00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.750
(fire crackling)

00:00:10.787 --> 00:00:15.787
(wood clattering)
(fire crackling)

00:00:22.467 --> 00:00:25.217
(hammer tapping)

00:00:28.520 --> 00:00:31.353
(leaves rustling)

00:00:35.670 --> 00:00:37.740
- This ground is hard to move.

00:00:37.740 --> 00:00:41.340
I'm 73 now, and with arthritis,

00:00:41.340 --> 00:00:43.620
it gets really hard to move around.

00:00:43.620 --> 00:00:46.527
And at one point my doctor asked me,

00:00:46.527 --> 00:00:49.860
"Do you fall down," is one of
the wellness visits, Medicare,

00:00:49.860 --> 00:00:50.887
oh, and I had to say,

00:00:50.887 --> 00:00:53.100
"How many times did you
fall down this year at all?"

00:00:53.100 --> 00:00:56.550
I said, "Oh yeah, lots of times." (laughs)

00:00:56.550 --> 00:00:59.730
With what I do in the woods,
I'm falling down all the time.

00:00:59.730 --> 00:01:02.403
But this is nice, this
really helps out a lot.

00:01:03.320 --> 00:01:06.070
(drill whirring)

00:01:07.587 --> 00:01:09.420
(hammer tapping)

00:01:09.420 --> 00:01:11.280
We're just breaking the freezing point,

00:01:11.280 --> 00:01:13.470
and the tree has decided that it's time

00:01:13.470 --> 00:01:15.810
to let out a little bit of sap.

00:01:15.810 --> 00:01:17.700
As the tree warms a little bit more,

00:01:17.700 --> 00:01:21.599
it'll go drip, drip, drip, drip.

00:01:21.599 --> 00:01:24.432
(drill whirring)

00:01:25.770 --> 00:01:29.130
This has been my home
since I was, I guess,

00:01:29.130 --> 00:01:31.143
I was about six when we moved here.

00:01:32.970 --> 00:01:37.970
My dad, I was born in Trenton,

00:01:39.390 --> 00:01:44.340
and my father got a job at
Hunterdon Medical Center.

00:01:44.340 --> 00:01:46.690
He was one of the very
first surgeons up there.

00:01:47.850 --> 00:01:52.850
And he bought this farm
then, and he loved trees.

00:01:54.690 --> 00:01:58.773
He kind of infected me
with that love of trees.

00:01:59.670 --> 00:02:03.153
I always dreamed, as a
child, of being a farmer.

00:02:04.020 --> 00:02:05.520
It's one of those things that,

00:02:06.900 --> 00:02:10.740
I don't know if I could ever totally

00:02:10.740 --> 00:02:12.660
have made a living on it.

00:02:12.660 --> 00:02:17.660
Now that I'm retired from full-time work,

00:02:18.960 --> 00:02:23.960
and I can justify doing this,

00:02:25.980 --> 00:02:27.933
and it keeps me busy.

00:02:29.040 --> 00:02:30.720
I'm not a traveler.

00:02:30.720 --> 00:02:32.520
I can enjoy traveling,

00:02:32.520 --> 00:02:35.130
but I think somebody has to stay somewhere

00:02:35.130 --> 00:02:36.930
and keep that area beautiful

00:02:36.930 --> 00:02:38.760
so that other people, who are traveling,

00:02:38.760 --> 00:02:40.953
can come and enjoy a beautiful place.

00:02:42.084 --> 00:02:45.501
(gentle nostalgic music)

00:02:48.991 --> 00:02:51.210
When I turn in the driveway
here, I'm in another world.

00:02:51.210 --> 00:02:53.850
I'm out of the business of New Jersey,

00:02:53.850 --> 00:02:57.360
the insanity of New
Jersey, the high speed,

00:02:57.360 --> 00:02:58.620
and I come down around the corner

00:02:58.620 --> 00:03:01.503
and I'm suddenly in my world,
and it's a quiet world.

00:03:06.656 --> 00:03:07.489
(clears throat) I'm still very much

00:03:07.489 --> 00:03:09.250
in the setting up process.

00:03:11.884 --> 00:03:14.467
(machine clanking)
Oh boy.

00:03:16.178 --> 00:03:19.178
(muttering quietly)

00:03:24.503 --> 00:03:28.789
Now, if I can get this side
connected, we'll be in business.

00:03:28.789 --> 00:03:31.706
(machine clanking)

00:03:33.831 --> 00:03:36.004
There we go.

00:03:36.004 --> 00:03:41.004
(hose hissing)
(water burbling)

00:03:42.022 --> 00:03:44.010
(pipe clanks)

00:03:44.010 --> 00:03:47.130
We're kind of blessed
that we're still producing

00:03:47.130 --> 00:03:52.130
syrup the old, in a, quote
unquote, primitive fashion,

00:03:52.740 --> 00:03:57.740
which produces a much more robust syrup.

00:04:02.790 --> 00:04:05.610
Oddly enough, this is all scraps of pine

00:04:05.610 --> 00:04:07.800
from our own plantation,

00:04:07.800 --> 00:04:09.993
my father planted many, many years ago.

00:04:11.169 --> 00:04:16.169
(ax thumping)
(wood clattering)

00:04:23.275 --> 00:04:26.025
(fire crackling)

00:04:31.290 --> 00:04:32.760
You're not seeing too much steam here.

00:04:32.760 --> 00:04:36.450
When I first built this, I
didn't have the steam hood built.

00:04:36.450 --> 00:04:39.210
Cripes, we started this 35 years ago.

