What We Need Is Here

Fall Fruit

I miss the muscadines and am impatiently awaiting citrus, but in the meantime we have this lovely local fruit that looks just right for fall: the persimmon.

They're native to this area, or at least one variety is. But I gotta warn you, if you pick or buy one of the native variety (their ends are pointy unlike the one pictured above), be sure and wait to eat it until it's soft as jelly. An unripe native persimmon is extremely astringent. If you don't know what that is like, imagine licking a stick of deoderant. 

On the other hand, the non-native variety with the rounded end can be eaten when they're still quite firm. Both types are sweet without being at all tart - much more like a banana than a mango. native Americans ate them raw and also cooked with them; in fact the the word "persimmon" comes from an Algonquin word meaning "dried fruit." There are recipes galore for persimmon jam, pie, tarts, etc.  But I really like them best peeled and either sliced or chopped and put into a salad. They add a nice color and flavor. You can find them at the farmers markets or at Ward's - our local grocer.

What we need is now

Every wise person I know or have read or listened to seems to say some version of this: We need to practice being in the present, accepting what is, and being grateful for it. It's the spiritual version of being local - Be Here Now. 

So, toward that end, I started a new discipline yesterday. Each time I hear my wrist watch chime, I stop whatever I am doing, take a deep breath and just look, and listen - and sometimes smell - what is right here. First thing this morning it was the sun shining from a window through the bannister onto the wood floor with dust motes dancing, the smell of breakfast John was making for the kids, the faint sound of a car alarm.  Later it was a tree-lined street, my feet on the sidewalk, the earbud wire attached to my arm, a man talking animatedly to his cell phone in his car. It's like taking a mental snapshot. We all have those in our heads and I have often wondered why my brain once captured that particular image and not another - my school shoes on the wooden stairs in 6th grade, a handful of snow sparkling in the sun, the back of my mom and dad's heads viewed from the backseat on a car trip.

Even if these more intentional snapshot don't linger, they are good. Stopping, breathing deeply, taking note of what is right here, right now; it seems to slow down time. And I see things I haven't seen before - like the house pictured above. Can you guess where it is?

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It's just across from the Gainesville Shopping Center (Publix) on busy North Main Street. I never saw it before.

We used to fly

Another quick trip over the weekend to check in on these good folks in Colorado - their post-retirement adopted home.

 

I may have read too much apocalyptic literature and watched too many end-of-the-world tv shows and movies, but I couldn't help but look at folks at the airport - coming from all over, heading out to who knows where, many reading magazines and newspapers with cover stories about the financial crash - and hear the voice over: "We used to fly." 

I may also have been influenced by the book I brought along for the trip - Depletion and Abundance: Life on the New Home Front OR One Woman's Solutions to Finding Abundance for Your Family while Coming to Terms with Peak Oil, Climate Change and Hard Times, by Sharon Astyk.  I removed my moratorium on book-buying for this book, and I am so glad I did. Having followed Sharon's blog over the last year or so, I knew it would probably be smart, informative, and practical. I would not have guessed, though, how thoroughly engaging it is. I underlined sentences, then paragraphs, then pages to read to John while we drove. I don't think I've been as excited about a book since first reading Wendell Berry. And I do NOT say that lightly.

The book is about the "coming crisis" and Sharon has proven herself way ahead of the game in predicting a number of things that have already happened, including the spike in world hunger we experienced earlier in the spring, the rise in gas prices, the mortgage crisis, and the stock market crash. She roots out the core causes and enumerates practical things to do to protect ourselves and our families as the crises begin to hit closer and closer to home. This kind of thinking could lean toward the "survivalist" mentality of stocking your bunker and battening the hatches, but Sharon has a deeply moral and ethical point of view rooted in community and relationship - and hope.

Here's an excerpt:

My friend, Pat Meadows, a very smart woman, has a woonderful idea she calls "The Theory of Anyway." She argues that 95 percent of what is needed to resolve the coming crisis is what we should do anyway, and when in doubt about how to change, we should change our lives to reflect what we should be doing "anyway." Living more simply, more frugally, leaving reserves for others, reconnecting with our food and our community - these are things we should be doing because they are the right thing to do on many levels. That they also have the potential to save our lives is merely a side effect ( a big one though).

That is, I think, a deeply powerful way of thinking because it is a deeply moral way of thinking. We like to think of ourselves as moral people, but we tend to think of moral questions as the obvious ones: Should I steal or pay? Should I fight or talk? But the most essential moral questions are the ones we rarely ask of the things we do every day: Should I eat this? Where should I live? What should I wear? How should I keep warm/cool? We think of these questions as foregone conclusions - I should keep warm a particular way because that's the kind of furnace I have, or I should eat this because that's what's in the grocery store. Pat's Theroy of Anyway turns this around and points out that the way we live must pass ethical muster first. We must always ask the question, Is this choice contibuting to the repair of the world or its destruction?

This is one quote out a slew of highlighted, underlined, asterisked, and dog-eared pages of this book so far. I hope you'll read it yourself. And while you do, you could check out Crunchy Chicken's book group for other's thoughts on the book and its ideas. And if you're local, leave a comment here. I'd love to hear your thoughts - especially on how to adapt Sharon's ideas to our particular location.

Inch by inch, row by row

 

We started the garden at "Rosa B" yesterday, with the help of three volunteers and thirteen children. Collards, lettuce, carrots and radishes are started and hopefully will remain - untrampled and well-watered. The kids were enthusiastic about the baby plants. We are looking forward to preparing after-school salad snacks and sending some greens home to their families. And there's room to grow in the spring.

