If You Build It, They Will Come

Chico and Italia.  For purposes of this article series, those are the names of the men who grow for the Sisters of the Valley.  I have to protect their anonymity because they don’t know, yet, that I’m blogging about the business, and when they learn, they are going to have a collective cow.   

I had never lived anywhere before where more than fifty percent of the population has a ‘handle’ in real life, a name called them by everyone, a name that isn’t their birth name.  I have never lived anywhere before where I’ve met people who have long histories together, shared decades of their lives together and still never know the birth name of the mate.  (Or so they claim.)  And that’s why, as soon as I entered the cannabis business, I took a ‘handle’ as well.  I used Kate because I had used that name to publish a sex tip book for men, once, co-authored with a world famous Madame.  My name was actually Dutch, Katje van Dijk.  (I was poor, three kids, dead-beat dad, it paid an advance . . .)

Kate became Sister Kate in the Autumn of 2011, when congress declared pizza a vegetable and, in response, I declared myself a nun.  I was furious with Congress for filibustering so that they wouldn’t have to listen to Michelle Obama talk about how unhealthy our children’s school meals are . . . and a week later, as if to flip her off completely, they convened to declare pizza a vegetable.  I was outraged -- enough to try to match their crazy.  Conveniently for me, that same period was the dawn of the Occupy movement – which spoke to my heart – and gave me a place to go with my rage.

“You aren’t a real nun, are you?” asked Italia, over a year and a half ago, when he and his partner, Chico, were interviewing for the job as the Sisters’ growers.  “I’m real enough,” I replied, pushing my glasses down onto my nose and looking up at him over the rim (as a real nun would do).  “I am just not a traditional nun.” I explained.

“Look,” I said, pushing my glasses back into position.  “I don’t really have any interest in explaining this to both of you, but if we can’t get to grow-talk without it, I will spell it out.  Are you both Catholic?”  I asked and they both nodded (not a hard guess, since Italia’s ancestry is Italian and Chico’s Hispanic, hence, their handles).  “So you must know that the Catholic nun is going extinct?”  This time they shook their heads, ‘no, they didn’t know’. 

So I explained to them that there are sixty thousand nuns left in America, the average age is eighty years old and they die at the rate of ten thousand a year.  They do have new recruits, but the average age of the new recruit is seventy-eight, so it is a zero population growth situation.  Essentially, in less than six years, they will be statistically extinct here in America.

You probably also know that Saint Scholastica, the very first nun ever, was self declared.  She declared herself a nun because her brother, Saint Benedict, founded the first monastery and there was no room at the inn for the divine feminine.  She did her own thing.  And that’s all I’m doing. 

“You’re bat-shit crazy.” Said Italia.  

“You . . . you . . . go out like this?” asked Chico, pointing to a picture of me in my office in full black and white habit, holding the sign that says “Respect Existence or Expect Resistance”.   Without waiting for me to answer, he said, “You shouldn’t be putting yourself out there like that if you are going to be a cannabis growing nun.”  Early warnings that he was the worrier of the two.

“Are you celibate?” asked Italia.

Instead of answering his question directly, I continued my story. "Technically, nuns live a cloistered and prayerful life, so we are really Sisters.  Sisters are in service to the people and through our medicine – and our activism for exoneration of the medicine – we are too." 

I continued, "We dedicate our lives to service, that’s one," I said, ticking off my fingers.  "The Sisters generally live together and pray together and in this case, the other sisters live in this town and we put prayer into our medicine making, so that’s close enough until we get a farm.  Nuns, or Sisters, are generally celibate and we are celibate during medicine-making moon cycles, so that’s three.  Vow of poverty.  That’s number four.  Look around, we’ve all been put there anyway by free trade and five million manufacturing jobs going out of the country the last twenty years . . . so, check.  I summarized:  (1) In service to the poor, (2) living a humble existence, (3) cloistered (sometimes) (4) celibate (sometimes) and dressing the same.  Yep, we meet all the requirements and that’s my sisterhood.  Now, can we talk about growing?  Because without cannabis, we can’t launch our business and without the business, we can’t grow the Sisterhood."

