we become like fish trying to “see” water. I am motivated to explore how individualistic cultures, including our own, can be.

In each column, I’ll reveal more about myself and my relationship to the landscape, people, and the culture. But I’ll bring profiles of and views from others as well. I’ll try to keep it interesting and informative. I’ll do that by seeing things as a newcomer, through eyes as fresh as I can manage.

I am a Christiansburg native, a graduate of Christiansburg High School and Virginia Tech, where I earned a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering, which, incidentally, was the most difficult thing I’ve ever done. I left the area for 15 years, spending five in Lynchburg, and 10 in Seattle, Washington. I’ve been back in the area for 20 years now, and I will be the first to admit that I have a much greater appreciation for what we have here than when I left.

My wife has a PhD in Psychology. She does consulting work and runs Pocahontas Press, a tiny company publishing local works of non-fiction and fiction.

We have one daughter who is a junior at Virginia Tech.

Even though I’m now in the bi-focal set, I still take my play quite seriously. My greatest passions are on two wheels: motorcycling and bicycling. I also love to hike, backpack, and travel.

I have two jobs; one makes money but doesn’t take much time and the other that takes lots of time but doesn’t make much money. In the former, I manage an industrial “shell” building in Christiansburg. In the latter, I write.  I’ve been writing commentaries and essays for years, but only for the last three years have I been writing seriously. In that time, I’ve written three books:

The Spine of the Virginias is a non-fiction exploration of the history, people, culture, and places along the border between Virginia and West Virginia.

Union, WV is an “R” rated novel of loss, healing, and redemption set in a tiny West Virginia town.

Harmonic Highways is a non-fiction look at Virginia’s Crooked Road, the Heritage Music Trail.

I’m at work on my fourth book, a novel set in Southwest Virginia in the midst of a national calamity. Research for that novel has put me in touch with preachers, historians, musicians, survivalists, and midwives.

As I am doing this research, I will share some of the experiences of these people and others I encounter here in the New River Valley. I will try to share with you my appreciation of the culture we have here.

Thanks for joining me. We’ll talk again soon.

* * What were they thinking?

I’ve generally shied away from political discussion here, but today I can’t help myself. “What were they thinking?” keeps rattling around my brain. The voters of the nearby 12th Virginia House of Delegates district elected Republican Joseph Yost yesterday over Democrat Don Langhrer.

Yost, 25, earned a Masters of Arts in Criminal Justice from Radford University and works for the Mental Health Association of the New River Valley as a Jail Diversion Coordinator. He has a sparse public service record and has never before held public office.

Langrehr, 53, is a Radford University Professor with two distinguished terms on Blacksburg’s Town Council.

Yost raised over $240,000, almost all of it from outside the district.

Langrehr raised 20% of that, almost all from within the district.

Yost avoided almost all the public forums to which both were invited, likely afraid of how weak a showing he’d make compared to the brighter, more experienced Langrehr. We live in a university community with an extraordinary number of brilliant people. THIS is what we give ourselves to represent our interests in Richmond?

The result seems almost inevitable: Yost will become a puppet, putty in the hands of Ken Cuccinelli, Bob McDonnell, and the radical right wing of the Party who bought this race for him. Expect Yost’s enthusiastic support on the Party’s assaults on women’s rights, gay rights, education, and the environment. Yost will have zero clout and will be steamrolled by stronger, brighter, and more experienced legislators. What a disaster!

My district?  We elected Republican Nick Rush, who ran unopposed for a vacant seat. If I'd known he was going to run unopposed I would have run against him, just so the big-money people would have had to spend hundreds of thousands to defeat me.

* * Hosting still more guests

We had houseguests overnight last night.

As I mentioned a couple of posts earlier, a year or two ago, I joined an Internet-based host service called Warm Showers http://www.warmshowers.org/. It is primarily for traveling bicyclists to link up with people who are willing to share a bedroom and perhaps a meal or two or them on their way down the road. Our home in Blacksburg is a couple of miles from the original 1976 Bikecentennial route, now called the Transamerica Bicycle Route.

On Saturday, I got an e-mail from a man in California who was traveling from the West Coast to the East Coast, looking for a place to stay. He had recently linked up with another man from Korea. With some confusion, these two arrived at our house late yesterday afternoon after bicycling from Wytheville.

Alex is in his mid-20s. He is a short, slight guy with a mop of dirty blond hair. He is from a suburb of Los Angeles and he looked like he would be comfortable riding the edge of a surf board.

“Oh” is from a suburb of Seoul, South Korea. He flew into Seattle and rode his bicycle to Astoria, Oregon, from where he began his transcontinental ride. He is 30 years old and has the black hair and dark brown eyes of most Asians. This trip to America was, astoundingly, the first time he had ever been in an airplane and his first time ever outside of his native peninsula.

With their late arrival, we did not have time to fix dinner for them last night, so instead we took them to our nearest Mexican restaurant, where they ate hungrily. Afterwards, we drove them into Blacksburg and showed them around the Virginia Tech campus. By this time, it was dark, so they couldn't really see much. But they were particularly interested in the Memorial set up on the edge of the Drill Field commemorating the shooting in 2007. Oh was particularly shaken by it because he recalled that the shooter was the son of Korean parents. He indicated that it was big news in Korea when it happened and that his country was deeply regretful.

This morning, Alex told me about his many experiences crossing our enormous country. At one point, in Kansas, he was befriended by a middle-aged man who was so generous with his time and money that it actually made Alex uncomfortable. Alex described the feeling of vulnerability that a person has while bicycling. He told me that particularly in eastern Kentucky, many people left their dogs free to chase bicyclists as they rode by. At one point, four dogs literally were biting at Alex's panniers.

