Living Seasonally

A recent windy. snowy day

The consensus around town is that this winter has been exceptionally crappy.  We have had snow, freezing rain, sleet, days upon days of sub-zero temperatures, ridiculous wind…and frankly we’re all tired of it.  I’ve been feeling particularly old, achy and tired lately, and if you know me, you know I generally have boundless amounts of energy.  Nora and I have discussed this overall malaise and her take on it is this – we’re meant to slow down during the winter.  From a purely biological perspective, during the 3-4 months of winter (ok, more like 6 months up here, but who’s counting) we are driven to rest (i.e., hibernate) so as to conserve our energy and body heat in times of intense cold, darker days and less food (before we started transporting food thousands of miles to satisfy our desperate need for tomatoes and strawberries in January).  It has the added benefit, or so goes Nora’s theory, of driving us to the brink of insanity with “cabin fever” until we would kill just to get outside in the sun and work, which has us raring to go come spring.  It actually makes sense from a biological and evolutionary standpoint.

But, as with everything, we have messed with it.  Now, the majority of people in the U.S., and in most other developed nations, live in small towns, suburbs or cities where the routine of life carries on pretty much the same regardless of season.  Most of us get up, go to work inside a heated or air-conditioned building, get in our cars and drive home; although the weather may impact our routine to some extent, overall it’s viewed more as an inconvenience than anything else.  In addition, the food we desire is available regardless of month or time of year at the grocery store.  Our days are extended by electric lights, and our need to huddle under piles of warm blankets in the winter diminished by various types of heating systems.  Our need to nap during the intense heat of the day during the summer is equally diminished by the pervasiveness of air conditioning. I’m not saying we don’t note the passing of the seasons – sure we celebrate the “holidays” and kids still get excited about summer vacation -- but we no longer need to abide by the rhythms and dictates of the seasons.

In contrast to this relatively new "normal" way of existing, farmers and gardeners not only understand, but embrace, the natural rhythms of the seasons.  For this small group of people, the seasons strongly impact the "when" and "why" something gets done at the time it gets done.     

Intellectually I knew this, but until we moved up here and started living a more agrarian lifestyle, I didn't fully appreciate it.  However, I noticed last winter that I had begun to keep not just my usual to-do lists (I'm the queen of lists), but rather a seasonal to-do list. It was the only way I could even begin to keep the multitude of things that needed to happen at a certain time straight.  For instance, if I forgot to fertilize the perennials in the early spring, it wasn't something I could just do at some point during the summer.  Ditto with pruning, sowing seeds, planting, harvesting, repairing fences, stocking wood, shearing sheep...you get the picture; everything has its appropriate time.  And I've come to realize, even though I still get incredibly frustrated with the long, long winters in the northeast, that I appreciate this seasonality and this rhythm.  Now if only I could get myself to relax and enjoy the slow winter period, everything would be wonderful!

Wilma D

Just a couple of pics of our lovable girl.

First, we have the "kiss of Dil". She likes to get right up in your face with her massive muzzle and jowls and just hold there. You squint your eyes and scrunch up your face because you know the smell of the breath and the moisture of the drool is coming. You hold your breath in order to avoid the odor. To no avail cause she just waits until you have fallen victim to needing another breath then bam!, she darts her tongue out onto you. whaddaya gonna do?

It was time to order another dog bed. The ones we order have to accommodate slightly larger dogs than normal. This one actually makes Dil look normal size.

More winter

So Lynn wakes up this morning to a blizzard. By the time I awoke things had calmed down a bit so I decided to take some pics.

self-portrait

Jacques and friend shooting the bull

Jacques mate named Embarrassed

The Evolution of a Vegetable Garden into a Potager

My thoughts on gardening continue to evolve as I read and learn from various sources.  I’ve spent a fair amount of time over the past 6 weeks reading books by the great British garden designers – Rosemary Verey, Gertrude Jekyll, Christopher Lloyd.  I also spent hours watching a fabulous video that I received from Nora for Christmas, The Art and Practice of Gardening, hosted by Penelope Hobhouse, another well-known (still living) British designer.  In the course of this “study,” I realized that what I was creating, quite unintentionally, in my new vegetable garden space is known as a "potager" (defined below).

