A Farewell to Old Friends
The Sisters also left Peekskill with hopes of continuing the
work with goats which had been a by-product of the Malawian mission.
We moved our five dairy goats — Lucy, Fwasani, Chisomo, Trinity
and Chikumbutso — and settled them in an old bull barn
at the SLC entrance.
The goat does were a big hit. Nearly every article about the Center in local papers that first year had photos of African novices and goats. An interview of our Visitor on the local television news ran with video shots of the bishop, the goats and a Sister walking down the road together. Bishop Dan hoped that being seen with a nun in habit might soften his possibly controversial statements. The does were their goaty selves, however, and stole the show -- frolicking, kicking up their heels and banging heads in mock battle. The morning after the newscast the Diocesan Office got a call. “Any bishop of the Episcopal Church who would appear on the six o’clock news with a herd of goats can’t be all that bad!”
The television reporter returned a month later to do a human interest piece on the Sisters. In the teaser before the commercial he stood with Fwasani and me in the background, explaining who we were and adding with flourish that they (the viewers) had guessed it, we were… Episcopalian. At the end of thirty or so seconds of serious video about the Community — an interview with Mother Miriam voiced over shots of Sisters chanting in choir — the reporter returned to me. “Tell me, Sister. Is it true that you sing to your goats?” Yep. It’s true — I still sing to the goats. Film at five....
Good things come to an end, though. I choose to think of goatsong as the melody that replies to my call song from across the pasture as I walk to the barn in the mornings, but “goatsong” is also the translation of the Greek word tragedy. In the winter of 2003-2004 we learned that all our girls had a crippling disease endemic to dairy herds. The older does were showing the first signs of pain that winter, and it was just a matter of time. Early in Holy Week last year we put our dairy friends down. It was a painful passage.
New Beginnings
Even before we learned of our goat herd’s infection, we had
begun asking the question: would fiber goats be a better long-term
option for us than dairy goats? Last spring we were unexpectedly
offered the gift of a start-up Cashmere herd by the Orthodox Sisters
of the Holy Myrrhbearers in Otego, NY, long-time supporters and mentors
to us in our farming enterprise.
In May of last year we took possession of a five year-old Cashmere doe, Maeve, and her four progeny. The yearlings are named Mtendere (pronounced “Ten-dair-ie”, which means “Peace” in Chichewa -- we usually call him Teddy) and Chikondi (which means “Love”). The goat kids are Lowani (“Come”) and Miyamiko (“Praise”).
The advantage to raising Cashmeres is that it is less labor
intensive. Aside from routine goat husbandry chores, the principal
work is combing or shearing the fiber once a year. No milking!
We visited two farms this winter run by single women who both
also have professional careers, and we feel that the work is
not unrealistic for us. We have considerable knitting and crocheting
talent right here at home — Sisters who do handwork quietly
while reading, visiting or even praying — and part of the
vision is to tie these several aspects of our lives into one
enterprise.
In addition we have two Nubian wethers — Pitani (“Journey”) and Achimwene (“Little Brother”) who survived a lengthy quarantine after being exposed to our original does. These “boys” have such wonderful, affectionate dispositions and are so popular with visitors that we have kept them to train as pack and cart goats.