I had to work my way through this exact thing a few months ago. Times get tough and the world gets overwhelming so you take things day by day or even one step at a time. However, if you pull your view in so close, you can eventually lose track of anything outside of your immediate context and that can become VERY damaging in very real and long-lasting ways.
Regarding the beer and gummy bears...are we the same person?
It's so true. I don't think it's at all new, but I'm sure having access to all worldwide information all the time makes it extra difficult to navigate choices. I go through this in phases. When my kids were much littler I'd get all angsty about salmon. Like, salmon is good for them and their growing brains but I know perfect well how badly ocean fisheries are suffering and how damaging farmed fish can be. Do I feed their brains? What about the fisheries? If the fisheries collapse no matter what choice I make, isn't it better that their brains can help benefit the world somehow when they're grown? And then onto chocolate: I should just let them enjoy the chocolate. There might not be any when they're adults. But what if I'm building in unhealthy habits that won't serve them when they're older? I should moderate their chocolate consumption. It's ridiculous.
Please, yes, always, let's not lose gallows humor. I'm sure that's what kept many of my ancestors going! I freak out about the most idiotic things but it's good to to be able to laugh about them. One of my life mottos is: "Blessed are we who can laugh at ourselves, for we shall never cease to be amused" (it was on the cover of a journal I bought in college, credited to "Anonymous").
In my 57 years on the planet, I attribute my ability to cope with some extraordinary stuff and subsequent resiliency to two things: meditation and gallows humor. If I had to eliminate one, it'd be the meditation.
It's got to be that. I've been doing about 2%, which is what all my sauerkraut friends say, but it really does keep spoiling. I thought I had it figured out when I was krauting cabbage that was a few weeks old (and maybe low in moisture) but nope, the two most recent batches didn't work either. I am taking your suggestion!
I guess the good news is the pea plants are doing insanely well?
"Pick cabbage on a nice fall day, after the dew has dried." Antique or not, I already love this book! One thing I find about books like that is that even if some of the techniques are out of date, they can have really good explanations for why things work or don't.
But also I haven't been pounding it. Sounds like that might be a factor? I just squash it a lot with my hands until a good amount of moisture comes out, and then pack it into jars and use fermentation weights. But it is clearly not working so I'm going to try your method next time around.
I love that book! The only thing I've ever actually tried was the salted green beans ... which were fine. If you needed to get through a winter. But I love owning it. Makes me feel like I'm ready if called ...
Pounding should help with the kraut. It breaks up the cell walls. I never get quite enough liquid with just pounding alone, so I usually top up with some water, which also helps all the salt and lactobacillus to move around ...
You've reminded me of why my spouse and I bought Country Wisdom & Know-How many years ago (https://www.akpress.org/countrywisdomandknowhow.html). I mean, I don't plan on eating woodchuck but it's good to know I can figure out how if needed?
My mom always made wonderful pickled green beans growing up. I still like those. And last year we pickled garlic scapes, which I've really enjoyed through the winter.
Pounding plus water plus double the salt -- I've got a cabbage coming in a farm share soon, so will be on it!
"Yes, but what if the planet and our systems all fall apart and there’s no point to any of this anyway?"
I think, maybe, because we (over the last two decades) have so much more access to the world at large than we ever have as humans, we are reaching a sort of limit to what we can be emotionally invested in. The challenges of our generation, but really the future generations, are going to be unlike anything mankind has ever reckoned with. Global in scale and, eventually, unavoidably so.
I don't know if we as creatures will be able to mentally reprogram. I know I can't, it's too late for me. It's overwhelming. I see all the problems the planet is facing and I know there's very little I can do individually; reprogramming myself is pointless. But future generations, growing up in a different world, may not feel this way.
(By the way, I wished I'd had a camera of any kind during this thunderstorm the other night, it was truly magnificent, but I was delighted to see that our host's kids--teenagers, all--were taking photos with disposable cameras, which I don't think I knew you could even buy anymore.)
I am really trying to come to terms with this. I'm 45 years old, a solid Gen X-er, who grew up with no television or telephone and had my first reliable email address in my mid-20s. I try *very* hard to adapt to the online firehose news reality.
But there was a quote from a 1980s memoir that I sent my sister once, that I can't remember the exactly wording of, but it was something along the lines of, "I believe the human heart can bear anything but it's capacity to actively care in the immediate moment is limited." Actually, it might have been the converse of that, that our capacity to care is infinite, but to absorb and process damage is limited in the moment. Something like that.
In other words, the human heart is infinitely caring. But what it can direct that care towards is limited in any given moment. I sometimes think the current problem is, possibly, that there is so much to care about we don't know how to direct our energies.