I created the new 52’ x 52’ garden area last year for primarily two reasons: (1) I wanted a smaller, more contained garden space that was closer to the house; and (2) I wanted to try the no-till method of vegetable gardening.  With some deliberation, I chose to place this garden close to the orchard and to include a fair number of beds of annuals (zinnia, sunflowers, cosmos, and marigolds) in the vegetable garden.  Much of last year was spent tilling and cleaning rocks out of the 3’ or 4’ wide beds, creating 2’ walking paths between the rows (covered with cardboard and wood chips to kill off any grass and weeds and to compact the soil) and a 4’ wide path down the center.  Jim also fenced the entire area to keep our little bunny and woodchuck friends out of the veggies.  Once the last of the fall crops were harvested, Jim and I spread several inches of straw and sheep manure on the beds to allow this organic matter to break down and leech into the soil over the winter.  

In accordance with the no-till method, the plan is to leave the layer of mulch on the beds in the spring, add a little more compost (and any other organic amendments needed to maintain a balanced pH level in the soil) and, at least this first year, very lightly work all of this organic matter into the top couple inches of the soil using a broad fork (the idea being to disturb the earthworms, nematodes and other micro-biotic organisms at work in the soil as little as possible).  In the future, the soil should not be disturbed at all and organic matter will be placed on top of the bed (“top-dressed”) in the early spring, and watering and subsoil organisms will pull this organic matter into the subsoil throughout the growing season. Transplants such as the flowers, eggplant, tomatoes and peppers are planted directly into the mulch/soil leaving much of the mulch untouched.  To sow seeds, I will need to move the layer of mulch aside so I’m certain the seeds come in direct contact with the soil.  Once the seedlings break the surface and get to be 2-3” tall, I will move the mulch back around their bases.   

The benefit of a no-till system of gardening is that you are able to add new organic matter once or twice a year, while minimally disturbing all of the beneficial life in the soil.  As an added benefit, you remove the labor and gas required in tilling the garden on an annual basis, and the mulch retains moisture in the soil requiring less overall watering.  With healthier soil, we should see healthier, more bountiful vegetables and over time, fewer pests.  Seems like a win-win method, hence the desire to give it a go.

But, based on recent reading, I decided to not only adopt the no-till method, but to move away from the traditional American style of vegetable gardening, i.e., symmetrical rows with each row containing only one type of vegetable and each vegetable plant a polite distance from its neighbor.  As mentioned, I’ve been growing flowers in my garden over the past couple of year, but they were also in their “own” rows.  There was no diversity in my garden rows.  It was all very clean and linear, but was lacking in the wild abandon I prefer in my flower beds (or, the look I’m striving for at any rate).  I decided I wanted that same carefree, natural look in my vegetable garden, and I wanted to add more flowers and herbs into the mix.  Turns out that what I had in mind has existed in Europe and England for hundreds of years.  What I ended up designing as I planned my vegetable garden for this year was a “potager.”

For those unfamiliar with this term, a potager is a formally laid out “kitchen garden” that incorporates vegetables, fruits, herbs and flowers.  Some use formal boxwood hedges to define the beds; others may have raised beds.  All have established walkways that can be as formal (stone, brick, gravel) or informal (grass, wood chips, compacted dirt) as you like.  Some have fruit trees, as well as berries mixed in.  But all grow herbs, flowers and vegetables inter-mixed and densely packed in the beds.  For instance, a single bed may contain beets, onions, parsley and poppies.  Not randomly tossed in the bed, making it difficult to know what’s what, but all in a single bed nonetheless.  The final result is visually beautiful, as well as productive in a much smaller amount of space than that used by the typical vegetable garden.



 

      My garden doesn't look quite like this yet, but close to what I'm hoping to achieve.  Photo credit: Lisa Hubbard 

My garden this year will have a couple of raised beds (on a trial basis, per Nora’s suggestion) and some tripod trellis’ to grow sweet peas, scarlet runner beans and morning glories.  Nasturtium will be planted along the fence line, as will valerian.  The garden will also have 40 different vegetable varieties, 14 types of herbs, and at least 10 types of flowers (which serve various purposes: cuttings, to attract beneficial insects and pollinators, to repel pests, and simply as food for the soul).  I'm very excited to see how it turns out this year!

