The Best Laid Plans...

Bad News at Cold Antler Farm & What Happens Now

Bad News

Wednesday morning I pulled a 5lb chicken from the freezer and set it on the counter to thaw. I don’t usually roast a bird on weekdays, but this Wednesday was a celebration. I had been waiting for this morning for two years.

Once every two springs I can reapply for a small loan for the farm. It’s the only kind of loan I qualify for (averages between 4k and 6k) and it’s the most money I have to my name in those 24-months. When it’s in my bank account I get to feel safe again, fill up my emotional tank with a little security.

The loan is for the farm. The money can be used for new equipment, clothes, feed, supplies, and repairs I’ve been putting off for 18+ months. This is when I can afford big purchases like fall hay, roof patching, firewood, fences, vet visitations, car or truck repairs, etc. Basically if it’s for the farm and costs money, I use it.

It frees up money I earn through meat and words for the mortgage and medical/dental bills. This loan is my one chance to catch up, to finally not be going to bed every night terrified of foreclosure and pretending around my friends everything is fine to be polite. It deserves a whole chicken dinner. Loan Day is bigger than Christmas around here.

Sadly, for the first time in a decade, I was not eligible. The farm didn’t earn enough to qualify anymore. That’s how loans work. The more you need them, the harder they are to get.

I didn’t qualify because I put half of my time and energy into the substack in 2024, and less sales came through on the farm side. The money earned writing doesn’t qualify for that loan, nor go through the same payment channels, so even though I earned roughly the same amount, it meant that old parachute was no longer available.

I put the chicken in the fridge.

Red Underlined

I was devastated. I don’t mean to sound dramatic. I know that’s what people spend on one vacation, not look forward to for years just to exhale, but I made different choices and live with a different budget.

It’s a huge deal to get that large of an amount of money at one time. A woman needs six weeks every two years to fall asleep not afraid of being homeless. At least a woman running on fumes like me.

I panicked. Then I cried. I got my period that morning so every emotion was underlined in red. What was supposed to feel like my first Forever Summer in over a decade was back to constant survival mode. I won’t be coming up for air this summer.

I let myself feel without judgment. I took Friday for a walk on the path, quiet and sipping coffee. I felt things and breathed and walked. I talked myself down the way I only can walking in a forest with a dog.

That’s when I decided to stop acting like a little whiny bitch and start moving forward.

Good News

Cold Antler Farm has never had money. It’s never been safe. It’s always been a dream under duress. My life is completely unreasonable. That doesn’t mean it isn’t possible.

Without that loan this summer will be very different than I planned, but it’s not a death rattle. There will be an interesting new level of frugality happening, more so than ever before:

It means not walking into a single grocery store till fall outside my local IGA for milk and cheese. It means forgetting my summer restaurant treat or new used laptop. It means moving around and putting off dental work or therapy. It means finding new ways to explain to friends that still pretend I’m middle class I can’t go do whatever fun thing they want to do.

But I refuse to feel defeated. I refuse to allow something as loathful as money ruin my summer. I’m finally able to sleep in my bedroom with open windows, not tend fires 24/7, garden and swim and fish the river... I am not letting money darken this season I prayed so hard for.

I believe if I work, eat, sleep, and write here at Cold Antler (and don’t leave the farm unless absolutely necessary) I will get through this summer. As long as nothing horrific happens, I can squeak by. Using the car less means less chance of car repairs. Leaving the farm less means less ways to spend money. I will figure out all the expenses, sell what I need to sell, cut back on whatever I have to, tighten my belt. What matters is keeping the property.

As of this week, Cold Antler Farm has made it 15 years. That’s half a mortgage contact, folks. That’s 13 years self employment. That’s 6 published books. That’s not nothing. I may never see Paris, but I managed this. I am damn proud of this.

I’m not going anywhere. The writing might get a little more intense and emotions will be all over the place, but I think it will be entertaining as hell for you guys, as the stakes and my heart rate soars.

Whenever I feel unmoored, I remind myself this homestead was the best choice I could’ve made with my life. The world is literally falling apart, climate change is crashing over graves, and Fascism is here. But Cold Antler is still mine today. It’s still tucked into that curve halfway up a mountain with a pond and stream and forest path for reminding myself I could be dead by morning.

Last night I roasted that chicken. I did it out of spite to remain, not celebration, but if that’s what gets me through the weekend I’ll take it. I refuse to not enjoy good food on my farm—the entire point of all this—because one day of bad news, especially for the amount of money some people spend on dry cleaning—is not going to be what ruins my summer. I didn’t have that money last month, or the months before. I didn’t have it last year and I figured that out.

So I am also going to figure this out. Cold Antler Farm isn’t going anywhere and neither am I. I know this because I’m in charge, and I have never let myself down.

Let’s fucking go. God hates a coward.