Relish the change of seasons
It’s that time of year again. The days are still hot, the soil still concerningly dry and the breeze still smells of smoke but they are getting shorter. Summer is slowly sliding into autumn.
The garden knows it. The leaves on the last potatoes have been yellowing. The beans, so prolific this summer, are finishing. A lone pumpkin is beginning to ripen on the self-sown vine. The red winter kale has finally admitted defeat in the face of powdery mildew and aphid attacks and gone to seed. Summer’s bounty is fading.
It’s been an odd growing season, and my first summer here at the Cottage. It was exceedingly hot1 and dry,2 with horrible winds that stripped the moisture out of everything. I don’t like to water much, but even my well-mulched, water-conservative garden has needed a good weekly soaking. The eggplants and chillies enjoyed the heat and I’m looking forward to harvesting a handful of aubergines. The tomatoes haven’t done so well though, or the zucchini: where I was expecting great gluts I’ve ended up scavenging from friends to gather enough for preserving. Still, I’ve had plenty to eat and largely kept myself in veg this summer (with the notable exception of carrots, of which I grew just one).
As the season progressed, so did my weekly harvest!
Now it’s time to prepare the garden for autumn and to stock my stores with the excesses of the summer. Yes, it’s relish time again!
The over-ripe tomatoes I scavenged from a friend’s garden have been turned into jars of rich, summer flavour. Soon that same friend’s surplus giant zucchinis will be cooked up with Indian spices for a spicy savoury relish. A couple of kilos worth of beans – green and scarlet runner – have been chopped and blanched and bagged up in the freezer for winter meals to come, and rhubarb has been stewed and frozen for winter porridge breakfasts. The apples that survived to worst of the weather only to fall prey to codling moth have had the edible parts rescued, been poached in vanilla syrup and stowed away: a delicious sweet treat despite the beasties. A good three kilos of potatoes are paper-wrapped and await a dark place to be stored.
It’s time, now, to prepare the garden for my winter crops. There are beds to dig, seeds to be sown, and if I don’t do it now there will be no backyard harvest through the cooler months. The soil needs a lot of love in places before much of anything will grow, so the compost bin has been shifted and I’m prepping green manure to get some much-needed organics worked in. One over-worked bed will lie fallow this season, then be planted out with herbs come spring.
For now, though, it’s autumn and winter veg I’m thinking of. I have interesting new heirloom seeds to sow: golden beets, fractal (romanesco) broccoli, ruby sprouts, mammoth leeks and purple cauliflower. Poor little plants will need to fend for themselves though, as soon I’m heading overseas again for a while. I’m relying on the kindness of friends and neighbours, on my little community, to tend my garden while I’m gone.
That’s the magic of a garden though: it doesn’t just grow food, it grows connections.3 This summer my surpluses have been shared with others. I’ve traded beans and potatoes for apricots and nectarines. I’ve swapped seeds with other growers. I was given the most amazing types of tomatoes by Pauline Mak and traded garden pest info with Provenance Growers.
My garden does so much more than feeding and nourishing me: it feeds the bees, provides home for the birds, it binds and enriches the fine black soil and it creates places for all sorts of crawlies to scuttle about. It creates a topic of conversation with friends and strangers alike, and allows the free trade of information and sharing of experience. It supports simple acts of giving and sharing and, like the sunflowers blooming down the bottom, spreads a little beauty through the world.
This is what my garden grows.
What about you? What’s happening in your patch right now? Are you starting spring planting? Still awaiting the thaw? Or, like my parents up in south-east Queensland, waiting for the saturated soils to dry out enough to plant?
What do you love about your garden? Tell me, what does it grow?
[1] Records were set for the hottest single day (41.8oC), the hottest summer overall (highest mean summer maximum) and the number of days above 30oC – source: Bureau of Meteorology.
[2] Only 39% of our average summer rainfall fell - source: Bureau of Meteorology.
[3] The social benefits of a garden – source: Irish Food Board.
From the ashes…
Chances are you heard about the severe bushfires that swept through Tasmania a couple of months ago.
It was awful, a terrible combination of a hot dry summer and a day of searing temperatures and high winds. Perfect fire weather: all it needed was a spark…
Up at Lake Repulse someone left a campfire unattended in the pine forest. Near Bicheno and out at Giblin River, lightning struck the blazes. In Forcett the latent heat from a tree stump burn two days before was enough to set the flames raging. Over 80 000 ha, burning; anxious days of checking the emergency broadcasts and trying to contact missing family and friends while the sun blazed red through clouds of smoke, the air choked with the smell of fire.
The fires were devastating, the damage is heartbreaking. People have lost their homes and livelihoods, whole towns are gone, yet somehow, incredibly, no lives were lost. It seems impossible when you drive through the fire zones, with their scorched paddocks, blackened crops and kilometres of destruction, the eucalypt forests now deep black with a canopy of red dead leaves, slowly falling. People are camped next to the remains of their homes – twisted iron and brick chimneys – the tents the only colour in a sea of black.
It’s been grim, times are tough and it’s going to take years for these communities to get back on their feet, but I think they will, because something amazing has been happening: people!
The community response to the fires has been absolutely amazing. From the first day Tasmanians have been helping each other, reaching out and doing what they can.
In the initial chaos and confused response a few inspired (and inspiring) individuals stepped up and set up a comprehensive social media network, connecting people who needed help with those who could provide it and establishing a critically-needed conduit of information. A flotilla was organised to rescue people stranded on the Tasman Peninsula, critical supplies were obtained and shipped to where they were needed and messages were passed on to concerned loved ones. Thanks to these volunteers, working away at home under their own initiative, the initial emergency response was kicked off long before the slow wheels of government started turning.