“Other women are not going to be crazy enough to put on the habit . . . “ Italia started to say, but I interrupted him.  

“Hah!  You’re wrong!” I said, pointing back, once again, to the economy. “People today wear full parrot costumes in one hundred and five degree temperatures, waving a sign, for take home pay of about eight dollars an hour.  The young girls will gladly wear the uniform for honorable work that pays fifteen dollars an hour.  Because I want young nuns to join us, I have surveyed girls from eighteen to twenty-four at a number of college campuses, and I’ve done my research, and I’m telling you . . . if I build it, they will come.”

“You’re going to have a band of paid nuns?” asked Chico, skeptically.

“Why not?” I asked.  “Saint Scholastica grew her order by giving food and shelter and medicine to all the women who came to her, the Catholic church only gets priests and nuns from abject poverty countries any more, so my version of ‘feeding and clothing’ is a fifteen dollar minimum wage job that provides at least thirty hours a week of solid, dependable employment.”

“Someone’s gonna shoot you.” Said Chico.  And it made me smile.  I’ve heard it before.

“Religions have been messing with women for thousands of years.  All of the women-empowered spiritual movements were stamped on by men.  All of the male-dominant, male-run religions won and the divine feminine lost (in the race of air space) and I think it’s because men are meaner than women.  So tell me, why should we trust you to grow us proper medicine?”

There was a pause in the air, as the thoughts of the men before me caught up with my words.  Then, Italia said “You don’t know it, but you are looking at the very best grower in the valley.”  As he said this, he unwrapped some Strawberry Diesel Coffin Cut and set the bud before me.  I picked it up, inspected it, smelled it, and put it down.  It didn’t mean anything.  That bud could have come from anywhere.

“Outdoor or indoor?” I asked.  “That’s from last year’s fall outdoor harvest.” Italia explained, while Chico just watched me. 

“Seriously, Kate,” said Italia, the man I had known for years.  “Chico, here, has been growing for thirty years.  He gets the highest grade product and the most output per plant.  And his kolas are huge!”

“Yes, yes, yes, I’ve heard this all before.  All the growers in the central valley think they are the best.  All think they have the biggest kahonas, I mean, kolas.  Words are cheap guys, and pardon me for not believing you.”  I let that hang in the air a second and then continued talking, peppering them with questions.  Have you had this tested before?  Do you know the average THC percentage for your crops?  Do you do indoor, as well?  Do you grow organic?  Do you specialize in strains?  Do you grow from seed or from clone?

A half hour later, we were back to talking about big kolas.  Huge kolas.  They made me look at pictures on their smart phones.  They were expecting me to ‘ooooh’ and ‘aaaaah’, but I didn’t.  It’s a sad fact of reality that since coming to the Central Valley of California, I no longer believe anything anyone tells me. 

“Let’s do this, anyway,” I proclaimed, after hearing all I needed to hear.  “Because I know of no other way to see if you are full of shit or not . . . You grow one season for me and prove to me that you’re as capable as you say, and then we will talk about a longer term deal.”

The conversation took place in March of last year.  By October, the Sisters harvested their best crop ever.  The buds were beautiful, the Sister’s portion of the harvest was enough to seed the launch of the product line, the bud and leaf tested out all organic, and the potency of the bud ranked over 22% THC -- near the top of any bud potency scale.  And you know what all that meant?  It meant I had to start being nice to my growers.  It turns out, they weren’t exaggerating about the quality -- nor the size -- of their kolas.

The Holy Trinity of the Clitorii

Once I wrote a sex tip book for men.  Yes, it was the height of the custody battle and divorce, Xaviera Hollander (most famous as ‘the Happy Hooker’) called me from the Netherlands, and I needed money. 

I remember, vividly, the first conversation where she learned about what was happening state-side . . .‘he’s fighting me for custody, he wants full custody!’ I lamented to her from a bar-stool near the Milwaukee airport.  

I had just arrived and my mother and I were sipping Bloody Mary’s when the cell call came in from Xie.  I will never forget her reply to my lament . . . so authentically spoken like someone who never had children . . . so quick her retort.  In her crisp British accent, without a split second of hesitation, she said, “Well, give him one dah-ah-ahling, afterall, you have three.”   After I recovered from laughing, I explained how he had seized all funds, all assets, and was trying to starve me into his victory corner.

