Syrup Time

by Andy

This past weekend we lived on syrup time.

For me there is something uniquely calming about letting go of control over my own timeline. When I take a long bus ride or a plane trip, I might have tension leading up to the trip, but once on the bus or in the air I feel a sense of relief. No matter how much I “hurry up,” the bus or plane won’t get there any sooner. I can trick myself into giving up that nagging voice that says there is something else I could or should be doing. It becomes a time apart from my day-to-day mental state and I can read a magazine or stare out the window or engage in idle conversation or do whatever I want.

Making maple syrup has its own time. You cannot make the trees drip sap. They drip when the weather conditions are just right. So you have to wait and collect when the trees tell you to collect. Also we can’t make the sap turn into syrup any faster than the capacity of our evaporator. We can boil off about 10 gallons of sap per hour, and when we collect over 300 gallons of sap, like we did this past weekend, the only thing we can do is stoke the fire and keep adding sap until there is no more sap to add. Sure, we can fuss around and collect firewood or stir the boiling sap, but essentially everything you are doing is connected to making the syrup.

Once I give myself over to maple syrup time I can really relax. As long as the sap is boiling, there is nothing else that I have to do. On the farm our lists of things to do can stretch into three pages, so there is always something lurking that asks for attention. Even when the workday is over, just being on the farm and looking around can be a constant reminder of the next thing that could be accomplished. Relaxing can seem like a foreign concept even when I am not doing anything. But making maple syrup, like that bus ride, can trick me right out of my timeline. It is not like there is nothing to do, but rather I can relax because I am not thinking about hurrying up so I can get to the next thing I have to do. All I have to think about is what is right in front of me. This frees my attention for the social life that is inherent in making maple syrup. Everyone wants to be part of it, and when they come out and see how good this state of mind looks on us, they want a piece of that too.

Upon reflection, I can see that there are many other parts of my life that operate on their own time and ask for my complete engagement. This is part of the flow state that we are all striving for. When I am tilling the garden or hoeing a row, I am called to be right where I am until the end of the row. Any preoccupation with the past or future is not helpful or necessary, so I just accept the task at hand. I think this is one of the gifts that the Land School offers children. When you participate in real physical work and operate on one of nature’s own timelines you step outside of your timeline and viewpoint for a moment and are forced to expand your worldview to include this real thing outside of you that has its own time. This is one of the beginnings of compassion and understanding.