Food Economy is NOT the same as Money Economy

Two thoughts I've had, of late...

(1)

I have to say...locally grown food IS economically cheap where we live...as so much grows here so easily. It is, however, time costly...so long as we choose to mentally divide our lives into "work and play." The sustainable way of life is to LIVE YOUR WORK as an integral and natural part of everyday existence. It was the horrific institutions of wealth and poverty of Europe that we still turn to for advice on how to live...for perspective and expectation. Foolishness! Life IS action...whether you are harvesting apples or planting peas or hunting for mushrooms, cooking or eating or cleaning...this is life. Nothing is bad. Nothing is good.

But, because we have "work and play" categories, we are messing with our own heads...thinking to ourselves, "Oh, I have to forage for apples because I don't have money to buy apples from another country...so, I must be poor. I am suffering. I am unhappy. I am...

Another aspect of our messed up society is the whole "independent" thing which leaves many people lonely or overwhelmed. Clearing a bed with four people takes 1/4 the time as it takes alone...but on the emotional level, it is a BOOST rather than a drain. Hence...locally produced food is cheaper and happier.

When we reach critical mass of people leaving the money economy and returning to the "do it ourselves" economy...then we'll find ourselves working together, celebrating our successes, chatting while we weed or harvest, laughing while we clean and shell and eat together, and THEN that "work category" will begin to resemble the "play category" more closely. And so...we'll see that a "living wage" will fade into old-time conversations. An irrelevant concept.

Or, we will think inside the box, believe that a bigger paycheck controls our lives, and be very unhappy as those who worship ONLY money attempt to enslave every last one of us in the future to come...

(2)

In response to the idea that many millions of people 

live on the verge of starvation and may not have the option 

of "work and play" categories, I would like to say...

Yes and no. For example, in many African countries, where women spend countless hours lugging water home from rivers and working, working, working...their men literally sit around waiting to be served the BEER made by that water by their women. In these cultures, a "hard working woman" is a valuable woman, and a man who can "sit around" is proof that the wife is a good wife.

However, I wasn't talking about people who are literally on the edge of starvation. My comment was more in response to Nancy's comment that we can't eat locally until our wages go up. On Vashon, if we have a work/play mentality, then we may resent the time spent foraging after a long day of work as just more work...rather than saying, "Hey...let's go for a walk and bring home some yummy stuff!" My husband and I used to do most of our chatting and connecting in the garden, while growing food. Or we talk while washing dishes...etc.

The repeatedly repeated truth is that there is NEVER too little food on planet earth...there is ALWAYS inefficient or unfair distribution of food. One excellent example is when people in a land known for its crab has to import crab from the other side of the planet for their own consumption, because they've become so export-focused that they no longer eat their own, locally available resource. We live in Washington State...why do we eat apples from Australia? We live on Vashon Island...why eat strawberries from California?

By the way, patience matters, too. I NEVER buy strawberries from the store, because they grow like weeds in my garden. BUT, my berries come up about 5 weeks after CA berries show up...so, I say to my kids, "We can be patient and wait for our own to be ripe...we will NOT buy imported strawberries just because we don't want to wait a few weeks."

Etc. Tea grows on Vashon wildly and easily (Chamomile, mint, raspberry leaves, nettles, lemon balm, dozens of others)...so, I have been out of the "money economy" on tea for almost a decade...and my family is used to sitting around a table and pulling leaves off plants while chatting or listening to music or staring into the distance.

Here's to everyone developing increasing freedom 

and self-sufficiency through a shift in action AND thought!

Warmly,

March

Food Choices Lead Us to Prepare for the Great Change

(2 book suggestions at the bottom!)

People talk about many "great" things.  For example, there is The Great Depression, The Great War, and of course...Alexander the Great.  I think "great" is a strange adjective to use for things which are violent, terrifying and destructive.  And, I've often wondered why?  I think "great" should be used for things which are momentous, exciting, challenging, and important.