The call for help went out and the Tasmanian community responded. people donated what they could to the cause, pulling together to help each other out:
- People donated stuff: food was taken to the emergency shelters, feed was delivered for livestock and pets. Every generator that could be spared was rounded up and taken down the Peninsula. People collected mobile phone chargers and took them to the evacuation centres so the evacuated could be contacted. Folk cleaned out their cupboards and donated clothing and household items. Some truly generous types have even donated their homes as housing for the displaced for however long it takes to re-build.
- People donated skills: where skills were needed, people volunteered. Several vets made visits out to the fire zones to treat livestock, pets and wildlife for free. A small army of cooks, chefs and producers donated their efforts to feed the hard-working fire-fighters the best food we could provide. Logistics types coordinated response efforts, builders offered up their skills and people on the ground starting doing things.
- People donated labour: so many people have found time to spare to volunteer. Crews are out every day getting on with the epic job of re-building fences, working with farmers to fence their land. Others are sorting and transporting the mammoth piles of donated goods, or carrying food and water to where they are needed. As the clean-up continues so many every-day people are helping to sift through the soot and ash to help get others back on their feet.
- People donated energy: those with the energy and connections to do so put on fund-raising concerts and other events, gathering performers, doing the promotions work and attracting a crowd in the name of bushfire relief. Moneys raised went to the Red Cross appeal, to the fire fighters or directly to the communities most impacted by the fires. Numerous musicians and performers put on shows for free, from international stars to local heroes, bringing smiles to faces and raising cash when it was needed.
- People donated money: right across Australia ordinary people dug deep to contribute to the bushfire benefit appeal, with Tasmanians making generous donations to help out their fellow islanders. Given the sorry state of the Tassie economy and how many people are down on their luck around here, the level of generosity shown was pretty mind-blowing
It was amazing to see, the way people came together and acted as a true community, people caring & sharing, realising they have more than they need and lending a hand. Disaster seems to have a way of doing this, bringing out the best in people and pushing us together. We saw it in the 2010 Brisbane floods and the way the Mud Army formed and cleaned up the houses of complete strangers. Outside of Australia, there was the huge volunteer effort in US after Superstorm Sandy, when people were helping their neighbours to get back on their feet long before official services could be mobilised.
When it’s front & centre in their awareness, people are amazing; humanity is brilliant and beautiful.
So why aren’t we like this the rest of the time? What happens through our every-day living that results in us living disconnected, inwardly-focussed lives? Why, when people can be so amazing, do we have problems like road rage and harassment? Why do we see so much social isolation and dislocation? What makes us hoard for resources and consume more than we need?
Deep down, people seem to know what we need to live together well and create community. That’s not surprising for a species that relied on social organisation to survive and flourish. What is surprising is how we so easily lose our way. It makes me wonder if it’s something to do with the size of our cities and social structure, or the marketing messages that are constantly flung at us, urging us to collect more and more stuff as if we’ve somehow earnt it.
We live our lives behind closed doors and high fences, distrusting our neighbours and defending our castles and consider our independence a triumph until disaster strikes. It is then that we remember the truth: we’re all connected and we need each other in order to survive and keep the great wheels of civilisation turning.
Watching the recent fire response gave me hope for humanity, reminded me just how wonderful people can be, but it also made me wonder why we’re not like that the rest of the time. If there’s a lesson to be learnt from the horrors of the fires it is this: community matters. Be a part of it.
Sustainably busy
As may be apparent, 2013 has got off to a busy start for me. Summers in Hobart are jam-packed with things to do, I’ve struggled to find time to write and I’m not as on top of things as I’d like to be.
It can be challenging to maintain balance during busy times and so often I hear people say that they’d like to be more environmentally-sound in their choices but they lead busy lives and they just can’t find the time. And so we let unsustainable choices sneak into our busy lives. We go to the supermarket to do our shopping, instead of visiting the local grocer and the farmer’s market. We drive places instead of cycling or walking. We buy ready-made and processed foods to eat on the run. Gardens get neglected… In the name of convenience, of saving time, we make a thousand small choices that make our lives less sustainable, that lock us in to being busier and busier, that have negative consequences on our health and the health of our planet, our one and only home.
If we really want to make this world, our home, a better place, sustainability needs to be a priority in our lives at all times, especially when we’re tired and stressed. That’s when our bodies and minds are telling us we need to slow down, to rest and to focus on the things that are really important: taking proper care of ourselves and our loved ones. That’s when we really need to nurture ourselves, and we do that best by making sustainable choices, by feeding ourselves wholesome and nutritious food, by connecting with our communities, by ensuring we breathe fresh air and get some exercise, by remembering that living in tune with our beliefs and values actually lowers stress levels and makes us happier.
So stop a while, take a moment to just breathe and remember how it is that you really want to live your life.
I am finally learning that making time to do things like this is essential for my well-being.
Making sustainable choices:
For me, I get through these busy patches by making sustainable choices part of my day’s structure. Daily routines and habits are much easier to maintain than big new changes, so when sustainability is part of your every-day lifestyle, sustainable choices just flow along.
Of course, I don’t have access to an endless well of time so some things do fall by the way-side when I get really busy. It used to be the healthy choices that I let drop. No time for a swim or a bush walk, no energy to cook a proper dinner, and I’ll just finish this or that before I head to bed (oh look, another night of not enough sleep…). Now I’m learning to stay off the computer when I’m tired, that blogging can wait. That I’ll feel better in the morning for cooking a real meal tonight and not opening that bottle of wine. That heading to the pool will clear my head and lower my stress, while an evening on the couch will do the opposite and that no-one is really going to notice if I didn’t do the cleaning this week, but I’m going to feel it I don’t get to the market and stock my kitchen with the sort of food I should be eating.
It’s taken an concerted effort to break these habits and I’m still working on it, but work it does and I’m getting through the busy patches now without dropping the things that really matter to me, without winding up sick and miserable as I push myself too far.