More on why we moved here

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what brought us to the “Farm.”  Perhaps it’s the arctic temperatures (-27 the other morning, and no, that’s not a typo) and the cold reality of caring for livestock during a somewhat harsh winter that has me thinking.  Nora and I have both had moments over the past couple of months where one of has looked at the other and said “remind me why we moved here again?”  Nora vocalized this very thing several posts ago, and then responded with reminders of why we chose to relocate to this physically wondrous environment.  And although I agree that the space (where else in the northeast could we live affordably on 135 acres?) was an important part of our decision, as was the natural beauty and abundant wildlife, the notion of sustainability was also a primary motivator of “the move” (not in a crazy “world destruction is around the corner” kind of way, but in a more educated, “the world is cruising through finite resources as if, well as if they weren’t really finite, and what happens when we run out of…” kind of way).

As is my habit in January, I’ve been taking stock of what we accomplished this past year and comparing it against the list of goals I set for myself in January 2013.  I’ve also been assessing how far along the sustainability path we have traveled.  Compared against the many modern homesteading books and blogs that I read, I often feel like an utter failure.  Unlike many of these folks, we do not supply 80%+ of our food (meat, vegetables and grains) from our property, nor can I feed my farm animals from what I grow on this property (we do not grow grains, nor do we grow and harvest hay).  We still use oil to supplement our heat supply and we provide none of our own electricity.  I haven’t even progressed to using a clothes line in the spring and summer months, rather than a dryer year round.  Need I repeat -- utter failure as a homesteader. 

Nonetheless, I do believe we made the right decision when we moved here.  I also believe we have made decent progress in building a homestead for ourselves.  Actually, when you consider we were two professional women, one of whom never set foot in rural America and the other who fled from that life almost 30 years prior, we’ve done spectacularly well.  And to make myself feel better, I made a list of the things we accomplished just over this past year:

            [

planted over 200 new perennials, berry bushes and trees (2 flowering crab apple, 2 spruce)

created 3 new perennial beds and expanded another

fenced and tilled new vegetable garden area (roughly a 52’ x 52’ area); grew 40+ varieties of  vegetables and herbs

tilled new pumpkin patch and strawberry patch that will be planted in spring

installed sheep fencing & gates and had barn built; added 3 adorable Southdown (Babydoll) sheep

painted wood shed; weatherproofed all stoops and porches

canned tomatoes, pickles jams, jellies, apple sauce; blanched and froze beans, edamame, squash, kale

continue to bake all of our bread weekly; tried many new recipes of all types

successfully started many perennials inside and transplanted – chamomile, sweet rocket, agastache, black-eyed Susan’s to cut down on my gardening costs

started blog in Jan. and still going…

Almost all of the homesteading books I have read warn anyone undertaking this change in lifestyle to “go slow” and make only a couple of changes per year.  It really does become overwhelming very quickly when you try to incorporate everything at once – growing and preparing healthier, organic foods (which can include everything from meat, vegetables, fruit/berries, grains, and making your own cream, butter, yogurt and cheese if you have goats and/or a dairy cow); canning and preserving your own food; raising and caring for livestock; becoming more energy efficient and in many cases, moving off-grid altogether; and learning to do many things in a more traditional and frugal manner (fixing rather than replacing things, sewing and knitting your own clothes, spinning and dyeing your own wool, using person- or animal-powered tools rather than electric/gas-powered tools, etc.).  We haven’t incorporated even a fraction of that and we still have moments, usually in late July or August, when we are feeling exhausted from the constant gardening, food preserving, and simply maintaining the property, when we question whether we’ve taken on too much.

But it’s in those moments of despair and exhaustion when we need to remember why we chose this path. Not simply because we wanted space and an attractive backdrop, but because we wanted to live more sustainably.  Now admittedly, sustainability is a tricky word.  If you asked 10 people to define it, I bet you’d receive 10 differing definitions.  I also think that my definition of sustainability has morphed over the past couple of years.  What it has come to mean to me is a life that is more in balance with the natural world than not. 

