To Quiet The Chatter In My Head

I know in other blogs I have told you why I strive to live a simple sustainable life.  One is to honor my ancestors.  Another is because I truly believe it is the right way to live, for ourselves and for the earth. But there is another reason....a big reason. 
The smell of rich soil or strawberry jam cooking, the colors of the flowers and real food,  the sound of birds singing and jars pinging, the feel of the gentle breeze and bare feet on a bed of thyme ....these are the things that stop the chatter. The chatter of  the world around me and the chatter in my own head.  For when I am living that simple sustainable life, it all stops, that crazy noisy, whirling out of control, that chatter that keeps me awake at night, that chatter that makes me afraid and angry at the same time.  The world suddenly becomes solid and real to me.  It is becomes my sanctuary.  To need so much...to have so much...to no longer see the world around me....that is when the chatter ...the thousand fragmented thoughts whirl around in my head like a tornado....until they hit that nerve that says you are not good enough, you are not smart enough, no one loves you, you have no friends, and blah and blah an blah.  You all know those thoughts.  Those little thoughts we picked up along the way.  But when I sit and dig in the earth...when I watch a lady bug trying to maneuver it's way out of a little hole ...when I watch the humming birds come and splash in the fountain and notice how beautiful their colors are...when I connect with who I am..when I connect with the earth...that chatter both of an angry and afraid world and mind...they not longer exist.  When I rely on myself to grow and can my own food.  When I create things for my home with my own hands, and don't just go out and buy "stuff"..that is when I am at peace.  So it is the right thing for me.  I have to balance that with the world I live in, and sometimes that is not easy.  I won't give up tho...because when you find the quiet and the peace and  the feeling that what you are doing is right with everything in your heart, you just don't give up the fight.

I guess this blog was brought on by reflections for a new year, my private writings regarding those reflections, but I also think it was something I needed to share.  That all of us who live the green, the sustainable, the simple, the prepper, the suburban farmer, the urban, the just plain farmer   etc. etc. etc.....whatever you want to call us...we all have different reasons "why"  but at the same time similar reasons .To make some sense of the world we live in ...to have some control in our choices.... to save the earth...whatever the reasons..they are all valid.

Sustainable Living ..Can Anyone Do It?

