'DEPLETED DAVIDS-----?'
'M and R time-----'
Time to do some 'M and R' ( maintenance and renovation) here on the organic eco micro-holding (small smallholding) in the UK midlands, both of which can be satifying activities – the one involving tidying things up, making the place 'shipshape', the other making things good again, always giving a satisfying feeling. Hedging is quite a big part of the 'shipshaping' operations, which if taken steadily and in installments, can be a pleasant task. Fruit collecting too – the new trees in the fairly new mini-orchard didn't really crop a lot this year like a lot of fruit trees hereabouts, but the old apple tree overhanging the veg growing area yielded like never before – at one stage it looked like an apple carpet on the veg growing ground. A few were saved for eating – this old variety doesn't store – and a couple of demi-johns of wine are being made with some ot them, advertising the rest of them on the local socialclub noticeboard free for winemaking etc. No takers, though, so onto the compost heap with them. At least not wasted, and maybe next year some cider flavoured compost - ?
Taking the runner bean plants down and onto the compost heap, saving the seed on them and then storing the canes and sticks used to support them undercover, has been another job, as has digging potatoes, and clearing weeds off ground and onto the now 5ft high current year's compost heap, by shaving them off with the edge of a spade. Generally, and as was the case this afternoon, the spent runner bean plants are the last 'garden waste' to go onto the heap before it's capped with a couple of inches or so of soil – time to start a new pile. The other pile from last year, now 'made' and settled down to around three feet high, will get applied in two layers to half the veg patch in Feb, along with a layer of woodash, which is then the total application in a two year spell, and seems to give quite reasonable yields, along with help from stored soil nitrogen from the sizeable beans and pea patch, all adding up to what's called a 'permaculture' system - i.e. one that's self-sufficient in terms of supplying on-going soil nutrients.
'Longer-term benefits----'
Over the now thirty years or so of this type of regime, pests and diseases which used to be a problem, no longer are, fingers and everything else crossed. No more white onion rot, nor cabbage root fly and maybe most telling of all, no more club root (soil-based fungal disease impeding brassica plant growth) – maybe the bi-yearly woodash application has had something to do with that - a long long-term benefit? The woodash also apparently keeps the soil from turning acid, as it's alkali. To reap some benefits, there's a need to 'be in it for the long haul', then - ?
'Mr. Robin'
In terms of renovation, no house painting thankfully this year, rather one pleasant little job has been restoring two of the bird feeder tables, one completely with new wood, the other adding new wood to the existing structure, all the wood being found within the various piles around stored over the years. It's really noticeable in poor weather that the feeders get heavier use, and along with keeping plenty of bird cover on the place, hopefully it all helps the job of keeping up a healthy bird population- quite a gang of sparrows around at the moment, for instance. Robins also seem to be plentiful- one came and had a chat just about two foot away by a hedgerow only this afternoon. Maybe they can suss out those who are 'bird and nature friendly'---? A small flock of about 15-20 doves has taken up residence in the higher vegetation between the veg patch and the small paddock -didn't really know they were flock birds, always seemed to have seen them in ones and two's before---?
Apparently, turtle doves are getting scarce, whereas collared doves, only in the UK since 1950's, are proliferating, so probably, they're collared doves here.
'Sharks ahoy----?'
The organic micro eco-holding here in the UK midlands is by its very nature hardly significant in any wider scheme of things, yet pretty significant at the individual level. It's hard, though, maybe to escape the feeling these days that size is what matters and that it pays to be a larger predator now that the free-market seems to have become more of a 'free-for-all' market. The virtually power-less individual may struggle in such conditions, so could individual freeworld rights be under threat-? Just recently here in the UK, for instance the democratic (?) government appears to have an agenda to lower individual human rights, recently reported proposing, for instance, to offer employees financial rewards to forfeit hard-won employee rights. The banks appear to be having to make even larger provisions to compensate people for the mis-selling of insurance products in their aggressive drive for profits, a possible sign that the pursuit of money had/has taken too strong a hold in a 'Goliath'-type business culture world, by default then resulting in a 'human respect' deficiency in business dealings , a base cause then of individual rights threat - ?
'Internal, individual motivation --ok? (eg. for longer-term, sustainable results)
'Stopping and thinking' about it, wouldn't a good type of society, possibly even the best one (and even though things 'social' can now almost seem to be 'infra dig', aren't though societies an actual reality, with people having to make individual contributions to central funds via taxes -?) , be one in which individuals thrived, with good satisfaction of their multi-various needs and good individual potential development possibilities, they then responding by being 'naturally' internally motivated to contribute strongly in return - ? Such conditions, and in spite of naysayers, would appear to have been achieved plenty of times in practice within individual firms , managed by people willing to trust and value other people, and to some extent to share power and rewards.
'End of the means----?'
The individual is though, in the short-term, faced with conditions as they are, and can, of course, do what they can to 'survive and thrive', surely a 'natural' reaction - ? It would likely be the 'freerange' type of independent response, and could take presumably several/many forms. One route, for instance, could be to eschew the modern trend of 'chasing the dollar' and follow the 'heart and vocation' route, as many individuals undoubtedly do. This mightn't necessarily imply that financial and business planning, in the case of, for instance, setting up a lifestyle enterprise, is ignored – it could well be necessary for a successful enterprise – but rather that money has a different place and role – it is seen as the 'means' rather than the 'end'.
A case-study from one of the 'freerange' e-books might illustrate:
N had a highly-paid city job and all the trimmings -the luxury pad, the flash car, the glamour girlfriend – you name it, he had it. At the end of one successful week though, he said, he began to be pestered by 'a little internal voice', which was saying 'is this it? Shouldn't there be more to it ?' He tried to ignore it, but it was insistent, and he realised himself then that to some extent, the voice was right, he'd been in a sort of 'success-city' bubble, convincing himself this was it, and yet, onnaccountably, the bubble had burst a bit. It led him to then think 'if this isn't it, what is it?', and he realised he didn't know. And yet by now it had aroused his interest and he felt driven to enquire further into it. The more he did, the more it seemed a conundrum, and the less satisfied with his current lot he became.
In the end, he took drastic action, and chucked in his job, shortly to be followed by the voluntary exit of his girlfriend. He felt, he said, somewhat bereft, but also a sense of relief and a small sense of 'freedom'. Money was not a problem, he had quite a bit of that, and he decided to go on a bit of an odyssey, visiting places that he felt he'd had some connection with in the past. It took some time, quite a few months, but in the end he felt settled with his new lifestyle. He'd sold the expensive town pad and bought a smallholding in quiet countryside in a peaceful, scenic part of the UK he'd always liked. He was running the holding purposefully, having gone on one or two relevant practical courses, and enjoying the 'hands-on' practicalities, and was now also involved in part-time lecturing, which he was finding quite fulfilling.
Two other lifestyle changes had surprised him in how much he related to them and enjoyed them. One was his involvement in and enjoyment of the local community, the other was that he was now in a meaningful relationship with the mother of two young children, who's company he'd taken to. He said he had to pinch himself now and again to come to terms with all the changes in his life – he now drove a pick-up instead of the limo, for instance – but whenever he asked himself the acid-test question of whether he'd be happy to return to his former life, the answer was always a clear 'no way'.
Maybe he was getting too much 'freeranger'-type enjoyment in his new, diverse life - ??
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