I expect that Nora and I will never (short of the unfortunate arrival of Armageddon) live an off-grid, completely self-sufficient lifestyle.  As we rapidly approach 50, it’s simply not an appealing thought; too much physical work and too much discomfort.  We have grown accustomed to many modern conveniences and unless forced to do so, I don’t foresee us giving them up willingly.  For instance, I don’t have the time or the inclination to spend 8-10 hours per week washing laundry by hand when I can throw a load in my electric washer and simultaneously get about the business of living my life (I am, however, determined to put up a clothes line this spring so I can cut down on energy used for drying clothes during the warm months).  In contrast, our dishwasher stopped working weeks ago and I don’t miss it at all, and we have no plans of replacing it.  In fact, it will likely be removed and I will have Jim build another kitchen cabinet in its place.  I have more use for extra cabinet space than I do for an appliance that takes more energy and time to do a job than I do.

However, we will continue to make small changes that move us, albeit slowly, in the direction of balance.  We will continue to grow some of our own food (vegetables, herbs, fruit and berries), and preserve and store what we can for winter use.  We try to eat seasonally and locally as much as possible (i.e., staying away from foods that had to be transported 1000 miles or more).  We will continue to keep hens for eggs and sheep for fiber.  At some stage (not this year; I've sworn off making any significant changes this year), I may even add goats for milk, cheese, etc..  I can say with almost 99.8% certainty that we will never raise animals for meat.  Neither of us have the ability to slaughter an animal that we have raised.  Is it hypocritical that we still eat meat?  Perhaps, and that is something I struggle with on a daily basis.  But at least I know that the chicken and beef that we do eat have been raised humanely, with plenty of space to run and graze, and have been dispatched as quickly and humanely as possible.  

I will also try to do a better and more consistent job of documenting those things we do, if for no other reason than, for our own purposes, it will be interesting to look back on our progress (hopefully) 4-5 years from now.

I’m not sure how many people read this blog regularly, but for anyone who does, if you’re willing to share your thoughts, I’m interesting in hearing your definition of “sustainability” (assuming that you've given it any thought).  Please feel free to share using the comment link below.

Okay, we just had to try it

So this morning's temp was -22F at about 7:00 so Lynn and I decided to perform the boiling water test. About half of the water vaporized and I admit, it was cool. Notice that I am in a hoodie. Apparently I am adapting to North Country. :)

okay another reminder

of why we are here. I have been waiting to snap a pic of the deer. They are quite skittish. I guess you would be too if people were always trying to kill you. While we do not allow hunting on our property, the two properties that abut our land do. So our acreage serves as a sanctuary of sorts. Or at least that is how we like to think of it. Anyhow, this morning I got lucky. There were three in our back yard. I only got pics of two.

And there I got spotted, (despite the fact that I was inside the house and desperately trying to blend in with the bathroom window) and away they went.

Well it's a good day

for getting the mail. I wore normal shoes, not boots with yax trax, no gloves, no hat, no coat, and no slipping of any kind. I even was able to walk at a normal pace. WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!!
Appreciate the small stuff, right? I am almost looking forward to my walk out to the sheep barn. I said, almost. :)

Seek and you shall find

Okay, I am a woman of my word. Well, most of the time. ;) I said in my last post I would seek out reminders of why we are here or inspiration. And I found it in a strange place not too mention very quickly. An apple tree. There she was. I have even snapped her pic before. She is the epitome of tenacity. She is the sign of hope. She refuses to give up. No harsh wind, no ice, no weighted snow or amount of time will break her.
Introducing the apple known as

"Ever"



May she serve as inspiration for us all to never give up. You Go Girl!!

January Thaw

I know it's been a while since either of us put up a post. We have been busy recovering from the holidays and mostly the lovely perks that winter brings.

Over the last couple of weeks we have been treated to high winds (still don't see the freaking benefit of wind, and believe me I have tried), freezing rain, heavy rain, snow and more snow, ice and snow build-up on the roofs, flooding, etc. At one point the other night I turned to Lynn and asked "Can locust survive in the cold?"

This season is proving to be a costly one. I have had to buy a lot of ice melt for one. We had to repair the snow blower twice (because it is inferior to the beloved tractor but useful in the paths), two broken gutters, two outside lights ripped off, a bird feeder obliterated, a tree decimated...all from falling ice off of the roofs (hey how come the plural for that isn't rooves?) Our upstairs heat stopped due to a frozen inside line so we learned to keep the heat on a higher setting up there and I got an education on furnaces and baseboard heating. The list goes on but I get annoyed just thinking about it. Oh yeh, both Lynn and I got sick with a nasty cold/flu thing.

