The One-Straw Revolution

 "I believe that a revolution can begin from this one strand of straw.  Seen at a glance, this rice straw may appear light and insignificant.  Hardly anyone would believe that it could start a revolution.  But I have come to realize the weight and power of this straw.  For me, this revolution is very real." 

Thus begins Masanobu Fukuoka's One Straw Revolution.

I came to Fukuoka late; my purchase of One Straw Revolution was in 2010.  I had read other books before - many of Gene Logsdon's books and some of Wendell Berry's books, as well as a bevy of the "how to" books written by reasonably engaging folks - but few of them (mostly Logsdon) caught my attention and indeed, my enthusiasm, like Fukuoka.

"I tell the young people up in my orchard again and again not to try to imitate me, and it really angers me if there is someone that does not take this to heart.  I ask, instead, that they simply live in nature an apply themselves to their daily work."

The book itself is about one quarter backstory of Fukuoka's life, one quarter his practice of "do nothing" farming, one quarter his philosophy, and one quarter his attempts to spread his agricultural philosophy in his native Japan.  It has the benefit of being a self contained history and philosophy and instruction manual of Fukuoka's practices; while he has written other works, one could understand him from this single volume.

"Humanity must stop indulging the desire for material possessions and personal gain and move instead towards spiritual awareness."

The principles of Fukuoka's farming practice are clearly described:  No cultivation, no chemical fertilizer or pre-prepared compost, no weeding by tillage or herbicides, no dependence on chemicals.  Simple practices - developed by a lifetime of trial and error.  Like many other Japanese practices, it seems deceptively simple in its presentation, but filled with the potential of a lifetime of improvement.

"The narrow view of natural farming says that is good for the farmer to apply organic material to the soil and good to raise animals, and that this is the best and most efficient way to put nature to use.  To speak in terms of personal practice, this is fine, but with this way alone, the spirit of true natural farming cannot be kept alive.  This kind of narrow natural farming is analogous to the school of swordsmanship known as the one-stroke school, which seeks victory through the skillful, yet self-conscious application of technique.  Modern industrial farming follows the two stroke school, which believes that victory can be won by delivering the greatest barrage of swordstrokes.

Pure natural farming, by contrast, is the no-stroke school. It goes nowhere and seeks no victory.  Putting "doing nothing" into practice is the one thing the farmer should strive to accomplish.  Lao Tzu spoke of non-active nature, and I think that if he were a farmer, he would certainly practice natural farming.  I believe that Gandhi's way, a methodless method, acting with a non-winning, non-opposing state of mind, is akin to natural farming.  When it is understood that one loses joy and happiness in the attempt to possess them, the essence of natural farming will be realized.  The ultimate goal of farming is not the growing of crops, but the cultivation and perfection of human beings."

The above quote represents to me one of the reasons that Fukuoka resonates with me.  Not just because he likens farming to Japanese Sword schools (although that is pretty amazing), but that he is able to turn to the philosophical end of farming:  in the end it is people that farms should be growing.  The farming is just the means to that end.

Fukuoka's humility comes through in these pages in a way that such a thing often does not - but, like the head of my own sword school, I suspect that if one were to have asked him what he was, he would have said he was only ever a student - "I have made a lot of mistakes while experimenting over the years and have experience failures of all kinds" he writes, and then shares some them:  how when he first started his "do nothing" farming, he killed almost all the fruit trees in his father's orchard or how, when he scattered ashes in the fields as a soil amendment, he disrupted the webs of young spiders in the fields.  He only writes of himself as a simple man, try to find better ways to attune himself to the natural way of the world.

"A person can analyze and investigate a butterfly as he likes, but he cannot make a butterfly."

Fukuoka passionately believes in his methods throughout the book, and he relates some stories where he attempts to convince others to adopt them - and while he always sad when they do not, he somehow seems to maintain his hope that someday, such things will be adopted.  In the meantime, he continued to practice his simple way of farming and life, somewhat immune to the world going on around him.

"Stepping out of the hut into the afternoon sun, I paused for a moment and gazed at the surrounding orchard trees laden with ripening fruit, and at the chickens scratching in the weeds and clover.  I then begin my familiar descent to the fields".

Every time I read this book, I am more taken with it.  It is the rare agricultural author that can write not only of farming practice, but of natural theory and philosophy and poetry and who ponders the great meanings of live through the medium of agriculture (and somehow links sword schools and farming).  Fukuoka comes across as student of nature, trying to learn from it the best way to work in harmony with it so that he can benefit from it without harming it; he has the humility of the learner and the courage of the practitioner. He sees himself as a provocateur of change - not change by force or decree, but by example and message.  

