Free-Range Living

‘Wrong Road Running - ?’

‘It’s no use running, if on the wrong road ---- ‘ So says the saying of German origin, implying that taking ‘wrong roads' is a possibility, and even that humanity could be on them - ? If that could be the case, then it’s probably effective if a ‘stop and consider’ move is undertaken, with a willingness to accept that a ‘wrong turn’ may have been taken, rather than, say, re-doubling running efforts, reminding maybe of the old quote ‘fanatacism is the re-doubling of efforts towards the same goal’. 

Much of modern western-style life has plainly been heavily commercialised with the overall assumptive goals of ‘wealth and power’, rather than, say, 'community well-being', the emphasis being sharply on individual gain, but seemingly resulting in quite a few difficulties and problems. Some countries seem to build more 'social well-being' into their societies, thinking particularly of the Scandinavian countries - Finland, Denmark and Norway in particular, which always seem to come pretty high up in the world's happiest countries list ----. In the UK there’s been a strong idealogical-based trend of ‘privatisation’, including of national key assets such as energy, travel and water, but producing real problems in all these areas, and probably needing the ‘stop and think’ treatment rather than, say, ‘re-fervoured’ privatisation pushes - ? (latest Aug '23 - a majority of British citizens are in favour of public services such as water, energy, national transport being nationalised rather then in private hands, according to recent survey results)

The growing season kicks off -------

Ah well, fundamental stuff, and ‘all grist to the mill’, as it were, but with important ‘fundamental stuff’ to consider here on the organic eco micro-holding (small smallholding) in the UK midlands area. In March, there was snow lying on the ground , with some onion sets (‘baby onions’) and early potatoes in the ground, under covers. There are broad beans emerging, along with a row planted last October and now (end of March) nearly a third of a metre high and in flower, which have been knocked sideways a bit by recent frosts, but being a hardy crop, have survived, and should provide a nice feed or two of beans early on in the ‘hungry gap’ April to June period.

 The spring planted maincrop of broad beans is currently being planted out, after emerging having been sown in buckets of soil covered in glass sheets (anti mice damage) in the top glass house, to then hopefully provide an early crop, which they generally do, then beating the bean blackfly foe. As they are a legume crop, as are peas, they have the advantage of fixing a plant nutrient, nitrogen, into the soil, as well as providing, when spent, quite a lot of green material for the compost heap. Getting the crop early also means it’s feasible to grow another crop – often winter greens – in the same patch of ground after the bean crop. All in all a pretty useful crop – a mainstay of the place – and those early young beans are just, delicious ----

There's a few pots of seedlings in the top glasshouse, well covered, and coming on well. There's celery, lettuce, onions, tomatoes, red cabbage, 'green' cabbage and calabrese, all lending good promise to the coming growing season. Some have to be got underway early - onion plants for instance - in order to get a decent crop later. The veg growing ground is 'ready and waiting', with this year's woodash and compost having been delivered to the half the area due for it the latter half of February. The compost is two year's old, like fine, rich soil so can just be spread on the top of the soil, then it's a 'no dig' system, the black loam earth just being 'opened' be fork leverage to plant stuff, or just Dutch hoed to make a seedbed to sow seeds. Preparation of the growing area adds to 'hope and expectations' for a productive growing season.

'Economic energy ---- '

The 'mainfuel' wood looks like just about lasting the winter out, to say mid-April, which is also, according to a phone call the other night, the due date for next year's wood to appear on the driveway, then to be wheelbarrowed by degrees into the 'logs-istics' centre and deposited in the woodstore area. As in most areas, the price of it has risen , but then the wood that's supplied from the micro-holding's own supplies on site (about a third of the total supply), is cost-free, so diluting the overall cost of wood provision, a useful move, and one illustrating the value of a self-reliant or semi self-reliant lifestyle. The other 'useful move' is of course the air-source heat pump, which has been performing admirably in its tenth trouble-free season here at the organic micro-holding in the uk midlands,  aided and abetted by the solar panel installation, which even in winter is often producing enough home-generated electricity to run it -two day living rooms heated for 'free', ------ and cooling the planet too ----

Charges for electric (and gas) here in the UK have effectively doubled due, it's said, to world events in the last year - that's a hefty 100% increase which has been, and still is, quite a threat to many households, and small businesses, along with food costs rising at a hefty 18% inflation rate - it's then maybe not too surprising that, again here in the UK, many groups of workers have had to resort to strike action to try to ensure adequate 'survivability'. The large energy companies have made massive profits -billions - which hasn't sat too well generally with people facing such rapidly inflationary  'threatening' conditions. From a 'freeranger' type of perspective, it can seem at times that things are these days arranged more to suit and benefit the powerful 'large' outfits, and their profits, rather than any moves to foster good societies in which people can thrive and prosper - ? Maybe, a 'wrong road' taken - ?

'Money, money, money --- '

 A group of chief executives from the business world more or less said the same in a group letter back along to a UK broadsheet paper, suggesting that the business world had become too preoccupied chasing 'maximum profits', and needed to broaden their remit to take in, say, their role and contribution to society. Maybe the role and place of money too needs an overhaul, in that 'money focus' may have become just a little too pervasive. The British comic actor, John Cleese, could have been thinking along these lines when he stated awhile back:

 'money has spoilt everything'.

