863 Rainy Sunday

Sunday, September 3, 2006

[Later edit - I accidentally filed this before it was finished. So I finished it.]

In an earlier entry, about the museum concert, I mentioned Ashokan Farewell. If anyone reading this gets any New York TV channels (Daughter?), you may have seen the public service piece about "... if you live in [various places in NY] ... make a difference ... vote". The gentle music during that spot, fiddle up front and guitar behind, is Ashokan Farewell. It is very beautiful. There's a 30-second clip here. Click on "The Catskill Collection".

The use of it on that ad is ironic. Jay Ungar wrote the music after a fiddle and dance workshop at the State University of New York's Ashokan field campus, when he feared they may not be able to go back. The Ashokan field campus is a beautiful spot in the woods near the Ashokan reservoir. There are bunkhouses, a meeting hall, a pond and creek, trails through the woods, and a small animal farm. SUNY leases it out to groups, and it's where the local Mensa group hosts its annual regional gathering. (It has a special meaning for me, because it's the place where Roman first went public with feelings for me.)

This year we couldn't hold the gathering, because due to the state legislature's budget cuts plus an attractive purchase offer from a group that wanted to buy it for a children's camp, SUNY decided to sell it. As it turned out, the deal fell through. It may still have to be sold, if they can find a buyer. I find it amusing that Ashokan Farewell is being used to urge people to vote. I wonder if I am the only one to see the irony. (I wonder if it was on purpose. Doubtful. Not many people are aware of the field campus. But I'll bet Jay Ungar is aware.)

In that previous entry I mentioned the Sloop Clearwater. Friday night they were signing up people for 3-hour cruises on the Clearwater, two on Saturday and two on Sunday. I've always wanted to sail the Hudson on the Clearwater. You don't get to just sit and enjoy - the Clearwater has (I've heard) the largest mainsail on any sloop, and guests on board are expected to help raise and lower it, and do everything else that needs doing. Clearwater plys the Hudson all summer from NYC to Albany, spending weekends and spreading ecological messages in towns along the way, so the opportunity to sail with her is rare.

I couldn't sign up for a Sunday sail because there was a good chance I'd be meeting a new friend in Sturbridge on Sunday. I mentioned to one of the other volunteers that I was thinking about a Saturday sail, and she said that Saturday was going to be very windy, with heavy rain from the remnants of the hurricane, so the boat probably wouldn't go out at all. Everybody was saying Saturday would be bad. So I didn't sign up at all.

Yesterday was absolutely beautiful. Cloudy, but otherwise fine. The Clearwater went out. I didn't.

Today is rainy, so there's no point in going to Sturbridge.

Mother is not happy.

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On another other front, the cute calves are back.

There's a "gentleman's farm" down the road. Huge, beautiful. It would be heavily taxed if it's not a "working" farm, so the owner leases out fields to others who want to pasture cattle or horses. Right now one of the large fields is full of mother cows and their calves.

The mothers are so calm. They just stand around with their heads down, munching grass. The calves are fun to watch. They sleep in little mounds, and then one of the calves wakes up, and gambols around waking the others. When they're all awake, they gather in a tight circle, facing in. It looks just like a sports huddle. They seem to commune for a few minutes, heaven only knows about what, and then suddenly one of them will jump straight up into the air, like she's been shot, and run away at top speed. All the other calves give chase, and they tear around, weaving in and out of their mothers, until they tire of the game. Then they butt heads a little, and stand around in groups of two and three looking for all the world like they're gossiping. The mothers don't even look up. The tired calves taste a little grass, sip a little milk, pile up for a little nap, and pretty soon it starts all over again.

I refer to these calves as "she", even though I'm not sure, because they're dairy cows. The boy calves have likely already been separated out, and are being raised without the opportunity to gambol. They can't be allowed to toughen their muscles.

That's why I don't eat veal. The poor little guys never had a chance to have fun. (Even beef cattle calves have a chance to play.)