Welcome to the Journal of the Graf Family Growing Power Home Model
Greens Yearning to Grow
Outside
Worms
Garden 07/30/08
Over two years ago (in January of 2006), I toured Will Allen’s Growing Power farm. Inspired by the Growing Power vision, my wife, son, a family friend and I constructed a home-based version of the Growing Power system in our sun-room.
We started by building an 8′ X 2′ box in our three-season room, and (with help of good persons at Growing Power and some worms) grew, with mixed results, salad greens and seedlings for the first summer’s garden. As the seasons change, our focus shifts back and forth between the sun-room and its evolving Growing Power Home Garden Project Box, and our Growing Power backyard garden, where we use the rich soil, worm castings and worms from the indoor box outdoors. Same system yet different.
Digging in the earth can uncover all kinds of things, and so can digging deep in ourselves. In my online journal, I have been recording daily reflections on the progress of our efforts in adapting the Growing Power model to our home and garden, mixed with my observations about life, peace, justice, faith, family, community and friends. Enjoy. Thank you! — Bob Graf
Click below to read any post in full, and to post your comments on it — see the Archives for older posts.
Hare & Goat with AIROnce upon a time there was a farm where in the summer all the young animals played together. Sometimes the children from the house came out to join them. However, on cold wintry days only a few animals came out to play and the children from the house seldom came out.
On one such cold wintry day only the young rabbit, which is also called a hare, and the little goat came out to play. They started to wonder why the other animals, like the pigs, calves and horses and even the children did not come out to play on cold days. The hare said: “There must be something about you and me that the cold does not bother us like piggy and the other animals.” “ Yes”, said the goat. What do we have that other animals do not have?” They thought and thought and finally the goat said, “I got it. It is our long hair. Other animals have hair but not as long as you and I.” “Yes,” said the hare. “It must be the hair.” They were very proud of themselves for figuring this out.
As they were celebrating this discovery the wise old owl came flying down on a nearby branch. The owl said “It is not your hair that makes you warm in the cold winter. “Look at me, I have no hair but keep warm in the winter. Also what happens to you when it rains or snows are a cold day.” The hare said “I get cold and go into my hole.” The goat said “I get cold and go into the barn with the other animals.” “Yes,” said the owl, “this proves my point.”
Beautiful Tree - Saturday, October 11, 2008
Tall, Strong & Beautiful TreeThe tree behind my backyard stands tall, strong and beautiful. The leaves in the summer are green and block the sun from the south, but in the fall turn colors and die so the tree can survive the cold and snow. The many leaves will fall to the ground only to be composted and live again.
Two community leaders, tall, strong and beautiful persons, have died recently. One I knew a little directly, Jack Stebbins, who, as his obituary said, “taught more than math.” He was a math teacher at UWM but more so a good husband and father and a man with a true compassion for the poor. He and his wife were key figures in the creation of the St. Ben’s Community meal program which, in 40 years, has moved from the table at Casa Maria to the Church hall of St. Benedict’s, from serving a few persons to serving hundreds of persons each night.
Milwaukee’s Own Organic FertilizerToday I buried another 30 or so flower bulbs in my effort to plant over 120 bulbs this fall around my house. I placed over each bulb a little mixture of castings, coir and Milwaukee’s own Milorganite. After packing some of the original soil on this mix I topped it with wood chips and watered each bulb. With all the perennials already planted, next spring and early summer my yards should be blooming with color. My hope is that the bulbs I am burying now in the fall will rise in the spring.
Some of the bulbs and seeds I am planting these days are in words or pictures. Today I heard from the editorial staff of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that in tomorrow’s newspaper they are publishing my letter to the editor called Crumbs from the Table of Rich. You can read my letter about the mental health parity bill just passed by Congress at the Hope To Healing, a mental health and spirituality ministry.
Tulips are coming next springBetween writing the open letter to MU administrators today about Marquette’s Hosting military training and teaching, and my planting a bunch of tulip bulbs outside, my nonviolent worm time was gone. The letter was open since the three administrators at Marquette that I first the letter to did not respond to my two suggestions and thus said No to both requests. The 20 or so tulip bulbs were part of my plan to plant 116 bulbs this spring around the house, in the front and back gardens.
So check out the open letter with two suggestions for Marquette to be Faithful to the Gospel, and you can see the tulips next spring on this site.
I try not to read too much into my son’s, Peter’s art, but some pictures, for reasons I do not understand, speak to me more than others. This is one. His titles give a hint of what he is imagining. This one, called ‘pain’, speaks to me of a deep longing to be somewhere else, in some other place. Wanting to be somewhere where you are not can be very painful.
