I drive through sheets of sleet in search of butter, noticing beat-up trucks parked in the mud next to greenhouses: the farmers are milling about. Inside the plastic and steel wombs, soil is mixed together, flats are filled, and cells are poked with callused fingers. In goes the barely visible black speck of an onion seed. Each tray is topped off with more soil, watered and set on a warming mat. Onions mature according to day length. Certain varieties take five months to bulb, requiring they be first on the list of spring seeding. Known for a pungent sweetness, alliums are traditionally rumored to stimulate desire. A quality sorely needed in February. Although the ground lies barren, there is a stirring underfoot. Marginally better weather means townsfolk start socializing again, gathering in the evenings next to a neighbor’s roaring woodstove to discuss our plans for the year. It was on such a night I met Camille. I saw her from afar while piling comfort food onto my potluck plate. Her gray hair was twisted into an unruly bun accented by thick glasses, behind which two inquisitive blue eyes peered out. As I lowered myself into a chair next to her, she turned and smiled. Learning that I lived at “Jen’s place,” she grabbed my biceps and in a thick French accent said, “I like you. You must know how to work.”

We spent the rest of the evening discussing the trials and humors of being a single woman in the country. Though separated by generations, our experiences weren’t dissimilar. Using a husky, authoritative voice on the phone so the hardware store would take our questions seriously or getting irate when we’d hire a gentleman to work on the house or property and we’d have to justify our visions, providing reasons that would never have been questioned man-to-man. How many times did we have to explain that we understood what a load-bearing weight is! Camille had recently called a store for a roofing quote. They asked if she wanted a lifetime warranty: it was good for twenty years. “How is that even possible?” she asked me. We laughed at the insanity.

Camille came to Madison County in 1972 with her husband, Dave. Dave’s father had grown up here, moving to Detroit at the age of nineteen for a better life. He couldn’t believe Camille and Dave wanted to return to what he remembered as a desolate region with nothing to offer. They were warned not to come, but their minds were set on it. Enraged by the Vietnam war, they wanted to be as self-sufficient as possible and learn directly from those who could still teach the way of the land. Less income meant minor tax payments, resulting in fewer dollars toward war machine. They took on cows, chickens, rabbits, sheep, and a garden. “A farm is a big name for what we had,” she says.

What was big was their ambition. It had to be. It was up against a lot. War was a symptom of an entire broken social system fueled by overconsumption. Refusal of business as usual was crucial to Camille. “I know we have to live,” she pointed out, “but we don’t need to do it at this level—we don’t need to destroy.”

Camille had already experienced the horrors of war. In 1944, her childhood home in Normandy was bombed, and although everyone was safe, the devastation left only a corner of the original house. Her family first took refuge in a nearby graveyard, surviving only on milk. There her father decided they would take the two-day walk to his parents’ farm, where he was certain food could be found. In the summer, they returned home to rebuild.

Normal weekly rituals ensued, one of which was a trip into town for bread. One afternoon, her sister returned with more than a sack of loaves; she also bore toys she’d found scattered on the roadside. Thin metal rods, like long pens, with a coil wrapped around the middle. They played with them for days, knocking them on rocks like drumsticks. But they weren’t toys. They were cast-aside detonators, and while her mother was busy with the wash, one exploded in Camille’s hand, causing the loss of her right arm at the age of two.

A decade into their life of resistance, Dave was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. The long list of daily chores became difficult to maneuver. The cow jumped the fence. The sheep ran away. The dog chased the chickens into the woods. They allowed their responsibilities to dwindle, eventually eating the cow. “It was part of the economy,” Camille explained, a firmness still in her tone. Despite changes in physical comfort and energy, they were as true to their original intentions as they possibly could be.

After Dave passed, Camille carried on the design of their home and land, every nook and cranny meticulously thought out and crafted. Stairwells fashioned after the golden spiral, massive mosaic projects, wood scraps and windows everywhere: ideals for a gentle society radiate from the walls. “I never had a course in building,” she said, “just an interest. I would look at an old building, I would see that it was still standing, and I would think, That is good.” Although Dave is gone, his presence remains, amidst a host of new and radical projects.

Never short on determination, Camille hired a carpenter to frame a door into a dirt wall so that she might dig herself a basement. Rigging up a bucket, a shovel, and a wheelbarrow, she chipped at the top of the wall, directing the dirt downward into the bucket. When the bucket was full, she’d take it to the wheelbarrow and empty it. When the wheelbarrow was full, she’d haul it outside and dump it in the gully. She kept at the work for days and months until rumors began to surface.

Her apprentice who frequented the local bar came to report back on the widespread speculation about what exactly Camille was up to. “You’ll never believe what they’re saying about you, Camille. They say you are digging out your basement single-handedly with a spoon!”

She chuckled. “Well then, let them think just that.”

I spoke with Camille recently. We wondered if it was even possible for future generations to go back to the land. There is increasingly less land to go back to, and the old-timers who knew the plants and the ballads are passing each year. Besides, living the rural life isn’t for everyone. It seems that each spring a new crop of young homesteaders arrive bursting with ideas, and only some of them make it to the next year for one reason or another. Many leave when they have children, and divorce is common under the stress of poverty. I like living here because it is so unchanged, and yet sometimes I forget there is a world past the blown-out streetlight. This landscape is a jungle that does not bend to human will easily. Some like the challenge. Some don’t.

Yet what we lack in finery we make up for in freedom. We have a choice. We can choose the detonator or the spoon. What will you leave behind? What will your legacy be? Free, gentle, and diverse is the culture I want for myself, my community, and my bread. Be an instrument for peace. Choose the spoon.

START A CULTURE

Starting a culture is simple. Maintaining it is the most difficult part. Once established and refreshed, a culture can live for a lifetime, maybe even several. If forgotten, it will not immediately perish or do you harm if ingested. The value of tending a culture lies in the care it needs to stay alive. While we strive to do our best, it should also be a process free of stress.

Standard yeast has one goal: to produce lots of gas relatively fast. Leavening with only commercial yeast cuts out beneficial multiflora from the fermentation process. While a naturally leavened culture takes more time, it unlocks a world of taste, souring the flour and bringing the full flavor body forward.

When water and flour combine, enzymatic activity breaks down starches into sugars. Yeasts metabolize the sugars, producing carbon dioxide and alcohol. This gas is the primary source of leavening in cultured goods. Bacteria, namely lactobacilli, create lactic and acetic acids and very little carbon dioxide or alcohol. A culture is simply the thick batter of flour and water that these yeasts and bacteria call home.

Stone-ground, sifted bread flour from a hard red winter wheat is appropriate to begin your starter with. If it’s unavailable, blend whole-wheat flour and bread flour in equal portions. Cultures fed only with whole grain will ferment quickly and can become acidic. Cultures fed with only bread flour, while strong, will taste flat. In any case, remember that this culture is the cornerstone of your future bread. Be consistent in your care, and it will be predictable in its leavening.