On Saturday, Steve and I went to San Francisco for the memorial of a dear old friend, Miguel Wooding. Miguel was one of the most selfless, smart, and energetic people I’ve ever met. He had dedicated the past 20 years of his life to helping San Francisco tenants to stay in their homes and providing homes for those who were homeless. Miguel tragically lost his life when he was hit by a jet ski while snorkeling on vacation. His death leaves a gaping hole in so many lives, and even though we hadn’t seen him in 15 years, we still feel his loss as acutely as if we had been with him just yesterday.
The memorial was bittersweet—a juxtaposition of desperate sadness with the joy of seeing old friends with whom we had never meant to lose touch. Among those in attendance were several of the people with whom we initially planned our escape from the city to farm life– a group we called Tenacious Sprout. In 1992-93 we met many times to discuss the details of how we would buy, organize, and live on our not-yet-existent farm. We pooled money into a $10,000 CD, we researched bylaws of Intentional Communities, and we went to a conference on ways to afford farmland put on by the group Equity Trust. We bicycled to the Russian River for a retreat at which we had long discussions of what sort of lifestyles we would find acceptable within our community, how we would earn and share our money, how many people and which ones we would include in our farm, what sort of housing we would have. Looking back, it is easy to see that we were missing any real understanding of a key part of our plan—farming. But I’m also amazed at how much effort, heart, and energy we put into our planning.
I don’t think we ever consciously disbanded Tenacious Sprout. Steve came down to work on his uncle’s farm and take classes in agroecology at UCSC. I moved to Oakland for a job in energy conservation. Other members moved, got interesting jobs, or pursued teaching credentials. After a couple years, Steve’s uncle Jerry helped us launch our own farm on a few acres of leased land, I moved down to Watsonville with Steve, and our farm was born. Amid the craziness of actually farming (and having children), San Francisco grew further and further away. But as I think back on it now, I feel that our farm is still wrapped in the tendrils of the tenacious sprout that sprung from a seed planted by so many friends long ago.
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