Seriously I think I could write about thistles and knapweed *forever.* But would have nothing new to say. They are making me a little crazy because I can see all the happy flower buds on them now and know I won't be able to cut every last one in time, and even if I could, now I see the same things all over town and am constantly like "We could just stop financing wars and use the money to employ people to eradicate thistle and knapweed and that would be a really good thing and also take many years!"
My Himself is also a soldier in the knapweed wars ... and then gets SO bummed driving back from his cabin when there are whole neglected FIELDS of it.
And I have an ancient short story, one of the 1st things I ever wrote, about getting stranded in 6 foot tall thistles on my grandmother's farm as a kid ... they are my lifelong sworn enemy.
Please tell Himself that I feel strong solidarity today! It's just *everywhere* and it's very disheartening.
I would love to read that story! The thistles are awful. They practically carpet our yard. I did have very effective lawnmowing goats one year, but it's an expensive way to try to eradicate thistles. Cute, though :)
Have you tried beheading them? You can go along with a trash bag and a pair of clippers and take the flowers off before they go to seed, and eventually, they're supposed to die back ...
It's my next strategy. There are just *so many.* Without kids + a job I could probably just do that full-time. Going to be away the rest of the week, but maybe I can start paying the kids a little coin to go out and snip a bunch.
Wonderful! I was curious. When I first glanced at the podcast I thought it was with Kathryn Aalto, whose book Writing Wild (https://www.kathrynaalto.com/books) is also an anthology of women writing on nature. (She's American but lives in London, so I realized my mistake when I heard Katharine speak!)
Feels like the balance is somewhere between "life is short, eat the damn chili dog" and "dude, you gotta eat something other than chili dogs", right?
That is it exactly. Insert "gummy bears" or "beer" for me and yup, nails the tension exactly.
I had to work my way through this exact thing a few months ago. Times get tough and the world gets overwhelming so you take things day by day or even one step at a time. However, if you pull your view in so close, you can eventually lose track of anything outside of your immediate context and that can become VERY damaging in very real and long-lasting ways.
Regarding the beer and gummy bears...are we the same person?
😂🍻
It's so true. I don't think it's at all new, but I'm sure having access to all worldwide information all the time makes it extra difficult to navigate choices. I go through this in phases. When my kids were much littler I'd get all angsty about salmon. Like, salmon is good for them and their growing brains but I know perfect well how badly ocean fisheries are suffering and how damaging farmed fish can be. Do I feed their brains? What about the fisheries? If the fisheries collapse no matter what choice I make, isn't it better that their brains can help benefit the world somehow when they're grown? And then onto chocolate: I should just let them enjoy the chocolate. There might not be any when they're adults. But what if I'm building in unhealthy habits that won't serve them when they're older? I should moderate their chocolate consumption. It's ridiculous.
I'm passing this along to my sons. Thank you for your clear writing and gallows humor. It's sustaining.
Please, yes, always, let's not lose gallows humor. I'm sure that's what kept many of my ancestors going! I freak out about the most idiotic things but it's good to to be able to laugh about them. One of my life mottos is: "Blessed are we who can laugh at ourselves, for we shall never cease to be amused" (it was on the cover of a journal I bought in college, credited to "Anonymous").
In my 57 years on the planet, I attribute my ability to cope with some extraordinary stuff and subsequent resiliency to two things: meditation and gallows humor. If I had to eliminate one, it'd be the meditation.
😂 HARD SAME
More salt! The general rule is 3-5% by weight, so if your kraut is failing, I'd up the salt. And maybe pound it more?
As for the rest. Yes. All of this.
It's got to be that. I've been doing about 2%, which is what all my sauerkraut friends say, but it really does keep spoiling. I thought I had it figured out when I was krauting cabbage that was a few weeks old (and maybe low in moisture) but nope, the two most recent batches didn't work either. I am taking your suggestion!
I guess the good news is the pea plants are doing insanely well?
Salt preserves! and keeps the cooties away ... I usually shred everything, weigh it, then do the salt calculation and pound it all in with the blunt end of a fat rolling pin. I learned a lot from this odd book (although I don't actually preserve much using their methods, because ... antique?) https://www.google.com/books/edition/Preserving_Food_without_Freezing_or_Cann/hanf1CdMvbUC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=french+preserving+traditional+methods&printsec=frontcover
"Pick cabbage on a nice fall day, after the dew has dried." Antique or not, I already love this book! One thing I find about books like that is that even if some of the techniques are out of date, they can have really good explanations for why things work or don't.