"If you hit the mark on the wrong target, you have missed."

Every time I read him, I become even more inspired to seek to life a life as he lived his:  quiet, welcoming of seekers, humbly living a simple life as an example that such a thing can be done, and done well.

"Lao Tzu, the Taoist sage, says a whole and decent life can be lived in a small village. Bodhidharma, the founder of Zen, spent nine years living in a cave without bustling about.  To be worried about making money, expanding, growing cash crops and shipping them out is not the way of the farmer.  To be here, caring for a small field, in full possession of the freedom and plentitude of each day, every day - this must have been the original way of agriculture."

Of Small Places And Agrarianism

Friend to this blog Leigh Tate made a comment in the post Of Small Towns and Small Cities that made me think a great deal more than perhaps is wise in the early morning upon reading it: 

"It was the connectedness of today's reading list post that reminded me to comment. I sometimes mention agrarianism as a lifestyle, and it is interesting to me that the response is usually a variation of "yes but, not everybody wants to be a farmer." This post reminds me of what I am consistently unsuccessful at explaining, i.e. that agrarianism isn't farming, rather, it's a social and economic structure based on community and the land. The small town is the heart of such a structure because it's there that the community has the potential to to meet its needs. I would like to say that it has the potential to be self-reliant, but I get scolded for that term too, because it tends to be interpreted as isolationist.

Instead, I think I'll say, an agrarian community is more resilient, and able to weather whatever ups and downs happen in life. Of course, this will never happen because human nature strives against it. But I sincerely think it's the way things were designed to be.”

Well, that is a lot for 0500 wake call and cup of coffee, to be sure.

I believe I was originally introduced to the term of Agrarianism by Herrick Kimball (Formerly of The Deliberate Agrarian, now of HeavenStretch), although I really believe I came tor understand it earlier through the writing of the sadly now departed Gene Logsdon in The Contrary Farmer.  Logsdon's book was in principle about farming and self-sufficiency, but really what it was about was way of life that both valued the land that enabled it and the small environments that it created and thrived in - the social and economic structure based on community and land that Leigh refers to.  In a way, it was a call back to the small place that I had grown up - but really a call back to the small environment that I had grown up in, the place where I felt (and continue to feel) most connected to.

Small communities can be (but are not always) interdependent and resilient.  It is not just in the sort of Hallmark-ish concept of "taking care of each other"; it is in the real human connections that come from living and doing business with people that live in the same community that you do.  One comes to value that community because in a way, through its success comes one's own success - not measured necessarily in the wealth one possesses, but in the way one feels when one is finished with the day.  One has done business - be it a retail enterprise, a farm, or some other interactive contribution - instead of just "commuting to a job".

Interdependence.  Resilience.  These are phrases we - or at least I - have heard a great deal in recent years.  The surprising thing - or perhaps not so surprising - is what this terms have come to mean.

"Interdependence", in the modern parlance, has come to mean relying on the largest administrative body possible. Communities should not be interdependent, states should be.  Interdependence is always facing up and outward, not down and inward.  Not needing "The System" is seen as rebellious and a bit;ignorant:  States need each other because that is the best and highest use of the individual, communities should not to the exclusion of the state but subservient to it.

Resilience is the same.  States should be resilient, but not communities.  Communities need to look to the state for their resilience and show there dependency on those outside, not generate their resilience internally.

Why is the concept of agrarianism - interdependent, strong communities generally (but not exclusively) practicing agriculture and the basics of living not embraced by those that mouth such words?  Because such places are not reliant on the the state that exists above them, are not "plugged in" to the much larger urban units that they are expected somehow to support and defer to.   Small communities in the modern world - agrarian communities - are places that should be dying or kitschy places where large urban entity dwellers can go to shop and stay and eat and be catered to, not communities which are not reliant on the larger whole for survival.

I perhaps sound a bit out of sorts by this disconnect between what the modern world says it wants - for example, interdependence and resilience - and what the modern world is willing to accept.  My thought is that it is - again - based on the concept that there can be only one "right" answer, the one that is authorized by Our Political And Social Betters (OPASB).  Interdependence and resilience must be exercised in the approved fashion, as specified by the experts and accepted by the social masses, not run willy-nilly by people who think they know what is best for themselves.

There is one thing I will say for state-sanctioned or state enforced interdependence and resilience:  it is a fragile thing, a tropical flower sustained in an arctic environment only by the greenhouse of the state.  Remove that greenhouse - remove the official requirement to make people be interdependent and resilient via laws - and much of those things, I posited, would blow away with the wind of reality.  These sorts of things, to last, must come to fruition organically, not enforced.

