First Week at Allegheny Mountain Institute

Allegheny mountain range might be my new favorite

Currently I am sitting atop a mountain in Highland County, Virginia watching snow fall into the red and green leaved rolling hills beyond me. So since moving here last week, I'd say life has been pretty good.

The main event of the week was probably our Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC) class. While I defined permaculture as "an intentional design to support and sustain the interconnectedness of life," its uses and applications in transforming land to edible, efficient landscapes spreads far and wide. So hopefully after a year my primitive definition will become much more inclusive. So stay tuned!

Since the designs of permaculture permeate over all parts of life, we did many activities to understand ourselves and people around us. One thing I liked that we did was analyzing what we each give and get from each other, using the lenses of  head, hands, and heart. Now, coming straight from 4-H, where these are 3 of the 4 H's (last one being health), I really enjoyed this experience. I enjoyed it so much that I think I will arrange this blog post in the same way.

View from the parking lot of AMI

Head

Wow! I never expected that the place I'd be most academically stimulated after college would be at a farm! That may be because I never expected to be at a farm after college. It could also be because of stereotypes, or that our group was hand-picked and self-selected. Whatever the reasons are, I am impressed by all of my cohort's heads: the way they think and solve problems, and how they came to their views on environmental health. I'm applying and expanding on the chemistry of cooking and environmental ethics I took in college. Fun Fact: you can let bread sit outside and wild yeast will help it rise (with some work).

Stream that feeds into the reservoir we use

Heart

I feel my heart growing to try to fit the love for all the new nature experiences I have up on the mountain. I feel it yearning for more nature, more food cultivation, more permaculture understanding. But I also feel it missing friends and family. I will hear a comment and just know that Josh would have the best retort to it. I see someone being meticulous about cleaning and I miss caring and helping my mom clean the house (Mom don't get any ideas that I like cleaning though). I even miss my 4-H family, especially that I don't get to play with their new snake! My heart is also stirring as I start to connect with my cohort. Still mostly each of us teaching each other cool facts and skills (like AcroYoga, fermentation, bread-making, and lotion making). Sometimes I feel like I am so similar to everyone here because I care about nature and food. And sometimes I am nervous I don't belong still because I don't know what skills I can help others with, but I am hopefully that feeling will continue to dissipate.

Hands

Sometimes the fog likes to isolate us more

This is probably the area I have experienced least being here thus far. I thought we would go straight into farming and cooking all day, but we actually have only played in the dirt for a couple hours at most. We have been learning, observing, and wandering. I have learned some amazing yoga poses, fed the chicken and transplanted some broccoli and cauliflower. I have loved the taste of learning with my hands and look forward to more of that. 

Health

This is my favorite part of the experience so far. Fresh food is SO TASTY! Being around people that love and value food, some more than I currently do,  is invigorating, inspiring, and intimidating. But mostly refreshing. People here put their health paramount and do so in a way that doesn't involve the health care system or pop science articles. They do it in a way where they treat their bodies with respect. I hope I can keep this mentality here at the fellowship and for years to keep.