Lady Henevere: Year in review

[miss_thenorth]

Ahem.....

Got into an interesting discussion the other day over on this thread, when I asked why some people are stocking up on food. I learned something, because for months now I was thinking that "TSHTF" was some sort of event--nuclear war, Y2K computer system disaster, China invading, sudden zombie apocalypse. Turns out it's not, it's the same old stuff on the news every day: the economy, people losing jobs, wacky weather events, life being hard. Life is hard for a lot of people in a lot of different ways right now, and many people here see stocking up on food as a wise way to prepare for the proverbial rainy day, with the knowledge that the rainy day, this time around, might be more like a major storm, and it might last a long time.

I understand this. I have been poor, scrounging change from my car to buy a burrito at a fast food place down the street, driving a car that only partly worked only part of the time, wondering whether I would be able to pay the rent month after month. It's tough. Putting food by then would have been great, but I wasn't anywhere near the self-sufficient mindset I have now.

But I didn't stay poor. Being poor--and more importantly, being powerless--made me mad. At one point two different things happened that really ticked me off: First, I got fired. A boss who had a crush on me got mad when I started dating someone else and fired me for a completely false reason. Second, I was staying at my mom's apartment since I couldn't pay my own rent after I lost my job, and a load of my laundry was stolen out of the community laundry room. I was furious. I hadn't really had anything stolen from me before and I felt so violated, like someone had intruded on my personal life and stolen part of me. These two things made me really mad, and I wanted a solution; some sort of fix to ensure that it would never happen again.

I decided what I needed was an education. To me, an education was power--the power to leave a job I didn't like, the power to have a needed skill so I wouldn't be fired on a whim, the power of an income high enough that I could have my own washer and dryer and not worry about thugs stealing my things from it.

So I went to school. Still working full time, I went to community college then transferred to a university. I stopped working full time when I had DD (still at the university), and I graduated a year later. I wasn't sure what to do next. I had spent my time in school working in the same industry I was fired from, but I didn't like it and didn't want to pursue a lifelong career in it. But more importantly, I wanted a skill that was clear, defined, and marketable, so I could do my best to never again be financially powerless. I went to graduate school for a very specific degree in a specific field, and today I am working in that field.

On the down side, my industry is tough and requires a lot of work. I spend much of my time inside an office, and I have to answer to other people. I have very little freedom. On the up side I am employed, and my career it is what I make of it: if I put in a lot of time and effort, I get paid better and I get better opportunities. But that leaves little time, and self-sufficiency requires time--time to raise chickens, time to tend the garden, time to can food, time to shop for sales, time to turn the compost, time to check all the watering systems. Between the job and the family, I don't have the kind of time I need to do it right. If I take the time to do it right, I am distracted from my job, I don't do my work well, I become expendable, and things get very hard. TSHTF, so to speak. I don't want to open myself up for that if I can help it.

I make decent money, but not enough that I don't have to worry about it. Economic issues have been weighing heavily on my mind lately. We invited my 15-year-old cousin to stay with us for the summer since she doesn't really have a good home situation. She has been a joy, and when her school situation for this coming semester fell through, we invited her to continue staying with us and she happily accepted. Raising a teenager is expensive, and suddenly I have two. Also, DD is starting high school, which makes me realize that college is right around the corner. I have always wanted to give her a college education and not have her incur debt from student loans like I did (starting adulthood with a big debt burden is the pits). It's not going to be easy, but I will do it if I am able, even if it means I have to retire later.

So when I was reading all those posts about people putting food by to save money as times get harder I was thinking, Is that something I should do? Is saving food important for me? And I think the answer is no. Doing such things is not the best way to spend my time. I think the best way to protect my family (barring a total social meltdown) is to spend my spare time working, saving money for the future or that very long rainy day, and not spending time growing food, canning, and stocking a pantry beyond what's needed to be prepared for a short-term disaster. If I can keep my job by being valuable to my company, I can help my family succeed to the best of my ability, even when times are hard.

So for now I will keep my little fruit trees alive, feed the chickens and hope they don't get sick, and leave the few annual veggies in the garden to nature. If I get something out of the garden this year, fine. If I don't, that's fine too. I just have to live with that for now, and re-assess my plan whenever the situation changes.

And if the zombie apocalypse happens tomorrow, well......I'm just going to have to go hungry.

Please don't let anyone make you feel bad about having a job. Having a job provides for your family. You are sustaining them by working for money to buy what they need. I am assuming you are not spending that money on frivolous things.

So you don't have time to garden or compost or whatever. Evenif you don't enjoy it, if the time you are taking to do that stuff is taking time away from your family---by all means give that time to your family. You don't have to doa ll theose things to be SS. Or maybe reevaluate what SS means to you. Ifyou want to put up for an emergency, no one is going to condemn you for shopping the sales and putting up previoulsy canned goods ( by Delmonte etc) on your shelves. do the SS things that you like to do, find ways that don't take alot of time that you enjoy to save money, increase your skills , just do baby steps with what you are comfortable with.

I must admit I didn't read all the bickering. It gets me down.

Just do what you can, what you enjoy, and excel at your job and at being there for your family.

 

[Lady Henevere]

Wow. What amazing responses. Thank you.

I have to admit that the purpose behind my post was a little defensive. When I asked for an explanation of "TSHTF" on that other thread, I was attacked and accused of lacking empathy, lacking common sense, being a part of the problem, etc. A couple of kind people offered explanations without attacking, which was very nice and helped me realize which part of it I didn't understand, but unfortunately some of the most vocal people on here are the most negative. I wanted to make the point that there are many faces to self sufficiency, whether it's the heavy-duty prepper, the farmer growing enough to support a CSA, the urban scavenger, or even the city girl working to be financially self-sufficient and learning how to can.

