Voices in the Field

The Garden

Each day is a new beginning, starting with a slow, foggy wake-up in my brain. Then my energy picks up as I remember the smiling and serious faces of my co-workers, like flowers in the sunshine.

As I arrive at the garden, a peaceful always sweeps through my being to know the joy and satisfaction that comes with the work of weeding, digging planting harvesting and wreathmaking. Always, I am reminded each day, that the Homeless Garden Project is a "we" and "our" garden project and that the sum of its parts is the very best whole and represents a new unity.

--Leigh Liles

Long Live the Biosphere

Arriving to work at the Natural Bridges Farm is not a dread as it usually is at jobs where I don't believe in the work I'm doing or what it really contributes to the world. It's only been two weeks but the following is my impression

(read more) --Gato

Feeling the Warmth of the Sun Again

When I came to the garden last September, it was like reaching the beach on Maui after swimming across the Pacific Ocean. It took nearly 7 years. Yet I had never left town. In 1991, I lost my home and my husband of 25 years. My son was nine, my daughter was four, our savings gone.

I was mentally and spiritually broken and we were homeless-and this lasted three years.

(read more) -- a WOFE gardener

Circle Meeting

The circle: unbroken energy. A meeting of wide-ranging personalities merging from all aspects of life; ending a workday in the living fields of Natural Bridges Farm. The women of the Women's Organic Flower Enterprise are trying to find and arrange rides to the farm. Energies heighten anticipating what we'll say on this warm, breezy, wonderful Thursday.

(read more) --Larry Moore

News from Natural Bridges Farm

We started with a great crew this year and they have alloyed into a cohesive group. Their hard work and ability to be supportive has transformed our "circle" meetings into an effective tool for problem solving. I continue to be impressed the group's diligence, sensitivity and resourcefulness in areas that range from resolving differences that arise between workers to legal, medical, and mental health issues.

(read more) --Patrick Williams, horticulture director

The transition of winter into spring certainly is symbolic of change in our lives.

This year we are making some changes that will build on last year's successes and improve our training program. We have decided to dedicate more of our land to production crops for WOFE as it seems that the major limiting factor to WOFE's further growth is the quantity of flowers needed for their production.

(read more) --Patrick Williams

Winter Newsletter

Director's Notes

During the particularly wet winter period, Pete opened up his small camper van to shelter a homeless woman who was even worse off than him. A VW van is a tight space to begin with and when it's your home 24/7 it gets tighter, and when two people...

(read more) -- Dawn Coppin

The Garden