00:04:39.210 --> 00:04:42.150
This is the second
evaporator we've had in here,

00:04:42.150 --> 00:04:43.293
since that time,

00:04:44.610 --> 00:04:47.730
but it used to be that
without the steam hood

00:04:47.730 --> 00:04:49.500
and that pipe going out,

00:04:49.500 --> 00:04:52.342
you wouldn't be able to see me now,

00:04:52.342 --> 00:04:54.569
as the steam starts to build.

00:04:54.569 --> 00:04:57.033
It would be like working in a cloud,

00:04:58.470 --> 00:05:00.020
it was actually kind of nice.

00:05:01.260 --> 00:05:03.150
And the children would climb up a ladder

00:05:03.150 --> 00:05:06.873
and disappear into the fog
up above, and loved it.

00:05:08.249 --> 00:05:10.999
(fire crackling)

00:05:14.520 --> 00:05:16.050
There's not much you can do.

00:05:16.050 --> 00:05:20.983
I mean, all I can do is sit
here, and boil, and listen.

00:05:24.270 --> 00:05:25.950
And when the sound goes down,

00:05:25.950 --> 00:05:27.630
I know that it needs a little wood,

00:05:27.630 --> 00:05:30.090
it tells me, "I need a little wood."

00:05:30.090 --> 00:05:32.340
And then it roars, and then it goes down,

00:05:32.340 --> 00:05:34.860
and it roars, and it goes down.

00:05:34.860 --> 00:05:35.760
And it's like listening,

00:05:35.760 --> 00:05:37.170
it's like sitting at a waterfall,

00:05:37.170 --> 00:05:41.040
listening to the water go
over the top of the waterfall.

00:05:41.040 --> 00:05:42.243
It's awful hot too.

00:05:44.370 --> 00:05:45.750
And it's lovely to come in here

00:05:45.750 --> 00:05:49.230
because you come in here,
oftentimes, and outside,

00:05:49.230 --> 00:05:52.890
you're outside and it's 20 degrees out,

00:05:52.890 --> 00:05:55.650
and you come in here and
you're working for a while.

00:05:55.650 --> 00:05:58.290
The fire's going, you start to evaporate,

00:05:58.290 --> 00:06:00.390
and even it's an uninsulated building,

00:06:00.390 --> 00:06:05.010
with openings, the ceiling,
and it's not all that tight,

00:06:05.010 --> 00:06:07.743
and in a little while,
you've got your jacket off,

00:06:08.790 --> 00:06:12.760
and you're still quite toasty
and warm, and it's lovely.

00:06:14.487 --> 00:06:16.053
And it's sweet smelling.

00:06:16.920 --> 00:06:19.893
I mean, you can smell it,
there's sugar in the air.

00:06:20.880 --> 00:06:24.633
There's that special (inhales)
sweetness of maple syrup.

00:06:25.862 --> 00:06:29.279
(gentle nostalgic music)

00:06:44.102 --> 00:06:46.110
Things have changed
tremendously over the years

00:06:46.110 --> 00:06:47.880
as to what I work on,

00:06:47.880 --> 00:06:52.880
but I always like to create
things, and make things.

00:06:52.920 --> 00:06:54.030
You know, through school,

00:06:54.030 --> 00:06:57.390
I was thinking of being an attorney

00:06:57.390 --> 00:06:59.760
and going to the Woodrow Wilson School

00:06:59.760 --> 00:07:03.603
and following family tradition
of basically public service.

00:07:07.380 --> 00:07:09.750
Nicholas Katzenbach, that's my cousin,

00:07:09.750 --> 00:07:11.822
who was a wonderful human being.

00:07:11.822 --> 00:07:12.660
He was Attorney General.

00:07:12.660 --> 00:07:15.150
He met George Wallace
on the steps of Alabama,

00:07:15.150 --> 00:07:17.250
and he wrote the Civil Rights legislation.

00:07:17.250 --> 00:07:18.120
- [Speaker] This is what happened

00:07:18.120 --> 00:07:21.090
as Nicholas Katzenbach, accompanied
by two federal marshals,

00:07:21.090 --> 00:07:22.980
left their car, and
approached Governor Wallace,

00:07:22.980 --> 00:07:25.140
standing in the schoolhouse door.

00:07:25.140 --> 00:07:29.280
- Two students who simply seek
an education on this campus

00:07:29.280 --> 00:07:31.260
are presently on this campus.

00:07:31.260 --> 00:07:32.580
They have a right to be here,

00:07:32.580 --> 00:07:34.140
they have a right to register here.

00:07:34.140 --> 00:07:35.493
They will register today.

00:07:36.420 --> 00:07:38.280
They will go to school tomorrow,

00:07:38.280 --> 00:07:40.803
and they will go to
school at this university.

00:07:42.028 --> 00:07:44.861
(people chanting)

00:07:46.681 --> 00:07:48.300
- And then I had some experiences

00:07:48.300 --> 00:07:50.250
over the summer of my graduate year.

00:07:50.250 --> 00:07:53.793
I walked out of high school
into the summer of love.

00:07:54.780 --> 00:07:57.043
And through some of the
experiences I had then,

00:07:57.043 --> 00:07:58.800
it just changed my direction.

00:07:58.800 --> 00:08:00.570
So when I went to school,

00:08:00.570 --> 00:08:04.050
I seemed to be somewhat
anchor-less at Princeton.

00:08:04.050 --> 00:08:06.840
Spent a summer just painting.

00:08:06.840 --> 00:08:10.890
I moved into one of the
classrooms and just had a studio,

00:08:10.890 --> 00:08:12.240
and just started to work.