But also I haven't been pounding it. Sounds like that might be a factor? I just squash it a lot with my hands until a good amount of moisture comes out, and then pack it into jars and use fermentation weights. But it is clearly not working so I'm going to try your method next time around.
I love that book! The only thing I've ever actually tried was the salted green beans ... which were fine. If you needed to get through a winter. But I love owning it. Makes me feel like I'm ready if called ...
Pounding should help with the kraut. It breaks up the cell walls. I never get quite enough liquid with just pounding alone, so I usually top up with some water, which also helps all the salt and lactobacillus to move around ...
You've reminded me of why my spouse and I bought Country Wisdom & Know-How many years ago (https://www.akpress.org/countrywisdomandknowhow.html). I mean, I don't plan on eating woodchuck but it's good to know I can figure out how if needed?
My mom always made wonderful pickled green beans growing up. I still like those. And last year we pickled garlic scapes, which I've really enjoyed through the winter.
Pounding plus water plus double the salt -- I've got a cabbage coming in a farm share soon, so will be on it!
"Yes, but what if the planet and our systems all fall apart and there’s no point to any of this anyway?"
I think, maybe, because we (over the last two decades) have so much more access to the world at large than we ever have as humans, we are reaching a sort of limit to what we can be emotionally invested in. The challenges of our generation, but really the future generations, are going to be unlike anything mankind has ever reckoned with. Global in scale and, eventually, unavoidably so.
I don't know if we as creatures will be able to mentally reprogram. I know I can't, it's too late for me. It's overwhelming. I see all the problems the planet is facing and I know there's very little I can do individually; reprogramming myself is pointless. But future generations, growing up in a different world, may not feel this way.
(By the way, I wished I'd had a camera of any kind during this thunderstorm the other night, it was truly magnificent, but I was delighted to see that our host's kids--teenagers, all--were taking photos with disposable cameras, which I don't think I knew you could even buy anymore.)
I am really trying to come to terms with this. I'm 45 years old, a solid Gen X-er, who grew up with no television or telephone and had my first reliable email address in my mid-20s. I try *very* hard to adapt to the online firehose news reality.
But there was a quote from a 1980s memoir that I sent my sister once, that I can't remember the exactly wording of, but it was something along the lines of, "I believe the human heart can bear anything but it's capacity to actively care in the immediate moment is limited." Actually, it might have been the converse of that, that our capacity to care is infinite, but to absorb and process damage is limited in the moment. Something like that.
In other words, the human heart is infinitely caring. But what it can direct that care towards is limited in any given moment. I sometimes think the current problem is, possibly, that there is so much to care about we don't know how to direct our energies.
Still true: I would read a regular column with this title! The one about thistles and knapweed will be widely shared because YOU ARE NOT ALONE.
Seriously I think I could write about thistles and knapweed *forever.* But would have nothing new to say. They are making me a little crazy because I can see all the happy flower buds on them now and know I won't be able to cut every last one in time, and even if I could, now I see the same things all over town and am constantly like "We could just stop financing wars and use the money to employ people to eradicate thistle and knapweed and that would be a really good thing and also take many years!"
My Himself is also a soldier in the knapweed wars ... and then gets SO bummed driving back from his cabin when there are whole neglected FIELDS of it.
And I have an ancient short story, one of the 1st things I ever wrote, about getting stranded in 6 foot tall thistles on my grandmother's farm as a kid ... they are my lifelong sworn enemy.
Please tell Himself that I feel strong solidarity today! It's just *everywhere* and it's very disheartening.
I would love to read that story! The thistles are awful. They practically carpet our yard. I did have very effective lawnmowing goats one year, but it's an expensive way to try to eradicate thistles. Cute, though :)
Have you tried beheading them? You can go along with a trash bag and a pair of clippers and take the flowers off before they go to seed, and eventually, they're supposed to die back ...
It's my next strategy. There are just *so many.* Without kids + a job I could probably just do that full-time. Going to be away the rest of the week, but maybe I can start paying the kids a little coin to go out and snip a bunch.
Thank you, Nia. I also listened to Katharine Norbury on Scotland Outdoors! Her book will be available in the State come October.
Wonderful! I was curious. When I first glanced at the podcast I thought it was with Kathryn Aalto, whose book Writing Wild (https://www.kathrynaalto.com/books) is also an anthology of women writing on nature. (She's American but lives in London, so I realized my mistake when I heard Katharine speak!)
Kathryn Aalto’s book is wonderful, and she contributed to Katharine Norbury’s as well!
Oh, fantastic!
That actually sounds like a whole lot of fun and what a great title Magick is!