THE CEDAR PORCH.
Some more cabin details: To protect the plywood until we can get the cabin sided, we covered it with tar paper - basically a thick, waterproof, tar-coated material. It's not the prettiest - but it works! Instead of buying siding - we are hoping to mill our own from the countless cedar trees we have been clearing as we make pasture space. Jesse already cut down two cedars to make beams and floor boards for the little front porch - it is our favorite part of the cabin so far!- Hannah.
FEELING THE BURN.
We as humans learn primarily by reaction: touch the stove and it's hot––OUCH!––ok, don't touch the stove; kitten puts ears back, hisses, then bites––OUCH!––fair enough, don't touch kitten when hissing. Then we constantly test and retest until we're absolutely certain about our observations, and our boundaries.This collection of information teaches us how to behave in the world. But what if something doesn't hiss or bite you back?––at least not immediately. How are we supposed to learn how to treat it?"Because of climate change," reports the Boston Globe this week, "scientists predict the frequency and intensity of [super] storms will only increase in years to come." Couple that with a forecast for a century of droughts, as recently reported by the New York Times, and we have some potentially serious concerns facing us, and facing our children.If the first time we did something destructive to the land, the land slugged us back, the world would probably be in much better shape today. However, though the Earth has always got around to punishing us eventually, the repercussions have never been immediate. And like little children, we push and push to test those boundaries, but when we push the planet, the planet doesn't hiss. It doesn't cuss us out or take a swing. When we do something that irritates the Earth, the planet reacts slowly. POWERFULLY, but slowly.So we're left to assume we don't affect it. The same goes for the human body. Although it's barely even food at a squint, you could hypothetically survive on fast food alone––and thousands do––for several years before the human body started to shut down. If the effects were immediate, though––say, eat a Big Mac get a belly ––then no one would likely eat Big Mac's. But they're not, the effects are slow. DISASTROUS, but slow.With all the problems we're going to be facing in the next few generations, and in the wake of a terrible drought followed by a devastating storm, I'm simply struggling to make sense of why we all haven't dropped everything, changed our diets and our lifestyles and become more sustainable. Quick. Is it possible we are simply not built to learn from long-term mistakes? Are we (horrifyingly) biologically apathetic to climate change? If we felt the burn from touching the stove several weeks, or months, or even years later... would we ever learn not to touch it? Would we still touch the stove, knowing in a few years it would burn us, or our children? Looking at the shape of the planet right now, and the forecast, I'm terrified of the answer.- Jesse.
image source: this amazing Hurricane Sandy photo essay.
HISTORY LESSONS.
This winter I've been trying to catch up on some reading and lately the theme has seemed to lead to a simple conclusion: you aren't just what you eat, you are, unequivocally, what everyone eats.I'm currently reading Timothy Egan's "The Worst Hard Time," on The Great American Dust Bowl. This is a period of our history when the government pushed Native Americans (masters of husbandry, those guys) off their land and encouraged farmers to move West. Millions of acres were soon plowed on what was traditionally, and naturally, perennial prairie grass. Wheat was planted heavily throughout the late 1920's with the blessing of the government, a booming economy and good weather. Then, suddenly as if by punishment, the economy crumpled and the rains stopped... for nearly 10 years.
Far too many parallels can be drawn between how we were treating the land and the economy in the 20's vs. now––i.e. roaring 20's/Great Depression/Dustbowl vs. Roaring 2000's/Great Recession/Great Drought––and that might not seem so scary if I weren't a farmer now. In a situation like the Dust Bowl, it simply does not matter how one treats the land if everyone around them is plowing it up like idiots (sound familiar?). And we can now throw pesticides, herbicides and fungicides into the mix and arrive at not only the possibility of a brutal air assault, but a lasting and effective attack on our ground water, our local wildlife and our health.Last week, in fact, the New York Times had an article about that very subject, how at least one community in California could no longer drink its water for the poisons it contained from the runoff of a nearby commercial dairy (somehow tainting ground water is legal?). I know a natural farm whose spring––which they rely on entirely for their drinking water––was recently compromised when the neighbors decided to plant their wonderful pastures up the hill to corn, an act which requires loads of herbicide. Herbicide will seep into the soil, then the ground water, then build up in our bodies if we consume it. When we eat anything commercially farmed, we have to acknowledge there is a family somewhere who can't drink their own water because of it. And increasingly, a country that can't either."At present," writes Wendell Berry in a recent piece for the Atlantic, "80 percent of our farmable acreage is planted in annual crops, only 20 percent having the beneficent coverage of perennials. This, by the standard of any healthy ecosystem, is absurdly disproportionate." If we as a culture continue to depend on big agriculture for our food, all food will suffer, because all farmers will suffer. Everyone loses. We need proper husbandry and land practices, absolutely, but we farmers can only do so much. If our neighbors are still getting subsidies and the corn and soybeans are still flying off the shelves (and freezers), they will continue to plant them with gusto. And if mother nature decides she wants to cut the rain for a while (seen any terrifying droughts around lately?), then we might not see a trickle down effect, the effects might just roll over us like dirt in the Dust Bowl. All of us.- Jesse.
WENDELL WEDNESDAY!
Wendell is temporarily having to adjust to life in the big city, but here is a picture from a few weeks ago at his more permanent home in Bugtussle. This was in the midst of a giant leaf pile fight with his new best friend and neighbor Rascal the chihuahua - who can barely be seen in the photo, squashed under Wendell's enormous right foot. I think he's going to be happy here.