Today was the first day of my renewed commitment to be fully where I am, to live more with Mindfulness. I am trying to avoid, except when I cannot avoid it, taking on any new project, but the problem is that there are already too many “unfinished projects” to deal with. Today I did some cleanup in the house and repaired the AIR storm windows on my own house. Hopefully soon I can plant the flower bulbs outside and the salad greens inside. I did notice after repairing the storms with AIR insulation pockets that this project got my full attention and my mind did not wander. This full attention often happens when I watch TV or a movie, but it is more difficult to do when there is an activity. Even during the activity of driving a car, something that needs full attention, my mind often wanders. I have mentioned before that working in the garden plants me in the present moment. So I guess there are some activities that make it easier to be present in the moment.
Nonviolent Worm DisplaysToday at the Faith In Recovery, mental health and spirituality, conference I brought both my displays, the one on resistance from Peacefest and the one from the Sustainability Festival at the Urban Ecology Center. When Sister Ann Catherine, the president of Faith In Recovery, asked me what I called the displays, which also included AIR and the Worm Magic show components, I said it was the Garden of Healing and Resistance. The Nonviolent Worm felt right at home at this conference, which covered subjects from “mindfulness”, being present to where you are, to the role of spirituality in recovery. Nonviolence, which Judith Brown in her book on Gandhi defines as “striving nonviolently to the point of sacrifice rather than fighting to attain one’s vision of truth” and the Worm, the heart of the growing power method, seem to go together in the display seamlessly.
Debra Jenkins — Justice for Her SonThis morning’s newspaper brought news stories of two friends who have inspired this web page of the Nonviolent Worm. There was a front page story about Will Allen, the founder of Growing Power, who is the real inspiration for my small efforts to write about a home model of Growing Power in this “Diary of a Worm.” It is a story about Will’s winning the MacArthur Genius award of a half million dollars, no strings attached. On the front page there is a picture of Will speaking with the Mayor of Milwaukee, Tom Barrett.
On page 3 in the local news section there is a story about Debra Jenkins. Debra is a friend that I met at the prayer vigils for homicide victims. Her only son, Larry, was shot and killed by Jon Bartlett, “one of the five police officers that were later convicted in the notorious beating of Frank Jude Jr.” (MJS) Debra’s son was unarmed, committed no crime, but was shot at 14 times, seven hitting him, by Mr. Bartlett because he was scared and ran from him. His mother Debra, seeking justice for her son, Larry Jenkins brought a federal lawsuit against Mr. Bartlett and the city. Although all the witnesses to the incident testified that Larry Jenkins poised no threat to Bartlett when he shot, she lost the lawsuit and the appeal. Now the city lawyers have won a judgment against her of $35,000 for bringing the lawsuit. This judgment against Debra Jenkins seems to have been initiated after Mr. Bartlett, who is now serving a 17-year sentence in Federal Prison to be followed by two other sentence in state prison, filed a lawsuit against the city contending “he was injured in the episode, and that the city should pick up the tab.” The Judge in the case against Debra wants the Mayor to sign off on the $35,000 Judgment. The Mayor’s spokeswoman “said the mayor would not comment on pending litigation and referred the matter to the city attorney’s office” which would not answer the reporter’s calls.
Sports Fall - Sunday, October 05, 2008
A Kite without wind will Fall, despite
the beautiful Fall day.The weekend has been a whirlwind of activities, from visiting three families in need in Milwaukee Saturday morning, to attending the Green Packer Game at Lambeau Field this afternoon. Despite being a whirlwind of a time, without any wind and despite the best efforts of some kids and myself, we could not fly our Mickey Mouse kite yesterday afternoon at my grandchildren’s house in northern Wisconsin.
Despite visiting families in crisis and trying to fly a kite, most of my time was consumed by sport events. This weekend I saw in person or on TV my sports teams: the Milwaukee Brewers, Green Bay Packers and the University of Wisconsin football team, fall in defeat. Like the kite, they just did not have enough wind to soar. Sports can be addictive, especially when your team is in big games, like these three were, and loses. After I got home tonight I even found myself watching on TV another football game and baseball game, not my teams. I just wanted to see a winner no matter who it was.
Already today too much is happening too fast to do a posting. But rather than not do one, I will repeat one from February 12, 2007. Enjoy!
I finally remembered to pick the salad greens from the Growing Power Box for the dinner salad tonight. The 3 ounces of greens, mostly arugula with some kale, made, with some homemade salad dressing, enough salad for three persons. The salad dressing contained some herbs that were from the backyard GP garden.