For those of you who offered kind comments, thank you. I appreciate them, and I appreciate your understanding.

I may be on here less, focusing on raising my daughter and my cousin (back to school time is so busy!), doing the minimum to build my garden soil and make it look acceptable enough that DH doesn't start talking about replacing it with grass so I have a place to keep a garden when I have more time, and focusing on my work. I'm not giving up on self-sufficiency, just focusing my efforts on what works best for me, in my situation, at this time.

Next project on the radar: 25 cents a pound tomatoes at the pick-your-own farm over labor day weekend -- I'm hoping to can a bunch again this year. (Don't tell DH I said that; we haven't used last year's batch up yet!)

 

[old fashioned]

I'm not giving up on self-sufficiency, just focusing my efforts on what works best for me, in my situation, at this time.

Next project on the radar: 25 cents a pound tomatoes at the pick-your-own farm over labor day weekend -- I'm hoping to can a bunch again this year. (Don't tell DH I said that; we haven't used last year's batch up yet!)

that's all any of us can do.....what works best for us in our own situations!

 

[miss_thenorth]

I'm not giving up on self-sufficiency, just focusing my efforts on what works best for me, in my situation, at this time.

 

[sunsaver]

I hope i was one of the nice ones. :/ If i attacked you i'd like to apologize. I do tend to be somewhat negative and pessimistic. There's nothing easy about self sufficiency, but it beats the heck out of taking orders.

 

[MyKidLuvsGreenEgz]

I hope i was one of the nice ones. :/ If i attacked you i'd like to apologize. I do tend to be somewhat negative and pessimistic. There's nothing easy about self sufficiency, but it beats the heck out of taking orders.

X2

 

[Lady Henevere]

So busy! School starts tomorrow for both kids; I'm looking forward to being back in a regular routine.

My hen Princess Laya (as in "laya lotta eggs") is sick. Pale, taking it easy, not walking around with the other chickens. I have never de-wormed them, and I'm thinking I should. I don't know what else might be wrong with her, and her symptoms are too general for me to find anything useful about it.

Some things in the garden are growing well, despite my neglect. DD has been watering, which helps; we'll see what happens after school starts. On my to do list is to install some type of watering for the trees. I got a quote to have someone else do it a while back and holy cow! I guess it's all on me. Anyway.... The trees have all survived the summer thus far. We have one early apple and one late apple on the cinnamon spice tree -- I hope they're good! I'm really excited about those -- I had no idea apples would ever grow here, I thought it was too hot. But then I discovered a nursery that had heirloom trees and chose ones that had been taken from areas nearby or with similar climates. Hooray for plant diversity! The peach tree did well but all the peaches were stolen. We got a single pluot and a single avocado, both of which disappeared when they were still small. Nothing else has produced fruit this summer, but the pluot, plum, and fig trees are all growing well. The pear and jujube are not doing as well, but they aren't dead either. We'll see what happens with those two as time goes on.

I bought of bunch of mint from the farmers' market and stuck it in a pot with soil -- it's now growing like crazy. (Note to self -- cut off those flowers before they seed the whole area with mint!) A piece of ginger root from the farmer's market is also growing well in a pot -- I think I need to put that in the ground. A couple of sweet potatoes from the farmers' market are growing well in a pot; I can break off those little plants and put them in their own pots or in the ground. The regular potato plants are looking old and wilty; perhaps it is almost time to harvest potatoes. A couple of zucchini plants are doing great, but no zucchini yet. The winter squash plants are small and I will be surprised if we get anything out of them this year. The bean plants are still only a few inches tall and not going anywhere. I realized yesterday that one of my grapevines is enormous -- maybe twelve feet up in a tall hedge. No grapes though. Another grapevine is doing okay beneath the orange tree, another I planted near the lemon tree is dying (bad soil over there), and one I left in a pot is still small and not getting any bigger. I need to put that one in the ground this winter. The blueberry plants I put out front are doing well, but the two I left in the back are not. I think I need to put those in pots so I can better control their soil acidity and moisture. Or maybe I just need to let them go and stick with the lower-maintenance stuff that works for this climate. Maybe that needs to be my garden theme in general.

I'm off to do work and lots of laundry.

 

[AnnaRaven]

I bought of bunch of mint from the farmers' market and stuck it in a pot with soil -- it's now growing like crazy. (Note to self -- cut off those flowers before they seed the whole area with mint!)

Mint can be invasive - it'll spread and take over an area. They spread by runners underground. Your best bet is to plant them in an area that's physically separated from the rest by some kind of barrier.

 

[Lady Henevere]

I bought of bunch of mint from the farmers' market and stuck it in a pot with soil -- it's now growing like crazy. (Note to self -- cut off those flowers before they seed the whole area with mint!)

Mint can be invasive - it'll spread and take over an area. They spread by runners underground. Your best bet is to plant them in an area that's physically separated from the rest by some kind of barrier.

Yes, I have it in a pot. I put some in a stone planter to try to keep it contained, but it just wouldn't grow there. I suppose I should pull up the pot and make sure the roots aren't going into the soil. Thanks!

 

[Britesea]

Or maybe I just need to let them go and stick with the lower-maintenance stuff that works for this climate. Maybe that needs to be my garden theme in general.

Darwinian Gardening FTW!