Learning new habits:
- Walk - the daily walk to work is so ingrained into my routines I don’t even think about taking the bus, plus the time and activity help me clear my head for the day ahead. Driving to work or the local shop doesn’t even occur to me now.
- Nourish - it’s very easy when busy to give into the temptation of easy food: processed stuff that will give you a quick energy hit but in the long run is bad for you and the planet (packaging, farming practices, food miles and the rest of it) but preparing and eating real food makes me feel better. When I’m tired and lack the motivation to cook I wander into the garden and find inspiration in what I can harvest there. I also over-cook when I can and stock my freezer with home-made insta-meals to get me through the busy times.
- Prepare - have the little things that help you make the right choices near to hand. I keep fabric shopping bags in places that mean I’ve almost always got one on hand and don’t get caught out needing plastic. I keep my swimming bag packed and hanging my the door. I have raw nuts on hand for snacking. I order seeds so I know I’ll get the garden ready!
- Share - turn chores into a social event by inviting friends, thus helping you to keep the commitment as well as spreading sustainable choices. I make dates with friends to sow the new season’s seeds, to go on foraging missions or get our preserve on to store seasonal surpluses.
- Decide - a friend introduced me to the concept of mindfulness a while back and it’s an amazingly powerful tool I use to keep myself going and being the kind of person I want to be. When I’m tired, grumpy or feeling over it I ask myself who I’m choosing to be, what impact will that choice will have on me? It’s usually enough to get me out and working in the garden or researching sustainability things!
- Stop - I’ve got into the habit now of giving myself a half-hour every evening to just sit and be quiet before bed; time I used to sacrifice in the name of productivity that now allows me to sift through my thoughts and feelings and work out where I’m heading each day. It’s keeping me grounded and has greatly improved the quality of my sleep.
How do you keep yourself on the right path?
Remembering what it’s all about
I’ve just returned home from a failed attempt to do my usual weekly produce shop down at my local farmer’s market. I go most every Sunday to buy my fruit & veg, perhaps a little free-range meat, and catch up with the friendly faces. Not today though: today it was bedlam as the collective insanity that is Christmas hit the market at full force.
We seem to lose the plot a little at Christmas. I don’t know why. The market was jammed with festive season shoppers, forming huge queues to purchase must-have items like raspberries and cherries. I stood there, watching, feeling totally overwhelmed (I dislike crowds at the best of times) and wondering how much of the food they were buying would just end up as waste. Honestly, who needs 2 kg of raspberries, or 5 kilos of cherries (or in some cases, “and”)? Are they really going to be able to eat them all before they spoil? Who needs all that in one glut anyway, when the fruit will still be available next week, and the week after?
It was enough to get me feeling misanthropic, so I beat a hasty retreat home, brewed a pot of tea, put some calming oil in the burner and some soothing tunes on the stereo. Ah, so much better!
Please don’t lose the plot this Christmas. Remember it’s not about having the most heavily-laden table or all the seasonal goodies. It doesn’t matter if you haven’t found the perfect presents, or if you haven’t bought presents at all. No one cares if you’ve missed out on raspberries this year, or if the panforte didn’t set (sticky, but still delicious!). It’s about spending time with the people who matter to you and celebrating the things that really matter: family, friendship, love.
Please, remember what’s important this season. Be kind to people, slow down, smile. Take your neighbours something from your kitchen or garden. Be nice to the people working to serve you and remember to treat them like the human being they are. Say hello to people you pass on the street: go, on, make eye contact and say it like you mean it! Reach out to others and let them know you care. Take stock of just how lucky we are to be living this life, with all that we have, and do what you can to build the kind of world you want to live it, a place you’d be proud to pass on to your children.
All I want for Christmas this year is a better world: more sustainable, communal, joyful.
Day by day, it’s what I try to build. I think, perhaps, you’d like it too.
On that note, I’m taking some time out in January to focus my energy on other things. I wish you the very best over the holiday season, no matter what your beliefs, and look forward to what 2013 will bring. See you next year!
I grew this
These last couple of weeks I’ve been feeling a little low. This time of year does it to me: I get over-scheduled, over-committed, under-slept, and with most folk getting busy with family commitments sometimes I feel pretty alone. I’m tired, and some days it can feel like a bit of a struggle to keep going, but then the little things come along that lift me.
This afternoon I took myself on a fossick around the garden. You see that luscious-looking big, buttery potato there? I grew that. Or more accurately, I provided the soil and the compost and the seed potatoes and the mulch, and it grew itself.
I’ve never grown potatoes before.
Neither have I grown the beans, beetroots, chard, oca and numerous other things doing well in my garden. It kinda makes up for the disappointments, like having only 3 carrots come up, and discovering the self-sown peas I’ve been nurturing were pretty sweet peas and not lovely food. Then there are the strawberries: what fruit has survived the unusually hot and dry conditions of late has been pilfered by the blackbirds: I have had one lone ripe berry.
Tonight I’m going to steam up that potato, diced into little cubes. I’m going to dice and fry some divine local free-range bacon (payment for assistance rendered) and throw in some broadbeans (donated by a colleague with a surplus) plus some chopped up garlic greens and sage leaves I picked this afternoon. I’ll squeeze over a lemon, taken from my friend’s tree, and toss the lot on top of some lettuce leaves that have evaded the worst of the recent weather in a shady part of my garden.
Between my patch of dirt and my community, I’m feeding myself. Tonight I’m eating outside of the system, far removed from the supermarket. I’m actually doing this, with my sad little garden that the heat has burnt and baked the soil to clay. I’m doing this in a rental house, with a full-time job and a life that takes me out and about quite a lot. I am doing this, and if I can do it, maybe so can you. Maybe together we can build ourselves a food community, connecting eaters with growers and using the land we have to grow the food we need.