Today, while I was hanging out the laundry, I answered some questions from a UF student who helped us plant the garden and wanted to write about her experience for her reporting class. She wanted to know why we garden, and my mind skipped around looking for justification: Because we are trying to match our skills with the needs of the community? Because so many children living in poverty are malnourished? Because our neighbors would enjoy the fresh veggies? Lots of justifications. But the main reason is so simple: Because we eat. Why not garden?

Every little step out of the dehumanizing corporate food system is a step toward creating a better one. Two little gardens. They're tiny alright, but they're growing.

Summer-Fall Soup

Although the weather remains stuck in Summer here for the most part, we are having at least one great indicator of Fall; for a little while we are harvesting veggies from both seasons at the same time. On Saturday we bought summertime peppers, okra, and tomatoes at the market along with autumn onions and wonderful collard greeens.  Here'a good soup that uses it all:

BLACK-EYED PEA SOUP

1 cup dried black-eyed peas

6 cups water

2 cups onions, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced or pressed

2 tablespoons olive oil

Pinch of cayenne

Pinch of thyme

1 green bell pepper, chopped

1 cup frozen corn

1 cup sliced okra

2 cups collards (or kale, chard, or spinach – all of which would take less time to cook), chopped

3 cups canned, diced tomatoes (28-oz. can)

Salt and pepper to taste

Grated cheese for garnish (opt)

 

Bring peas to boil in 4 cups of water. Turn down and simmer for 45 minutes, or till tender. Sauté onions and garlic in olive oil till tender. Add peppers and stir for a few minutes. Add a pinch each of cayenne and thyme and stir.  Add tomatoes, additional 2 cups of water, and collards and bring to a boil. Simmer till greens are tender (at least 20 minutes for collards).  Add corn and okra and bring to boil again. Simmer till heated through. Garnish with chives, cilantro, and/or grated cheese.

Truthiness, and the Fall from Citizen to Consumer

 

“...a term first used ... by Stephen Colbert to describe things that a person claims to know intuitively or “from the gut” without regard to evidence, logic, intellectual examination or facts.” - Wikipedia

Have you been watching the debates? Or listening to the stump speeches? I have become a little addicted lately - checking out The Huffington Post and The Daily Beast every morning with coffee, and watching excerpts from The Daily Show and Colbert at night to try and give it all some perspective.  

With many others, I hope Obama might change things for the better (they're pretty bad...). But it's hard to tease much substance out of the speeches and debate rhetoric when they keep on repeating the things they're hoping will please the most voters. I have tried to tell myself that they've gotta play the game to get elected. But do they? Doesn't it seem like its gotten worse?  At the debate we heard both candidates say the crashing economy would not have much of an effect on their presidential plans.  Now there's a lie that's going to be revealed pretty quickly.

Last night I finally got around to watching the last of a four-part BBC series called, "Century of the Self." Ben and I started watching it while he was in treatment, on recommendation from  The Daily Kos. The whole thing was a fascinating take on how Freud's understanding of the human psyche and our unconscious needs was used by business and politicians in order to manipulate us. (The term "public relations" was actually coined by Freud's nephew, Edward Bernays.) This last episode showed how our transformation from citizens, concerned about the common good, to consumers, concerned about fulfilling our individual needs, has also changed the way politicians campaign and the way we decide on whom to vote. In other words, it helps explains how we elected a straight-talkin' liar as president, twice. 

You should watch the fourth episode before the final debate.  And watch the others too.

Oh, Baby

 

 

I love this. Pure potential. The possibility of collards all fall and winter, like these beauties from last year at our old house. And more in the works down the street starting next week. So happy to get the "Growing In the Garden" sidebar going again!

Common Good

The "Wild Spaces - Public Places" initiative, which will be on the ballot in November, is one of those things that seem clearly the right thing to do.  But there is always that block of voters who believe any tax is a bad tax (the Gainesville Sun had a depressing number of folks who wrote in lately against taxes for public education, for Pete's sake), so it may face some opposition in November - especially this November.

But it's exactly at times like this that it's most important to be forward-thinking in where our money goes. In hard times, folks need public spaces more than ever - free places for their children to play, place where elders can find community and resources for this part of their life, and land that will be preserved for all of us now and for future generations. This is real frugality - getting the best bang for our buck by putting it in places that will benefit us all, especially the most vulnerable. (Oh, how tempting it is to point out the huge amount we have been recently taxed to bail out big business, and the big question looming regarding whom these dollars will actually benefit).

As stocks plunge, and irresponsibility skyrockets in the national picture, It's up to us to take care of what's important in our own place. Who can argue that our elders, our children and our land aren't excellent investments?

New Garden Hopes

The weather is finally cooling off, and we are so ready to start a garden.  We’re also a bit overwhelmed by the time and energy our schedule at the new house is wringing out of us.  So we're going to start small in the fall.

And I do mean small. First stop will be the garden in our postage-stamp front yard. Currently planted in thirsty, summer flowers, we plan to prune, pull, and possibly transplant these to the extent we have some space for a salad garden in their place: Mixed lettuce, chives, arugula, cilantro… good cool weather things - and maybe a basil and tomato or two, hoping for a later than average frost.

A little later in the month, we’re going to start a garden with the children at Rosa B. Williams Center. A lot of kids in our neighborhood (Pleasant Street) play there after school, and in the past have loved growing collard greens. We may try to make some space for some lettuce and few edible flowers (johnny jump-ups and pansies are usually a favorite).

We're looking forward to finding a bigger space in the spring. Meanwhile, we'll stay plenty busy with this.