Just this. Somewhere in the last 30 years or so, we
lost our ability to Pay Attention. Too often, we rely on someone else to
tell us how or what to think or how to do things, and exchange "virtual
life" for real life. A good example of this was my (ex) husband watching
the Sunday morning fishing shows religiously. On beautiful Sunday
mornings, I’d see him in front of the TV, taking NOTES on the type of
line/bait/lure to use and when/how to fish. I’d look out the window at the
lovely day and think how pretty the sunshine was sparkling off of the LAKE
that was less than 300 ft from our door, where his tackle box quietly
collected dust. Insanity.
Going out for the day? Better check the weather
channel to see what it’s gonna do. Of course you could also LOOK OUT THE
WINDOW.
Crazy.
Once you get onto the farm, it’s a different story.
There are no indicator lights on livestock, or little printed directions
on each sprout in the garden.
You will have to Pay Attention.
Having every piece of equipment or tool you could
ever use will not help you if you don’t keep it clean, dry, maintained and
somewhere you can find it when you need it.
Every time you feed your livestock, pay attention to
the feed. Does it smell fresh? Do the animals have access to plenty of
good clean water? How does each and every one of your critters look? Are
they standing funny? Moving slower than usual? Coughing, sniffling,
panting, having normal stools? Are they too fat, or too skinny? All of the
animals we use as livestock are pretty far down on the food chain, and if
you remember your National Geographic specials, they will APPEAR healthy
till they are pretty much dead. This keeps them from being singled out of
the herd and into the predator buffet until it’s a certainty that they are
not going to get well. Therefore, once your animal looks obviously
ailing, it’s gonna be a long row to hoe to get it healthy, if it can be
done at all.
Now, the above is not nearly as time consuming as
you’d think, even if you have livestock numbering in the hundreds.
Remember the first few times you drove a car (or the last time you tried
it impaired in some way). Staring at the steering wheel, belted in,
mentally checking off every little step to turning on the vehicle and
getting onto the road. Of course, now you do it without thinking
(starting the car, that is, not driving impaired - that’s BAD - don’t do
it), and the same will be true about checking your stock. After just a
short while, your head and eyes will be checking stock while the rest of
you is engaged otherwise. Any little variation from "normal" will stop you
in your tracks.
The same holds true for your garden. Check every
little plantlet every day. Are they green and happy looking? Are they
wilty? Turning brown? Fuzzy looking? Do you see bugs on them (even a few -
since there is truly no such thing as ‘a few bugs’)? Catching a problem
early is vital to gardening success since you can lose an entire crop
literally overnight if defensive measures are not taken immediately (I
prove this to myself year after year after year…)
Being in tune with the weather when you have a
homestead is much more than tucking an umbrelly into your car on your way
to work. Most of the work to be done on a farm is outside. Your individual
climate will teach you when you need to do things. Learning to work when
it’s the cool part of the day in the summer and the warm part of the day
in the winter will save your patience, your sanity and your health, and
again, once you’ve done it awhile deliberately, you will naturally adjust
your schedule. As if by magic, your day will flow from inside to out with
the temperature (without one look at the Weather Channel), and one day you
will wake up JUST BECAUSE IT’S MORNING, and not when the alarm clock
sounds.
Congratulations. You are a
homesteader.
I think our society has it
backwards. The assumption is that because our brains are so big, and
capable of processing and storing so much information, that we need to
throw huge amounts of data at it at all times to keep us "sharp".
Bigger, brighter, louder, is
better in such an ever-growing cacophony of sense-numbing images and
sounds that it’s a wonder we aren’t all on the ground having sensory
overload seizures.
Maybe, just maybe
Our brains are large to be
able to soak up details. Tiny little things that make a huge difference to
our lives and our souls.