Oh told me that his cellular telephone and a couple of other items were stolen from him in Missouri, but somehow miraculously he was able to have them recovered. Otherwise, he said that everyone was kind and cordial to him.

Only a few days ago, these guys were riding in a remote area not far from Marion, Virginia. It was raining and cold. They became dangerously wet, and were forced to seek refuge under a carport. Neeting a warm and dry place to stay, they were so desperate they called 911. A state trooper came to investigate their predicament. He was unable to help them personally but he put them in touch with someone who had a pickup truck and who took them and their bicycles into Marion where they were able to find a motel. Life on the road has enormous challenges, but they were in good spirits and optimistic about the trip.

It is always fun and interesting for us to have strangers visiting with us in the house. This group of two riders is the fourth separate group we have had stay with us this year. Every one of them has been a pleasant and worthwhile experience.

* * Exploring Lexington

This past weekend Jane and I spent two nights in Lexington, Virginia. Every year that we have been together, which is better than a quarter of a century now, we have gone away in October for a couple of days either to a small hotel or to a bed and breakfast. We typically like to choose a place that is between one and three hours from home. We like to be far enough away to have it feel like we have left, but not so far as to spend the entire weekend traveling.

Previously, Jane has spent a lot of time in Lexington because she has accompanied our daughter there to the Virginia Horse Center. But neither of us had spent much time in the town itself.

Lexington is home to two universities, Virginia Military Institute and Washington and Lee University. The former is our nation's oldest state-managed military school, founded in 1836. Stonewall Jackson was teaching there at the onset of the Civil War. George Marshall (Marshall Plan) and many senators, congressmen, justices, and Nobel Prize winners have attended. It has about 1500 students. The latter is one of the nation’s oldest collebest, dating back to 1749. it was formerly named Washington College. After the Civil War, Robert E. Lee became president. When he died, grateful trustees rename the school Washington and Lee University.

The weekend got off to a rocky start. Jane and I needed to take separate vehicles because she had an appointment in Charlottesville on the following Monday and I needed to return home. So I drove our Honda Pacific Coast motorcycle and she drove the Subaru station wagon. When I arrived in town on the motorcycle, it failed to restart. We were planning to take it for a ride later that afternoon. We decided that under the circumstances, it was best to not ride it anymore. Anticipating some problems, I had brought with me a trickle charger. We found a long extension cord at the downtown hotel where we stayed and I was able to connect it.

Back in April, I was team leader for a Rotary International GSD trip to Bolivia, which I have chronicled previously on this blog. At the same time I was in Bolivia, Bill Ricks of Lexington was team leader to a similar team to Tasmania. His experience was much different than mine. Because Tasmania is an English speaking country with a similar culture to our own, it was a much easier place to meet and interact with people than the Spanish-speaking Bolivia. Jane and I had dinner Friday night in downtown Lexington with Bill and his wife, and we traded notes on our experiences.

On Sunday, Jane and I rendezvoused with one of my dearest old friends, Chris Hamilton, and his wife Phyllis, who live near Harrisonburg. We decided to walk together on a new trail called the Chessie Nature Trail, linking Lexington with Buena Vista. The trail is about 6 miles long and it parallels the Maury River. It is a delightful trail, alternating between forests and farms, with some large open fields and some narrow cliffs.

Chris had told me earlier that he had invited some other friends to come along as well. Two couples had initially accepted. However, by the time the event actually rolled around, apparently both of them changed their minds, citing medical issues. Chris is a couple of years older than I am. He served for two years in the Army before returning to school at Virginia Tech, where I met him. He is in exceptionally good physical condition and thinks nothing of doing a 75 mile bicycle ride. However, he told me that walking was actually tougher on his body than bicycling. Phyllis said that she frequently walks in her neighborhood and this 6 mile journey was not a problem for her. Likewise, I often do four to five mile walks on the nearby Huckleberry trail. So this was in no way a strenuous activity for me. By contrast, I had recently returned from a 40 mile backpacking trip where I was caring where I was walking upwards of 10 miles each day. Hiking 10 miles, up hill and down, with a heavy pack on my back is considerably more stressful to the body than hiking six flat miles. By the time the trip was over, Jane was complaining about pain in her knees. Although she goes to the gym often for workouts, she still found this trip to be stressful to her body. We’re not getting any younger!

Back in town, we found a sports bar where we were able to have dinner together while watching most of the Virginia Tech football game with Boston College, which Tech won handily.

The next morning, Jane and I toured the adjacent campuses of Washington and Lee and Virginia Military Institute. Lee's Chapel at Washington and Lee is a beautiful building, open to the public. However, we were there on a Sunday morning in a time where it was closed. So we were not able to go inside.

At VMI, we were able to tour the museum of the Institute. One of the world’s most complete collections of firearms is housed there. The austere campus and the presence of uniformed students was unnerving to me. Certainly there have been times when our military has been needed to protect our country and its security. However, I grew up during the Vietnam conflict and I have always felt that our country was a bit too eager during the past few decades to go to war. Looking over a room full of firearms, each of which is designed to kill a human being, made me categorically uneasy.

Once on my way home, the Honda performed perfectly. At one point, I had to stop to fill it with gas. I did so without shutting off the motor, afraid that I would not be able to restart it once back on my way. When I finally arrived in my driveway, I shut the motor off. Then I pushed the starter and it fired right back up. So, most of my anxiety was wasted.

All in all, a great weekend!