Imagine that: a world without dependence on the big supermarkets, with their demands for unsustainable farming practices and shelves stacked with pretend food. A world where we know our neighbours and trade our backyard surpluses, where we’ve met the grower who sells us vegetables, where we’ve gotten close and personal with the animals that become our meat. Lower emissions, more sustainable farming, connected communities. Grow, forage, trade, cook: do it.
Sometimes all it takes is a humble potato to remind me what it’s all about.
Raise your voice for the future of Tasmania
Tasmanians, the Forest Peace Deal Agreement is going through the Upper House, where the legislation will either pass, or crash and burn with a huge loss of public faith and return to community division and ongoing stalemate.
The agreement isn’t perfect, I know, but it’s better than no agreement and it has involved compromise from both sides to reach. We can always build from here and work towards a better agreement once people have adapted to change and seen that the Agreement hasn’t led to wholesale economic collapse. Please don’t ditch the agreement because not every patch of high-value forest is protected, or not every forest job is saved. Extremism will never reach a compromise, on either side. The problems will never be solved by holding out for your own ideal of a successful outcome. Remember that it’s a step in the right direction to building a more sustainable future. The first step, with many more to come as we walk down the path together, as a cohesive community with a shared vision for the future.
Those against the peace deal – those who want unrestricted forestry at any cost, despite the reality of falling demand and industry decline, and those who will not accept that not all high-conservation-value forests can be protected – have mobilised opposition, further feeding bitterness and division in the community. They are petitioning the Upper House to reject the Agreement legislation and they’re creating a lot of noise.
Don’t let division and extremism determine the future of our State. Stand up for working together for long-term, sustainable outcomes for Tasmania. Sign the counter-petition and let our politicians know we support peace in our forests. If we don’t speak up, the voices of conflict will win. Rejection of the Agreement does not benefit anyone. Please raise your voice in support of a more sustainable future for Tasmania.
Sign here: Official petition in support of the Forest Peace Deal Agreement
Strange habits
I have a few strange habits:
- I keep every rubber band that enters my house in a container in a kitchen drawer.
- The frilly tulle bags from jewellery shops get tucked into a box in a draw.
- I stack up old egg cartons on top of the fridge.
- Glass jars get washed up and stowed in a box under the table.
- A pretty box in the study stores used wrappings, packaging and ribbons.
- What plastic bags and tubs cannot be avoided are washed up and stored.
- I pile up plastic plant pots in an old plaster bucket under the house.
- Bottles of old engine oil get dutifully stored under the house.
- I bring home occasional piles of newspapers from work or bags of coffee grounds from my local cafe.
And yet, I’m not a hoarder. My home is small with little storage and I’m pretty strict about stuff. So why keep these things? Because they are still useful – to me or someone else – and needn’t be thrown away.
The rubber bands go to the market vendors who use the blighters to bundle their veg (with a few kept on hand because they’re always useful). The frilly tulle bags that still look brand new are taken back to the shop (eventually), saving the vendors money. The egg cartons get split between colleagues with chooks and the CWA shop (I tried using some as bio-degradable seedling pots this year, but it was a bit of a fail). The jars are re-used for storing dry goods and home-made preserves, with the excess passed on to a local charity for others to use. Rescued tissue paper and cellophane are kept to wrap another day, post-packs are recycled and ribbons re-used.
Those unavoidable plastics* are re-used to store fruit and veg in the fridge, and to freeze left-overs for future lunches (though I’m a little bit worried about the health implications of this). Pots are recycled (it’s best to sterilize them first, if you can) for the next lot of seedlings, now that I’m growing from seed, or passed on to gardening friends. The old engine oil goes to a guy who uses it for weather-proofing timber for his landscaping projects. Newspapers help light the fire, get shredded into the compost or added to mulch, while coffee grounds are deployed as slug and snail protection around pale green garden things.
This year’s seedlings shot up in recycled pots (but did less well in egg cartons), while an old olive tub gets used again for storing home-made hummus.
These things that would otherwise be thrown out as waste, added to the vast pile of landfill, are still useful. There is no need to throw them away. Each and every item that comes into my home came from somewhere, was made from something. Resources were consumed to make it and transport it to me, and living sustainably is all about conserving our resources as much as possible. Whether it’s the petroleum products in plastics or the plant nutrients in the coffee grounds, I feel I have a duty to make the most of the resources I consume and so I do my best to re-use and recycle.
What I really like, though, is the expression of pleasant surprise on the faces of shop-keepers and growers when I turn up with a bundle of tulle bags or rubber bands. I’m saving them money by my small acts, making a tiny contribution to reducing their operating costs and keeping my favourite businesses going. Now how’s that for sustainability?
Our little choices and small, simple acts can all add up and make a real difference.
The world is a beautiful place, but there’s work to do to keep it that way!
* Any tips on how to go about buying locally-grown olives or other deli goodies without bringing home another plastic tub? How to store leafy veggies in the fridge without plastic bags? I’m keen to de-plastic my existence!
Remember
11:00, 11/11/2012
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old;
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
Lest We Forget
Potager Cottage
It’s been just over 6 months now since I moved here to the Cottage, looking for a home that would better enable me to live the lifestyle I was after; something smaller, lower impact and more locally-focussed. It feels like a good time, now, with the weather warming and winter fading into memory, to reflect on the changes that have been made and the life I’ve been growing for myself.
So how have things turned out? Let’s take a look at my original list of desired aspects and see!