We live today in a bifurcated world:  those that are interdependent and resilient (and this is not always in the "classic" way) and those that believe they are because the state says they are. Let the requirements fall away, and I suspect that true agrarians among us will shine like stars in the sky. 

Philosophy and Tilling

 

If there is a quote that more less encompassed what I dream of doing, this is likely it.

I know, I know - philosophers have a rather foolish habit of extoling the simple life without either understanding what it entails or not practicing it (Lucius Annaeus Seneca was often mocked for the difference between his preaching of the simple Stoic life and his vast wealth), and I suspect on the whole it is easier to make a living as a farmer that thinks on philosophy than a philosopher that tries to farm.  And yet, the combination can exist in fact:  some of the greatest agricultural philosophers of the last 50 years - Masanobu Fukoka, Wendell Berry, Joel Salatin - have done exactly that.

G. Musonius Rufus, in the quote above, posits that is is living in accord with nature and drawing directly from it, rather than another source.  I suspect that is largely true.  At the same time, at least in my own life, the more I find that I am actively engaged in the practice of something that provides me benefit - be it gardening or cheesemaking or stitching up a sock for the 20th time - the less time I have to think about other things that I want or desire that are beyond what my actual needs are.  

Leisure can have a tendency to do this to me:  the more time sit and surf the InterWeb, the more I seem to find things that I "need", or at least want intensely, regardless of whether or not I actually need them.  Whereas actively spending my leisure on either doing needful things or actually pondering and thinking (and writing, or even swordsmanship in my case) leads to a decided lack of desire.

The more I do and make do with what I have, the less I find that I desire and that those things I desire, I truly need to do things I need to do.

Automated Bread

 While I am not a true bread connoisseur, it must be said that I enjoy a good piece of toast (slathered with butter) for breakfast or a peanut butter and honey sandwich for lunch.  Both of these for me are comfort foods as well as meeting an caloric intake:  toast happened for breakfast almost every mornings except Fridays growing up (which was cereal day) and for special "breakfast for dinner" nights when TB The Elder was gone (and one was allowed to read a book at the table, wonder of wonders), and peanut butter and honey sandwiches have graced my lunch box and plate for almost as long as I have been alive.

One of the recent consequences of the current environment is that bread is, well expensive.   A loaf of Orowheat bread (the somewhat healthy one, not the "corn syrup dusted in flour" version") will easily set one back $4.00 to $5.50, if it is at all available (which in the past year is often not the case).  The resolution in such a situation is to make one's own.

The bread maker above is the one we received from my parents years ago - before we moved to New Home, actually - when my father found out he was diabetic and bread was now forbidden.  It has served us well - for years we would use it to make pizza dough and on Sunday nights we would have pizza and a movie as a family event.

It is stupidly simple, of course - so simple even I can use it:  using the attached ingredient book, dump ingredients into the container.  Lock container into place in the unit.  Select program.  Push button.  Go away for two to three hours, come back at the bell.  Remove hot pan and hot bread from unit (hopefully without burning one's fingers, but that does not always happen).  Immediately cut off a piece while still piping hot and smear with butter.  Eat.  Then go back for another one while it still hot (it never reheats as well).

Five years ago I would have told you that making it served no purpose other than having it hot, as the cost difference was negligible.  Now, I am not so sure:  what is the cost of 3-4 cups of flour, 1-2 teaspoons of yeast, 1 tablespoon of butter, a tablespoon each of oil and honey, and water?  I am rather certain that it is not $5.00.

Na Clann have occasionally made bread from scratch (e.g., in the old style by hand) and this is the next logical step of course:  the one flaw in my practice is that the bread machine relies on electricity to work.  But that is certainly something I can work into.  I am really the only one who eats bread at home anymore on a regular basis and so a small loaf will easily serve my needs for a week.

Now, to start making butter...

On Yogurt And Unplugging

 (By way of introduction, I apologize for my tardiness in responding to comments.  Apparently this platform has taken it upon itself to becoming "difficult" again.)

This week I made another batch of yogurt.

I have been making yogurt regularly for almost three years now, so far as I can recall.  It is a simple process (which is why I likely keep doing it, of course):  one gallon of whole milk heated in a Crock Pot to 180 F with a beach towel over the lid to retain heat, followed by allowing it to cool to between 90 and 100 F, adding either new culture or some yogurt from a previous batch (live culture and all), replacing the lid and covering with the beach towel and wrapping with a blanket and allow to sit all night, followed by 12-18 hours of straining through cheesecloth.