00:08:12.240 --> 00:08:13.920
Nobody seemed to worry about it,

00:08:13.920 --> 00:08:15.892
you know, nobody bothered me.

00:08:15.892 --> 00:08:16.725
(clears throat) All the students

00:08:16.725 --> 00:08:19.200
that had taken classes
there in the previous fall,

00:08:19.200 --> 00:08:20.550
left all their materials behind

00:08:20.550 --> 00:08:22.860
because they weren't really interested.

00:08:22.860 --> 00:08:24.510
I was interested,

00:08:24.510 --> 00:08:26.730
and I had all these
materials I could work with.

00:08:26.730 --> 00:08:29.190
No money, but a lot of materials.

00:08:29.190 --> 00:08:33.990
I had fun and learned so
much, and then hit the...

00:08:33.990 --> 00:08:35.280
I got married as I left,

00:08:35.280 --> 00:08:37.170
I'd fallen into love
with a beautiful woman

00:08:37.170 --> 00:08:41.283
who I love to this day,
we're going on 51 years now.

00:08:42.420 --> 00:08:45.000
But that was just life at that point,

00:08:45.000 --> 00:08:46.920
and then I hit the reality of,

00:08:46.920 --> 00:08:50.820
oh you gotta make a living
and your paintings never sell,

00:08:50.820 --> 00:08:53.253
nobody's gonna pay any
attention to your art.

00:08:54.270 --> 00:08:55.860
You're not gonna be famous

00:08:55.860 --> 00:08:57.690
and it's not gonna get handed to you,

00:08:57.690 --> 00:08:59.790
and you're not independently wealthy.

00:08:59.790 --> 00:09:02.160
So what are you gonna do?

00:09:02.160 --> 00:09:06.210
And looked in the newspaper,
what jobs can you find?

00:09:06.210 --> 00:09:07.043
You know, what do you get

00:09:07.043 --> 00:09:09.810
with a degree in religion
with a minor in art,

00:09:09.810 --> 00:09:11.410
you know, what are you gonna do?

00:09:13.380 --> 00:09:17.070
Had a friend who got me into
the International Labors Union

00:09:17.070 --> 00:09:18.960
and I worked heavy construction,

00:09:18.960 --> 00:09:22.383
and did that for, oh, I guess six years,

00:09:22.383 --> 00:09:26.343
on interstate highways,
big flood control projects,

00:09:27.780 --> 00:09:29.763
all over the place, swinging a pick,

00:09:30.600 --> 00:09:33.720
shoveling all day, until my back went out,

00:09:33.720 --> 00:09:36.900
and then they, I did have
a degree from Princeton,

00:09:36.900 --> 00:09:38.580
so they thought I was smart.

00:09:38.580 --> 00:09:40.350
So I learned how to use the first lasers

00:09:40.350 --> 00:09:44.610
when the lasers were first
coming in, to lay things out.

00:09:44.610 --> 00:09:46.080
I became a grade foreman

00:09:46.080 --> 00:09:48.870
and did other work on the jobs there.

00:09:48.870 --> 00:09:51.390
And meanwhile, I was
going to school nights,

00:09:51.390 --> 00:09:54.240
getting a master's in
industrial education.

00:09:54.240 --> 00:09:58.300
And I got a job teaching
emotionally disturbed children

00:10:00.000 --> 00:10:02.130
at Eastern State School and Hospital.

00:10:02.130 --> 00:10:06.180
Very, very, difficult
children, difficult kids.

00:10:06.180 --> 00:10:10.860
I'd have kids that weren't
allowed to have books

00:10:10.860 --> 00:10:12.420
when you'd walk in their classroom

00:10:12.420 --> 00:10:14.490
because they use them as weapons.

00:10:14.490 --> 00:10:16.680
Their desks were attached to the chairs

00:10:16.680 --> 00:10:18.900
so they couldn't throw chairs.

00:10:18.900 --> 00:10:21.630
And I take those same kids, and in a year,

00:10:21.630 --> 00:10:25.260
they were pouring molten
lead, and using band saws,

00:10:25.260 --> 00:10:30.260
and working beautifully in a
shop, and having a good time.

00:10:31.680 --> 00:10:35.490
And I was having a good time
watching them kind of change

00:10:35.490 --> 00:10:37.440
because people have spent their lives,

00:10:37.440 --> 00:10:39.900
trying to get a kid that hated school

00:10:39.900 --> 00:10:43.050
to go from a first grade reading level

00:10:43.050 --> 00:10:45.510
to a second grade reading level

00:10:45.510 --> 00:10:48.780
when the kid was 13, 14 years old.

00:10:48.780 --> 00:10:51.810
And that kid had no intention
of paying any attention,

00:10:51.810 --> 00:10:53.160
and acted out continuously.

00:10:53.160 --> 00:10:55.410
But when you gave them
something that they could do

00:10:55.410 --> 00:10:57.753
and succeed at and enjoy,

00:10:58.920 --> 00:11:00.600
the change was instantaneous

00:11:00.600 --> 00:11:03.210
and their behavior just
flattened right out

00:11:03.210 --> 00:11:07.290
and they were well-behaved
and decent human beings.

00:11:07.290 --> 00:11:10.859
As they could be, I mean,
some of them were really sick.

00:11:10.859 --> 00:11:13.609
(rustling grass)

00:11:23.310 --> 00:11:25.143
She just gave birth this morning.

00:11:26.190 --> 00:11:29.880
And the one next to her was
yesterday, and she has twins,

00:11:29.880 --> 00:11:31.770
and then this one over here was yesterday,

00:11:31.770 --> 00:11:33.840
and she's got triplets.

00:11:33.840 --> 00:11:36.840
And she is being completely recalcitrant.