So now we are in a thaw. We are seeing temps in the 30s and 40s. This is t-shirt weather for us at this point, lol. No seriously, I can go out with just a t-shirt and hoodie and not even feel the cold. I guess I have acclimated. Not sure if that is a good or bad thing. And with the thaw comes the melting of  snow. And with the melting of snow comes water in our basement. The work never ends.

I guess my tone is less than positive at this point. Don't fret. It's just the post-holiday blahs with a hint of "oh my F'ing god why did we move here" tossed in. To be expected. I just need a reminder of why we came here. I am confident that reminder will come. Sooner rather than later is preferred. Maybe I will go out and sit on my Kubota for inspiration.

Cheers

Pagan Purge, Day 2

So, back to our story...

Day 2 - New Year's Eve.  Tim and McKay arrive bright and early Tuesday morning.  McKay is carrying a large paper mache head and a very large bag of beautiful brown and gray wool roving.  Horrified, I say "you aren't planning on burning all of that are you?"  Thankfully he replied no.  Lorna had kindly sent the bulk of it over to me for spinning, and just some bits and pieces were intended for the Mother Earth Goddess's dread locks (because what other hairstyle would have been appropriate, really?).  McKay got to work adding an additional layer of flesh toned tissue paper to the head (unfortunately, the only tissue paper we had in that shade was covered in poinsettias, but it seemed fitting for the Mother Earth Goddess), and then added the dread locks.

Here she is, drying in front of the fire.

Meanwhile, Tim managed to drag the skirt out of the barn by himself and attached a couple of ropes to help in the carrying it out to the burn pit.  I'm not sure how much the thing weighed, but 500 feet and some sore arms and shoulders later, the skirt had been deposited in place.

I ducked inside at that time to begin food prep for the evening while Nora, Tim and McKay made many more trips from the barn to the burn area with the bodice, the head and piles of wood to keep the fire going.  Within a few hours of their arrival, the Mother Earth Goddess stood ready for the evening's festivities.

The party kicked off around 7:30pm, and by 9:00 the group (there were about 16 of us) bundled up and headed outside into the 6 degree evening.  We all stood off to the side as McKay lit the materials inside.  Slowly, the skirt began to glow and orange light flooded out of the seams between the cardboard. 



We all seemed to gravitate naturally into a circle around the Goddess.  As planned, the cardboard began to burn and the flames slowly marched up the skirt, eventually spreading to the burlap.  One person at a time walked up to the opening and tossed in a representation of whatever they wanted to purge.  As the cardboard began to burn away, the carved symbols inside were gradually exposed.  They hung there, untouched by the flame for awhile, but eventually the heat and flame began to consume them. 



As they slowly caught fire, the sparklers would ignite sending off this wondrous, mini explosion of light.  



Eventually, the Goddess succumbed to the fire and crashed down into the pit. 

It was a once in a lifetime experience with a group of close friends.  The stars shone above in the cold, clear sky, people honked their horns as they drove by, and we all stood in a circle basking in the warmth of the fire and friendship. For that moment, it seemed as though all of the negativity in the world had indeed faded away.  Thank you Tim, McKay and Nora for turning this idea into reality (and thank you Jill for the photos of the actual burn event).

The Pagan Purge, Day I

What started as a dinner conversation became something incredible. You may recall from a previous post that our friend Tim has this amazing ability to turn ideas into reality. This New Year's Eve was no exception. Scratch that; it was, in fact, quite exceptional.

A few months ago we were having dinner with the Burleys (possibly a few martinis were involved as well) and the subject of the New Year party came up. I thought it would be a cool idea to host our own version of Burning Man. A scaled down version of course with a lot less in the way of mind altering substances. :)

Over the few weeks leading up to New Year's Eve, Tim would briefly mention "the fire" and not much more would be said.  Little did I know that his creative and engineering juices were flowing (although I should have known, since this is how he operates).  Two days before NYE, Tim calls to tell us that he is coming over with "some materials" for the fire.  Sure enough, he shows up with McKay (fabulous son #2) and they proceed to empty his truck of wood, plastic, debris, etc.  Piles of stuff from Tim's barn.  It was a lot of material. What was this man planning?!

