Bedlam Farm Blog Journal by Jon Katz

I love to watch the people who watch the sheep shearing at the Open House. This ancient art is a beautiful thing to watch, an important ritual in our lives on the farm.

I am forever in awe of the adaptability of dogs, and the great value of learning to communicate with them. Bud acts as if he has been here for years, he has  found his place here.

He loves Red, and Fate is slowly learning to accept him, and sometimes, even play with him. He is a strong dog, a dominant dog, sometimes terrified of new sounds and sights, sometimes fearless and confident.

He is a very affectionate dog, and loves to sit in my lap and get his head stroked. He is becoming less aggressive around food, he is learning that he will get fed, every day.

He still has accidents in the house, they are becoming less frequent.

He is no longer marking table legs.

He has discovered the chewing pleasure of firm American rawhide.

He seems to have bonded with me, and also with Maria.

He is not afraid of people, only sudden moves made towards him.

He has great potential as a therapy dog, he is calm and steady and comfortable with strangers.

He is, like most Boston Terriers, a character, filled with ego and personality.

Yet there is also the fragility of the mistreated dog, he grows easier by the day, but can be reduced to jelly by a wrong or sudden move.

There is no aggression of any kind in him.

Bud definitely has some herding moves. I’m taking him out to pasture with Fate and Red two or three times a day and he is surprising me with his strong herding instinct. He does natural outruns around the sheep, he keeps his distance and does not rattle or frighten the sheep in any way.

I’m taking this slowly, one step at a time. While Bud is very interested in the sheep, they seem mostly disinterested in him, and I have not yet seem him try to move them or succeed in that.

I work with him for only a few minutes, then leash him up. He loves to run with Fate and  Red, and then settles down and sniffs around the field. Unlike the border collies, herding is not his life, it is just one thing in his life.

But I don’t want him getting too excited out there, three intense dogs can rattle the sheep if the sense it is out of control. The sheep are used to Red, who is calm and professional.

I think Bud is going through a delayed puppy period.

He dumped on the bathroom floor last night, and he was caught chewing on Maria’s shows, then mind. I’m sure the Open  House rattled him, he seems more  himself this morning.

I couldn’t sleep much last night, my head was spinning last night from one of our most interesting Open Houses yet.

It was cold and it rained much of the time.

We had by far the fewest visitors to any Open House, yet this morning my mailbox was flooded with messages from people saying how much they loved it, how intimate and personal it was, how wonderful it was to have time to talk to me and Maria, to meet other people, to hear Mary Kellogg and Carol Gulley read their poems, to see Bud and Red and Fate and meet Lulu and Fanny, who were quite hospitable and stuffed themselves with carrots.

The very brave Sisters Of the Shawl, Maria’s Belly Dancing group, rode out the cold mist to dance for the hardy souls who came out in the cold and the wind.

I’m not sure what all of these means. the weather was bad for sure, and I haven’t had a book out in two year, which affects the number of people coming quite a bit. But the truth is, I have no idea why our smallest Open House seems also to have been our best.

We are, of course, exhausted and will sit down and try to figure things out for next year. I loved this Open House very much, i got to connect with so many people in such a deeper and more meaningful way.

My morning began with a phone call from the Fraud Department of my bank, telling me someone had been spending hundreds of dollars this morning at a  Sears department store in the Midwest, and so my card was cancelled. Life in America, this is quite a common experience, a discordant note and a pain in the ass.

Maria is exhausted, and I spent a couple of hours cleaning up the yard, putting away the chairs, taking down the banners, putting the Fiber Chair back where it belongs, tucking the chalkboard away until next year, although we are certainly giving thought to next year and what creative things we might try, what different things we might do.

I’m trying to get my head around the fact that so few people came – two or three hundred perhaps – and yet everyone seemed to love it so much, including me and Maria. And she sold a bunch of art as well.

I guess it is clear, in a sense. Being able to talk to people is important, still, to so many of us.

I hauled too many things around, and my angina told me to stop, so I did, but I got it all done. We both need some rest. I can get through the day without my  bank credit card.

Bud is having a bit of a puppy period, I’ll write about that separately. And sometime this week, I need to get back to work on my  book, Gus and Bud. No shortage of material there.

Tomorrow, I record some promos for my upcoming radio show, “Talking To Dogs,” to be broadcast on WBTN, Brattleboro, Vt., a community radio station. I’d wanted to have my own radio show for some time, and this station could use some help and support.

So could my show. It will be streamed online (WBTN, 1370 AM, 96.5 FM), and it will be a call in show, so I hope lots of you call in. I think the number to call is 802 442 6321. Anybody who can stream on their device or TV can hear it and call in. More later.

This station needs support, I hope to help. And I can’t wait to do the show.

Thanks for following the stories about the Open House an many of you are checking out our video from Maria’s studio to see if there is anything you might want to buy. Have fun. There is some lovely and inexpensive art left.

I love this portrait of Becca and Michael, they came to our Open House this weekend,  theirs is a story of love and bravery and commitment.

Each was in a bad place before they met online and took a chance on one another. Now, they are in a good place. Michael is recovering from PTSD, Becca will soon start a new career pet-sitting in Maryland and doing her work as a Reiki Master.

It paid off. They are happy married and deeply committed t supporting each other. I  have great admiration for people who work hard to get from a bad place to a good place.

These two are heroes to me. So many people whine and complain about their hard lives, few people work to change their lives. Becca and Micheal did and are living lives of purpose and connection.

I guess this is really what the Open Houses are all about – fostering a community of people who care about more than  money.

They bravely seek out love, and do the hard work of self-awareness and connection. This could be our Open House poster, for sure. Proud to know them, and very happy to see them at our Open House.

That is, after all, what the Open House is all about.