- North-facing, sunny position: a definite success! Once I hacked back the mirror bush that was shading out the morning sun, the Cottage has been filled with light. Sure, my armchair under the window is fading, but I don’t mind. Even on cold days, if the sun is shining the house warms up and stays warm until late evening. Even in the depths of winter, a sunny day means coming home to a warm house. Old but decent curtains help to keep the warmth in (though would be even more efficient if floor-length) and the tiled floor also adds to the thermal mass of the place. I’ve been seriously impressed: this old timber girl was far warmer through the winter than the previous modern brick place I was living in.
- Not open plan: There’s nothing open plan about this place and being able to shut rooms off made for much more efficient heating on those chilly winter nights. If I didn’t get the fire going I could use the electric heater to warm up only the room I was using, which was far more efficient and effective. On the other hand, once I had a good blaze going in the evenings I could open the door to the bedroom and know that by sleep-time it would be cozy warm in there. The place doesn’t feel pokey though, and with all the doors open the place is light and breezy.
- Insulated: Yeah, well, you can’t have everything, right, and the place is 100 years old… The roof here is not insulated and when I first moved in I discovered a few rather chilly draughts! The ceiling is timber panelling (huon pine, I believe), which is unusual, but turns out to have pretty good insulating properties. Well, at least once you’ve had your landlord get up there with gap filler and block up all the cracks and gaps where the timber’s warped with age. No longer are there 2 am “waterfalls” of cold air falling from the knots above my bed. I also sealed the sash windows and now, even in the spring gales with their 100 km/hr winds, no draught gets in. Between the timber ceiling and the proper curtains we stayed pretty warm through the winter, again much better than my old, semi-insulated 1990’s house.
- Workable kitchen with natural light: Ah, the kitchen. I compromised a little on the kitchen here and at first I hated it: dark, no storage, not enough bench space, a single sink and the cooker-of-fail. It took me a little while to figure out what to do about it! Fitting some construct-it-yourself shelving into the empty fridge nook (my fridge is too big to fit it) created an open pantry and solved my food storage problem, while a spare table and old fish tank stand were adapted to provide extra bench and storage space. The limited space is well managed now by having neat systems in place: everything has its place and the space works fine as long as you follow the system (woe betide if you don’t do the dishes for a day around here). The fail-cooker and I, well, we’ve come to an understanding. I’ve adapted what and how I cook and it mostly doesn’t burn my food. I’ve even managed to reduce the gloominess a little by sticking a cheap mirror up on the outside wall opposite the sole south-facing window. It’s subtle, but the reflected light does make a difference.
- Space for a garden: Oh boy, did I take on a bit much in the garden department! The backyard is decently sized and faces north, but had been woefully neglected. Still, with so much growing potential on display every time I look out these lovely big north-facing windows it was inevitable that I’d spend way too much time out there, wrangling it into shape. It’s still got a way to go (and if I owned, the whole yard would be terraced and turned into veggie beds) but it’s a lovely productive garden now, and I’ve had a surprising about of “volunteer” plants come up from things former tenants let go to seed. I’m not complaining about unexpected peas, leeks, shallots and celery! Given time and a liberal application of effort it would make the proper potager I’m dreaming of.
- Community: I got very lucky here. Not only is most everything in walkable distance, I scored great neighbours too! Admittedly I’m yet to meet anyone from the flats across the way, but I’m on good terms with my direct neighbours. The neighbours to the north are just plain brilliant. They’re happy to lend me tools, to mow my lawn when doing theirs and regularly stop for a chat. They keep an eye on my place when I go off travelling and I take care of their dogs while they’re away. I’m also getting to know the folks from local businesses I frequent and create a real sense of connection. It’s really lovely and I couldn’t be happier with the way things have turned out.
So the move to the Cottage has been a success, though not without its dramas. A few year of neglect has meant lots of catch-up maintenance and it’s taken some lifestyle re-adjustment. When I first moved in the place felt quite small and I struggled with finding places for my stuff. Now the Cottage feels luxuriously big for just one and I’d happily share the space (though only with someone as systematically organised as me!). I do miss company, living alone, but it’s nice to not have to compromise on my ethics and values or to clean up anyone else’s mess.
In the next 6 months I want to look at how to run the Cottage even more efficiently, reducing my water and energy use and continuing to reduce the amount of STUFF I keep and use. This space challenges me to think about the choices I’m making and work to my values and I love it for that. The Cottage has very quickly become my sustainable little home.
How does your home shape your lifestyle?
Small steps to sustainability
One of the wish list items I was looking for when I chose my most recent home was a walkable neighbourhood, and I’m pleased to say I got it. Since moving here I barely use my car. I walk to the corner grocer, I walk to visit friends or to my favourite coffee haunt, I walk to the produce market on Sundays and five days a week I walk to work.
The weekday walk to work quickly became something I love, even in the midst of winter on those chilly Hobart mornings. Walking into town watching the sun rise, drinking in the peace of the dawn is a truly beautiful thing. I don’t even mind so much when it’s raining (unless it’s a proper downpour, in which case I might wimp out and take the bus): with a rain cover on my back pack and a waterproof coat I quite happily trundle along. The only really unpleasant weather is when there’s a freezing wind blasting down from the Mountain and I haven’t got a decent coat.
Atmospheric autumn
It’s a 35 minute walk to the office, if I don’t get distracted or decide to explore a different way. Just enough time to give me all those health benefits the “find thirty” people are banging on about, twice a day each work day. I’m getting regular gentle exercise (particularly important at the moment, with a nasty knee injury keeping me from bush walking and other more intensive activities) as part of my daily routine, but the walk also gives me time to calm my always-busy mind and take a look at the world around me.
There’s always something to see, even walking the same route most days. In Autumn there was the long, golden light and the falling of the leaves, and the discovery of local fig and apple trees ripe for the foraging. In winter I enjoyed the sparkling frosts and mountain snow and watching the city wake and shake itself from slumber. Now it’s spring I’m seeing this little city bloom and the smiles return to people’s sun-warmed faces. There’s always another little detail to notice and I try to remember to take my little pocket camera with me to capture some of the beauty I see.