I work very hard to live a sustainable life and to leave as little damage to the environment as possible, and I do so because it's what I think is the right thing to do.  I live in a warm loving home, I have stock piled food and I never go hungry.  It seems like such an easy life, but I am very aware that in a blink of an eye it can all be gone. Would I bounce back if that happened, probably but that is because I am the kind of person that if you give me a lemon...I won't just make lemonade...I will grind it up and spit it out.  That is my makeup, my disposition..I was both born with it and learned it thru life's circumstances.  I know what it is like to go hungry, to have people in stores ignore you because you clothes are ragged, I have stood in free cheese lines, accepted free food boxes, lived off of powered eggs and canned meat in some kind of slime, I have felt the wrath of people behind me in a grocery store when I used food stamps, and have seen the heart breaking look on my kids faces because they could not have what other kids had.  I have been there so I write this from both sides of the fence.  I am not writing this  to put anyone down because I am a firm believer that most of us do the best we can with what we were given.  For everyone is affected by circumstances in a different way, everyone feels pain in a different way, everyone reacts in the only way they know how. I am certainly not putting anyone down for having the means to live sustainably.  But my point is that we do have the "means" to live that way regardless how we got there....we have the privilege of having a home, a little (or a lot) of land to grow our own food.  And this is what has been on my mind lately, that I have been graced with a disposition that bounces back, with enough money  to live in a home, and wear clothes  that makes people in stores rush to ask if they can help me.  But it is not that way for so many people, and I have started wondering if we few who have the means can help the ones who don't.
I work in a beautiful city, in a beautiful 100+ year old building, but if you step outside the door, a big face full of reality will hit you.  The homeless, the ones who somehow did not find the way to that dreaded, nasty saying pull themselves up by their bootstraps.  People whose bodies are destroyed by drugs and alcohol (in most cases I suspect, their only way to escape), mothers with little children begging for food,  people 20 years younger than me who look 20 years older than me.  How did they get were they are?  Is it their own fault?  Maybe it is but maybe, just maybe its because they just didn't have the means, mentally or financially to pick themselves up.  Maybe they started using to ease the pain and it became a perpetual spiral.  Maybe they just lost their job, lost their home, lost the will to keep trying or have tried to no avail.  These people do not care about the environment, they don't care about GMO, they don't care about pesticides, they just want what we all want, someone to love them, a warm home, and enough to eat.  They smell because they have no place to bathe, they do their business on the street because they have no where else to do it.  Some of these people are mentally ill and have no one to help them.  Some of them are so lost in alcohol or drugs they no longer even know they are there.  Is it their fault...in most cases I think it isn't.
So with all of this said...can we as farmers or sustainable striving people extend ourselves to those that don't have the means....can we begin to make part of our fight for these people also?   I have read that there are warehouses of stock piled food.  We can't give that food away because it would lower the prices paid to farmers?  Why?  I know there are many farmers struggling just to keep afloat.  But what the heck is wrong with that picture....think of it.. people go hungry  so that farmers can barely eek out a living?  I heard a homeless man talking to another homeless man as I hurried to the train excited to start cooking my Thanksgiving dinner, he said...It's a holiday...I don't want to be out here...how hard is it to handcuff me and take me to jail?  Can you imagine...does it not make your heart ache.  Can we make part of our fight to make the world better .....making it better for everyone?  Can we give our surplus to those who need it ...can we fight to get the mentally ill back in institutions...can we volunteer at shelters...can we work to change laws that will help those that can't help themselves.  Sure we all work hard, have very little time for ourselves, sometimes maybe just enough to feed our families, I realize that, but if we are truly serious about making the world better, isn't part of that helping the ones who haven't been graced with whatever it was that helped us get where we are now. 
I know some of you will say you have no money to give, no energy to give, or (and I hope not) they deserve what they got.  I get those feelings, but for me being sustainable does not just mean it's all about me, it means that I fight for those rights for everyone.  Maybe if nothing else we can make just one person feel they are not alone or forgotten.  Maybe we can take the abundance from our gardens and give it to a shelter or bring that guy at the train station selling newspapers for a living, a bag of plums or tomatoes.  Maybe just once in a while we could not look away, look the person in the eye and say good morning.  Sure there are the aggressive homeless and those you just have to walk away from...but even with them maybe as you hurry away you could say good morning..maybe just maybe they will hear it.

                                            EATING SUSTAINABLY ON A BUDGET

This is a subject that is near and dear to my heart.  It is easy for someone who has the money to buy those high priced "organic" foods to tell you that you can eat healthy and stay away from packaged and mass produced food-like stuff, but I am not writing to you in that frame of mind.  Although at this time in my life I am comfortable (not rich, not by far), I have not always been so.  I was a very young (and I mean YOUNG) mother with two small kids on my own.  I have lived on commodities(before food stamps), food stamps, and on a salary of $90.00 a week.  I have gone hungry, and have seen the look on my young sons faces when they saw all the wonderful food eaten by others, knowing they could'nt have that.  I know that it is not easy to feed your family when you make minimum wage, sometimes have 2 or three jobs, and are tired as all get out.  No, I know it is a bone-weary feeling.  I have been there.  That is why I am writing this blog, so maybe just maybe, I can help you achieve a certain amount of control of what you eat.  That type of control is power.  But the thing is, you have to want do it.  It is not easy, it is not fast, and it will be extra work.  If you are ready for that here are a few tips.  These are tips that I have learned from life experience and reading what others have written on the subject.