Voila! Yogurt.  Strained longer, it becomes thicker and more "greek" (and I like my yogurt thick).  I have no idea how much I yield in a batch, but I easily fill up one of those 16 oz. Cool Whip containers, sometimes with a small amount of overflow.  I have not been able to calculate yield by weight, but it is certainly more than the 1.5 lbs scale will measure.  Maybe 2 lbs?  Plus, I end up with 18 to 24 ounces of whey to drink over the week.

This amount of yogurt will last me about a week - yes, I eat that much, which is one reason I started making my own instead of waiting for trips to the grocery store to get more.  That, and by making it myself I pay about half of what it would currently cost me at the store - perhaps more, as a pound of yogurt here goes for $4-6 and I am eating at least twice that.

The only times I purchased yogurt in the last three years is when I go back to The Ranch - I could make it there (I have a crock pot, and culture is easy enough to procure), but it is a solid two day process and I would end up wasting some - a crime in my book, as all yogurt deserves to be eaten.

It is a rather small and silly example of some kind of unplugging from the system - I need milk to do it of course, and there is no way a dairy cow or even a goat is magically going to make it in the toasted stubble that has become my backyard.  But it is an example, my maybe one thing that unplugs me from that system.

Sometimes when we read of changing the world or unplugging from it or unplugging from it to change it, it seems like such a daunting task.  In reality, we can all start somewhere.  It is not the size of the effort that  counts, but making the effort.  Once a thing is done - the solar panel up and feeding energy, the side of beef in the freezer that we bought directly rather than through the commercial system, the vegetables are canned/preserved/dried, the sock darned - we realize that it was not as difficult as we might have thought.  And, the process can be replicated.

The rock breaks not because of the immediate strike, but because of the thousand strikes that came before.

Window, Door, Pitchfork

 

200,000 Miles

 

The Grey Ghost hit 200,000 miles this weekend.

We bought the car new in 2010 (one of precisely two cars I have owned since I started driving in the mid 1980's that was actually new, not just new to me).  It is the cross between the old station wagon and the newer SUV  that companies tried to make popular in the mid to late 2000's as a sort of Mini minivan; the fact most of them seem discontinued suggests it was an unsuccessful experiment.

In its 10.5 year sojourn with us, it has driven us to Old Home and back at least three times, been to college dropoffs which are almost in Old Home twice, driven all about New Home for all kinds of activities.  Once it passed to me, of course, its life became much less exciting, as its primary job became ferrying me to and from work and to the rounds of life I have made for years now:  Iaijutsu training, the Rabbit Shelter, the gym.  It has made any number of trips in and around the state as I threw as well, completing not a few 300 + mile round trips in short periods of time.

It has its quirks, of course.  It "seats" six but really only four comfortable.  It is a standard transmission (blessedly).  And over the years it has acquired small malfunctions:  the CD player and converter for the phone music do not work (the radio still does), one of the passenger windows only goes down 50% in Winter (but I seldom have passengers), two of the three climate control buttons are not lit at night (I looked into how to change the bulbs.  As it literally involves tearing out the whole dash assembly, I can live with it:  at this point, I have memorized which way is heat and cool).  But it is roomy enough for myself, my swords, my throwing box, or various and sundry rabbit and gardening supplies.

Thanks to The Plague this year, I only logged about 4,000 miles.  The most recent ~ 200K service suggested that the engine itself is in pretty good shape - and with a manual transmission, my fear of significant repairs in that area have dropped (I have had to have a transmission rebuilt.  Once.  Never again.).  My dream - and how lovely it would be - would be to keep this car for another 150,000 Miles (Not implausible:  we also owned a 1993 with a similar engine that made it to 315,000).  Even assuming my driving increases a bit to 6,000 miles a year, that would be 25 years.  By that time they either no longer make parts or the internal combustion engine will be a collectors item only.  And at that point, I might have only one more car purchase to make - or no longer need or want to drive at all.

To be honest, I grumbled about the price of the car when we paid for it.  While strictly not an "investment", I can say that I am now incredibly pleased we did.  

Candles

 So finally - four months after we actually purchased the materials - we made candles.

The process is actually a great deal easier than I anticipated. I fully planned to show you the whole process, but realized that my first "outing" might not be the best one to start with.

A short version is:  Prepare and melt wax in double boiler.  Prepare wick and mold.  Add color and fragrance.  Pour melted wax into mold.  Top off and let sit.  Remove candle from mold after cooled.