A few months later, she called with two representatives of two publishing houses that worked together, something like one having recently acquired the other.  Truthfully, I wasn’t paying that much attention when she made the introductions.  By this time, I had escaped Kentucky and was sinking financially in Atlanta. 

“You know, dahhhhling, how you helped me organize the best of the best from my thirty-two years of writing the Call Me Madame column for Penthouse?” 

“Yes.” I said, reluctantly.

“Well these good folks are prepared to pay us an advance for putting them into a sex tip book for men, and I want you to write it.”

I needed money.  There was no offer from the universe I wouldn’t entertain.

“What do you want to call it?” I asked.

“One thousand nine hundred ninety-nine mind-blowing sex tips for women!” she exclaimed.

I choked or made some similar disgruntled noise.  “Xaviera, I’m sorry, there just aren’t one thousand nine hundred ninety-nine mind-blowing sex tips for men in all of history, in this universe, and in any nearby universes.  There just aren’t.”  I informed her and those listening.

“Of course there are, dahhhling.” She said.  “I wrote that darn column for thirty two years, there must be . . . “

“Look,” I interrupted her.  “I tell you what.  How many folks on this call with me?  Three?  Ok, if each of you can name one mind-blowing sex tip for men, right now, right here, then I will concede that there may be one thousand nine-hundred ninety nine in the universe.  Go.” 

My gauntlet was met with silence, followed by a heavy sigh from Xaviera.  “Ok dahling,” she said.  “What do you suggest?”

“What I suggest is that you definitely don’t put one thousand anything on the title, because most men don’t buy books that are big . . . most men would look at the title and walk away.  It has to be short . . . they like the number sixty-nine so maybe that one, each chapter just a few pages, and some pictures, maybe retro sketching of couples . . . the women are going to buy it for the men, is my guess, since they buy most of the books on this planet and only if you do this right.”

“Ok then!” she agreed and the rest of the call was hammering out terms.  I put that book together in six weeks.  It’s based on the holy trinity of the clitorii.  That women have three of them.  A brain clit, a heart clit, and a body clit.  And that for the man to get to the body clit, he has to make the heart clit feel safe (loved) and the brain clit feel unsafe (challenged, prodded, teased sometimes, the right times).

The only reason I am sharing is because the extra books are now in my living-room . . . yesterday, I filled a large order of white sage bundles for the east coast, and the only box that fit was the box that formerly held my books.  That led to questions . . . questions led to the story. 

“Did you ever make any money from the books?” the buyer asked. 

“Not really.  I got paid an advance for writing it, I then spent fully half of that on copies for three dollars each, which I could re-sell for ten dollars each, as Xaviera does, if I wanted to be in the business of selling sex tip books, which I don’t . . . I’d rather forget about them . . .  but it was a learning lesson.  I learned how corrupt the American publishing industry is . . . how exploitative.  And it made me research self-publishing -- for when I get around to publishing something substantial.”

I gave the buyer a copy, just for listening to my story.

One of the saddest things about the Catholic religion, Rome, the Papacy, is how they systematically equated female sexuality with a sort of demonized behavior.  Therefore, even today, sixteen hundred years after the invention of the Bible, people can’t get their heads around women being sacred, being spiritual, and being sexual.  In ancient times, it wasn’t like that . . . women exercising their thigh freedom, especially medicine women, healers, spiritual leaders, didn’t cancel out or contradict their ability to walk the sacred path.  In fact, exercising thigh freedom itself was probably part and parcel of their spirituality, an honorable event, with a climax that re-affirms the woman’s connection to Mother Earth and the heavens above. 

“Meet me under the passionate skies, with hope in your pockets and love in your eyes.”  Romance is the frosting on the cake of life.  Denying sexuality for men or women, in my opinion, is nuts.

Even though I prefer to forget that chapter in my life, I do think the book can be medicine for American men, who rank poorly as lovers on the international comparison scale.  (I didn’t make that up . . . surveys say . . . ) My advice in a nutshell: Three clits, guys, and you can’t ignore any of them.  And if I were to write a book for women, it would be to tell them ‘you can be holy and you can be sexual.  They aren’t mutually exclusive’.