When I was young we used to talk about America as the melting pot where various cultures got together to make a great country, like various vegetables and meats put together in a pot for a good stew. With more emphasis on the strength of our unity being in our diversity, that image has faded somewhat.
Tonight I thought the image of the salad bowl with some tasty dressing on the greens made for a good image of the growing network of people with similar passions coming together. This developing bowl of friends is growing just like the salad greens in the GP box.
Like these salad greens these friends are all green, meaning that they are all concerned about the environment, making it healthy for all. We all enjoy the same zesty desire for life as the salad greens share the same delicious dressing. We are organic like the greens in tonight’s salad, which for people in this network means that we have a holistic quality to ourselves, always seeking to connect everything together in our lives. We, like salad greens, come from similar origins but are diverse. Together we seek to feed the hungry, bring justice and peace. As one leaf of a plant we can do little; “Together we are Growing Power.
Worms in Hand of Will AllenRecently Will Allen, the founder of Growing Power won the prestigious MacArthur Foundation Genius Grant, an award of $100,000 a year for five years. This makes all of us who know and respect Will very proud. But in all the articles applauding this urban farmer winning this award, in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the NPR story and the New York Times there is barely, if any, mention of worms. Yet it is farming with worms, vermiculture, that brought Will Allen and Growing Power to my attention and the attention of the city, nation and world. There were and are many urban farmers growing all kinds of food, yet what distinguished Will’s method of growing was the use of worms to make castings, “black gold” as Will used to call it. I guess neglecting the role of worms is understandable, the worms being such a lowly creature. But it is the popularization of the use of worms for turning compost into rich organic soil, a phenomenon that has been going on for hundreds of years, that put Will and Growing Power on the map in farming. I have noticed in my last few tours of Growing Power with Will, and with all the help the Growing Power staff has supplied the DMZ community garden, a downplaying of the role of the worm and worm bins — they used to call ‘worm condos’. These worm boxes or piles play an essential role in this way of growing. There is no chance of Will being called the “worm guy” as the vermicomposting farmer I met in Venezuela is called, or as even I, a nobody gardener using this method, have been called. Yet it was Will and Growing Power that made us look at worms in a whole new way, and worms are at the heart of the Growing Power method.
Dorthy Day—Real ChangeTonight was, for me, non-stop reality TV entertainment. First it was the entertainment of the baseball game, which our home team the Milwaukee Brewers unfortunately lost. Then it was the reality TV show called the ‘Vice Presidential Debate’. This debate was a much bigger entertainment event than the baseball game, but I doubt if it made any more difference than the outcome of the baseball game.
But the day was not full of reality TV entertainment. This afternoon I heard Robert Ellsberg, editor of the “The Duty of Delight, The Diaries of Dorothy Day” speak at Marquette University. As readers of the www.nonviolentworm.org know, Dorothy Day is one of my role models for living the Way of Jesus. Dorothy Day never voted in an election, yet was a person who led a movement that radically changed the lives of many persons, including Mr. Ellsberg and myself. She did not live in a world of entertainment reality TV shows, like the debates, but in world where the poor mattered and where the way to peace was peace, not violence. She saw the world of popular politics as it is: entertainment. She knew the way to really change the world was, in the words of Gandhi, “To be the change you want to see.”
If I had to answer to Dorothy Day for my day today, I believe she would be more understanding of my time watching the baseball game than of the reality TV show of the debate (plus all the endless commentaries). However, she would have been most proud of me this morning, when I drove a friend to a hospital to get the two bags of medicines she and her husband need each month. She would have approved of my presence at a prayer vigil for two homicide victims this morning and my small work on the AIR insulation project for the needy in our parish neighborhood. Hearing Robert Ellsberg would have been okay, but she might have had a harsh word or two for me about my time wasted (not in a Growing Power sense) watching reality entertainment TV, which is just a distraction from the real issues that matter. Also, she might have been on my case for other computer stuff and for not working on the Garden of Resistance today. Fortunately Dorothy Day, like Jesus, was bigger on mercy than judgment.
Dorothy in her day did not like being called a ‘saint, for, as Ellsberg explained, calling her that was a way of dismissing and marginalizing her. Well, I have not been called a saint, but I have been ignored and marginalized. Maybe that counts in diminishing the impact of my reality TV watching on this day.
Crying childPeople are dying,
Wars are raging,
Children go hungry,
Rich get richer,
Poor get poorer,
Financial markets tumble,
Presidential candidates do not talk about the poor,
Suffering of mind, body and soul increases,
Common Good is swallowed by individual greed.