The next morning, he and McKay returned to begin the work.  Tim explained the concept that he had fashioned using a combination of myths, ideas and conversations, including a Latin tradition called 'Año Viejo' that his daughter, Stevie, had learned about while in Ecuador.  This, and our previous dinner conversation about Burning Man, led us to the idea that our ceremony should be an homage to the Earth Goddess (I believe that was Tim's idea, 'cause well, women are awesome!)  The plan was as follows:

The physical concept would be modeled after this form.

The spiritual concept was a marvelous blend of Pagan rituals. He landed on the following: The fire would burn in two stages.  During the first stage, the exterior of the skirt, which would represent all of the negativity, would be burned (i.e., purged) away with the end of the old year.  Once all of the bad juju on the outside burned, the interior, which would contain positive symbols carved from wood (peace signs, doves, hearts and yin/yang symbols), would be revealed. These signs, which would be interspersed with sparklers, would slowly burn (they would be carved from hard woods, so slower to burn) and the fire would gradually make its way up the base to the Earth Goddess herself at top – eventually consuming the entire structure. People would also be welcome to toss anything they wanted to purge into the fire as it raged. 

Pretty damn cool right? This all had to happen in about 36 hours in temperatures that never rose above 10 degrees. So the work began.

The skirt was constructed first. This served as the frame/structure of the entire piece. It had to be strong, yet light enough to be carried out 500 feet to her podium (a fire pit in our field), and partially comprised of material that would ignite and burn quickly to serve as stage one.

Cardboard, since it would burn quickly, was selected as material for the outer shell.  An opening was created to allow entry to hang the carved, wooden signs, as well to toss any items folks wanted to purge.

Once the skirt was covered, McKay and Tim started work on the Earth Goddess.  The torso and head needed to be created.  Tim ended up sculpting her body using scraps of wire fencing and chicken wire -- a brilliant sculpting job of which he was quite proud (we admit the photos don't do it justice).

She also ended up with a rather impressive wing span (the wings were a surprise -- Nora thought she was a little reminiscent of "Winged Victory").  

McKay was largely responsible for the elegant design work using the burlap (notice the asymmetrical line around both the bodice and the skirt); who knew the kid could sew like that?!

While Tim and McKay worked on drawing and carving the wooden signs that would hang inside...

we started to paint words on the cardboard that represented the negative energy we intended to purge.  In between carving, Tim and McKay would toss out a word and eventually took up the brushes as well to add their own.  When we had covered every square of cardboard with at least one negative word, and hung all of the wooden signs within the skirt, we called it a night.  Tomorrow, New Year's Eve, we would add the head and carry her out to her place of honor over the burn pit.  

** Note - because of the length of this process, we're dividing the post into two parts (Day 1 and Day 2).  Also, Nora and I have both contributed to the writing of this post, so you'll probably notice a blend in tone and style.

Beyond cold…

It’s difficult to describe how truly cold -11 with a wind chill of -32 degrees feels, unless you’ve experienced it.  It is so unbelievably cold that it feels as though any exposed skin freezes within minutes; so cold it knocks the wind out of you (in reality, the freezing, dry air is probably constricting your bronchial tubes).

I worry ceaselessly about the hens and sheep in this kind of intense cold.  We have made them as safe and warm as possible, short of bringing them in the house (which Nora won’t allow, although I don’t understand why).  The heat lamp has been on non-stop in the coop since yesterday afternoon when temps really started to dip.  It will remain on until this ridiculous arctic blast moves out of the area on Saturday.  I added more pine shavings to the coop yesterday to provide a little more insulation, and thankfully with the heat lamp, the water in the coop remains unfrozen.  The hens have been eating like crazy.  We went through a 50 lb bag of feed in 2 weeks.  It usually lasts 4-5 weeks.

The sheep have not been allowed out of the barn since yesterday.  The straw on the floor is a good 12-14 inches thick to provide warmth.  They have been getting a little extra sweet feed in the morning and evenings and have a constant supply of hay.  Although their water bowl is also “heated” – as in the water remains unfrozen, provided they don’t knock it slightly off the base as they like to do – the water is very cold, so Nora and I have been bringing buckets of warm water out to them 2-3 times a day.  Rationally, I know they will be fine inside the barn with their 4-5 inches of wool.  But it has to be uncomfortable, even for them. 

I also topped off the bird feeders outside the house this morning.  This is no time for the wild birds to go without food.  They need to keep their little engines going as well.