00:11:36.840 --> 00:11:39.960
She does not want to nurse her children.

00:11:39.960 --> 00:11:41.580
She doesn't want anything to do with them.

00:11:41.580 --> 00:11:44.910
So she's, right now,
she's tied to the wall

00:11:44.910 --> 00:11:47.160
so that she can get up,
she can move around,

00:11:47.160 --> 00:11:49.860
she can get a drink, she can eat hay,

00:11:49.860 --> 00:11:52.500
but see her pushing against her babies?

00:11:52.500 --> 00:11:55.623
She doesn't want to accept
the fact that she's a mom.

00:11:57.660 --> 00:11:58.920
First lambs for everybody,

00:11:58.920 --> 00:12:01.590
but she's talking, she's
talking nicely to them,

00:12:01.590 --> 00:12:04.537
she just doesn't know
how to deal with them.

00:12:04.537 --> 00:12:07.120
(sheep bleating)

00:12:10.217 --> 00:12:12.967
(fire crackling)

00:12:16.200 --> 00:12:18.180
Teaching the disturbed
kids was really rough,

00:12:18.180 --> 00:12:20.430
and I think I lasted for a few years

00:12:20.430 --> 00:12:24.630
and then I was extremely
fortunate that a classmate of mine

00:12:24.630 --> 00:12:27.630
was working for a company
called Princeton Energy Group,

00:12:27.630 --> 00:12:30.600
which was doing the first
passive solar homes,

00:12:30.600 --> 00:12:32.940
and research and engineering.

00:12:32.940 --> 00:12:35.730
They wanted to start a
construction division,

00:12:35.730 --> 00:12:39.630
and since I had some
construction experience,

00:12:39.630 --> 00:12:41.340
I took the job.

00:12:41.340 --> 00:12:45.990
We built solar greenhouses
and solar additions

00:12:45.990 --> 00:12:49.020
and homes all around the place.

00:12:49.020 --> 00:12:53.250
And then I left that because
I was having some problems

00:12:53.250 --> 00:12:55.260
with people that were running it

00:12:55.260 --> 00:12:57.213
and it just wasn't working out.

00:12:58.380 --> 00:13:00.690
And I started my own design build company,

00:13:00.690 --> 00:13:05.640
and I started doing the same
kind of work, design of homes.

00:13:05.640 --> 00:13:08.430
I'm not an architect, but
I have a lot of friends

00:13:08.430 --> 00:13:10.290
who are engineers and architects,

00:13:10.290 --> 00:13:12.390
and I would do the
drawing, I'd learned that

00:13:12.390 --> 00:13:14.970
in getting a degree in
industrial education.

00:13:14.970 --> 00:13:18.450
I could sit there on the
old style drawing board

00:13:18.450 --> 00:13:23.430
and make, you know, make
pretty decent drawing.

00:13:23.430 --> 00:13:26.370
And I was very fortunate
that that worked out for me.

00:13:26.370 --> 00:13:29.400
I had a good client base through this area

00:13:29.400 --> 00:13:32.370
and I built everything
from homes to additions,

00:13:32.370 --> 00:13:33.840
and loved it.

00:13:33.840 --> 00:13:36.540
Meanwhile, we were working this farm.

00:13:36.540 --> 00:13:38.700
So we cleared a little piece of land

00:13:38.700 --> 00:13:40.410
and we put up our house here.

00:13:40.410 --> 00:13:44.400
It was a log house, 1833
originally, and we rebuilt it here.

00:13:44.400 --> 00:13:47.430
And since then, the farm has expanded out.

00:13:47.430 --> 00:13:49.920
I put a sawmill in, made tons of lumber.

00:13:49.920 --> 00:13:52.412
It went all over the place.

00:13:52.412 --> 00:13:55.329
(machine rumbling)

00:14:04.599 --> 00:14:07.349
(metal clinking)

00:14:16.597 --> 00:14:21.597
(tool clattering)
(machine rumbling)

00:14:28.319 --> 00:14:29.550
You can see where the
board will be right here,

00:14:29.550 --> 00:14:33.506
that's your first flat cut
on this log, nice big log.

00:14:33.506 --> 00:14:36.423
(machine rumbling)

00:14:39.026 --> 00:14:40.140
If I didn't live in a pine forest,

00:14:40.140 --> 00:14:41.520
I wouldn't have a sawmill,

00:14:41.520 --> 00:14:43.830
but I got this thing (laughs) where I,

00:14:43.830 --> 00:14:47.340
where my father planted a
pine forest on our best land,

00:14:47.340 --> 00:14:49.110
when I was seven years old.

00:14:49.110 --> 00:14:52.380
So I'd like to see this land grow again,

00:14:52.380 --> 00:14:54.060
and eventually,

00:14:54.060 --> 00:14:56.010
we'll have the section where
we're standing right now,

00:14:56.010 --> 00:14:57.870
from here up to where the road is,

00:14:57.870 --> 00:15:00.720
it's a fairly narrow section,
but it's our best soil.

00:15:00.720 --> 00:15:01.860
And there's an acre or two

00:15:01.860 --> 00:15:04.800
that could grow a lot of
vegetables and a lot of flowers,

00:15:04.800 --> 00:15:06.633
or be nice alfalfa pasture,

00:15:07.740 --> 00:15:09.870
and some nice hay come
off of it for the goats.

00:15:09.870 --> 00:15:12.900
So, one way or the other,
we'll make use of this land,

00:15:12.900 --> 00:15:15.480
it's just a matter of having
to deal with the trees

00:15:15.480 --> 00:15:18.150
and I'd just as soon have them harvested

00:15:18.150 --> 00:15:19.300
and become good lumber.

