As in, it's supposed to get up to 103 degrees today and I'm about to head out and work for 4 or 5 hours cobbing. But what the heck. Lots of water and mud involved. In this hot dry weather the cob dries almost too quickly, since it is good to be able to sew the layers together with a "cobber's thumb" (stick.) The structure is coming along pretty well. I have propped in the door and several of the windows now. Starting to look vaguely like a house. Debbie DeRose suggested calling it a playhouse (for official purposes.) I like that. Dan's playouse.
After literally tons of work on the urbanite stem wall, I have been itching to start actually cobbing. I was going to do a ceremonial first batch of cob last night, then today. But finishing the stem wall has felt like a living exploration of Xeno's paradox, and I'm still not quite there. Actually it is really pretty much done now except for maybe a piece or two more of urbanite, but I think I will start the actual cobbing on July 4th. It just feels right. Celebrating real independence. Not that I can do this thing alone. Oh, far from it! Today I was feeling a serious lack of motivation, a feeling of real overwhelmment at the sheer enormity of the task in front of me in building the cob walls, not to mention putting in the door, windows, cob benching, shelving, counters, loft, roof, and earthen floor. I'm really hoping there will be a few super-volunteers who are really jazzed at the prospect of learning this stuff by doing a bunch of it. At any rate we'll have a work party weekend on July 8 and 9, and probably again after that too. I confess I feel more daunted by this project than anything else I have ever undertaken, including thru-hiking the AT and biking down the coast and across the desert. The thing about this one is that it will require collaboration and "project management" on a scale I have never attempted before. Hiking the AT was physically difficult but very simple: just get up and walk for 10 hours every day. Maybe I'm making this too complex in my head right now. Probably. It's just that I have never felt very "handy" before, and here I am building a house! It feels a bit insane. If nothing else it will be proof that *anyone* can build a dwelling.
I won't really have time to write many entries. However my friend Debbie West has taken it upon herself to provide a periodic photo documentation of the construction, which you may view here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/42433046@N00/sets/72157594185107592/
I appreciate this, because although I like to take pictures, it is hard when you are continuously covered with mud and grit, and I still do not have a functioning computer of my own.