Well, when I was a teenager, I took a look at the historic patterns of empires, the average length from their creation to their inevitable demise, and I applied that template to the empires of my day...and I said, "I will likely see the collapse of my society halfway through my life."

As I matured, I began to realize that language and intention matter...and so, I came up with a new way of viewing our natural shift away from empire domination.  

Now I call it:  The Great Change.

Funny how powerful that word is!  And how laden with connotative meaning.

Change is the only constant.                  (acceptance and submission)

Everybody fears change.                       (anxiety and discomfort)

It's time to change for the better!           (hope and confidence)

So, I'm trying to focus on and develop the sense of "change" as being natural, normal, and positive.  Therefore...rather than call our current economic implosion a "Great Recession," I prefer to say that we are "experiencing the early stages of the Great Change."

And I honestly believe this.  In a finite world, there is no reason to believe that unfettered growth is possible.  The question of course becomes, WHAT will fetter us?  Our self-control and wisdom?  Our wars and human-caused famines?  Our destruction of the natural order?  Or...what?

Well, we can't know.  And we can't control this, as an individual.  BUT, we CAN begin to model for others a new way of living...a way which reflects purposeful changes based upon what we see happening around us...a way that is actually healthier and happier than the rat race we've become accustomed to and believe is good.

Here are two books which help a person do exactly this!  One is a unique gardening book.  The other is more of a memoir.  Both are fascinating reads, contain applicable information for every person, and deserve space on any person's "how can I improve my life and leave the world a better place" book shelf.  

The Resilient Gardener:  Food Production and Self-Reliance in Uncertain Times

Including the Five Crops You Need To Survive and Thrive - Potatoes, Corn, Beans, Squash, and Eggs

By Carol Deppe

Radical Homemakers

Reclaiming Domesticity From A Consumer Culture

By Shannon Hayes

Check them out at your local library, recommend them to your gardening club or book club, and begin to consider...how can you make "self-reliance" a normal part of your lifestyle?

Happy reading!

~March

The Ease of Saving Seed

Every Spring, most of us (including me) head to the store to buy nicely grown, harvested, dried, and packaged seeds in little paper packets.  This is SO NORMAL in our society.  So, is it any surprise that most Americans barely blink when they're told that Monsanto has eliminated most farmers' ability to save seed?  To us, the seed buyers of American, we don't really get it just how HUGE this is.

Well, it is huge and here's an example from my own kitchen.  

(1)  Two years ago, I bought a packet of Speckled Cranberry beans.  I grew them, I fell in love with them, and I dried them (because that's what they are...drying beans, not fresh eating beans).  Before this, I had NEVER saved a seed in my life.  

(2)  Last Spring, I had some beans left over and I decided to try planting them along with another store bought variety.  The night before, I soaked them all in water.  The next morning, my saved beans had already put out a sprout tip, while the other beans had done nothing.  In fact, my beans felt alive!  I planted them all in the same soil and the same area of my garden.  Three days later, my SAVED beans were pushing up through the soil.  The other beans took 9 days.

(3)  Each bean plant produces about 30 pods of 7 beans = 210 seeds per plant.  I had 3 tripods of 3 plants each.  That's 9 x 210 = 1,890 seeds OF WHICH I SAVED 9 SEEDS FOR NEXT YEAR.

OMG!!!!  Instead of spending $3.75 to buy a packet of 30 seeds, when I only need 9...I saved .005% of my harvest and was ready to go...or, if I'd wanted, I could have planted 3 times as many plants (tripling my harvest) for the cost of three mouthfuls of cooked beans.

In other words...SAVING SEED IS SUPER CHEAP & EFFICIENT!  

So, converting America's soy, corn, potato, canola, and sugar beet farmers to BUYING SEEDS was an economic coup by the world's International Chemical Companies.  One which was supported by our government officials who were, first, supported by the Chemical Companies in running their campaigns to get elected.

Who wins?  Politicians and Corporations.