Where do we look?
Where do we go
To find hope and a way out of this mess?
Some do not want to know about the way out,
Some ignore it or do not care,
Many feel hopeless.
God where are you when we really need you?
You tell us to resist evil and do good,
But does it matter?
We have sinned, have mercy on us.
Let us come back to the Garden
Where waste becomes new soil,
The least, like worms, rule,
Where we can grow our food,
Work together in peace,
And be what You created us to be.
Jack Stebbins 1925–2008Today it was chilly and cloudy for the second day in a row. I guess fall has finally come. With fall comes the dying, leaves falling, and bulbs and seeds buried. In midst of the two festivals last weekend, one at the Urban Ecology Center and Peacefest, I learned of the death of my friend Jack Stebbins last Friday. But with all the festivals his death only sank in today. With any death of a friend, sadness and memories come alive. Although Jack was around during the 60’s, the Milwaukee 14 days, and at the beginning of Casa Maria, Catholic Worker House of Hospitality, we had just known each other in passing at various peace and justice events. Our knowledge of each other and friendship got a spark when some members of the Milwaukee 14 and supporters like Jack had a gathering at our house four or five years ago.
Jack knew quite well and had stayed in contact with Lorenzo Rosebaugh, a member of the Milwaukee 14 and an oblate priest now serving the poorest of the poor in Guatemala City. At our first gathering with Lorenzo he was working on his memoirs. At the second gathering Lorenzo was here to promote his book To Wisdom Through Failure. I had already received a copy of the book and read it. Jack purchased one at the gathering with Lorenzo. About a week later he called me up one day quite excited and said he had just read the memoir and was so deeply moved by it that he had to call someone to share his experience with. He chose me because he knew I had read the book. This book of our friend had also impressed me. We talked for quite a while on the phone until we had both shared the joy, pain and peace we had discovered in Lorenzo’s life story. We also shared the experience of the passing of another mutual friend, Gordon Zahn.
Jack planted a lot of seeds of hope and joy in his life and I know that, like all seeds planted in good soil, they will rise again in the spring of life. We who knew Jack, even a little, were greatly blessed. You can read his obituary in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Peace, my friend, and remember us who, like you, strive to bring the Kingdom of God on Earth.
Tonight, after loading some pictures of Peacefest that John K and I took, I was going to write something about each picture. But the only words that came to me were the words of a friend who emailed me this morning to say it was a “profound experience.” It was just a simple celebration of old and new friends, of food and music, displays and talks. But it was moving. You could feel the Spirit moving in the wind. Maybe the Dalai Lama was correct when he said you could make nonviolent changes with festivals. So I will let the pictures speak for themselves.
Garden of ResistanceIt has been a very busy weekend for the Nonviolent Worm and me. There was the Fall Festival at the Urban Ecology Center Saturday and for a while today, and and Peacefest today, the 40th anniversary of Milwaukee 14 and the 40th anniversary of the Resistance to military at Marquette University. I had many wonderful conversations, shared some good music, poetry and stories with friends old and new. I now have material for many postings and pictures to share. But being tired I will share just two brief stories with you. I was talking with my friend Joyce, longtime advocate for Peace and Justice, at Peacefest and she shared with me a metaphor she had found useful. She was talking with a group of persons about the meaning of “resistance.” She told them how important the spinning wheel was to Gandhi and his followers in India during their resistance to British rule. It was a symbolic act of resistance to the British rule of India. By spinning their own clothes they did not have to purchase British-made clothes but were nonviolently resisting British rule. The symbol of a spinning wheel did not resonate with those she was sharing with. So she turned to another symbolic and real act of resistance, a Garden. In a garden we can grow our own food and like with the spinning wheel can show resistance, this time to the major agribusinesses that run our food system. It might be a small act of resistance for us but it is an act of resistance. She found that many in the room could relate to this symbol. Growing a home garden, as so many persons do these days, is an act of resistance. As I digest this thought and reflect on my talks with Joyce and others more I will have more to share.
Worn Worm - Friday, September 26, 2008
Sept. 26th and Sept. 27th
Due to preparing for the Fall Festival at the Urban Ecology Center tomorrow and Sunday, and Peacefest on Sunday at Marquette University, the Nonviolent Worm ran out of time, is tired and cannot post tonight or Saturday. Both the Nonviolent and Worm sides of this web site are being pushed to their limits. However, many pictures and observations will flow from these two events in the days to come.