About 85% of that actually worked.  I learned at least one thing that did not (for sealing the bottom wick outlet, one must used mold sealant, a sort of clay.  Other sorts of clay - like Playdoh, for example - will not quite get the job done).  Also, that one probably needs to add more fragrance than one thinks.

But overall, they are candles and they burn.  I would call that a success.

Goals: 2021 Edition

 As some of you know that have been long time readers here, I am usually consumed by goal setting at this time of year.  It tends to be the culmination of a one to two month review of what I want to do, numerous drafts to documents, a final kvetching to myself as I look at them, and then the "final-final" version which is supposed to be ready on 01 January.  In fact, last year's process was even more involved:  I had a spreadsheet set up with 13 different worksheets including a daily schedule, various things I was going to learn, and then 1,2,3,5,7, and 10 years goals.  All quite logically put together, carefully chronicling my transition from what I was doing (Senior Management, Quality) to a form of gentile retirement and second career.

And then, of course, 2020 happened.

I laugh - a bit bitterly of course - looking at what I had written down for this year.  Most of my "career' goals had to change as soon as my career changed.  The vacations we had planned fell into the dust.  A burgeoning interest - wine - crashed into the pavement (with lots of cross outs on the spreadsheet) as working on learning wines in a world that was happily collapsing economically seemed like a fairly bad idea.  Of all the things I had listed, I hit three:  Write 350 blog entries, maximize my  retirement savings, and have a set amount of emergency savings.

This year has been a much more restrained goal setting experience.

For a long time, I did not want to do it - the sting of last year's cognitive dissonance in existence made any sort of planning seem wildly inappropriate.  But one needs something to aim at, lest one completely lose all sense of focus.

My goals this year are in a way, much more pedestrian - and much more under my control.  They are also much simplified in terms of the things I want to accomplish.  As before, I use the Rule of Five (Five being the number of fingers on my hand, which is something I can keep track of):  God, Girls (Family), Gold (Career), Iaijutsu, and Ichiryo Gusoku  - or GGGII, if you like acronyms.

Gold has an unusual amount of activity (for me), but I suppose that is to be expected, given the triple combination of a change in career, a general concern about the stability of my job, and the realization that I may make a shift much more quickly than I imagine.  Iaijustu - a combination of Iai practice, Japanese, and strength/aerobic training - is much more a pass/fail sort of definition than the theoretical concepts I often write in.  Girls  has mechanisms for spending time with the family in what is rapidly dwindling as family time (everyone is getting older and more independent, these things happen).  Ichiryo Gusoku is cheese, gardening, and translating Old English.

God is the most simple:  "1) Find a church that fits; 2) Develop meditation and prayer." 

What I have not left space for - because I do not know how to meaningfully make space for it - is the major changes that may come that I cannot foresee. I have a hint of this, a vague clue that they may come - but to plan for the unplannable is to dabble in worlds I simply cannot fathom.

As usual, I have no sense of how many of these goals can be accomplished or to what degree:  Not surprisingly perhaps, 2020 has left a bad taste in my mouth.  But for the first time in a while, I can look at these and think that each and every one of them is achievable this year.

That, in itself, is something.

The Dilemma Of 1876

 I have to admit to you that I am feeling more and more like a samurai in 1876.

The Hatorei edict of 1876, which forbid the wearing of swords by all non-governmental employees in public, was the last of a set of decrees over the years 1870-1876 that had slowly whittled away the status and income of samurai as samurai.  Western dress and industry was valued while the traditional old ways were not.  First dress, then hereditary military service, then income were all changed.

It is not as if the samurai were left without options, of course.  The Meiji government clearly encouraged them to throw themselves into the new order of things with abandon, which many did.  They were encouraged to find new roles in industry, forestry, agriculture, and education.  And many did - 23% of businessmen in the 1880's were from the former samurai class and 35% in the 1920's.

But others, of course did not make the change, whether from inability, unwillingness, or an attachment to the old ways and days that simply were not returning.  They fought - and perished - from the years 1874 to 1877, the most famous of these The Satsuma Rebellion (idealized in the Tom Cruise movie "The Last Samurai").

My sense is driven, I suppose, by the realization - ever growing- that the world has changed in the last nine months in profound ways and no matter what the outcome of the next few months, will never go back to the way it was. To somehow pretend that it will is engaging in the same sort of nostalgia that caused those samurai who could not adapt to look back as if they could restore the past when the world had clearly moved on.