One morning in winter
Not only do I have time this way to stop and smell the roses (and I do love burying my face right into the petals while I deeply inhale), I have time to put my thoughts in order, to properly wake up before work in the mornings and to relax each evening before I get home. It’s wonderfully good for my mental health, this walking business. I also get time to notice what’s going on in my little city: to see the new businesses opening and, all too often, the shops that have closed (last week the butcher specialising in local free-range meat who always waved as I passed, now another mainland chain butchery – please support your sustainable local businesses!).
I walk to work. I smile at the people I pass on the way and mostly they smile back. I keep pace with the changes around me and I notice the weather and the seasons more. I appreciate the days when the sun shines and the breeze is gentle, and I feel good about myself for still walking when the weather’s less kind. I care for my body, mind and spirit while saving money and stepping a little more lightly on the planet at the same time. That’s the very essence of sustainability!
Sensual spring
How do you make your way to work each day? Can you find a lower-impact route that fits with your daily routine?
Before I moved here I took the bus to work and used the time to listen to podcasts, alighting a stop or two early to get a bit of a walk in. For previous jobs I’ve taken trains, caught ferries and cycled, and yes, even done the dreadful thing and driven where a viable alternative could not be found, though I car-pooled when I could: every bit helps!
If it’s too far to walk or public transport’s just not your thing, can you dust off your bike and cycle on in? It’s Ride2Work day tomorrow, the perfect time to give cycling a try!
Mostly though, I have to recommend it: walk where you can. You might just enjoy it.
An urban forage
Have you ever noticed how much food grows in our urban spaces? Here in Hobart I know where to find elderberry trees, blackberries, olives, apples, quinces and figs. As I’m slowly learning a little more about edible natives I’m discovering a whole new range of plants to scavenge for a free feed. The urban bounty isn’t restricted, however, to the plants that grow between the cracks. There’s also plenty of edible goodness going to waste in other people’s gardens. Who hasn’t seen a lemon tree laden with un-picked fruit and longed to clamber over the fence for a handful of fruit? After all, there’s no point letting it go to waste!
But as well as being illegal, trespass is plain bad manners. So when walking a new route home one day and stumbling across a heavily-laden little cumquat tree I resisted the urge to just help myself and summoned up the courage to knock on a stranger’s door. And you know what, permission to pick all I wanted was granted (though I did have to come by a couple of times before I caught someone at home). The next free Sunday I wandered on down and filled up my little bag then spent a few quiet hours preparing the fruit to preserve. Juicy little balls of sour in a sweet-spiced syrup: juice, honey, sugar, cinnamon, clove and brandy, stowed away for a Christmas treat and as gifts-in-kind to helpful friends.
Did you know cumquats are fiddly little things to peel? How my hands ached the next day! It turns out though that the peel is edible and I should have done my research first. Ah well, next time I’ll preserve them whole.
Of course, there’s a price to pay for picking with permission: a jar or two of your handiwork delivered to the grower to show your thanks. I hope she likes them! There’s also something quite nifty to gain: another link into creating community, building trust between neighbours and breaking down the walls we construct along property lines. We know each other’s names now, the cumquat grower and I. We’ve enlarged each other’s world, just that tiny bit more.
Tips for urban foraging:
- Be certain you know what you’re collecting: stick to things you can readily ID. Take an expert with you when foraging for mushrooms (and if you know one in Hobart, please point them my way!).
- Avoid collecting from plants along major roads; they’ll be covered in car exhaust crud.
- Only collect from plants you’re certain haven’t been sprayed (particularly problematic for blackberrying).
- For native plants leave enough to share with the wildlife; they need the food more than you.
- Ask for permission before harvesting from private gardens if you’re crossing the property line (I’m less circumspect about collecting fruit from the other side of the fence, especially if it’s clearly being left to rot).
- What goes around comes around: always pass on something made with the product to growers who donate.
What have you foraged from your neighbourhood?
Shape of things sabbatical
It’s about to get quiet around here: very quiet indeed. I’m taking a break from this blogging business while the rest of my life needs my focus.
It’s not that I don’t want to be writing: I do! I have a huge list of blog topics up on my wall, several half-written posts in my head and a few more sitting in the drafts folder. It’s not a lack of motivation or a shortage of ideas. What I am running low on is time.
How can doing things like this not inspire me?
I’m working long hours and travelling a lot at the moment and lots of long days are taking their toll (On the plus side I’m getting lots of practice at packing and living out of my backpack, which will be handy for my upcoming South America trip!). I’ve been too busy to get out bushwalking or go drumming. I’m running on coffee, sugar and stress.
It’s not a sustainable way to live, and so I’m stepping back a little while I get through this busy period and while I’m off on adventures overseas. A sabbatical: time to reflect, explore new ideas, go on a grand adventure and get my life back into balance. Two months off.
I’ll be back again in September to share my stories from the road and keep growing this little community. In the meantime, here are a few great reads to keep the conversation going:
Blissful blogs:
- Whole Larder Love: let Rohan’s excellent photography and delicious recipes inspire a low-impact lifestyle
- Speed River Journal: my Canadian friend Van blogs about his own sustainability journey
- Provincial Life: the lovely Kat explores Tasmanian food and places with an eye on reducing her environmental impacts
- Milkwood Farm: adventures in establishing a viable permaculture venture
Noteworthy news:
- Grist.org: Environmental news, views and advice
- ABC environment: Australian environmental news and information
- Science Daily: sustainability news from around the globe
A touch of zen:
- Zen Pencils: gorgeous weekly illustrations of great quotes to inspire you
Open mind, open heart, open road
It’s fitting that I’ll be posting again come the start of spring. It’s a good time for re-beginning.
