Gypsy Cafe, Wednesday

I can’t believe it’s Wednesday already, but it is. I’m in Sunny Valley, Oregon on a great little piece of land called Gypsy Cafe. I feel like the past few days have been very productive. The lifestyle here is extremely laid back, but very hard-working. Any time someone has time to do some work, they’re doing it. The owner, Myshkin, works in the mornings until the early afternoon in her office, while the other WWOOFer, Anna, and I do things that can be done without her help.

I arrived on Sunday afternoon, a lot earlier than I had intended. But Anna was here hanging out and she showed me around, told me the basics of what living was like here, and we sat on the porch until it started to get chilly. The evening was pretty much the perfect first evening. Anna made dinner -  a delicious stir-fry with tempeh and rice, and we drank wine and talked. Before we knew it we had fiddles and guitars out and were teaching each other songs and playing together. It couldn’t have made me feel more at home.

The work started straight-away on Monday. Anna and I started by patching up some of the walls in the little cottage beside the house, and I installed some insulation. We then covered the open side of the wall with drywall (who knew I’d ever work with drywall??) and cleared out the room so we could do some patching of cracks and eventually paint the walls and re-do the floors. Anna really has a hang of things here, and I’m a bit worried about when she leaves, because I won’t have her guidance anymore. But I guess that’s part of what the experience is here.

After a short break, Myshkin was done with work and came and helped us patch the cracks in the walls with mesh tape, and we began to mud up the walls (like plaster, basically), accompanied by some delicious home-brewed stout beer. Myshkin then made us dinner and we moved on to yet another project – painting the kitchen and living room trim with earthen paint. Anna and I dutifully wrote down the recipe – make wheat paste from wheat flour and boiling water and mix that with equal parts sand and clay. Then you add natural pigment. We used a beautiful deep green color, and painted with some tunes until about 11pm. It was an intense day!

Barb, the other owner, arrives tonight from a long trip to Portland. She is the one in charge of most of the gardening tasks, so I’m excited to get started on some of that. It has been raining a bit since I arrived, but today seems a bit clearer. We’ll see how the next few days go.

Yesterday we got a visit from three girls from Olympia, Washington. They attend this extremely progressive school called Evergreen, which sounds fascinating. They have such interesting experiences among them and are all determined to live exciting, passionate, nomadic lives. They were a great help while they were here, and a lot of fun to have around. We went for a hike and yesterday three of us got our feet dirty during our first experience with cob. Myshkin is building a cob house up on the hill from the farm house, and it’s amazing! Cob is basically clay, sand and straw mixed together and hardened. It’s super sustainable and lasts a good long time. This is a 200 square feet house, and it’s just mind-boggling to think how many small, foot-stomped batches of cob are in that house. We did a large batch and got about 4 inches of height onto the back of a bench. Slow, slow process. But very fulfilling. The clay feels really nice on your skin, but is quite rough on the feet after a while. And, it dyes your skin and clothes orange! Pretty fun. They have great books on cobbing, and I’ve been inspired to try to make a cob oven someday, for wood-fired pizzas, breads, etc. How cool would that be?

On another, less fun note, my Colorado farm canceled on me because he had accidentally double-booked the time. So, I’m scrambling to get another farm lined up for the beginning of June. But hopefully if that doesn’t work out I can just couchsurf in Boulder and Denver and hang out with friends. The Gypsy Cafe has wireless internet, so I’m doing some research. Trying to stay away from computers other than that and this.

I already miss all my friends, and keep thinking about the amazing last night I had in San Francisco. I’m a bit anxious, but am trying to push through it and just embrace the experience of where I am and where I will be for the next few months. It’s all for the best, and I’m really excited about what the future will bring, but my body tends to play tricks on me. But hopefully this will be the experience that ends this dreaded anxiety.

Today we make a trip to Ashland, which I’ve heard is a great little artsy town. I’m excited to explore. We’ll get some groceries as well and we’re supposed to be getting 5 or 6 fresh loaves of homemade bread today as well, so I’m excited about that. So far the food has been simple but absolutely delicious. Rice, beans, greens, eggs, cilantro and spices. More to come…

Emily’s Photos from Gypsy Cafe – sorry for the lack of better organization