It has been established that I am fairly crazy. My crazy has several different forms that it can take, but in this current manifestation there are four important factors causing the perfect storm of crazy.
- Food
I am obsessed with food. In the way that only someone who has struggled with weight and body image can be. I’ve felt uncomfortable about my body since third grade when that little boy called me Thunder Thighs. I could write posts and posts about my struggles with being comfortable in my skin but for the purpose of brevity let’s just say they are present but not specifically relevant to my current crazy. Food’s role in my current crazy is that I have decided that I want to eat a plant-based diet. I have tried this before with varying degrees of success, but I feel compelled to try again. My ongoing food issues muck up the works because for me nothing can be as simple as choosing beans instead of beef. I need to over analyze my food choices until my head feels like it’s going to explode. Some days I wish I could give up eating and try that liquid mineral mix. Or just treat food as what it is – fuel, not the decision upon which rests the fate of the world (or my waistline). - My children’s safety
There has been a lot in the news about Monsanto. There hasn’t been enough. With an anger enough to again fill multiple posts I will just say this: We cannot blindly trust a corporation with their financial interests in mind to have our heath under its control. After all we ARE what we eat. I am not denying the need for scientific advancement, but not with my tomatoes. Which brings me to… - Gardening
It’s spring. As I mentioned in my last post, Spring always convinces me I am invincible. We live on just over an acre here on the river. In winter, it’s a quiet snowy yard. In spring, it’s an acre of promise and possibility. This is where the Spring Symposium from the New Hampshire Master Gardeners Association comes into play. A yard full of perennials? I can do that! A garden big enough to feed my family all year round? Let’s do it! I’ve got the perfect spot for a hoop house.
It was the speaker after lunch who put the nail in my crazy coffin. His name is John Forti and you can find him at his website or on Facebook. We were lucky enough to listen to his Edible Gardening lecture and when he finished talking I was fairly certain that we can save the world, one garden at a time. - Time
This is the last and most important factor in my perfect storm. More specifically, the lack of time. I have been working roughly 1000 times my normal hours. Okay, that may be an exaggeration, but I’ve been working a lot lately. This week those hours include two hours of commuting time.
Can we just talk for a minute about how ambitious I am when I can’t do anything about it? The car has always been my best spot for brainstorming. Unfortunately, (or fortunately depending on what ridiculous project I’m planning) I leave my motivation on the road. So all the hours of NOT being able to do anything only makes me think of all the things I COULD be doing. And you know as well as I do that keeping me from something increases my desire to do it. So these working hours are doing nothing but elevating the idea of being out in the garden to mythic status.
So where does this leave me? Honestly, it leaves me frustrated, overwhelmed and really, really tired. It leaves me wanting to do everything all at once and nothing at all. It leaves me sitting on the couch late at night looking up “small farms for sale in NH” on the internet. I need a plan.
My plan cannot be to turn over the entire acre and plant heirloom vegetables. It also can’t be to find a hole and stick my head in it. I need to find a happy medium. Happy medium is not my strong suit. But I need to remind myself that I’m not going to change the world, or even my yard over night, or even in one season. I need to make small lasting changes. This probably applies to all four points to my crazy crown. Baby steps, right?
Sometimes it helps me to take a deep breath, drink a cup of coffee and write it all down. By committing it to paper (or computer) it stops it from swirling around aimlessly in my head. With a little rational thought, I can make this work. I’m sure of it. The plan will come, I’ve still got lots of unusable hours in the car this week.
River Ramblings 