Little we see in nature that is ours......but these are mine

When Uncle Eldon water-witched our property in Southern Utah soon after we bought it, he scanned the hillside and named all the trees and shrubs: ponderosa, fir, oak, manzanita, squawbush (aromatic sumac), serviceberry, rabbit brush, sagebrush, piñon pine, juniper. I knew them already; I taught my fourth-graders the plants of Utah, and these were a small representation--those typical for the elevation. It's good to be able to claim some parts of nature that are our own.

The rounded tops and butterscotch-scented bark of the ponderosa pine. Mine.

The 6,000 foot elevation difference between the rim and the river: Mine.

The upright hardiness and squishable yellow centers of colorful hollyhocks. Mine.

Manzanita, with its scratchy round leaves and smooth red bark. Mine.

Squawbush and its mouth-puckering flavored berries to put in hiking water bottles: Mine.

Rubbery rabbitbrush that take over with a bit of liquid encouragement from water. Mine.

Piñon pine's sticky sap and reluctance to bear fruit but once every decade or so. Mine.

Growing up, it was this color--not the volume--of water that signified 'flood.' Mine.

Utah's incomparable cumulous topped with cirrus clouds in August. Mine.

The 'pinks' of Southern Utah: view from the rock-gathering hike. Mine.

Maidenhair fern in Zion. Mine.

I love recognizing sacred datura; and I know not to eat it. Mine.

Weeping rock at its best. Mine.

Zion. Mine.

The knowledge that I can get prickly pear slivers out of my skin, even the littlest ones, with duct tape. Mine.

That dry rustling sound of cottonwoods in the fall. Mine.

Arm extended--two finger widths above the horizon, twenty minutes to sunset. Mine.

Mountains to the east. Lake to the west. Mine.

Little we see in nature that is ours, but I'm claiming these eighteen.

Getting and Spending

We've been home from our mission for almost three weeks: 19 days in which we have spent a lot of money. On our mission we bought food. We spent our time doing things other than getting and spending. We've pretty much made up in three weeks for the eighteen months of abstinence. I think Wordsworth was right, "Getting and spending we lay waste our powers; (Little we see in nature that is ours....)

Yes, the 23 year old carpeting had to go, and the tile countertops, too. Wallpaper has gone out of vogue and it's now back in, but I'm not trying to catch up with the latest. I'm over it. The Bagley house was due for an update, and is getting one in the next few weeks; but the time and energy involved in making these changes has been significant and I'll be glad to return to life without consumerism.

I realize since being home how materialistic our society is. We are bombarded by temptations to spend money almost at every turn, and we haven't turned on the TV but once in the time we've been home. We haven't subscribed to a newspaper. We throw away the junk mail without reading it. I think it's just the the presence of so many stores, and so many things in those stores that is overwhelming. Do I need this, might I need that? Objects that I didn't know existed before seem to clamor for my attention.

And then there's the internet. I've been up for an hour an a half this morning. I like to read my email and check in with FaceBook before hitting the scriptures and my journal. An hour and a half! With five minutes of real email and two minutes of catching up with friends and family online. That leaves eighty-three minutes of being a consumer. Eighty-three wasted minutes. I might as well have been watching TV. Despite 'unsubscribing' from every commercial email I receive, I still sift through many messages urging me to take advantage of this fabulous offer or that incredible bargain every day. If I click on a website hoping to select a good color for bedroom walls, suddenly I'm subscribed to every home decorating and furnishing store ready to meet my needs. And the angst of customers fearful of making the wrong color choice is there for me to read about. I now have several more to unsubscribe from just by that one click.

I should have been a pioneer. Nothing to buy.

BUT: two weeks later, here's what our house is starting to look like~~

Homeward Bound

First go to this link:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MaQYQnrPgSM

Did you listen to it?!! Do it now.

Nostalgia is my favorite minor key. I've always been a homesick girl down deep.

When I was young I'd try to spend the night at Grandma's--just our two yards and a dirt road between us, but I would look out her upstairs bedroom window at the lights of my own cozy home and want to be there so fiercely that I'd tiptoe down the stairs, out the back door and brave the dark to run home--being chased by bears.

I love being home. I'm a homebody. (In Chile, I'm a casera) Fortunately, I've been able to live all over the world and have kind of learned to "bloom where I'm planted," but I've always been eager at the end to go home. With less than three weeks until we get on that plane, I'm indulging my inner homesick child. Enjoy the music. (Maybe someone will help me make hot links so you don't have to cut and paste.) Suggest other songs to really get me bawling, as I did when singing "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas" with the Officer Wives Skylarks in the Philippines in 90 degree heat.