Central Valley Cannabis Operations

My Name is Sister Kate.  I am an accidental nun, and that story will be told in time.  I have been directed by my own higher powers to begin writing, regularly, about the adventure I am on.  I have been told to reveal the story as it unfolds, because, it is in the better good of the people to know what’s happening, as it happens . . . and because, it is for the better good of the Sisters of the Valley to take people along with us on the ride.  “Your readers will help and inspire you.”  (Desiree, my earth angel)

After harvesting a bountiful cannabis crop last fall, we were in the position to launch our line.  For the first six months of this year, we played.  We made teas and tinctures and medicines and sold them locally, and gave away a lot of product for people to try.  In our play, we figured out what seriously worked for folks and suddenly, we had people requesting our cannabis medicines from far corners of the world.  People were offering amazing testimonials on the healing powers of our products.

We make our medicines by moon cycles and, as best we can figure, in accordance with ancient First Nation rituals.  We sew prayer and healing into each jar and each bottle.  We put the batches up under a new moon and bottle under a full moon.  Women only make the medicines.  It is a solemn ritual.  As new age nuns, these are our periods of celibacy – the medicine-making moon cycles.

We have all our products certified organic and labeled with potency information from SC Labs in Santa Cruz.  Sometimes our product potency does not match up with the testimonials we are getting.  The miracle cure stories, the re-orders, the buzz, is more than what the potency label shows. 

“My potency for CBD looks weak compared to others,” (I complained to the lab technician), “And yet, I am hearing it cures, or contributes greatly to the cure of a great many things.”

 

“It could be working so well because of your combination of CBD, CBN and THC.” Offers the lab technician.

“But your labels!  People are going to think we have weak medicine!” I object.  “Shouldn’t we retest that batch?”

“It is what it is, Sister.”  Says the lab tech patiently.

“Perhaps it is because we do it in a spiritual environment, calling on the lunar energies, Mother Earth, preparing them with focus on healing intent?  Perhaps it is because we tell the patients to apply with healing intent, and they do?  Perhaps it is because we have pulled in energies that you aren’t testing.  When are you going to test for the energies of the environment the medicine was made in?  That would be something!”

“Do you have anything else, Sister?” the lab boy says patiently.

Meanwhile, we sold out of CBD oil within two weeks of opening the ETSY store.  This is a grand experiment, after all, and the public is embracing the medicine. 

In April and May, I began contacting dispensaries and 420 delivery services, by going to weedmaps, beginning in our home town, and working my way outward fifty miles in all directions, I contacted cannabis suppliers.  They were very slow to respond, but by July 1^st, around the same time I opened the ETSY store, I had three of them regularly buying products from us.  Just two days ago, I did the numbers for July and between the on-line store and the local cannabis suppliers, we are doing over a hundred a day in sales (humble, but auspicious beginnings).

When it comes to the many facets of this business diamond, it seems my dual Gemini nature reflects in all.  Marketing has two prongs:  dispensaries and direct sales via the internet.  Marketing has more prongs within those prongs (somewhere), which are wholesale and retail, agent force and direct marketing.  Our product line has two prongs:  Regulated and de-regulated (must be sold through dispensaries or can be sold to public). 

The big challenge right now is in securing a CBD crop.  We have two mini-farms going with all CBD crop but that won’t be ready until November.  On Wednesday night, under the new moon, under what we, the Sisters, call the mid-Summer moon, we put up our last batch of CBD oil (see photos) until harvest -- unless we can shake some high CBD leaf loose from the universe.  Just yesterday, I put out the distress call to the Native’s.  They might be able to help.   But that’s the joy of being in a newly deregulating business.  You never really know from whence the great challenges come.  Here in the central valley, it is hard to convince growers to grow the high CBD, low THC strains.  None of them believe there is a market. 

I am not allowed to write about growing; I have been forbidden to write on grow operations, which makes me crazy, because that is wild, wild, west shit and catnip for my cat-soul.   Maybe I’ll write about it, just a little.  Stay with me . . .

Sister Kate