I sit writing this on a quiet Sunday morning.  Everyone else has gone and it is only myself and the animals at home.  The animals are all asleep with mid morning naps.  The only sounds I hear are the occasional sound of a car driving by and the low hum the aquarium pump as it goes.  I am, in a sense, inside a small bubble while the outside world goes on with its wars of words and deeds and its progress.

If I could, I would stay here always, surrounded by sleeping animals who know nothing of mandating "progress" or ideologues but only of the gratefulness of home and food and books which contain knowledge and statements without trying to convert them into points of view or "the right way to think" or anything else but a clear and simple statement of the past.  

I am not allowed that option, of course:  the modern world knows nothing of allowing people to simply "be" anymore; we all must be engaged and in some cases weaponized in The Great Cause (whatever that cause happens to be). 

In writing of the samurai and their dilemma, I failed to mention a third group.

They were the martial artists (and craftsmen) who persevered between the two worlds, such as Yamaoka Tesshu, existing in a state in which they really neither succeeded in the new world nor fully held on to the old, living their lives in the limbo that the preservation of traditional skills becomes, always holding on to the past while questioning which parts of the future could and should be integrated.  They were a minority, as they will always be a minority in a world which is always straining towards more progress.  But somehow they managed to maintain their balance in a world which was straining towards mandating the adoption of new, even if they did not achieve worldly fame and success in doing so; the fact that traditional martial arts and crafts continue to exist demonstrate that their way was not in vain.  

Herein, perhaps, remains the path that is left to me: to be in world but not a part of its wars of words and deeds and policies, accepting by exception not default those things - be they items, objects, systems, or beliefs - are touted as "the way things are now".

A final note on the dilemma of the samurai:  their acceptance of the new order did not preclude the rise of a better order, as the conquest of Korea, the Russo-Japanese and Sino-Japanese Wars, or World War II demonstrates.  Unquestioning acceptance of progress and the new did not inherently lead to the better, only to the different.

The traditional martial arts and crafts survived.  Imperial Japan, based on the new Meiji Order, did not.

On Writing A Manifesto And Being Intentional

 I have been toying with the idea of a Manifesto for The New Normal.

As we slog through the implications of The Plague of 2020 and the outcome of the continuing economic ruin caused by actions taken to halt its spread, what I think should be obvious to anyone is that 2020 is going to represent a seismic shift in the way we live, the way we do business, the way we interact with each other, the way we live  (To be clear:  Yes it exists, Yes many people recover from it, No we do not know the long term health implications from it or what and how it will mutate during the "High Sick Season" of Winter.  Color me "talk to me in three years when the data is in".)  The more I read and ponder, the more I believe this will ultimately be as seismic a shift in either of the Two World Wars of the last century.

Having said that, I have to also note that this is not always a bad thing; things are usually all not one sided in that respect.  But it can take a lot longer for those things to make themselves evident:  deaths and job losses are easily seen and quickly felt.  Shoots of new ways of living or new economic changes are much slower to manifest themselves.

But I want to capture these changes now, as I see them coming, and embed them in my life rather than quickly gloss over them into the areas of The New Normal.

The other reason to consider a Manifesto - which to be clear how I am using the word, is simply a declaration of my views of the world and how I intend to live in it - is that without a conscious decision on my part, others will make that decision for me.  The world, to appropriate a Christian metaphor, will attempt to squeeze me into its mold instead of the other way around.

Over my years of blogging, I have been exposed to a number of very good effective manifestos, people living out their intentions in life (to be fair, most of them live them without ever really thinking to write them down).  And perhaps therein lies the secret and the discussion:  intentionality. They are living their lives intentionally. 

For me, something written down is the place to start (it always is, for me.  I do not perform quite as well with thought exercises only).

I have no particular idea when this will come out as I am picking through my ideas and thoughts - but part of the reason of speaking of this at all is by writing it here, I am now committing to do it.

And perhaps that is the great lesson of this new age:  that more so than ever, we need to be intentional in how we live, how we speak, how we spend our money and time and our lives.  

Before it is determined how we should act and react.

Reaping And Planting

Yesterday, as  a matter of course I finished out another batch of yogurt.  It did not really strike me as a significant event at all - except for the fact that this was the second round of propagating yogurt.  A certain level of independence has been achieved.

This week I started in on my cheese that I had made in June.  It has some mold issues so I have had to remove larger parts of the rind and outside portion than I might like, but it was the second cheese that I made using my cheese press.  Guess what?  It actually tastes like real cheese (instead of everything tasting like a fresh cheese that sat a while.

