SEASONAL SOLACE
Life's harvest-----?
Now's the time of year (mid September) thoughts turn naturally to preparations for winter, time to get to 'battening down the hatches' before winter strikes. The last few weeks, though, here on the organic eco micro-holding (small smallholding) in the UK north midlands, summer's eventually arrived after a wet and pretty miserable few summer months, with a few weeks of warmer and sunnier weather, and still with some of the same for the forecast. Nice though such better conditions have been, nevertheless anticipation of the winter season to come is still the theme. Each season seems to have its own particular characteristics and pleasures to look forward to, the anticipation of which surely forms part of life's harvest of pleasures and satisfactions, particularly maybe living rurally in the countryside - perhaps living in towns and cities renders seasonal aspects a bit less prominent - ?
'Freerange fightback----?'
Current seasonal tasks still have to be carried out, of course, of which picking runner beans, digging spuds, hoeing leeks and greens and gathering fruit have been prominent, along with mowing grass - has there ever been a season when mowing has been so relentless - ? Wettest year for exactly 100 years hereabouts, apparently according to the statiticians. The runner beans have been bountiful this year, as against last year when they were a bit 'hit and miss'. Best picked young - about 8 - 10 ins long and lean. No problem if a few are missed and go past it - they're then left to mature and picked later to provide bean seed for next year. Quite an amazing crop really - so much bounty from so little ground (they grow up sticks) - have to keep them well watered though. Normally they're available, planted in two separate lots, for 3-4 months - the record here is a week short of five months. Tasty if not over cooked, and store well for a few days in a fridge, wrapped in plastic. Another seasonal job has been to de-caterpillar the winter green plants, which if not done results in no winter greens. As it is they get quite a 'hit', but then recover ok, and, trying to work with nature, a few plants are 'sacrificed' to the little wee beasties. The black and yellow variety are apparently the offspring of the large white butterfly, whilst the harder-to-find all green ones are that of the smaller white.
Spud (potato) digging has been on-going since June to provide for the table, but now the rest of them need to be dug up, dried off in the sun and then stored in paper sacks. It's been a really wet blighty season, and for once blight resistant varieties were selected, which do seem to have staved off the blight attack for awhile and left a worthwhile crop behind (might have been useful to record the varieties). Digging them is a satisfyingly productively profitable exercise, combining four processe in one: harvesting the tubers, gathering the weed covering for compost material, cleaning the ground in the process and digging it for the next crop.
The wood to burn this next winter has though been under cover for a few months now, so is looking pretty dry: the bulk of it is bought and virtually ready for burning on the wood stove, which was 'chimney cleaned' a few weeks ago in preparation for use, and the small sawbench is due to come back from loaned-out summer use any day now, so come October the weekly satisfying job of sawing wood with it and the electric chainsaw, courtesy of solar power, will resume. The solar power installation very nearly halved mainstream electric use over its first year's use, which together with moving to a more consumer-friendly electric supplier has now also nearly halved monthly electric payments, which is ahead of expectations. Goodo - all helps in the 'freerange fightback'. One of this winter's pleasant activities will probably be having a look for an electric vehicle, probably a bike, although there's now a sort of electric buggy available, which could look interesting. Electric cars still look pretty pricey, and then it's about a further £80 per month to lease the batteries.
'Vive la differance----?'
Late autumn and early winter will see the start of another satisfying phase - lopping spars off, trimming hedges and generally tidying and cleaning the place up, again giving a good, productive feeling. The four seasons, with their differing activities each with their relevant anticipations, seem to give a sound basis to that old adage 'variety is the spice of life', with other seasonal change effects amplifying the 'variety' effect. Driving the 'sportier' car here, for instance, just for the summer, reverting to the small saloon for the winter, seems to work in this respect, especially as the summer vehicle hasn't built-in entertainment facilities, so music listening then becomes a seasonal winter delight. The Welsh coast caravan is not available for winter use, so is something to look forward to for the summer, and , of course, the 'piece de resistance', the cosy woodstove fire is something to look forward to for the winter, as is gathering and bringing in the fuel. Not long now till it's afire - about mid October, given a normal season. 'Vive la differance' can apply in several directions, then - ?
'Dare to Care----'
The above was the interesting title of a book which surfaced recently, with the theme that the 'out-for-self' modern cultures were over self orientated to the detriment of community values, and therefore one-sided and lop-sided. Such an analysis seems to tie in with some modern problem analyses- new top bankers are now reportedly calling for an end to the 'bonus culture' tied to individuals (a Swedish bank with 'old fashioned' banking values and practices is also apparently making inroads in the UK) - and also with the findings of psychologists such as Abraham Maslow, stating that human needs 'naturally' included social needs. Given, though, the heavy accent and focus on business and entrepreneurialsm, it can appear that the word 'social' has even become 'the dirty word' - ? And yet, plainly, people live in societies - ?
One of the latest demands from the business world, that of gaining the right to be able to sack people at will and without cause, has apparently been rebuffed by the Lib Dems in the UK, but not on the grounds of humanitarian social justice, but rather on the economic grounds that such a move would create counterproductive levels of insecurity then impacting on business profits in the form of lower sales. Not too much 'daring to care', then, and the quality of mercy for the poor souls to be put into such insecurity not being strained an awful lot - ? Maybe though in such an individually-focused, competitively-hyped culture, fellow feeling and compassion are seen as weaknesses ? Could the other view, though, be the 'dare to care' approach, in that that risks going 'bigger' beyond the self, and a 'reaching out' to others (i.e. fellow humans) - ?
'Grail non-hunting----?'
Questing, enquiry, 'life exploration' - all seem to be very much out of fashion in this materialistic age, in which there seems to be a sort of 'mass acceptance' of money, and more money, being the answer to everything. One pundit on mainstream TV recently seemed to be suggesting, for instance, that bankers hadn't caused problems, it was rather the cause of a 'global financial crisis', although she didn't mention why there was such a financial crisis. In a money economy, money surely is of some importance and significance - but, the answer to everything? Crikey, wouldn't that create a somewhat simpilstic and one-dimensional world - ? Half of Maslow's 'human needs' hierarchy' would be rendered redundant, and wouldn't that be the 'higher need' half - ? Has a sort of 'money mania' narrowed the vista, maybe even leading to a 'wrong road' - ? ( German saying 'running is of no use if on the wrong road') And maybe this is what the 'new' bankers are now referring to, when asserting that the root of the problem has been the 'big bucks bonus culture' - ? Maybe a case of back to the old saying: 'money is a good servant, but a bad master' - ?
If avid money seeking does limit the range, then freerangers interested in 'life questing' are presumably not then going to be 'mainstream', and in fact may have to find 'byeways and backwaters' in which to better 'survive and thrive' - ? Talking of which, back to the eco micro-holding here. One self-sustaining crop that has done well in spite of the inclement growing season, is the onion crop, although other onion growers in the vicinity have not been so lucky. The onions have been picked and been on trays drying under clear plastic for a week or two. They're about to come into the couple of glass houses on trays for a week or two to get fully dry, at which point the trays will get moved into the utility/store room, probably three of them (old bread trays) stacked up and then supplying onions for the year.
All adds to that feeling of self-reliant and independent 'surviving and thriving', a bit like Ken Dodd's drum again - 'you canna beat it'.
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