Garden Pictures

As requested, some pictures of the garden...
Peas climbing the fence

Beans and turnips

The raspberry patch

The blueberry patch

Bee hives in the orchard, looking up toward the house

Mom and Aunt by a corn bed

A garden cat

The squash bed

The parsnip that ate Chicago

View over corn beds to broccoli

Beets, carrots and cucumbers growing beneath the corn

Broccoli!

By the way, this place is for sale. 3 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath, daylight basement with garage and lots of storage, about 2000 square feet. Set up for passive solar heating, wood stove, on about 2 acres with year round pond.
A bedroom community of Seattle, good schools, still lots of Tech industry jobs....
List price is $450K, negotiable.
Feel free to e-mail or leave a comment if interested....

Garden Notes

The Garden is a constant source of joy (and food).
Beans are starting to flower, beets are getting fat, broccoli has golf ball sized heads, and zucchinni and winter squash have baby squashes.

Harvesting peas, pac choy, swiss chard, garlic, raspberries and cherries. Blueberries will be ripening soon. Corn is almost waist high. It's time for a second thinning of the carrots; the thinned are big enough to be edible.

One of the bee hives swarmed today, and there is a football sized clump of bees hanging out in one of the apple trees.

The Parsnip That Ate Chicago (it's about 2 feet taller than me) is getting fat seeds that should be dry and ready to save in a month or so. Select spinach and lettuce plants are also being allowed to seed.

Watching and waiting.

Finding the Green Valley

The rest of my trip was very enjoyable. I visited several friends, had bonfires on the beach, and many fabulous conversations about our disconnected society and looking for ways to heal it.

My last stop was a rest area just south of the Oregon/California border. I had intended to make more miles, but the rest area was well off the highway, with soft green grass and a beautiful sparkly river.

It was just so damn pleasant I had to stop for the night, even though it was early in the afternoon.

Redwing blackbirds chuckled in the willows and cattails, and every so often I would catch a whiff of sea air, blowing up the river from the Pacific.

I laid on the grass near the river, and thought about my journey. It was amazing how the timing had worked out. Any time I was delayed, it worked to my advantage. I invariably arrived at friends places at the beginning of their weekends. Once I just decided to flow with it and "let it roll" everything fell into place.
I thought about how thankful I was for this opportunity to see our big, beautiful country, and follow spring across it.
I gave thanks for good friends, and for simply being alive and able to appreciate all the wonderful possibilities life has to offer.

Slowly I drifted into a state of bliss I can only describe as the "God experience". When one is truly, deeply grateful for one's existence, and hyper aware of the realities that surround you, you can get to a place where you feel the earth breathing, and feel that you are a part of All That Is.

It is a place so whole and loving and happy it never fails to move me to tears, though they are tears of joy.

It occurred to me that wherever my friends were on this journey, there was a green valley.


Near Santa Cruz, CA

Near Tucson, AZ

There was a Green Valley park near my brother, and a Green Valley town near my mom.

The Green Valley isn't necessarily a physical place, it is inside me. It's where my community lives.
That Green Valley is inside all of us. Where do you think the Eden story comes from?
The Green Valley is an archetype as old as mankind.

This blog has been slipping for a while. I'm simply too busy to spend much time time on the computer. I think it's time to wrap things up.
I'll still check in from time to time, and maybe be lurking in the blogosphere, but this is probably my last post.
I am a different person now. This blog no longer reflects me as I currently exist.
If I start a new blog I will post a link here.

A few days ago, I visited a place that comes as close to the physical reality of my Green Valley as I could ever hope for.

About 1 1/2 hours drive from the nearest city, up winding country roads, across an old wooden bridge, lies a valley surrounded by wooded foothills.
I worked alongside fellow gardeners and volunteers in the acre of organic vegetable gardens.

I wandered through the fields, skimming my hands across wildflowers and grasses, and felt like I could fly.

I swam in the beautiful rocky trout stream beneath the wooden bridge, and saw more food swimming around in the water than I had seen since the reef in Key West.

I hiked up to a patch of old growth trees, put my hands to them and gave thanks that they still existed, while praying for their continued existence.


I followed nicely built hippies through the shoulder high grass next to the stream.

I felt this land welcoming me home, holding me gently in its embrace like a lover.



We are each responsible for creating our reality. With every thought and word and deed we shape what we experience.
I want a reality filled with love and peace and light, and I will work tirelessly toward that end.

Each of us is a creature of God, a part of the universe, and like it or not we hold the power to manifest our reality. Negative energy begets negative reality, and positive energy begets positive reality.

You can't fight the waves, but you can learn to surf.
I just caught a monster wave, and I'm gonna hang on and ride it all the way in to the land of milk and honey.
From here on out, I surf.

