by Randy Dyess
“It was a lot of work at first. We experimented and learned a few ways to make things easier on us that our parents and grandparents didn’t know about. For one thing, I didn’t start out by tilling up a portion of my yard and planning seeds in long rows with space between them. During my research I always thought this was a waste of space because I wasn’t going to drive a tractor into my garden. Most of that spacing is to accommodate tractor wheels or horse drawn equipment and only provided space for weeds to grow in.“
“What did you do?” Mark interrupted.
“What I did was to start with raised beds. I built about sixty of them over the winter months. After completing the beds, I went to a large compost company nearby and bought enough compost to fill all the beds. I did mix the compost with some additional minerals and a little peat moss to fluff things up to hold water better. I did not use any dirt I dug up around the garden. This gave me a start to our gardening in with very little weed seeds in my dirt. Because most of the soil around here is poor or full of chemicals, using this dirt gave me a start with fresh fertile soil.“
Mark started visualizing the process as Owen continued, “We did pretty well the first year. We ended up growing a lot of great food and had to spend hours learning how to store it through various methods so we would have food during the winter. The first year we canned, dried, and froze enough to replace a majority of the food we had been buying at the store. Don’t get me wrong. We made a lot of mistakes during the first year and are still learning what to do to keep the harvest large enough to feed us all year-long. It takes years of gardening to learn how to handle the weather, insects, and other things around here. It has even taken me a few years to figure out how many plants to plant each year. I found out it doesn’t take many jalapeno plants to get my quota,” he laughed. “The first year I had jalapenos coming out of my ears. We also found out the old saying is true that the only reason country people lock their car doors in the summer is they are afraid someone will fill them with squash and zucchini. We had mounds of the stuff and couldn’t even come close to eating it all or giving it away. Ever ate zucchini bread every day for two months straight? Donna put zucchini in everything we ate that summer. Jalapeno, zucchini, and squash casserole takes some getting used to,” Owen said as he started laughing.
Everyone started laughing and after the laughter died down, Owen continued. “After the first year was done, I did a few other things to keep the health of my soil up. After the finishing the harvest I covered the beds with plastic to keep the soil from being compacted during the winter and to help keep weed seeds out. Right before we planted again I went to each bed and scooped up the top six inches of soil. I mixed aged horse and chicken manure, fresh rabbit manure, worm castings, and new compost into the soil I dug out. This was used to replace the soil in the beds so each bed would be ready for the next round of crops. Healthy soil goes a long way in overcoming insects and the weather problems we have around here. If you have loose soil with a little peat moss in it will hold water better than if you just tried to plant something in the ground. It takes a little time to do this each spring, but it pays off in the long run with larger harvests and healthier plants.”
“Most people don’t realize to have a healthy garden it is all about the soil. Many think you can dig up your yard, plant a few seeds and wait for tons of food to grow. You might get lucky and have it work one year, but most of the soil around here is poor and it will not take long to completely play it out. Plus with all the chemicals we put on our yards and land, it takes years before you have food that is chemical free and truly organic.”
“Do you still buy all the compost you use?” Kelly wondered.
“No, over time I have built my compost heaps and have created worm beds in a shed to use for replacement soil. We have also started raising rabbits and chickens for both food and to use their manure for our soil. I still get some horse manure from a local stable and buy some mineral supplements from local gardening stores. Except for the few minerals we add to keep the health up and balance the PH levels, all the rest does come from our own farm. We are trying to be as self-sufficient as possible in case things go as bad as we think they will.”
“We’ve learned a lot over the last few years raising our own food. One of the things we have learned is that you have to make sure you eat what you raise. Our diet has changed as well over time to accommodate the food we can grow. We’ve had to build up a collection of recipes that work with food as it comes into season. People do not realize many of the items in a salad may not be available at the same time of the year. What we consider a salad is not natural here in Texas. It is just too hot to grow lettuce for more than a few months in early spring and fall. You may never have lettuce and tomatoes available at the same time from local gardens. Many people don’t realize that when they go to the store and put together a great salad. We’ve learned to adjust our diet based on what we are harvesting and what we have stored from last year. Not what is normally available in a store,” Donna continued the conversation.
