Not long ago a company launched 30 spammy web sites in a link scheme offering pine nuts in attempted to scam a top place on google. It was   a very directed attack on our work and domain - together with an assault on any web site that worked to properly develop their domain and the internet community as a whole. Ecommerce does not apperciate spam in any form.

 Being a woman with 5 planets in fire, there was a fire in my belly as a matter of principal. I  work  hard and take my responsibilty to the forests as the  heart  of my work with wild products.  It was offensive that someone would launch a scam like this . I saw it as, an assault upon the forest's bounty- not just a business manuver, but something very different. That is where my fire enages, as the forest is like my children - loved deeply.

 Yet,competition is good and when people are comfortable- things stay the same.  The advice I was given by white hat SEO folks, was take care of  your site- work at making it better; it will all sort out in the end and there are no real shortcuts.  I did pour myself into taking care of all the google noted flaws in the site and worked very hard at it.  My husband, George saw the intensity with which I worked and did something very special for me.  

He  designed and built an American Pine Nut sheller, specically for my Grade AA Jumbo soft shelled pine nuts. My husband, George Frazier - has incredible mechanical and design abilities. I have eaten so many pine nuts from test runs and % calculations, that I was ready to burst. It a home sheller and is beautiful and it works and I am thrilled. He did this because he loves me.

Power tools for the beloved" alt="George and Penny in love with each other, pine nuts and geodesic design" title="George and Penny Frazier" />

 In turn, I bought him the best chainsaw I could buy. The salesman at the store said, "yes, nothing says love like a chainsaw." He did not know the half of it. I know it seems oximoronic .  In fact, this entire post is an O'Henry story with a positive twist. You have to understand that forest keeping sometimes means thinning.  It is like in the old days, when a person harvested a buffalo.  You take with reverence for the life and use all that you can.  There is a reciprocity that is natural, so long as the reverence is there. 

Then another irony, our pine nut business had to physically expanded. George had to place a new build on the pad for our homesite. There was no more room to grow, so he set aside space from his love, the geodesic building, for me and my nuts.  As a result, we have to clear more land for our work .   But, we needed logs for our mushrooms, (see, Curious George's garden in the drawer) and our forest in Missouri, was poorly logged, prior to us buying it.  A poorly logged forest leaves damaged, sick trees, lots of little trees competing for light in an unhealthy overstory.  We have learned  to take out the dead, diseased and out of balance trees for restoration.  

   The moral of the story: when people take their passion, hearts, minds and hands, create   from a space of love do so with intergrity and the world holds infinite possibilities, tremendous joyes and tangible results.  There are basic natural laws to everything.  As long as we follow them, we are okay - one does not try and cheat or short cut.  Thank you, George for the pine nut sheller, for trusting me enough to giving up things you love. The pine dryad's whisper was true. I am very grateful.