Who loses?  Consumers and Farmers.

Anyway...saving seed is easy, casual, fun, effective and something we all can do!

Warmly,

March Twisdale

YES on I-522 - Food Labeling Matters - Here's WHY!

About two weeks ago,

I decided to share how food labeling

matters to a Mother, an American Citizen,

a Shopper, and me.

I wrote several small articles about actual

experiences and did some independent research.

Even got in some arguments which actually

helped me clarify my views.

THEN, I wrote a letter to Jay Inslee, to 

encourage him to go public in support of I-522.

At the time, I decided to pull together a blog

and put all of my personal experiences/articles

into the blog!

The name is easy to remember:  

www.522matters.blogspot.com

Please take a look, and consider sharing with 

your friends, your family, and our fellow citizens.

Sincerely,

March Twisdale

Moving onward...

Greetings my dear Esperanza Farm Community viewers!

As you can see, I have not posted recently.  This does not mean my garden is not still growing, though. Indeed, we expand every year!

In 2011, we plowed a new section of land, about 100 x 40 feet, and then covered it under a HUGE tarp for the winter.  End result?  Easy to sift soil, mostly dried out, with a light dusting of easily uprooted weeds...

The following Spring of 2012, we invited new friends from the Occupy Movement of Seattle to come out for a day on the farm...and in two such days, the land was tilled, shaped, and planted!  A huge harvest came of that season, with over a dozen families sharing in the many months of harvest.

This Spring, we are down to three families...and my efforts to finish my first novel leave me with only a single day's worth of gardening time per week.  We meet on Wednesdays for six hours of communal gardening, and the first harvest of the season has already begun!  

Wildly growing greens, a final burst of Spring Broccoli, radishes and last year's carrots, beets and their leaves, kale and chard, leeks and onion greens...fresh, new cilantro and parsley...yum!  Of course, hundreds of pounds of strawberries are on their way, the plums are small, green, and hard on the trees...our cherries and apples are covered in blossoms, and the berry bushes...oh my!  The Goumi berry crop will be huge this year...as well with currants and gooseberries and blueberries, raspberries, and thornless blackberries!

Of course, we still have many lovely chickens...including our "house chicken," who spent five weeks coming into our home every morning to lay her eggs, then three weeks sitting on them (and going out on her own each day to poop!), and over the past night and day...she has successfully hatched eight chicks!

BUT...why am I not posting photos and making regular posts?  The simple answer is that I have two new projects on my plate, and I think you may find them interesting.

In fact, I have two new blogs:

vaccinesandbeyond.blogspot.com

marchtwisdale.blogspot.com

(1)  After several years of polarizing debates about improving our community health through "increased vaccinations alone," a close friend of mine and I decided to tackle this complex issue head on.  We now have a 12-month newspaper series that is being published in The Loop, on Vashon Island.  If you'd like to hear a balanced, respectful, curious and questioning viewpoint on the issues of "community health," you'll enjoy our blog.  We post our monthly series and other "support material" for people around the world to learn from and all are invited to the discussion @ Vaccines & Beyond

(2)  My second blog is designed to highlight and support my basic life-platform:  inspiring social change, one day at a time, one person at a time.  To achieve this goal, I do many things.  My farm is one way in which I have positively impacted people from teaching them to feeding them.  My lifestyle, as we homeschool our children and hope to raise aware and enlightened individuals is another.  Then, you have my new RADIO SHOW, which is scheduled to come out in August.  And, of course...there is my novel, The Ghost Lords.  It is through this work that I discovered the "power of fiction" to change people where it matters most.  In their hearts.  And so, you are invited to join me in this journey at my second blog, Inspiring Social Change Through Fiction.

I hope that every day of your life,

you hold onto your faith in the goodness 

present in every man, woman, and child.

A hidden gem is not lost...it simply needs to 

be regained...found again.  And, only by 

seeking, do we have a chance to do so.

Sincerely,

March Twisdale