PRIORITIZE

This is not an easy one.  I know that when the world is wearing you down, all you want to do is come home and watch some tv or indulge in destructive ways to escape.  Believe me, I have gone that path myself, and still do sometimes when I am having a pity party with myself.  Here comes the part where you have to want to do this.  Sit down and take a good look at how you spend your time.  Are there things you can cut out?  Make a list and while you are at it make a list of pros and cons of eating sustainably. Here you will find out if this is something you want to do.  But if you want your family to be healthy it may trump any cons on your list.  Look at how much tv you are watching which seems to be the biggy that traps us all and robs us of precious time. Would listening to the radio help you relax while freeing up you hands to create wonderful meals?  Do you spend hours on the computer, playing games and chatting?  Once you start cooking you may discover that it relaxes you especially if its not just the crank out a boxed dinner.

PLAN MEALS

Now that you have prioritized, you have a little free time to sit down and plan out the week or the month's menu.  Plan meals around legumes, rice, veggies and fruits.  Use meat as a flavor enhancer.  A word of warning here.  For years I was a vegetarian.  My poor younger son, craving meat, discovered that other folks ate steak for dinner, and somehow he got lots of invitations to eat dinner at their house. And don't even ask him about lentils...I had a million ways to use lentils. So unless you have always been a vegetarian and that is all your family has ever known...add a little meat.  One of the things I learned to do was buy a couple of chickens cut them into pieces for 3-4 meals including using the back and neck parts to make soup.  Buying whole chicken is so much cheaper than buying the parts...it just takes a few minutes to cut them up.  If you eat beef...buy a small cut of good quality beef and cut it into small pieces to add to a dish.  There are many very satisfying dishes made from legumes and rice..sometimes adding cheese or eggs.  Read cook books and look on line.  Keep copies of the recipes your family likes in a binder so that eventually all you will have to do is look thru your binder.

BUY IN BULK

We buy all our spices,  legumes, rice, and flours in bulk.  Get on the Internet and see if there is a place in your area where you can buy in bulk.  It will save you a lot of money.  Is there a farmer in your area that has a u-pick farm?  Take the whole family and have a healthy family day picking your food.  It's good for the kids to learn where their food comes from, and give you time to share with them.  Come home and shuck the corn together or peel the apples and make applesauce together.  If your kids have a part in the food they eat, they are more likely to eat it.  Which is a bonus.  Check out the farmer's market.  A lot of the vendors will sell bulk bags of produce toward the end of the day.  Some farmers will let you invest in their chickens, beef, pork, or goats...for a little of your time and a money investment..you will be guaranteed milk, eggs and meat.  Join a community supported agriculture group...local food will be delivered to your door for less than you would pay at the store. 

GROW YOUR OWN

If you have a little space, plant a garden.  Read books on gardening.  Be sure to only plant what you will eat, you're just wasting space if you plant something your family will not eat.  Learn to can and preserve so you can eat all that goodness in the winter too.  If you don't want to learn to can (try it!  I get the greatest feeling looking at all the food I have put by)  learn the proper way to freeze produce.  If you don't have a yard, grow veggies in containers....just about anything will work as long as it is not toxic and drains.  Trust me...you will never go back to store bought produce once you taste fresh.  What  do you eat the most...maybe you could start just with that from scratch.  Grow herbs in pots..those little bunches of herbs in the store are highway robbery.

COOK FROM SCRATCH

Instead of buying packaged, mass produced  food which has little nutritional value,  make meals from scratch.  Take a day to cook up meals that you can freeze and just spend a few minutes on a busy evening to pop it into the oven.  Cook up beans and freeze so they will be ready to use in quick dishes.  Cut up veggies for quick use...just store in containers in the fridge.  Grate cheese and store in the fridge.  I make my own cheese, condiments, and bread.  Takes more time but I know what I am eating and its very satisfying.  Now that I make my own bread..the bread at the supermarket tastes like air.  Bread should be hardy..it is the staff of life!