In Health & SicknessFeeling sick like I did today just makes life harder, but it goes on. Fortunately my main task today was to get ready for my display and worm magic show at the Fall Festival at the Urban Ecology Center on Saturday. But any time you do not feel good it just makes doing anything harder. Fortunately my ‘bug’ is quickly disappearing, but it is still a reminder of how many persons, like my friends Ann and Marna, live with constant sickness. Marna lives with a long list of illnesses and Ann with an unidentified heaviness and pain in her chest. Both keep going and making the most of life. I remember how sick my sister was when she was dying of cancer. To do anything, even working in the garden, takes real courage and willpower when one is sick. However, physical illnesses, hard as they may be, seem easier to deal with than the suffering of persons with depression and other mental illnesses. In our fast-paced society it seems like a growing number of persons are suffering from illnesses, physical or mental or both. I am daily reminded of how blessed I am with my health.
Making pictures today, for the display at the Fall Festival at the Urban Ecology Center, of the gardens in front and back of house, my sunroom GP box, my worm bin and depository, vertical growers and plant stand as well as my Air insulation system made me realized how blessed I am to have the opportunity for these home model garden systems and with the help of the web and my wiki master, Tegan to share them. So in health and sickness Uncle Bob of the nonviolent worm lives on.
Ways and Means - Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Today is the 40th anniversary of the Milwaukee 14. I was 25 years old on Sept. 24th, 1968, when 13 other men and I entered the Selective Service offices in Milwaukee, took thousands of 1A files outside and burned them. Also 40 years ago, in 1968, Marquette (MU) students(of which I was one at the time), after winning a major battle against “institutional racism”, took on the issue of having Marquette Being Faithful to the Gospel and No Longer Hosting Departments of Military Science. The first issue, like that of “institutional racism” at MU, was won. There is no more forced selective service system. The second issue, resistance to military training for war at MU, continues on. Actually, after 40 years I realize there is no “winning” or “losing”; what matters is how you work for changes you seek. Like in a garden, it is the “how” not the “what” that determines the outcome. Violence breeds only more violence, and wars do not end wars. It is in the Way you change, not what you change, that determines the end. George Orwell taught us that lesson in the book “Animal Farm”, and Gandhi says it clearly in the statement: “Be the change you want to see.” This is an old lesson of history that often is forgotten.
Sometimes computers can waste garden time, and I am not talking about the kind of waste that can be composted. I was trying to send an email about Peacefest today to a large number of persons and had major computer problems, saving it as a draft, finding the email address that was stopping it, and getting error messages. My stubborn attitude kept me at the computer until I had solved most of the problem. Finally I managed to send it out to different grouping of persons; some may have got it more than once and some that I intended to send it to probably never got it. In the meanwhile, the nice summer afternoon disappeared into time to make dinner, and I did not work in the garden. I still do not know the source of my problems and probably will never know. But I do know that the time spent on that email is non sustainable. With preparing for the Fall Festival at the Urban Ecology Center this weekend and Peacefest this Sunday, all I can hope that this nice weather continues until next week. The GP box inside is half planted and most of the soil for the bulbs is ready but there is always more to do in the garden, a place where work, unlike work on the peacefest email, is sustainable.
But not all work on the computer is non-sustainable. Hopefully these daily postings will help give new life to more Growing Renewable Affordable Food G.R.A.F.. I may not know this for sure but believe it. I am a computer consumer as well as a sustainable gardener.
My brother-in-law, my deceased sister’s husband who lives in Houston, told me tonight that he nearly died from a heart attack recently. Last night I found out that my brother-in-law, my wife’s sister’s husband who lives out East, has a serious form of cancer. They are both fortunate to have health insurance or otherwise, like many Americans, health cost would be destroying their way of life. These days I often feel our country is sick and infested with some type of insects, just like at times my Growing Power Box seems to have insects in it. However, with my Growing Power box in the sunroom I can just spray on an organic soap and the insects go away. I cannot do that with our infected health care system. Like in China now with tainted milk for babies, greed seems to have taken over our health care system and many other systems of government.
As a child and adult I’ve always been taught by the Catholic church that the main purpose of government was to serve the ‘common good’. Whatever happened to that idea? The success and failure of the garden seems to be somewhat in our hands, but the success and failure of the government seems to be out of our hands. Now I understand why there is a deep sense of Christian Anarchism in the Catholic Worker Movement in this country. Catholic Workers believe in the one-person revolution, taking personal responsibility for the common good and not relying on government. Like taking care of a garden, we can take some control of our responsibilities for common good by feeding the hungry or giving shelter to the homeless. Yet part of me says that while doing the works of mercy I must work for justice, changing the systems, like the health care system. If we do not, there will not be many brothers-in-law anymore.
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