 Bill Byson, the American author who lived for quite awhile in the UK, could too have been on the same line :

' We used to build civilisations; now we build shopping malls' 

The 'limited dimensional' aspect of the 'money angle' approach presumably leads to what some call the 'dumbing down' of society, aiming more at 'self serving small self' level, than, say, public service 'bigger self' operation, and maybe a trend that's not too surprising given the modern strong 'self focus' trend - ? The  strong focus on money making may too well be a factor in cultural trends and aims being 'lowered', as it were ---- ?

'Big - itis ---- ?'

'Big business' has noticably in recent times been fairly preoccupied with making maximum profits and using its 'economies of scale' war-cry as a sort of justification, all of which might just have led to a too narrow focus in terms of 'real life' awareness - ? (another 'limited road' - ?).  Smaller rural sector business operators identified awhile back, for instance, that 'profit maximisation' was the objective area that most conflicted with an array of other important areas ('care for the environment' for instance).  

There have been quite a few actual examples of 'profit maximisation' focus causing problems in society -one of the most recent here in the UK was the generally unloved large energy companies forcibly putting many poorer households onto electric meter sysytems and then charging a higher rate for their electricity, so the firms concerned than make higher profits - a practice that's been labelled as 'corporate bullying'.

The mis-use of power is presumably likely to be an on-going issue with so many large organisations in existence, with protection for the 'prey', the 'small', not seeming to be quite so prevalent these days. In older times, in the UK, small farm milk producers for instance were being 'taken to the cleaners' by large, powerful milk wholesale buyers. The UK government intervened to protect the small producers, creating in effect a producers' coop organisation large enough to effectively counter the power of the buyers.

In recent times the same has happened with the smaller producers again facing 'large power' resulting in lowered product prices and many producers going out of business. No central intervention or protection though, in these 'free market' geared times. (the 'free market' concept was likely based on the economists 'perfect market' model, in which supply and demand worked 'naturally' to product the 'perfect' equilibrium price). Was this a move by big business to order the world 'in their own image' by eliminating 'unbeloved' (i.e.to 'big business') 'pesky' small business, in which case from a social and an 'independence' perspective, another 'wrong road' taken - ?

'The many ---or the few ---- ?'

 The 'big' difference was that the perfect market was one with 'many buyers and sellers', with no-one, or no group, big enough to affect its working, whereas the 'free-market' appears operate without this important constraint, then to be a 'free-for-all' market, with lots of large predators predating off the 'small' (a 'bullying' charter -ref. the often poor customer relations record of large outfits - ?) Many, if not most, UK vet small local practices are now for instance, owned by large fund groupings. Such a 'false' reality - a free market but with a key restraint ('many buyers and sellers') not in place, so facilitating 'predator' conditions, represents a real threat to individuals and their freedoms, and no doubt to democracy itself in the longer term. Size, that is big size, can be automatically associated with 'superiority' but may it be an easy trap to fall into? There is in actuality no law that says 'big' is 'better' or 'best' and plenty of instances in history when it's been shown not to be. Some, such as Robert Pirsig (Zen and the Art of --- '), have argued the reverse, that small in the form of the individual, is the repositary of 'quality', with then presumably 'big' more associated with 'quantity.

'It's ok not to be a fan of capitalism --- '

Especially maybe, when 'ordinary folk' appear to be getting the 'thin end of the wedge' - ? The same sentiment's expressed in a recent book by Bernie Saunders, a former US presidential candidate. It may be that capitalism per se isn't a problem, and in terms of harnessing peoples' energy and talents, quite a few may well argue for it - the problems could be more associated with 'unbridled' capitalism, with its plethora of large 'predatory' firms, and particularly too when a society's key individual/society balance gets 'out of kilter' - ?

The micro-holding lifestyle here in the UK midlands has stood up reasonably well to the rampaging price inflation of recent times (food costs inflation a hefty 18% currently in the UK), and can be adapted further to provide that bit more protection from 'economic 'ravaging''. There's generally fresh vegatbles to pick most of the year plus often salad stuffs which are particularly useful in the summer months. Potatoes are normally available for six months of the year and a full year's supply of onions is often grown.

A mesh netting tunnel has recently arrived on site under which carrots should now thrive - without protection they've been a problem due to the carrot fly pest. More roots in the form of parsnips and turnips can now be grown, and the more recent leek problem with the alium leaf miner fly pest seems to have been at least partly combatted by growing leeks in separate small beds rather than in one bigger bed.

Maybe there'll be more uptake of the self-reliant type of lifestyles, as people act to protect themselves from 'the system', one aspect of it though - high property prices and high rental charges - maybe being a bit of a stumbling block to be in then a position to take self-protective measures - ? It's not too bad a feeling to be able to act 'freerange-ly' to self-protect by counteracting to some extent the ravages of current 'system' economic trends - maybe the 'freerange' self-reliant, self-responsible approach will be more needed, with inventive 'freeranger-type' solutions providing some solace for good ol' 'honest-to God', 'down-to earth' folk - ?