00:15:20.678 --> 00:15:23.730
(chimes ringing)

00:15:23.730 --> 00:15:27.196
You're gonna get your
camera and you're gonna see,

00:15:27.196 --> 00:15:31.110
you're gonna get part of the
picture and part of yourself.

00:15:31.110 --> 00:15:32.610
And then you can get part of me

00:15:32.610 --> 00:15:34.650
and I can become part of the camera.

00:15:34.650 --> 00:15:36.940
I can make the camera my eyes

00:15:37.830 --> 00:15:41.086
and my mouth is there speaking.

00:15:41.086 --> 00:15:42.990
And it goes the other way around.

00:15:42.990 --> 00:15:44.880
And it's kind of fun, if
you do with another person,

00:15:44.880 --> 00:15:47.760
you can share eyes, nose,
and face with another person,

00:15:47.760 --> 00:15:50.130
and you're kind of part of the painting

00:15:50.130 --> 00:15:51.583
and the painting's part of you.

00:15:51.583 --> 00:15:53.310
I have trouble classifying my work

00:15:53.310 --> 00:15:55.050
and I have trouble showing it, oftentimes,

00:15:55.050 --> 00:15:57.810
because people don't know if
it's sculpture or painting.

00:15:57.810 --> 00:15:59.550
It's kind of a mixture.

00:15:59.550 --> 00:16:03.000
I love color and I grew up as a painter.

00:16:03.000 --> 00:16:04.470
I was studied as a painter at Princeton,

00:16:04.470 --> 00:16:08.010
but the glass just lends itself so much

00:16:08.010 --> 00:16:12.090
to being three-dimensional,
at least to see through it.

00:16:12.090 --> 00:16:12.960
And people aren't used

00:16:12.960 --> 00:16:15.090
to being able to see through a painting.

00:16:15.090 --> 00:16:18.933
You don't see through a painting,
a painting is on a wall.

00:16:20.370 --> 00:16:22.590
It doesn't have to be, you
can see through a painting.

00:16:22.590 --> 00:16:24.180
The geometry of this

00:16:24.180 --> 00:16:26.490
is more complicated than one would think,

00:16:26.490 --> 00:16:28.620
25 pages of formulas.

00:16:28.620 --> 00:16:30.600
I didn't understand half the formulas.

00:16:30.600 --> 00:16:32.310
Turns out it's a base seven system,

00:16:32.310 --> 00:16:34.210
it kind of comes out of a base system.

00:16:35.430 --> 00:16:36.960
It predates the pyramids,

00:16:36.960 --> 00:16:39.720
it's an ancient, ancient, ancient symbol.

00:16:39.720 --> 00:16:43.230
In India, they paint
them on people's houses

00:16:43.230 --> 00:16:45.900
to bring peace and
prosperity to the house,

00:16:45.900 --> 00:16:47.924
and mostly peace.

00:16:47.924 --> 00:16:51.420
(sap boiling)

00:16:51.420 --> 00:16:54.630
We just got to go another few percent now.

00:16:54.630 --> 00:16:57.230
So a little more steaming,
and we're getting closer.

00:17:00.660 --> 00:17:04.680
In a lot of places, this could
boil all day and all night.

00:17:04.680 --> 00:17:06.810
That's how it's done oftentimes,

00:17:06.810 --> 00:17:08.820
and there are actually shifts of people,

00:17:08.820 --> 00:17:11.730
people sleep in a sugar house.

00:17:11.730 --> 00:17:14.190
There's a lot of drinking
done in a sugar house.

00:17:14.190 --> 00:17:16.500
There's a lot of times, it's a guy's way

00:17:16.500 --> 00:17:19.260
of getting away from the
home, and just going,

00:17:19.260 --> 00:17:21.087
we're going to sugar camp, you know,

00:17:21.087 --> 00:17:24.450
and a bunch of guys will go
off and make syrup, you know,

00:17:24.450 --> 00:17:27.779
all winter long, and
come home occasionally-

00:17:27.779 --> 00:17:30.330
(machine clanks)
While they boil.

00:17:30.330 --> 00:17:32.190
And boil and boil, ugh,

00:17:32.190 --> 00:17:33.810
don't tell me you want more wood,

00:17:33.810 --> 00:17:36.898
I know you've got enough wood.

00:17:36.898 --> 00:17:39.606
(fire crackling)
(door clanks)

00:17:39.606 --> 00:17:42.439
(sap boiling)

00:17:59.716 --> 00:18:01.716
I'm a transgender woman.

00:18:02.951 --> 00:18:07.951
And yet, I was always attracted to women,

00:18:09.270 --> 00:18:12.303
so I never knew how to deal with that.

00:18:13.233 --> 00:18:15.030
I mean, sexually, I'm attracted to women,

00:18:15.030 --> 00:18:17.253
and always have been.

00:18:18.120 --> 00:18:23.120
So I wasn't gay, per se, although
some may say I'm gay now.

00:18:25.859 --> 00:18:30.859
But I also felt like somehow
I wasn't in the right gender.

00:18:32.910 --> 00:18:35.640
Now, it's very hard for
people to understand

00:18:35.640 --> 00:18:36.750
what that's about,

00:18:36.750 --> 00:18:39.630
and I can't say that I
understand what it's about.

00:18:39.630 --> 00:18:42.600
I just know that all through my life,

00:18:42.600 --> 00:18:47.130
there have been times when I've
wanted to dress as a woman,

00:18:47.130 --> 00:18:49.590
and present myself to
the world as a woman,

00:18:49.590 --> 00:18:54.570
and be seen as a woman, because
that's who I felt I was.

