Adapt & Endure: Is This Our Future?

 President Obama announced that his administration is launching seven "Climate Hubs", mostly throughout the Southern US, to help ranchers and farmers deal with the impact of climate change. It is important to understand that the government has long had a role of using science & research efforts to assist and guide farmers. It was the change from straight line plowing to contour plowing (in which the farmer follows the landscape more) that helped mitigate some of the worst effects of the Dust Bowl. These new Climate Hubs are going to focus on ensuring food production remains at acceptable levels despite intense storms, droughts, and subzero temperatures.

This is a tall order. Let's talk about what it means for the home gardener. I believe that the days where growing some or all of your own food won't just be a hobby or a political statement: it's going to be a necessity for anyone who wants to eat well, regularly, on a budget.

There are several factors to consider when we're thinking about what to plant. It's easy to let habit guide us: if our family grew tomatoes and lettuce, we grow tomatoes and lettuce. But we can look a little further into things. What crops will grow best in your garden? I'm not sure the Zone System is enough of a guide when it comes to choosing appropriate crops. You want to examine whatever information there is available about how hardy the plants are. Can they handle a little drought? What happens if you get an early cold snap? If you can't find this information on the seed packets, go online and do some research.

Other factors to include is how productive the crops are, and how you're going to store and use the food. This is an area I've struggled with, personally: over the coming year, I have to become much more adept with my canner, as well as expanding my freezing and drying efforts. Sometimes you can get overwhelmed with how much produce you wind up with: this is the time to be mindful things don't go to waste.

Part of the story about the Climate Hubs said we were going to need to adapt our practices if we were going to be able to endure our changing future. One way that we may need to adapt is rethinking how we garden. Container gardening, vertical gardening, hydroponics: these may all have a role in how you feed yourself and your family. The smart use of greenhouses to extend the growing season may become much more vital if we're seeing longer, colder winters.

What do you see being important for the gardens of the future?

There's Always More Than One Solution To Any Problem

My hubby and I were on the road the other day when we saw the scene in the picture playing out. Talk about re-defining the meaning of the words "Tractor Trailer"!

There's always more than one solution to any problem. We need to remember that. These farmers, for example, needed to move the trailer - a job that is by no means inexpensive when you do it through 'traditional' methods - hiring a big rig moving company. But they used the resources they had on hand, some teamwork, and accomplished their mission.

One way we can start reclaiming our economic power is to start practicing solving problems for ourselves. Rather than default to calling in the pros, do you have the skills, ability, creativity, or resources to fix the problem yourself?

You might not need to move a house trailer - but you might need to fix the dripping kitchen faucet or do some other home repair. Taking on these tasks, you may find yourself surprised with what you can actually do for yourself! Get in the habit of appointing yourself your first go-to repair company. After a year, you'll be amazed at what you've done, and how much money you've saved.

Points of Post-Consumerist Philosophy

Buy less, do more. We are impoverishing ourselves, individually and as a nation, buying things we don't need and don't actually want. If you have closets, garages, and storage lockers full of stuff you're not using, you don't need any more stuff!

Educate yourself continually. Ignorance makes you vulnerable. It is easy for people to take advantage of you, rip you off, and abuse your rights when you're not informed. Choosing to be ignorant means saying "Here, other people in the world! Why don't you run my life for me?"

Depend as little as possible on others. No man is an island, and it's impossible to do everything in this world entirely on your own. However, you should be very mindful of what you're choosing to have other people do for you. You may be better off doing it for yourself.

Make purchases mindfully. An aware consumer makes better choices than a consumer who is functioning on auto-pilot. Think about what you buy, where you're buying it, and why you're buying it. Make sure your purchases are in alignment with your belief systems. Think about what things cost to produce and market: if you're paying an exceptionally low price for something, you can be sure that someone else is paying dearly, generally in terms of their labor/quality of life.

Make creativity central to your life. We were given imaginations for a reason. Creativity is as vital to our well being as physical exercise. It doesn't matter if you never 'learned' how to be creative: something as a simple doodle can be the gateway to an innovative solution to a tough problem. Humanity survived & thrives because it is innovative and has the ability to transcend history, seeing beyond what has always been done. This power is inside each of us: don't think it belongs to ivory-tower academics and government think tanks. But you have to use it, or you will lose it.

The Autodidact Alternative: Best Practices

I believe that education is a life long process, and that attending college shouldn't be. Education empowers us. The more we know, the better decisions we can make. The more we know, the more enjoyment we get out of the world.

Every moment of every day should be devoted to either enjoying your life or improving it.That means education is essential. When we can afford to have other people teach us, we have to teach ourselves.

Here are some best practices to help make that happen:

• It is more important to listen than it is to talk. Make a point of shutting up and give your attention to what other people have to say regularly. If you actually listen to what's being said around you, you can learn an amazing amount of stuff.
• Take steps to remember what you've learned. When you learn something new, tell someone else about it. Write it down in a journal. Blog about it. Think about it when you go for a walk or work out. Turn the idea over in your head. We don't necessarily remember things automatically. It takes effort, repetition and time spent with a new concept for it to 'sink in'.
• It takes time to learn stuff. Give yourself time. We live in an instant-access world, where every bit of information available is just a click away. We have developed very unhealthy expectations of instant comprehension and instant understanding. People think very, very fast - but I'm not sure that thinking fast necessarily equals thinking well. Practice developing your attention span.
• Let your interests be your guide. It is easier to educate yourself when the pursuit is fun. If you're slogging through something because you feel like you have to, there's a layer of resentment and frustration built in that's not helping you. This is your life. Focus on learning the stuff you personally find fascinating.
• Question everything. When you're reading a book, research the author. Are they well-regarded? There are different schools of thought within every discipline. Don't just latch on to the first one you encounter and regard that as the absolute truth: try to familiarize yourself with many different voices to expand your understanding. 

Three Thoughts About Technology

On Morning Joe this morning, it was reported that there's now inpatient treatment available for internet addiction. Wikipedia tells us that internet addiction is excessive computer use that interferes with daily life. Joe seems to think that this is a problem largely for children and grandchildren, but I'd argue that some parents and grandparents are struggling with this issue as well. People don't know what to do if they're not online.

One of the stats I use a lot at work is that more than  half of us have added checking Facebook to our daily routine. Even before we have our coffee, we're going online to see what has happened in our family & friend's lives. It's so important to observe other people's lives - when do we have time to live our own?

Thought number two: there was a tremendous rainstorm here last night, with thunder and lightning and torrential rain for a short period of time. Our power stayed on. But it made me think about the amount of knowledge we all store on electronic devices. Books work when the power goes out. The computer doesn't.

Obviously, the ultimate place to store knowledge is inside your head. That's portable, always accessible, and doesn't take up storage space. But we all have limited capacity. I certainly don't remember everything I need to remember to maintain our household on a typical day. It's smart to have a low-tech copy of all vital information, in case the power does go out.

Third. The first thing I saw on the TV this morning was Feed The Children's infomercial, raising money to provide for American children living in poverty. Later on, on the news, I saw a story about the millions of Syrian refugees, including the unprecedented level of children, who are living in camps. 
So much of survivalist philosophy & education is centered in a hunker-down mentality; I wonder if there's not a need to prepare yourself to live as well as possible if you have to take your family on the road and flee whatever bad thing has happened. We need to have a conversation about moving away from warfare, natural disasters, even economic dead zones.

Technology can help us access economic resources no matter where we are (assuming one can access the web) so I'm no Luddite - there's no need to throw the baby out with the bathwater - but we need to use tech to lift us out of poverty & improve our circumstances; not saddle us with addictions and keep us from being successful.