A Bit More Mindfulness

     Ever noticed when you've been made aware of something new, how that something seems to turn up everywhere? (Like buying a blue car thinking the color is rare, only to spot that same color everywhere you turn.)
     No doubt our minds have "selective retention" ...It's the stuff ear-worms are made of (you know...those tunes you can't get out of your head) ...But I dare say it is also the stuff of synchronicity.
     Recently I was introduced to the concept of "Permaculture" ...A notion of working with nature as we plan our landscapes, our gardens, our eco-systems, not forcing moves against it. By more gently working with her, not against, Mother Nature becomes our ally; we are able to accomplish more with less, by observing first, acting second. (Or as it was explained to me when I immediately wanted to know "What can I start planting to stop my soil erosion?" I was told the goal is 10 hours of observing to every one hour of muscle. (A concept I like more and more as I age...Sounds like wisdom to me.)
     To that end, I was moved (not only by the fact that this clip opens with a wolf that looks very much like my beloved Pyrs, and my Siberian husky, Darby from years past) by recent happenings out in Yellowstone. Thanks to one simple act of re-introducing wolves to their eco-structure, the total environment has changed and in relatively short order.  Rather than elaborate or commentate, I'll let the footage speak for itself. (There is a full length documentary on YouTube for those who care to know more.)  Until then, just ponder the possibilities...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysa5OBhXz-Q

Permaculture: My New Word of the Day

            It’s a word I was starting to hear a lot. Like thermodynamics or some other equally lengthy, science-sounding word, it didn’t really resonate until someone painted me a picture.

            “Imagine you’re standing on a rock, looking out over a rocky plain with a bag of grass seed by your side. You spread seed in all directions and leave it to do its thing. Several months later you return to see where the grass came up, where the rains moved the dirt around; you decided to add a little dirt of your own to help it out. In the deeper pockets, you add a tree here, some perennials there. You spot the perfect place for crops that need sun; note how the water flows when rains hit. Somewhere along the way you might even position a cabin, working around the soil and creating a sustainable environment of self-perpetuating plants and green things.”

            (The picture is being painted for me to grasp a working plan for permaculture only I don’t know it yet.) The story continues:

            “Imagine this, you parents idea; you grew up here; you play here as a kid. Then you move away. Start your own family. Your parents die. It’s 25 years later and you come back to this spot and what do you find?

            (No brainer, I’m thinking: “Weeds!”)

            “No.” (I am corrected.) “You'd have a forest. If you had grown a linear garden you’d have weeds; if you’d grown a perpetual garden, you’d have a permaculture design.” 

            A term coined by a couple of Australians in the late 70s, with roots dating back to Egyptian times, permaculture is a system of sustainable architecture and self-maintaining habitats that work with nature rather than against it. According to Bill Mollison permaculture engages a philosophy of “… protracted and thoughtful observation rather than protracted and thoughtless labor, and of looking at plants and animals in all their functions, rather than treating any area as a single product system.”

In other words, we let our land tell us where things will best grow, rather than overhauling our yards to make it work the way we insist…(Cause usually nature’s going to win out anyway.) It’s not that we don’t put a shovel to it; we just put thought to things before we pull the shovels out.

            Think of nature as art.

            Think catching and storing renewable resources (rain, goat poop, hillsides washing away get repurposed and put to good use)

            Think permanent cultures.

            Think leaving the planet better than you found it.

            It’s a concept worth thinking about…One I’m going to test myself next go round (that would be early spring). For now, it’s time to learn more about the concept. (Stay tuned.)

Asparagus (for those who didn't know)

    ....Looks like THIS...if you let it grow....

In other words, if you don't eat it as a plant (even one that is very, very good for you)

You can breathe its O2 coming from a bush...a shrub....a tree of a plant...

(In other words...it lives to sustain us one way or another...)

My latest fixation: Permaculture.

(Look into it.)

