It’s been more than a year since I posted here, but you can see that on the menu of posts. I’ve been writing in a journal made of handmade paper and leather for the binding, writing with a pen. How 20th century of me. Course, I’m from the mid 20th century, a true Boomer. We’ve mostly disconnected from anything internet, except for this BLOG. I’m on no social media platforms, except for LinkedIn. I couldn’t figure out how to get off of it so I left it as is. I doubt that I will come back to any social media either. As far as I can tell it’s still just as poisonous as ever.
No, not poisonous like a spider. This is just a garden spider living in my vegetable garden. I’ve been watching it drag it’s egg sack around for a few days now. I’m hoping I get to see how many baby spiders will come spilling out. Garden spiders are good for a garden. I always enjoy “meeting” them, love the pesky bugs and flies they catch.
We’re still living where we’ve been for 22 years now. The trees are older, taller, more mature. And some have fallen in storms, a normal process of nature. Every year the flowers change according to the weather patterns and rainfall. I never know what will come up.
This year it was Dames Rocket, a wild phlox. I didn’t plant those. They just showed up. Last year a doe gave birth in the garden. She and her fawn were there for more than a week, eventually ate everything growing there. After they left I mulched it and left it alone to wait for this year. And, voila, turns out our deer family left us a gift! It was absolutely stunning too. Every morning it was filled with humming birds, butterflies, bees of all kinds. What a wonderful way to say, “ Thank you !”. It’s developing seed pods now so I’m going to harvest most of them and pay them forward to friends and their gardens.
We work hard, sunup to sundown, and stop along the way to play too. We’re now growing more than 75% of our own food, canning, freezing and dehydrating the produce and processing our own ducks and chickens too. I won’t say I enjoy that part of it very much but it has given us more independence from a system that has repeatedly failed us several times over the past few years. The horses, ducks and chickens contribute to the composts which gets spread on to the gardens. Our horses are more friends now than working horses but I do still get up and ride occasionally, and play with them on the ground every day.
Our dogs guard us and the animals. The cats hunt the mice and rats, the ducks and chickens give us eggs. The flowers bring us great joy, the trees shade us. And there’s a never ending number of problems to solve, probably my favorite part. I do love a challenge.
I still help with the neighbor’s horses and other animals. I love to farm sit. It gives me all kinds of information about systems that work or don’t work as efficiently. It’s a never ending cycle of life in the present, not captured on little glass screens. Course the irony is that if you are reading this, you’re looking at it from a glass screen.
Last year we celebrated fifty years of marriage. I’m lucky. I married my best friend. If I have any advice to give young possible newly weds, it’s just exactly that. Marry your best friend. Forget those stupid Hollywood movies that whine about marrying your best friend. Laughter, crying together, working hard to support each other, genuinely committing to a life long partnership with a vow in front of friends and family is the best thing you can do for yourselves. The only thing that tops that is having your children. Ours live far away from us but we hear from them nearly everyday. When we celebrated our fifty years together they came in from all over along with friends and family.
I don’t know how often I’ll come back here. And I will be massively surprised if anyone finds this post. But if you are here, reading, please be kind to one another. Make sure you go outside, exercise, fresh air, sunshine are essential. Our Earth is a lovely place. Go out and enjoy it. Life goes by in an eye link of time. Eat organic food, stay away from junk food. Find a purpose in your life to focus on, something that keeps you motivated. Call the people you’ve been neglecting.
Have an adventure. Try something new. Stop watching the horrible, angry, violent and relentlessly stupid videos of people doing weird things. Laugh more. Read a good book. Turn off the TV. Dance, sing, tell a good story to someone you’ve just met. And smile more. You’d be surprised how smiling makes you feel better. And listen. When you stop and listen to the people around you, you learn a lot about who they really are.
I am, as always, yours,
Nancy, smiling
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