I also made hooks this weekend.  Nothing fancy (my technique needs plenty of work), but something that actually could be useful in some kind of circumstances.

None of these I would consider to be particularly large victories by any stretch of the imagination.  A batch of yogurt only lasts about a week around here; the cheese only slightly longer once opened.  The hooks may or may not get used for things.  But the important thing is that they were done - and having been done (as demonstrated with the yogurt), they can be done again - better perhaps, and with a bit more finesse (and less mold).

Sometimes , as Stevenson says, the seeds planted are far more important than the harvest reaped.

A Sustainability Milestone of Sorts

I have reached at least of my goals in sustainability, albeit a small and rather silly one:  effectively, I am now self sustaining in yogurt.

I eat yogurt - a lot of yogurt.  I can easily put away one of those larger containers a week (good source of protein, low fat, all the things).  The cost on those is about $4.00 here locally for the generic brand.

One of the activities The Plague has allowed me to do with greater frequency is make my own yogurt.  It is not terribly hard:  one gallon of milk in a Crock Pot heated to 176 F, cooled to 115 F, culture added, and then wrapped up to keep the heat (I wrap the outer container in a blanket and put a towel over the lid where the heat loss is greatest) and allow to sit for 12 hours.  After that, I drain through cheese cloth for 12 hours (I like thick Greek style yogurt, so I let it drain quite a while).  Ladle into a container and done.  The cost is that of the gallon of milk (about $3.00 hereabouts), the culture (maybe $0.25 over the life of the product), and the electricity (around 6 hours) to run the Crock Pot.

Yogurt is a versatile food.  I eat it for breakfast (I just put it in with my dry oatmeal and eat it, but occasionally exchange the oats for cereal or even more rarely fruit).  You can make any number of sauces out of it (dill dipping sauce, the Greek sauce tzatziki).  It also makes a great dessert with honey poured over it as well.

But here is the thing I have reached: I am now self sustaining in yogurt.

Not self sufficient:  I do not have anything that produces the raw ingredients (milk), nor do I think it likely that I ever will.  But give me a gallon milk and I can make yogurt. 

I just received (from the good folks over at The New England Cheesemaking Supply Company) a Bulgarian Yogurt Culture which (in theory) allows you to take from a previous yogurt, add to prepared milk, and then make a new batch of yogurt. I will try to ease into this (my confidence level for such things is low), but in theory it is possible.  If true (and successful!) this would extend my self sustainability further.

There is no great victory here; man cannot live on yogurt alone.  But, at least to me, it matters.  It is a chip - a very small chip, but a chip - in my requirements to be dependent on the system to provide me with finished products. And anything - any single thing - that reduces one's reliance on a rather creaky distribution system or on the ability and willingness of others is a victory worth having.

Onward to the path of dairy freedom!

2020 Garden Update

So finally - three weeks later - I actually have a garden update!

Tomato plant is doing well (with a potato volunteer in the foreground):

Jalapeno Pepper. Such a reliable producer year after year:

Another potato volunteer:

Collection of young peppers, beans, and black eyed peas:

Bolting Lettuce (for Seeds) and onions and garlic:

Trying Corn and two times of Sorghum:

Asparagus is 6' or more:

My limes continue to grow.  My greatest victory of the season:

Of Eggs And Rice

Growing up amidst three square meals a day, we had a multitude of different meals.  Breakfasts were always eggs (scrambled except the days they were softboiled) and Fridays, which were cereal.  Lunches - at least into high school, were almost inevitably a sandwich of some kind (in the time before lunch tupperware, this was the way of the world), chips or crackers, apple, and a cookie.  Dinner ran the gauntlet but mostly (that I recall) consisted of pasta, beef, or chicken.

But from this melange of 18 + years of meals, there are a few that stick with me even now.  Meatloaf and baked red potatoes (both which were from my maternal grandmother and which we still make at the Toridhealbheach Beucail household to this day), spaghetti, waffles off a real waffle maker, and fried rice cakes.

I am sure that fried rice cakes are not really what they were (or are) called.  It consisted of white rice which was left over from previous dinners, combined with egg (as a binder) and fried for breakfast.  We had them with syrup (not the maple kind, which we never had growing up but rather the sugar syrup with maple flavoring, which we {again} still have to this day).

I cannot tell you what made these so memorable to me.  Maybe it was the fact that they were rare (seldom do I recall us having leftover rice).  Maybe it was because it was one of the few non pancake and waffle meals where loading something up with syrup was allowed.  Maybe it was the texture (they are very different from anything else that I have eaten).  But they continue to stand out my memory as a delicious memory.