Highlands of the Mind

I left Arizona, and I was tired of the desert.
I like places where things are green.
I drove until I reached California, and breathed a deep sigh of relief to be back on the west coast. I spent the night at a rest area, with the scent of new mown alfalfa hay drifting into my dreams.

The next day I went to visit my brother in the mountains east of San Diego.
After the harsh monotony of the desert, the wild beauty of the mountains was a breath of fresh air.
I came to a valley at about 4,000 feet, and its untouched beauty took my breath away.

The prairie grass undulated gently in the wind, and in the distance a sweep of yellow wildflowers clothed the soft hills and drew my eye to the mountains beyond.

It was so beautiful, I had to pull over and stop to cry.
It finally dawned on me.

I was free.

No longer could I feel the pain and fear of the city. The sense of impending doom I had felt so strongly in Louisiana was finally gone.
These mountains were sparsely populated. They just felt empty and natural and free.

After a few deep breaths, I continued to my brother's place.
I stopped in the small town to ask directions, and smelled lilacs and dutch iris blooming for the first time in 10 years.

My brother has a pretty sweet deal. He lives off grid in a tiny hut, and works for an outdoor adventure camp where room and board are paid, and he gets $400 a week.
He eats fabulous organic food, most of it grown in the gardens on site.
Health care is 100% paid for.
I didn't know that still existed.

My Bro and I didn't talk for about 6 years. I thought he was an arrogant poser hippie and he thought I was a loser for abandoning my marriage and my schooling to live in Key West.

But things have a way of coming full circle, and over the years we came to the same conclusions about life and society, and share many philosophies and interests - prepping being one of those.

In true redneck fashion, we decided to hunt ground squirrels for dinner, since they frequented the compost pile.
He was a bit overeager and went tromping up to said pile, promptly scaring dinner back underground.

Oh well.

But as we were walking back, we saw a pair of turkeys in the valley below.

"Should I get 'em, Bro? I've got a shot."
The turkeys were about 80 yards off.
"Well, I don't know......."
The turkeys were moving farther away.
"Now or never dude!"
"Uhhhhh..."
"I'm going for it."

At about 110 yards, I pegged the big turkey with my 10/22.
He flew up, we gave chase, and ended his life with respect and gratitude.

It was a huge tom turkey. Before cleaning he was easily 35 lbs.
I know, I had to haul his ass back up that hill.


After cleaning, he was still over 20lbs. It was the biggest turkey I had ever seen.

We brined him in a solution of sugar, salt, tarragon, rosemary, and pepper, then threw him on a smoker for about 6 hours.
It was the tenderest, tastiest, moistest turkey I've ever had.
My bro cleaned and salted the tail, and I took it as a trophy.

I stayed for a few days, having turkey quesadillas for Cinco de Mayo, and enjoying campfire circles with guitar, harmonica and song.

Making music together is something that connects us as human beings. It might not sound like the digitally mixed, pre-recorded everything of today, but it's got soul. It renews our connection.

Feeling entirely refreshed by the beautiful highland mountains, it was time to continue on my journey. My next and last big hurdle of the trip was looming ahead;
getting through the Babylon known as Los Angeles.

I Hope I'm Wrong

I'm picking up on a disturbing undercurrent in many areas.
This video describes it aptly.
Dear God I hope this isn't in our future.

So Long, Seafood.

Our poor oceans.
I knew this was happening, but it seems to have gone mainstream. It was actually on Yahoo via McClatchy.


Scientists: Global warming has already changed oceans

WASHINGTON — In Washington state, oysters in some areas haven't reproduced for four years, and preliminary evidence suggests that the increasing acidity of the ocean could be the cause. In the Gulf of Mexico, falling oxygen levels in the water have forced shrimp to migrate elsewhere.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/226/story/69751.html

Smoke 'em if ya got 'em.

Prepper's Paradise

I found an awesome store the other day. It's called Champion Grocery, and it's an independently owned outlet store. They have all sorts of stuff for cheap, much of it organic.
I got a huge bottle of shampoo for $1.65, various spices, juices and canned goods cheap.
But the best part was the grain area.
$25.00 for a 30# bag of organic whole Kamut (a type of wheat) $35.00 for a 50# sack of hard red winter wheat, good prices on corn, beans, rice, sugar, salt, all in large sacks.
I picked up some more black beans, barley, soybeans, and buckwheat as well.

The owner was also the cashier, and insisted on loading it all into the car for me.
Apparently he is doing quite well. They were sold out of 50# wheat, so he ordered it for me.

Sold out? Heh. This guy must know every prepper around here.

It was pretty sweet. I will definitely return if my meager income allows, though food is mostly covered. Next on the list is more fish hooks, needles, and a grain mill.

More posts on the journey coming soon. The laptop is being a bitch and not letting me upload photos. Time to hook up my old dinosaur PC and see if it trats me any better.