Homeward Bound (Not Simon and Garfunkle but Tabernacle Choir's version) link above
Oh Home Beloved, LDS Hymn https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ay_b-r1WeGw
New World Symphony Dvorak https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOX15agZ3-0
Bring Him Home:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-ypIhY42-o
The Road Home: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbwhSP3ZIq4
I'll Take you Home Again, Kathleen
Sappy song, but I can't resist Johnny Cash and Elvis crooning my demise
           Johnny Cash  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aK1OZZ-TOuM
           Elvishttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TEHnzFC7M9A

From Olives to Olive Oil

After the truck dumps the olives, workers judge the ripeness of the particular load. The mix of green and purple indicates what the balance of flavors will be: bitter, fruity, grassy, etc. North Americans, who use relatively little olive oil prefer a blander taste than Spaniards and Italians who enjoy a more robust flavor. More green olives = more grassy, amargo (bitter) taste. I'm starting to really like flavor in my olive oil. The greener the better in my book! 

This batch of olives has a good blend of the ripe (purple) fruit with the less ripe (green) olives.

Conveyor belts move the fruit from the basement to a series of points where it is washed, leaves and non-olivey objects are separated out and into a series of machines that shake, rattle and roll (just kidding--I have no idea what happens, but it involves mashers and centrifuges and magic but NO HEAT). Don't let the three people who have explained it to me know that I suggested I didn't understand the process completely!

 This slurry gets refined and separated every step along the way---

.....until wah-lah! Olive oil!!

 The oil is stored for a time in the tanks with legs and a funnel-like base for any water or solids to sink to the bottom and be drained off and then in gigantic tanks (over a million gallons of storage capacity in these 40 tanks) in a climate-controlled room ready to be sold to wholesalers and exported.

This is the General Manager and Company Vice President and family that we love. Just having a tour with the commoners...... Austin prides himself on making funny faces, Dakota has redeemed that name for me, Madi is just eleven and knitting socks because I'm an awesome teacher and Dillon wanted a short list of things for his birthday--the last thing on the list was, "Bagleys." How could you not love him?

So once the oil has been extracted, some byproducts have to be dealt with. The pits become this material in my hand, piles of which are in the other two pictures. It is burned in the bio-masa red machine to provide energy for the plant~ very efficient and resourceful! I'm not sure what happens to the leaves and twigs, but it's an impressively small pile in comparison with the pit material.

The sloppy olive mash after the oil is extracted gets loaded on a truck and hauled to an area of the fundo where it's hilly and wild. There's quite a quantity of this residue, but a large area for it. It looks like a river of tar and smells woody and rich at this point. The wild horses seem to enjoy eating it. 

Watch for Chilean olive oil in your local grocery store. It's being sold to companies who will bottle it under their own label, but for the last two years, it was bottled and given as gifts under the label ARC (AgroReservas de Chile) with a picture of Noah's ark. The purpose of this farm is investment in the land, primarily, but also to produce food reserves in times of need. I'm happy we won't have to rely on Crisco for our fat allotment in a famine, aren't you?

Harvest! The culmination of a year's worth of work and anticipation

The harvest is going on night and day for about a month. Last year was the first mechanical harvest, with "try it out" equipment and very limited scope. I'm just remembering a day or two.

When all the trees are producing, it is estimated that these harvesters be operating for 70 days, 24 hours a day. 

This year, there are three behemoth harvesters that drive right over the trees, snarfing up the olives and leaving the leaves and branches pretty much intact. Olives go through the tall arm into a bin (metal with green framing) driven in the adjacent row. When this container is full, it dumps the fruit into larger trailers parked along the road.

A few of the small end trees suffered as drivers learned how to maneuver the harvesters.

  Overhead shot of a bin just beginning to fill up.

Truckloads of olives come first to the reception building where the load is weighed and data is collected. Then the olives are dumped into a chute to the basement where the fruit begins the process of becoming olive oil.

We have heard different reports about the harvest, but so far it looks wildly successful. Anywhere from 1/3 more than expected to four times the expectation. The workers are exhausted, the wives are weary (we've done guard-dog duty staying overnight at homes where hubby wasn't home) and the lights don't seem to go out in the fields or the mill; but after this week it should be done. It's 11:30 at night and I just heard another truck rumbling by. Thrilling!