“Most people complain about all the work it takes making a Thanksgiving meal. Try making one that requires you to plan a year in advance so you will have the right things put away and stored for the meal. I start my preparations each year right after Christmas. We will have a turkey ready, fruit for pies, grain for bread, and all the other things you eat during a typical Thanksgiving Day meal. One of the concessions I do make is I still buy cranberries at the store. I’m trying to figure out other things for the meal instead of what is considered typical but I would miss cranberry sauce.”
“You have your own fruit trees?” Mark asked.
“We’re starting to get our own fruit now as well,” replied Owen. “Even with the dwarf stock, it takes a few years to get good crops and enough of them to have more than a few pieces apiece. Those were one of the things we usually picked at local farms until ours started coming in. We even travelled some to be able to pick crops from farms that are not nearby. Nice apple farm in Missouri we went to over a weekend last year and picked enough to put away for the year. We are still having a hard time with apples, so we still go to Missouri for them. They just don’t seem to do well around here. We have started substituting other fruit for apples in our diet, but will go to Missouri for as long as possible. I still love apple butter with my breakfast and crave apple pie as well.”
“As we said earlier, we also are just now starting to raise all of our own meat,” Donna said. “We started with the basic chickens for eggs and added rabbits later. It took a little time to work up to think bunnies were food and not pets. I cried the first time we slaughtered them, but have gotten somewhat used to it over the years. I still do not cook rabbit often and would rather sell them than eat them. But it is something we have to get used to since they are easy to raise organically and can produce a lot of meat with little effort. After rabbits, we went on to start a larger flock of chickens for food and added turkeys and ducks for extra meat and a few more eggs. A few years ago we brought in some goats for both meat and milk. We both had to learn to eat goat, but found out we like goat’s milk better than cow milk. Plus the fact goats are much easier to raise than cows. Goats will eat weeds growing around here. This limits the amount of hay we need to grow and feed we buy. We may still get a milk cow or two and try to learn to use their milk for cheese. Goat cheese is fine, but it is not the same as the cheese we grew up eating. We do have meat cattle and last year we butchered one of our own cows for meat. I am also looking into raising some sheep and even fish for variety, but haven’t started those projects yet. Overall, it has been a journey, but today we have a wide variety of food we grow, raise, or hunt. So much we have been able to move beyond the simple stuff most people associate with small farmers to producing gourmet meals rivaling fancy restaurants. It takes more work to do this, but we are looking into ways and products most people would miss, but we may be able raise locally. We think we can use these items for money or barter if things reall
y go bad.”
Mark looked at Owen and Donna and asked, “So we’ve told you about our past, but we haven’t given you a chance to tell us anything about yourselves. Did you grow up near Madill?”
“Why do you ask?” Owen asked.
“I saw the little glance between you two when Kelly mentioned Madill.”
“No. I grew up in the suburbs of Detroit and Donna grew up in Lansing. We came here after meeting at Michigan State because the job market was better here than in Michigan. Farming, gardening, and animals were a complete mystery to us until about five or six years ago.”
“I would have never guessed it. You seem like you have been here a long time and have always been into the natural way of living you’ve been talking about.”
Owen went on to tell them about growing up as the son and grandson of auto workers. He told them how his entire family was devastated by the collapse of the Michigan auto industry. He told them he grew up poor and how he managed to get into college because of a baseball scholarship. Unlike most athletes with scholarships, Owen never had faith in his pro chances. He didn’t want to end up like his parents, grandparents, uncles, older cousins and everyone else in his town that lost jobs in factories after the collapse. He decided to major in computer science to avoid their fate. He guessed at the time the computer industry would explode in the next decade and computers would be something which would always be around and necessary in the future.
“Makes sense,” said Mark. “What about you, Donna?”
“I always wanted to help others, so I majored in nursing and worked as a nurse until I had Lelian. I became a stay at home mother after she was born. I only work a few nights a week at the hospital to keep my certifications current and keep my skills from getting rusty. I thought after I had Lelian, I would go back to work after the kids started to school to give me something to do, but have not yet.”