00:18:54.570 --> 00:18:58.683
And yet, never able to
do it because of fear.

00:19:00.060 --> 00:19:05.060
And at the same time, I
learned to accept what I had,

00:19:05.430 --> 00:19:08.280
which was being a male.

00:19:08.280 --> 00:19:09.810
There have been times in my life

00:19:09.810 --> 00:19:11.860
when I was the toughest kid on the block.

00:19:13.020 --> 00:19:15.210
You know, when you're
swinging a pick all day long,

00:19:15.210 --> 00:19:20.210
literally, and you know,
you get pretty tough,

00:19:23.370 --> 00:19:24.930
and there's not much that's gonna,

00:19:24.930 --> 00:19:27.240
muscularly, over your whole body,

00:19:27.240 --> 00:19:31.110
it's not gym workout body,
it's a body that works,

00:19:31.110 --> 00:19:34.353
hands that are like steel.

00:19:35.280 --> 00:19:37.710
And I've accepted that as well.

00:19:37.710 --> 00:19:38.970
And when I transitioned, it was like,

00:19:38.970 --> 00:19:41.910
oh I should just live
completely as a female,

00:19:41.910 --> 00:19:45.210
but high heels and a lot of lipstick

00:19:45.210 --> 00:19:48.183
and really sexy clothes, that's not me.

00:19:49.200 --> 00:19:50.283
I'm a farmer.

00:19:51.420 --> 00:19:52.920
And yet,

00:19:52.920 --> 00:19:56.130
the other day I went up to
the to the doctor's office

00:19:56.130 --> 00:19:59.790
and one of the ladies at
check-in said, "Love your skirt."

00:19:59.790 --> 00:20:04.560
And, you know, I like
looking nice too, you know,

00:20:04.560 --> 00:20:09.390
so it's good to be me,

00:20:09.390 --> 00:20:14.390
and I feel comfortable
being me as me, and I,

00:20:16.590 --> 00:20:20.280
that's something that,
(sighs) I'm still, maybe,

00:20:20.280 --> 00:20:23.310
I'm different, you know,
not everybody's like that,

00:20:23.310 --> 00:20:26.910
but, and when I was, cripes,
when I went to school,

00:20:26.910 --> 00:20:30.360
I would've been literally,
I would've been,

00:20:30.360 --> 00:20:32.703
well first of all, I
would've been expelled,

00:20:33.810 --> 00:20:36.360
but I probably would've
been beaten thoroughly

00:20:36.360 --> 00:20:39.360
before I was expelled, if not hung,

00:20:39.360 --> 00:20:42.303
you know, beaten and hung.

00:20:44.130 --> 00:20:47.550
And my father, oh my gosh, you
know, as a World War II vet,

00:20:47.550 --> 00:20:48.933
he would not touch it.

00:20:51.960 --> 00:20:53.160
And he would've hated, you know,

00:20:53.160 --> 00:20:57.990
and it has caused me a lot of pain,

00:20:57.990 --> 00:21:00.213
and it's caused others a lot of pain.

00:21:01.740 --> 00:21:04.680
Hopefully that's resolving itself now.

00:21:04.680 --> 00:21:07.690
Hopefully, in time,
people can understand that

00:21:08.700 --> 00:21:10.560
there are people like me.

00:21:10.560 --> 00:21:13.290
I'm not unique in this world.

00:21:13.290 --> 00:21:15.690
Unfortunately a lot of children

00:21:15.690 --> 00:21:18.000
and a lot of adults, at this point,

00:21:18.000 --> 00:21:20.940
but children, it's really hard on kids.

00:21:20.940 --> 00:21:22.020
You know, there are times in your life

00:21:22.020 --> 00:21:25.740
where you just want to check
out because you can't live.

00:21:25.740 --> 00:21:29.613
You can't, no one will
accept you for who you are.

00:21:32.610 --> 00:21:37.260
And you're ashamed, and guilty feeling,

00:21:37.260 --> 00:21:38.460
and horrible about it.

00:21:38.460 --> 00:21:43.230
But today, those feelings are going.

00:21:43.230 --> 00:21:47.768
And a lot of that happened,
I mean, let's see,

00:21:47.768 --> 00:21:50.820
this month, earlier this month,

00:21:50.820 --> 00:21:53.070
I celebrated 15 years of sobriety,

00:21:53.070 --> 00:21:55.410
and a lot of what has happened

00:21:55.410 --> 00:22:00.410
has been working in sobriety, you know,

00:22:00.900 --> 00:22:04.863
with the help I found, as
I found help to get sober.

00:22:06.360 --> 00:22:11.360
And in that process, part of
it is to be true to yourself,

00:22:12.570 --> 00:22:15.390
to find yourself, to be open and honest.

00:22:15.390 --> 00:22:18.660
And it took a lot to be open and honest.

00:22:18.660 --> 00:22:21.360
Very painful to be open and honest,

00:22:21.360 --> 00:22:25.170
but the rewards have been,
to me, very spectacular,

00:22:25.170 --> 00:22:30.120
and I am finding a certain
peace and contentment with life

00:22:30.120 --> 00:22:33.259
that I never thought possible.

