how to tend to soil

[deep breaths]

it’s one day before the full moon

wednesday, may 6th, 2020

the 12th day of the hebrew month Iyar

7 weeks in quarantine

spring

———

i’m here on mohican land— the home of a people who were torn from this place

i’m also here on land stewarded by waters, rocks, flying beings, legged beings, and swimming beings

land stewarded by farmers and educators

grazing cows

myself

and group of people whom i love very very much

i’m here to tell a story-- the story of the 10 lunar cycles I’ve experienced in this place, 10 months, 10 beginnings, 10 journeys of unlearning and learning and creating and falling apart. a story of evolution

i feel strongly that none of the words i share here belong to me— i rest in the arms of so many teachers, traditions, and lineages. this is a story told through me, rather than one that is my own.

what led me to this story? place corps. the organization that has housed me, nourished me, and educated me since I graduated from college last may—the organization dedicated to the exploration of place. a child of hawthorne valley farm and the good work institute, place corps seeks to equip young folks like myself with the skills needed to live equitably and regeneratively in this world.

for the past 10 months, in the first year this program has existed, this has looked like my 7 housemates and I sharing a communal home, a garden, a budget, decision making, and all of the rich and vibrant coursework, workshops, and trainings that place corps has offered us. i’ll get into all of that soon, but first, i want to talk a bit about what this year has meant to me.

i've been learning about an ancient jewish agricultural practice called shmita, a word I first heard on a November day from a wise person named Connor. Shmita, I later learned, translates to the word “release.” shmita is also known as the sabbath year, and it describes the time in agricultural cycles when the land lays fallow and farming activity comes to a stop. just like we rest on the sabbath during the week, the land rests on the sabbath year of shmita. from the rabbis and mystics and farmers and educators who have taught me about this concept, i’ve also learned that shmita is a time for bountiful regeneration-- a time to release from the cycles of production and invite a time to rewild.

in so many ways, this year at place corps has been a shmita year for me. a radical experience of releasing the mechanisms of my former city life-- constant productivity, competition, & consumption-- and rewilding towards the playful, creative, divine being that comes forward when life slows down and space is made for rest.

to tell the story of my shmita with place corps, i’d love to let mama Earth tell most of it. i’m growing to see my life through her eyes, to see myself as an organism, an ecosystem, a being seeking cultivation and balance. one of the ways that I particularly love to apply this lens is through soil. three types of soils. inner soil, social soil, and ecological soil.

to get to know these soils, i’d like you to imagine three concentric rings. in the inner most ring, you can place inner soil. in the middle ring lives social soil, and in the outermost, ecological soil. you might visualize yourself encapsulated within your communities within ecosystems of Earth. this visualization was introduced to me by a beloved teacher and mentor named Abrah.

the regeneration that comes from shmita occurs in all of these three soils. when the land is allowed to heal and rest, farmers can turn to their community members to rejoice in the new openness of life. when we are supported by our loved ones, we might be able to open our hearts towards inner selves and tend to the garden that is the human soul.

the framework of these three soils has guided me throughout my whole experience at place corps, and i owe so much gratitude to our teachers Rachel & Steffen for sharing this framework last august.

my time at place corps has offered me an embodied understanding of these soils— an embodied understanding that the health of one is inherently connected to the health of the others, and vice versa. when our communities are healthy, so is the land. when the land is sick, so are we. this understanding is also rooted in adrienne maree brown’s understanding of fractals, which she writes about in her book emergent strategy. she says:

“...what we practice at the small scale sets the patterns for the whole system... This doesn’t mean to get lost in the self, but rather to see our own lives and work and relationships as a front line, a first place we can practice justice, liberation, and alignment with each other and the Planet.”

so this is how i will tell my story, from my front lines. from my inner, social, and ecological soils. each soil seeking to be in reciprocity and balance with the others.

and hopefully, my story reaches the soil inside you, and maybe even creates some space for new life to emerge.

click through the posts below for the next three parts of this story

Lila Rimalovski

inner soil

social soil

ecological soil

during this past year, i’ve had the blessing to learn directly and indirectly from so many folks and organizations overflowing with gifts and brilliance. this is an incomplete list, in no particular order. i offer my deepest gratitude to everyone.

all of the Place Corps cohort members, educators, administrators, co-founders, funders, and seminar speakers, the worker-trustees at The Good Work Institute, everyone from The Omega Institute for Sustainable Living and the Ecological Literacy Program, Mandana Boushee & Lauren Giambrone (Wild Gather), the organizers from Nishmat Shoom, everyone from the Jewish Farmer Network, Deb & Ricky Habib (Seeds of Solidarity Farm), Aviva Argote, Dave Jacke (Edible Forest Gardens), Steve Gabriel (Wellspring Forest Farm), Leah Penniman & Amani Olugbala (Soul Fire Farm), Naima Penniman & Alixa Garcia (Climbing PoeTree), Sherri Mitchell (Sacred Instructions), Rowen White (Indigenous Seed Keepers Network), Ken Greene (Hudson Valley Seed Co.), Joseluiz Ortiz (Biodynamics Association), Suzanne Snider (Oral History Summer School), Connor Stedman (Appleseed Permaculture), Abrah Zaltzberg-Dresdale & Adam Brock (Regenerate Change), Jesse Smith (White Buffalo Land Trust), everyone from the Northeast Farmers of Color Land Trust, Nikiko Masumoto (Masumoto Family Farm), andrienne maree brown (emergent strategy), Robin Wall Kimmerer (Braiding Sweetgrass), Starhawk (The Fifth Sacred Thing), Sandor Katz (Wild Fermentation), everyone from all parts of Hawthorne Valley, especially the farmers and apprentices, everyone at Farmscape Ecology, the amazing yoga teacher Rachel (Soul Medicine Yoga), everyone at The Schumacher Center for a New Economics, Rachel Schneider, Steffen Schneider, & Jill Jakimetz (The Institute for Mindful Agriculture), and of course, the land herself and all of her beings, the moon, the sun, and the stars