From the Farmhouse Table: August 2021

One Clear Goal: To Continue Providing Space

A certain kind of Pacific Northwesterner thinks of summer all winter: the long days of breezy sunlight, toes dangling in water, and excuses to avoid any travel beyond Cascadia. But here in the thick of it, all I can think about is the future: Hiring three new team members. Stocking up on air filters for fire season. Wondering whether we’ll need to update our month-old vaccination mandate to include booster shoots. And whether our March 2022 fundraising event will be in-person, virtual, or a mashup of both.

It is a weird time to be running a writing retreat.

By its very nature, Hedgebrook exists outside of the churn of worldly concerns.

The combination of solitude and community makes for the retreat’s most valuable and rewarding gift. Wifi is spotty in Langley—and the cottages aren’t wired for it—so it’s uncommon to awake to the annoying ping of cell phone messages. Far more common to awaken, squinting, to the dragon battle sounds of a pair of young eagles fussing above the treeline.

But the wider world cannot help but touch Hedgebrook Farm and the people who retreat here.

Covid-19, and the specific virulence of the Delta variant, press on the retreat. I am grateful we have had no cases.

Our writers sign and return safety protocols that include emergency departure plans, proof of vaccination, and masking and hand sanitizing requirements. Nightly suppers, once shared in the Farmhouse around the antique pine table, are delivered in bento boxes, to be eaten outside. With access to the kitchen off limits to residents, the endless cookie jar is, for now, no more.

As we wrestle with emerging information about the variant, the Hedgebrook team continues to put our writers in residence first. We share one clear goal: to continue providing space, unfettered by the churn, for women-identified writers whose words will carry us through this pandemic and beyond.

-Kimberly A.C. Wilson, Executive Director