00:22:33.259 --> 00:22:38.259
(liquid burbling)
(quiet peaceful music)

00:22:45.047 --> 00:22:50.047
(chimes ringing)
(quiet peaceful music)

00:23:26.398 --> 00:23:29.704
(chimes ringing)

00:23:29.704 --> 00:23:34.704
(machine clanks)
(quiet peaceful music)

00:23:43.440 --> 00:23:44.550
I was thinking the other day,

00:23:44.550 --> 00:23:47.850
I remember going to a really
big processor at one point,

00:23:47.850 --> 00:23:50.190
and seeing them,

00:23:50.190 --> 00:23:55.190
it's a place that makes 60,
70,000 gallons of syrup a year,

00:23:55.860 --> 00:23:59.550
and seeing people with 55 gallon drums,

00:23:59.550 --> 00:24:01.470
rushing by out of the evaporator

00:24:01.470 --> 00:24:04.890
and assembly lines of people,

00:24:04.890 --> 00:24:07.860
feeding machines that bottle and label

00:24:07.860 --> 00:24:09.123
and do everything else.

00:24:10.290 --> 00:24:14.700
Going off into commercial
tanks, it's a little different.

00:24:14.700 --> 00:24:17.220
This is my scale.

00:24:17.220 --> 00:24:18.693
Small is beautiful.

00:24:19.860 --> 00:24:21.960
Ain't gonna make you a millionaire, but...

00:24:26.280 --> 00:24:27.860
Make some good syrup.

00:24:37.260 --> 00:24:39.480
It was eight years ago today

00:24:39.480 --> 00:24:44.480
that I received my
legal name change forms,

00:24:44.520 --> 00:24:46.410
and went to the motor vehicle office

00:24:46.410 --> 00:24:49.500
and got a new driver's license.

00:24:49.500 --> 00:24:50.333
Of course,

00:24:50.333 --> 00:24:54.120
I'd had a new driver's
license a few years before,

00:24:54.120 --> 00:24:55.440
but it didn't have the right name.

00:24:55.440 --> 00:24:58.450
It had me, presenting as a female,

00:24:58.450 --> 00:25:00.360
(laughs) but it still said Charles.

00:25:00.360 --> 00:25:01.800
So it was a little odd,

00:25:01.800 --> 00:25:04.620
and the people at the motor
vehicle place loved it,

00:25:04.620 --> 00:25:08.610
in a way, and then they
were very happy to help me

00:25:08.610 --> 00:25:11.670
change the name when I had an
official legal name change,

00:25:11.670 --> 00:25:13.110
and they did.

00:25:13.110 --> 00:25:16.050
Today, I wrote about that on the internet.

00:25:16.050 --> 00:25:18.780
The internet has been a wonderful tool,

00:25:18.780 --> 00:25:21.153
in many ways, for me and for other people,

00:25:22.080 --> 00:25:23.610
and I wrote about that

00:25:23.610 --> 00:25:28.050
because there are a lot
of people who are older,

00:25:28.050 --> 00:25:31.830
who, like me, were raised at a time

00:25:31.830 --> 00:25:36.000
when it was absolutely impossible
to express who you are.

00:25:36.000 --> 00:25:39.390
And they're wondering, "Oh,
is it too late for me now?

00:25:39.390 --> 00:25:41.130
Is this impossible?

00:25:41.130 --> 00:25:46.130
I'm 69 now, or I'm 60 now,
I've lost my life, I can't be."

00:25:47.490 --> 00:25:48.780
And the only thing they can't be

00:25:48.780 --> 00:25:50.253
is they can't be a teenager,

00:25:51.390 --> 00:25:55.623
but they can be a crazy
old limping old woman.

00:25:56.520 --> 00:26:01.113
And they can live their
life, as they want.

00:26:02.400 --> 00:26:05.103
And I can share the fact
that that's what I did.

00:26:06.060 --> 00:26:09.300
I figured out how to live
my life as the person I am,

00:26:09.300 --> 00:26:10.383
and you could do it.

00:26:11.820 --> 00:26:15.390
So, and I think that helps people.

00:26:15.390 --> 00:26:18.240
And you know, there's a thing in recovery

00:26:18.240 --> 00:26:20.130
that talks about sharing your experience,

00:26:20.130 --> 00:26:22.173
strength, and hope with other people.

00:26:24.180 --> 00:26:27.963
And your experience
might be pretty horrible,

00:26:28.800 --> 00:26:33.800
depending on, you know,
what your life has been.

00:26:35.430 --> 00:26:39.240
A lot of people have, I
mean, we all have lives.

00:26:39.240 --> 00:26:40.840
We all live through tough stuff.

00:26:42.810 --> 00:26:45.030
And when you share that with other people,

00:26:45.030 --> 00:26:46.890
who are living through tough stuff,

00:26:46.890 --> 00:26:50.673
and are finding a way to
find peace with themselves,

00:26:53.100 --> 00:26:56.310
and you can share how you
lived through tough stuff

00:26:56.310 --> 00:27:00.330
and how you found peace
with yourself, as yourself,

00:27:00.330 --> 00:27:02.250
or, you know,

00:27:02.250 --> 00:27:04.200
maybe you've always been a straight,

00:27:04.200 --> 00:27:08.583
cisgendered, heterosexual
male or female, great.

00:27:11.370 --> 00:27:14.223
But still, you have to
find peace with yourself.

00:27:15.060 --> 00:27:17.700
A lot of us, we all kind
of want to do things

00:27:17.700 --> 00:27:22.700
that we aren't necessarily able
to do, for whatever reason.

00:27:23.790 --> 00:27:25.830
Sometimes it's a lot less dramatic

00:27:25.830 --> 00:27:28.983
than changing your gender.

00:27:32.640 --> 00:27:36.480
And you can help people
just by sharing the fact

00:27:36.480 --> 00:27:40.110
that you've found peace enough in yourself

00:27:40.110 --> 00:27:44.250
to be able to express
yourself as yourself.