The pictures you see above are my attempts from this weekend to make them.  My recipe is not that original:  add leftover rice (about three cups) and eggs (I eyeballed it and adding two), and mix together.  As you can see, my sizing is all that good and my ability to judge how long to fry them got better as I cooked.

Having them this weekend, with my non-maple syrup maple syrup, I had a double helping of satisfaction.  The first was that rather than having rice that ended up not being used, I was re-use it.  The second was a reasonable approximation of a food I enjoyed growing up.

Good use of resources, good memories, good practices.  All cleverly disguised in eggs and rice.

Cheese Press In Action

This weekend was the first outing of my cheese press.  I tried a stirred curd cheddar (basically, a regular cheddar cheese with a couple of short cuts:

I obviously have some work to do on setting it up (need a much smaller section of cheese cloth for example for this small tomme mold.  I also found out that keep the press level does not allow the whey to drain; I need to tilt it as seen here).  But the result look amazing:

This will air dry for two or three days and then be waxed for aging.  The curds were extremely well knit together, far better than I could have done with my previous arrangement (weights balanced on the top of the mold).

Now, I need a cheese cave...

Cheese Press

So thanks to the good folks at The New England Cheesemaking Supply Company, I am about to level up in my cheesemaking.  I purchased a cheese press.

The benefit of a cheese press is that it allows you to apply varying levels of pressure (up to 80 lbs) for extended periods of time to knit the curds together.  Most all hard cheeses undergo this process.

Fancy stainless steel pan and plastic follower.  The other parts are sturdy wood and steel.

I am very excited!

The Contrariness Of The Mad Farmer

I am done with apologies. If contrariness is my

inheritance and destiny, so be it. If it is my mission

to go in at exits and come out at entrances, so be it.

I have planted by the stars in defiance of the experts,

and tilled somewhat by incantation and by singing,

and reaped, as I knew, by luck and Heaven’s favor,

in spite of the best advice. If I have been caught

so often laughing at funerals, that was because

I knew the dead were already slipping away,

preparing a comeback, and can I help it?

And if at weddings I have gritted and gnashed

my teeth, it was because I knew where the bridegroom

had sunk his manhood, and knew it would not

be resurrected by a piece of cake. ‘Dance,’ they told me,

and I stood still, and while they stood

quiet in line at the gate of the Kingdom, I danced.

‘Pray,’ they said, and I laughed, covering myself

in the earth’s brightnesses, and then stole off gray

into the midst of a revel, and prayed like an orphan.

When they said, ‘I know my Redeemer liveth,’

I told them, ‘He’s dead.’ And when they told me

‘God is dead,’ I answered, ‘He goes fishing every day

in the Kentucky River. I see Him often.’

When they asked me would I like to contribute

I said no, and when they had collected

more than they needed, I gave them as much as I had.

When they asked me to join them I wouldn’t,

and then went off by myself and did more

than they would have asked. ‘Well, then,’ they said

‘go and organize the International Brotherhood

of Contraries,’ and I said, ‘Did you finish killing

everybody who was against peace?’ So be it.

Going against men, I have heard at times a deep harmony

thrumming in the mixture, and when they ask me what

I say I don’t know. It is not the only or the easiest

way to come to the truth. It is one way.

- Wendell Berry

Sad Cheese

This past weekend I picked up making cheese again, something that tends to fall off during throwing season as it requires parts of a full day to complete.  The result was less than exciting:

This is meant to be English Farmhouse Cheese, something I have made several times with good results.  As you can see on the left, the results were not quite what I was hoping for.  For some reason the curd was not as firm as it should have been (more rennet, I suspect) and we had a structural problem transferring the curd.  And then, of course, releasing the cheeses from the molds (I use ricotta molds because they are what I have - sadly, they are not ideal).

There are fixable problems, of course.  More rennet is easy enough to add and I am looking at new molds (I think I found some Chevre molds that will do the trick).  And I did try some this afternoon - sure enough, no matter what the appearance, it tastes just as good as ever (for soft cheeses, I recommend honey over them. They make a great dessert).

The point of this (I think) is to remind all of us that not everything we try to do to be skillful or self-sufficient works out quite as we had anticipated. That is no reason not to try, though.  We only make the effort time and time again to get better.

After all, you cannot fall off the floor.

Do Nothing...

(Administrator's Note:  This is my first attempt to replicate the pictures that I have posted here before.  The ideograph in the lower right corner is Ichiryo Gusoku (see the pages section next to this for a fuller explanation).  I beg your indulgence as I start to work through this medium).