I am the handwork teacher. The first and second grade class — nine kids — see me twice a week in a corner of their schoolroom and I guess they like me. They — and a few other members of the staff — have no idea how much it cost me to accept the unexpected job offer that came my way in October of last year. On the surface, I am well qualified to take the job: I have always been interested in textiles, I am versed in various crafts involving wool, such as spinning, weaving, knitting, crocheting; I have raised sheep and sheared them, and I like to pass on my knowledge and interest. But it was the location of the school that made it hard for me to teach there.

Black Kettle Farm used to be my home. Kathleen’s office used to be my daughter’s bedroom. The classroom used to be my living room, and the corner, where the rocking chair forms the center of the handwork class, was my reading nook. Black Kettle is where I made and raised my family, where I worked the ground, raised my sheep, milked my cow and butchered my pigs. It was my life, for twenty years. After I moved into the village and changed jobs and life, it was hard to go back and painful to look at the neglected garden, and the fields we had spent our energy growing crops reverting to weeds. Many farmers came and lived at Black Kettle, seduced by the view and chastised by the hard work, and left before winter set in. For many years I avoided the roads going up to the farm, did not mention the farm or the name of the new owner, denied any interest in the news concerning my old home.

When the Lakeside Preschool needed a more permanent location and was offered the yoga room at Black Kettle, a new era began for the old farm, and a new chapter began for my relationship with the school and the house. (Only my kids remember that the kindergarten school room was constructed in the shed that used to house our rabbits.) Nobody knows that the house harbors a benevolent ghost that makes his presence known in the winter, at night. I know where the wildflowers grow in the spring, where to find the hepaticas, the dutchman’s breeches and the hens and chicks on the rock face. New faces populate the garden, happy children again play under the walnut tree, and the old maple where we watched a family of raccoons grow up now has a beautiful tree house, sitting on the stump after Hurricane Irene dealt the venerable tree a deadly blow. The barn that used to store our hay now hosts barn dances and festivities of the season. The garage where our tractor lived and died will be the new school room when a new set of firsts graders starts in the fall.

There is a large rock on the other side of the road from the farmhouse. Just a rock that gets passed by all the parents and teachers in pursuit of children and their well-being and education. That rock has been sitting there for centuries, and about 225 years ago, some early surveyor put his initials and the date, 1788, on that rock. To remind us how long the farm has been there, carved out of the wilderness. How many families have lived in that protected nook, away from the winds, but open to change, and receptive to new ideas and a new purpose?

Written by Barbara Kunzi – Handwork teacher & former owner of Black Kettle Farm

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• Lakeside School: Freedom and Independence (www.essexonlakechamplain.com)
• Letters from Lakeside (www.essexonlakechamplain.com)
• Lakeside School: Sprouts News (www.essexonlakechamplain.com)
• Lakeside School: View from the Office Window (www.essexonlakechamplain.com)
• Lakeside School at Black Kettle Farm: Summer Camp (www.essexonlakechamplain.com)
• Lakeside School: Maple Sugaring! (www.essexonlakechamplain.com)