A Matter of Community

     As my third year's garden comes to a close (only sweet potatoes and one pumpkin high in the weeds, remain...curious the color of these crops to the theme of the season is it not? And all this time I thought Cracker Barrel invented October color themes.) I find myself pausing to reflect once again on all I've learned, and all I'm still learning. I'm pause to weigh what to retain, what to chalk up to experience...And while there is much to process, one theme stands clear: Gardens are not a one person sport, instead, to grow one properly it takes a family if not a village.
     For this reason, and for the next chapter of my life, I am committed to studying those who've discovered just that (i.e. the value of gardens to community and communities to gardens) for it is my fervent belief that the future of our planet will derive from some working formula thereof.
     Visit the moors and villages of Northern England and you see this in play everyday...folks coming together, working common plots, in the school yards and church yards of their villages...In those hours their working jobs will allow, their gardens lay side by side in common plots. In addition to looking quite charming, it's really very resourceful and I've no doubt, very healing.
     But you don't have to jump across the pond to see this sort of thing. Our own country is catching the wave. Many in our own country have been doing this for years, (folks like Steve and Ina Mae Gaskin's "Farm" come to mind; I also think of family I hold dear that lived years of their young married life in a community south of Chicago called "Stelle")
     Lifestyles committed to sustainable living, renewable resources, revering the planet are to me,  lifestyles worth studying, and to those who might scoff at my green, tree-hugging bias, may I simply say that having studied many types of people over the years, with lifestyles ranging from the political high and mighty to the rich and famous to the starving artist, my gardening heroes, these people of the soil exemplify to me, a good and decent, honorable way to live. They are comfortable in their own skin. Their insides match their outsides. They are (as the scripture describes) salt of the earth.
     For that reason (starting now, as my own garden loosens her tethers on me) I begin the next chapter of my journey, which is to study those who've been doing it already...I want to know what they've learned...glean what they've gleaned. To capture (as I have been blessed to study and capture from my own farming mentor, Thurman) those lessons that were years if not lifetimes in the making by others alongside them, living in community centered around the sacred theme of garden. To me it feels a good and worthy investment of my time, for some day I would like to provide others the same if it means they would consider for their own lives such notions as permaculture and all things life supporting.
     More and more each day, these are the people and ideas that capture my fascination, but transcending all this, to be perfectly honest, the real fruit of this labor is that of discovering a peaceful, more gentle way of living.

"I Want to Live in A Commune"

     It was a funny line that came out of nowhere. How did she know I'd been pondering this very same notion for a few weeks now...I wasn't toting my book.
     I was waiting for my routine check up when the nurse practitioner came in asking, "What? No veggies today?" Lately I've become the Pied Piper of Veggies having discovered it's just easier to give things away than to try to can or freeze everything. Thurman taught year one of my garden "It just makes for good neighbors," what's more, it makes me feel nostalgic...like in your grandpa's day when folks paid their doctor with a pig or something. (Veggies are much neater.)
     We struck up a conversation about food of all things. Maybe it's my age. Maybe it's too many stories of something tainted. In both our cases we confessed to feeling guilt with each drive-through run, but sometimes at the end of a long day you just want to fill up your belly and collapse. I know the feeling all too well...Only when you're tripping over fresh veggies everywhere you turn, you do have a built in reminder to deter you.
     But then she said the funniest thing. This educated nurse practitioner who is mindful she shouldn't but sometimes goes for junk food anyway when she's too, too exhausted (and looking at her office that day I sensed this might be one of those evenings) ...she said (and I quote) "I want to live in a commune."
     Despite the book title I'm showing atop this blog, I had not carried that one with me, however it's on my bedside table and has become a Bible of a read as I ponder just how that might work...after all, when you make the choice to focus on careers and not kids (well, not the two-legged kind anyway), there will come a point where you ponder your future...It doesn't take a rocket scientist to point out that if  I want to continue living the life I'm living (and I do) where farming is a key part, and funny lifeforms grace my daily routine (which I like) then you better come up with a plan, Evins, cause someday you'll be the little old lady in need of assistance. Heck, I could use help now (says the girl dreading the morning's task of lifting 3 (50 pound) bags of goat chow out of her Jeep!)
     Co-communities...Intentional Housing...Co-housing...There are many words for the concept. It originated in Denmark (leave it to those Danes) and it's fairly common in Europe, and now, it's even starting to show up stateside~
     I have some cousins who lived in such a community. (And to be clear, I'm not talking The Farm, though having interviewed Steve Gaskin and his lovely wife, Ina Mae, on several occasions I have to say I always admired their commitment to the concept.) In my cousins' case, it was a village outside of Chicago called Stelle. People from all walks of life joined together to share in common beliefs and common chores benefitting both from the safe haven of community, but also from the economies of scale. They shared a big garden and canned their own food; they watched out for each others kids making it one of the safest neighborhoods around. They were green before green was cool, harnessing solar so as to create their own electric grid and telephone co-op. They had their own natural water supply and treatment set-up. They focused on permaculture and sustainable living and to this day this little village of 100 or so people thrives beautifully depending not on the government, but on each other.
     I'm only starting to study the concept, but I gotta say, I'm finding it fascinating. As I think through all the chores I do on any given day, that my next door neighbors and their next door neighbors do--just like I do~ Well, it does occur to me there might just be another way of going about  things if we put our heads together.
     On top of this, people my age don't expect Social Security to be in existence by the time we could cash out. One glance at the evening news tells you our economy is propped on smoke and mirrors. You don't have to be a "Doomsday Prepper" to know we've got to sustain ourselves somehow and I for one like thinking ahead before someone else does my thinking for me. The closer we grow things to home, the better for everything involved (the better the food, the better the pricing, the better for our own bodies). Right now as I look around at friends who are as busy as I am, some facing bankruptcy, some facing job uncertainties, friends wanting to downscale and simplify, I'm wondering who you gonna count on?  Your church? Your government? Or those who know you best and love you most...More and more I'm thinking "It takes a village."