00:27:44.250 --> 00:27:47.000
(fire crackling)

00:27:52.980 --> 00:27:55.920
I think that's one of the
weirdest things about painting.

00:27:55.920 --> 00:27:58.833
Who knows where it's
going until it's gone.

00:28:00.360 --> 00:28:01.193
You know, it was funny,

00:28:01.193 --> 00:28:04.650
I was talking to my
grandson about it yesterday,

00:28:04.650 --> 00:28:06.810
coming back from the train.

00:28:06.810 --> 00:28:09.450
For Christmas, he got that
wonderful coloring book

00:28:09.450 --> 00:28:13.620
that is just mandalas, in black and white,

00:28:13.620 --> 00:28:17.100
very ornate, very tight, very precise,

00:28:17.100 --> 00:28:19.200
and he's coloring them in beautifully.

00:28:19.200 --> 00:28:21.210
I mean, I love 'em when they're done,

00:28:21.210 --> 00:28:22.983
and he's working his way out on it.

00:28:23.910 --> 00:28:27.000
And that kind of, as we were
driving for a little bit,

00:28:27.000 --> 00:28:31.350
and we were alone, we
started talking about mantras

00:28:31.350 --> 00:28:32.820
and what they were about.

00:28:32.820 --> 00:28:35.940
And I said, and one of the
things that you'll find is that,

00:28:35.940 --> 00:28:39.390
as an artist, you spend a
good bit of time in a work

00:28:39.390 --> 00:28:41.970
and looking at a work and
trying to see that work

00:28:41.970 --> 00:28:45.120
and trying to open
yourself up to that work,

00:28:45.120 --> 00:28:48.930
as it evolves, and find
your way through it.

00:28:48.930 --> 00:28:53.930
And how the mandala tends to pull you in

00:28:54.930 --> 00:28:58.530
because it is a centrally oriented piece.

00:28:58.530 --> 00:29:00.637
When I go to a museum and
I asked him this question,

00:29:00.637 --> 00:29:01.620
"When you go to a museum,

00:29:01.620 --> 00:29:03.843
do you ever get a chance
to look at a piece,

00:29:05.340 --> 00:29:08.187
at a piece in the museum?"

00:29:09.360 --> 00:29:12.510
And nobody ever looks at
a piece in the museum,

00:29:12.510 --> 00:29:14.100
or very rarely.

00:29:14.100 --> 00:29:17.760
What they're seeing is all
the pieces in the museum,

00:29:17.760 --> 00:29:19.350
one after the other, after the other,

00:29:19.350 --> 00:29:20.610
after the other, after the other,

00:29:20.610 --> 00:29:22.500
as they walk down the aisles.

00:29:22.500 --> 00:29:25.980
My hope in life is that somebody
actually spends the time

00:29:25.980 --> 00:29:28.230
to look at a piece, to
sit down for a minute,

00:29:28.230 --> 00:29:29.400
and look at a piece.

00:29:29.400 --> 00:29:32.400
I used to have a vision of taking a globe

00:29:32.400 --> 00:29:34.050
that I could paint the interior of

00:29:34.050 --> 00:29:37.060
and then have a chair in it so that

00:29:38.400 --> 00:29:42.990
any viewer would go in
and sit down in the chair.

00:29:42.990 --> 00:29:44.133
I got ya for a minute.

00:29:45.840 --> 00:29:47.850
For one minute, I got ya.

00:29:47.850 --> 00:29:50.643
You're surrounded by a piece, enjoy it.

00:29:51.480 --> 00:29:55.110
It's hard to be in that
space of right now,

00:29:55.110 --> 00:29:57.933
which is all I got is right now.

00:29:58.770 --> 00:30:00.960
Well, it's a beautiful gray day

00:30:00.960 --> 00:30:04.590
and I'm inside painting
instead of freezing out there,

00:30:04.590 --> 00:30:06.990
when my hip can't, I can't work around

00:30:06.990 --> 00:30:08.640
'cause my hips are hurting me too badly,

00:30:08.640 --> 00:30:12.990
so I'm enjoying a little
time with some colors

00:30:12.990 --> 00:30:15.213
and figuring out where it's gonna take me.

00:30:16.229 --> 00:30:18.979
(chimes ringing)

00:30:27.419 --> 00:30:29.250
I'm just another farmer.

00:30:29.250 --> 00:30:31.620
I'm just another farmer
who's had a crazy life

00:30:31.620 --> 00:30:33.210
of doing 50 million other things,

00:30:33.210 --> 00:30:36.810
but that's, you know,
that's just the way life is.

00:30:36.810 --> 00:30:38.070
It's okay.

00:30:38.070 --> 00:30:40.140
Up and down, up and down, and you know,

00:30:40.140 --> 00:30:41.880
at this point I'm facing the fact

00:30:41.880 --> 00:30:46.050
that between my heart condition,
and my hips breaking down,

00:30:46.050 --> 00:30:51.050
and my body breaking down over,
and years taking their toll,

00:30:51.360 --> 00:30:53.490
I'm limited in the number of years

00:30:53.490 --> 00:30:56.310
that I'll be able to
do what I'm doing now.

00:30:56.310 --> 00:30:58.263
Producing syrup isn't gonna be forever.

00:30:59.280 --> 00:31:02.403
So many things are changing, always.

00:31:03.240 --> 00:31:06.540
And whatever comes,
comes, it'll be all right.

00:31:06.540 --> 00:31:07.640
We'll make it through.

00:31:09.588 --> 00:31:14.588
(fire crackling)
(gentle peaceful music)

00:31:40.512 --> 00:31:43.262
(fire crackling)