See you in September!
Life is beautiful
I’m writing this on a Monday – that dread day of the week – telling you that life is beautiful.
Thanks to a weekend with the most excellent company, filled with shared laughter, food and affection, I’m feeling totally in love with life. My perspective is refreshed and I can see quite clearly that my life is amazing.
I look around me and see so many good things: the little cottage that’s become a cozy home, the community of warm and inspiring people I’m connecting with, the astonishing natural beauty of this place (that I get to appreciate every day), the loving and inspiring people I’m fortunate to call friends and the many excellent adventures I’ve had and have yet to come. In a few weeks’ time I’m off on an adventure of a lifetime with one such friend: the Atacama Desert and Machu Picchu (I’m almost imploding with excitement about this!). I have a job I enjoy, working with people I like and respect. I wake up in the mornings and I want to get out of bed, to see what the day brings.
This little corner of the universe is a pretty damn special place to be. This life – my life – is something astonishing. My life is amazing. It wasn’t always so.
Not so long ago, my life looked very different. I was lost, defeated and seriously ill. Disaffected with my career, isolated in a State where I knew no-one and with my life tied to another who was pulling me in the opposite direction to where I needed to be, it was a very different picture indeed.
I was not living my values, I was not listening to my emotions and I was very, very stressed. Every ounce of energy I had was expended running as fast as I could just to stay still. They call stress the silent killer, and they’re really not kidding: I developed severe Grave’s Disease, an auto-immune condition triggered by stress and a latent genetic susceptibility. I lost the best part of 5 years of my life to this illness and I lost my will to fight, instead watching my life slip further and further from where I wanted it to be.
Eventually, after two doses of radio-iodine, my body recovered and I finally found the energy to start re-building my life. It was a long, slow process, filled with challenges and difficult lessons, but it’s brought me to the place I am now, and for that I will be forever grateful.
Being sick was awful. Extracting myself from the unhappy mire that had become my life was one of the hardest choices I’ve ever made, but these experiences helped me to build the life I have today. Worth it? Yes, several times over.
Here are a few of the things I’ve learnt along my journey, and will likely keep re-learning for the rest of my life:
- Life in tenuous, uncertain; the future rarely turns out the way we plan. Stop waiting, stop telling yourself “one day” and start living now.
- If your thought processes seem a little broken or you just can’t keep your head clear, find a good psychologist. Persist until you find one who feels right for you; it’s worth every cent.
- Without risk there is no reward. Taking risks challenges us and makes us grow. Playing safe constrains and cripples us. Put yourself out there.
- Learn to be resilient: build the support structures, emotional strength and coping mechanisms to roll with life’s punches and make the best of it. Fighting things you can’t change is a waste of time and the universe doesn’t give a damn about fairness.
- Stress is your body and brain telling you that something is wrong. Chronic stress is a sign that something is fundamentally off-track in your world. Find it and change it.
- Where you can’t change the circumstance, try changing your perspective. Sometimes looking at things a different way can change your whole world.
- As much as possible, live your values. Work out what they are, then how to build them into your every day: life feels much less like hard slog once you stop fighting yourself.
- Don’t underestimate yourself: you will be amazed at what you can learn / achieve / withstand once you’re making those choices for the right reasons.
- Trust your instincts[1]. Our brains are processing so much more information than we’re consciously aware of and feeding it to us as gut reactions.
- Surround yourself with the kinds of people who bring out the best in you. Choose friends who inspire, motivate and encourage you to be the best version of you. Avoid the people who try to make you less than you want to be.
- Tell the people who matter how you feel. Be honest with them and with yourself, ask for what you need, give what you can and love freely.
- Make mistakes, and forgive others for making them. Remember that everyone deserves a second chance, including you.
- Take good care of yourself: no-one else can do it for you, so it’s up to you to work out what you need and provide it for yourself.
So have I won the war? No, but I have learnt how to win the battles that really count. I still take on too much, get over-stressed and under-slept and let life’s knocks bowl me over now and again. There are many lessons I’m going to need learn repeatedly: the ones about balance, about the warning signs of stress, about taking on too many things and trying to control too much, about security-seeking, risk avoidance and resilience. There will be many times I fall down, sliding back into old, broken thought patterns and behaviours. I will fail again and again and again; that is inevitable. But you know what? That’s not what counts.
What matters is picking yourself up again, dusting yourself off and getting back on that bloody horse, no matter how many times you fall. It’s remembering who you really want to be and putting in the work to get there. It’s about learning from each fall, challenging your behaviours and beliefs and finding a better way forwards, building the shape of things to come. It’s about making change sustainable, and stopping occasionally to look around and see just how far you’ve come.
So who do you want to be?
[1] Unless you’re a woman on the contracetive pill, in which case your instincts may well be broken.
Farmer’s Market: more than food
These days I think most everyone who’s interesting in food – from either a taste or a sustainability perspective – has discovered the benefits of shopping at local farmer’s markets*. Fresh, local produce that tastes great and supports the local community: what’s not to love?
Farm Gate Market, every Sunday morning in central Hobart.
There’s a lot of good information out there about the benefits of shopping at your local market and avoiding the supermarket produce aisles:
- The food is fresher, thus packed with more nutrients and will keep fresh for longer.
- You can get a broader range of varieties, bred for flavour and to suit local conditions, rather than shelf-life and supermarket aesthetics.
- You’re supporting smaller farmers who tend to manage their land more sustainably than the big agri-business growers that supply the supermarkets (where often decisions are made too far away from the land).
- You’re supporting the local economy, investing directly into your own community instead of creating profits for multi-national corporations.
- You’re shrinking your carbon footprint by purchasing food that’s locally grown and in season, avoiding energy use for storage and transport.