EAT LOCALLY AND IN SEASON

Foods in season are much cheaper and are much healthier for you than foods that have traveled a lot of miles to your table.  Look on the Internet for local farmers and ranchers.  Eating locally is a win win deal for everyone.  I for one want to support those hard working farmer's who strive to bring us healthy food free of pesticides and other stuff that do not belong in our bodies.  Take a look at www.foodnews.org for produce shopping guide to see what foods you should buy organic and other that you can get away with non-organic. 

Finally use up what you have.  Make a list..mental or written and try to plan your meals around that.  Don't waste veggie peels and things like the end of onions ..freeze them and when you have enough throw them in a pot with other ingredients and make soup or stocks with them. 

Not easy..nope its not.  It takes time to eat healthy on a budget.  I hope you will give it a try tho...I have a feeling you will enjoy it once you do.

Until next time..stay well.

                                                A JOURNEY TO SUSTAINABLE LIVING

In many ways, I have always lived a sustainable life.  I have always had a garden, for many years I have preserved either by canning or dehydrating. As I have said in a previous blog, I was raised that way.  But it has not been until the last year or so that something really hit home and that is that I want to be in control of what I eat and how I live my life.  I want to do what feels right and living sustainably is a no brainer to me.  The thing I realized, and probably have always known, is that if you rely on "things" to make you happy,  and if you don't take charge of what goes in your body, then chances are you are "owned" by the big companies that tell you what you should like and how you should live.  Because that is how they make money, by making you believe that if you eat that creamy boxed mac and cheese, if you drive a car and own a home that you can't afford, if you have all those new electronics, if you have all the fancy clothes....you will be happy, feel better, and succeed.  The truth is that it's not true.  For years we have been lied to about what is good for us, but it wasn't and isn't good for us..it is good for the big corporations.  I am convinced beyond a doubt that the mass produced food we have been told was healthy for us has made us sick.  We are not eating real food...we are eating food "like' stuff.   We have gone more and more into debt because we are told we need more stuff.  When these things hit home...actually hit me between the eyes...I started changing my life.  I don't grow a garden, cook at home, preserve food, or only buy what I need because I think that the world is coming to an end or that we are going to have a zombie attack (although I want to be ready in case that happens :-).  I do those things because I want to be in control of my life.  I don't want to owe anyone so that I have to work until I am 75, and I certainly want to know where my food came from and what is in it.  Trusting in a corporation that could'nt care less about me is not an alternative for me.
So I kicked up my journey to sustainable living.  I know that I will never be 100% sustainable or that I will not leave my carbon footprints at anytime.  I can only take my little suburban farm and do the most I can.  I read a lot, just about my view point but the opposite view point also.  I want to make an educated decision.  There are always pros and cons to any view point and you have to weigh those pros and cons.  I have seen too many people who put blinders on when it comes to hearing the other side and believe me....people are taking sides on this issue....especially the issue of food.  Just post on a blog or Facebook that you would like to be able to make sure everyone gets food and I guarantee that you will get some nasty replies.
I have a long way to go on this journey.  For it to dawn on me at the beginning of fall that I have not put any fruit by is an indicator that I need to be thinking more.  I need to focus more.  One of my biggest hurdles is that I have a 9-5 job, while I don't hate my job, it does have a draining effect on me...I come home and I don't want to do anything.  I have to learn to keep the big picture in front of me, if I don't someone else wins.
Living the way I do feels right and it is worth the effort.  It makes me feel connected..it makes me aware of the seasons. This year I have noticed how different birds come to the feeder at different times of the year.  The smell of fresh veggies and fruits makes me smile and makes me frown when somebody dripping in perfume passes me at the farmer's market.  I don't want superficial ...I want the real thing...so I will continue this journey.  I know there are people that laugh at people like me...call me a tree hugger or a hippie...I really don't care...this is not a passing phase with me...this is a way of life

Until next time...