These are all very good reasons to consider shopping at farmer’s markets (though there are potential down-sides in terms of global food security, affordability and global distribution of wealth, but that’s a complicated discussion for another day) and what originally got me out of bed on a Sunday morning to head down to Farm Gate, but it’s not the main thing that keeps me coming back.
What keeps me supporting my local market is the sense of community this simple activity builds. Sometimes I’ll wander the market with a friend, making new connections as we meet people they know, but often I’m happy to wander alone and strike up conversations as I go, a question about growing techniques or flavour combinations turning into a connection over shared interests. Over time I’ve come to know a few of my favourite stall holders and growers, learning about their businesses and the passions that drive them to produce small-scale, high quality food.
Provenance Growers temp me with a diverse array of grow-your-own edibles to try.
There’s Ross and Matt with their free-range heritage-breed pork products, who have made me finally understand what the fuss over bacon is about. There’s the amazing Paulette of Provenance Growers, with her near-encyclopaedic knowledge of unusual edibles and native herbs who is enabling my ever-expanding herb collection (and her mum, who keeps me happily supplied with finger limes). Mark of the Naked Carrot and grower of tasty micro-veg has a ready smile and says nice things about my photography, and Masaaki Koyama makes the best sushi I’ve ever eaten (and has cooked for Iron Chef Sakai!).
Masaaki makes amazing seasonal sushi from fresh local produce.
Through these talented cooks and growers I’ve learnt more about where my food comes from and the challenges local farmers face. I’ve learnt what to do with broad beans and mizuna, eaten purple spuds and slippery-jack mushrooms and ditched growing parsley for the tastier native sea celery. From the market I’m learning what to sow and harvest each season in my own little patch, when dairy goats produce the best milk and how to cook a cassoulet, but more than that I’m making friends with the people who feed me, connecting a little deeper with my local community.
From the corner store to your favourite café, food has an enormous power to draw people together, and no-where have I found that more strongly illustrated than at the market. These days I look forward to catching up with my favourite market people as much as to the delicious produce I’m going to be bringing home.
Farm Gate Market: bringing Hobart people together and building a more connected community through food.
Have you nurtured a sense of community through food? Got any ideas of how we can connect our communities through food in places without farmer’s markets or where socio-economic drivers keep people away? I’d love to hear about community gardens, co-ops and other projects that grow more than just food and feed more than our bellies.
* Or a CSA veggie box or local produce co-ops and market gardens. My friend Kat has a great post about why she chooses to eat locally sourced food: read it here!
Getting by with the help of my friends
The last couple of weeks have been rather busy with hard work; moving out of the old house and into the Cottage, getting myself set up and dealing with a cluster of minor crises. I’ve survived, but I couldn’t have done it without the help my friends and community. I’m very, very lucky to have found the kind of quality people I can lean on when I need to, and I can lend a hand to in return.
It wasn’t always like this. When I first moved to Hobart three-and-a-half years ago I knew almost no-one. It was just me, my then-partner and a cluster of cousins, uncles and aunts that were virtual strangers to me (having grown up far away). For the first couple of years I really struggled: Hobart can be a very closed social network; the product of small population, isolation and distrust of blow-ins from the Mainland like me . I struggled to find ways to meet people and to turn a handful of promising acquaintances into genuine friendships.
When my relationship ended a couple of years later I found myself with just two very new friends and a serious gap in my emotional well-being. Brilliant friends in distant places kept me going through the wonders of online communication, but it’s just not the same as having face-to-face conversations. No matter how much we’d like to, you can’t give a hug over the internet.
Our connections with others help to nourish us. They provide that essential feeling of belonging, being part of the world around you. We need strong real-life networks to connect and support us, to help us grow. Finding those people who will become our friends and chosen family is one of the great joys of life, and one I’ve been blessed with so many times.
Finding myself suddenly single gave me fresh incentive to put myself forward and make the most out of the opportunities life presented me. Those two tentative new friendships flourished, given a little extra effort and have grown rich and strong. Fate smiled on me one day when I ran into an old, old friend, long-lost, on the streets of Hobart. A forced change of role of work had the unexpected benefit of landing me in a team of lovely people who share my warped sense of humour and appreciate my quirks, quickly becoming much more than just colleagues. Through smiling, saying hello and putting myself out there I slowly got to know more and more people and began to find my feet here in Hobart.
I involved myself in activities and volunteering, walking the hounds at the Hobart Dog’s Home and helping coach a local soccer team before finally finding a joyous activity that brought a warm welcome with it: beating out Japanese-style rhythms with Taiko Doramu. Drumming has proved an immensely rewarding activity filled with amazingly warm, open and funny people. At long last I found myself a community, a place to belong.
It’s no longer a lonely life for me. Slowly but steadily I’ve built up a brilliant network around me. I’ve managed to find the people who challenge, teach, inspire and nurture me. After an uncertain start these people make Hobart feel like home and I don’t know what I’d do without them. Certainly I would have had a much harder time moving house! Many hands and a couple of trailers made short work of the move, at the bargain price of a batch of lime and poppy-seed cupcakes, a hefty dose of gratitude and the promise of a feast once I’m all settled in.
Now I’ve landed in a new house in a different part of town I’m working on connecting to the community around me. So far it seems I’ve been lucky with new neighbours who have welcomed me and offered a hand to get me settled in and I’m hopeful we’ll develop the kind of rapport I had with my old neighbours, where we looked out for each other and shared the occasional bottle of wine.
So this one goes out to my friends, colleagues, neighbours and taiko troupe: you’re amazing people and I wouldn’t be without you. My personal community is a key part of making this life sustainable, keeping me connected and making me feel like I finally belong, that this little city is home. Friendship, support, affection and a helping hand: love.
How have you found your own community? Have you ever had to start from scratch somewhere new? Tell me how you get by with a little help from your friends. 