“Thought at the time?” Mark enquired. “That with Owen’s comment that you were ‘deeper’ into your preparations than we are makes me believe there is more of the story than you’ve told us.”
Owen looked at Donna and while smiling said, “Told you he would catch on.”
“Ok,” Owen said. “I think you two probably feel somewhat like we do, so I’ll fill you in on some of the rest of the story.”
Mark and Kelly looked at each other and got comfortable for what they assumed would be a good story. “About seven years ago, right after Sera was born; I took a good look at my lifestyle. We were living a lifestyle similar to the way you two are living now. I had made quite a bit of money during my consulting days and when I acted as CIO at a few small dot-coms during the dot-com craze. I was lucky enough I was able to cash out of those companies when they were bought out by larger companies instead of folding up like so many others. I thought we had it all, money, credit, stocks, retirement accounts, a nice home in Las Colinas on the golf course. My only concern at the time was about how much better the future would be for my kids than what I had growing up in the blue-collar ghetto I did. It wasn’t until my dad died a few weeks after Sera was born I started to change. I spent a few weeks up in Michigan cleaning out his house and in doing so found old records he had kept. There were decades of financial records, bills, and receipts from both him and his father stored in his house. I knew he had a habit of keeping everything, but never knew how much stuff he crammed into the house. It had been years since we had last seen him. Because of the problems he had while I was growing up we never had a great relationship. By the time I was born we were poor and he drank a lot after getting off of his shift as a security guard. I was never close to him because of it and didn’t keep in touch after leaving for college. I was one of those idiots who thought they were better than everyone else from their home town and never wanted to go back to that place after leaving it.”
“Sounds familiar,” Mark said as he looked at Kelly.
Owen went on after taking a drink of wine, “Most people would have thrown all those records out as junk. Something inside of me stopped me from doing that. At the time, I didn’t believe in guardian angels. Now I wonder if mine was talking into my ear and telling me I needed to save those for some reason I would not understand until later. I still can’t believe that I actually boxed them up and carted them back home. I am so glad I did after I started looking through those records over the next few months.”
Owen went on to tell them he read every scrap of paper he had boxed up from his dad’s place. What they showed him was both his dad and his granddad led lives similar to his own. The pay and benefits they received while in the heyday of U.S. automobile industry gave them money to buy what were considered nice homes at the time. They had good cars and boats to go out on the lakes when they took their vacations. He found out at one time all of his family members had vacation cabins in the same small town on Lake Michigan. They spent two weeks each summer vacationing together. The wages they earned at the auto plants allowed them to have about everything average people at the time associated with being well-off.
Owen continued by saying, “On day I was feeling full of myself because I had scored a big promotion which put me in the same department as Damian. I knew Damian was an up-and-comer and would someday be offered the CIO position at a large company. All I had to do was position myself so he would take me along with him when he got another job. That was about six years ago, which was about four years before he became the CIO at Plains Airlines.”
Mark and Kelly glanced at each other and waited for Owen to finish.
“About six years ago I was coming home feeling good about my new promotion. As I was driving through the gate to get to our subdivision it hit me. I had everything my dad and granddad had and they lost it all when the auto industry in America went bust. It wasn’t anything they did nor was it anything they could have controlled, but it affected them just the same. The American auto industry wasn’t prepared for the gas shortages in the 70’s. Americans decided they liked to buy the smaller foreign-made cars instead of the large gas guzzling American made cars. Granddad managed to retire before everything fell apart, but he lost his union pension when the plant he worked at shut down and the small company went out of business. Most people don’t believe they can lose their pensions and Granddad was one of them. He never saved or prepared for any life without his pension. Granny never worked, so after the pension was gone, they only had his social security to live on. In the end, they lost everything and ended up living in a small, dirty apartment on what little social security paid him. They went from a high flyer lifestyle to a retirement of sitting on a couch all day watching TV because they couldn’t afford to do anything else. He couldn’t get over thinking about all the things he had waited to do when he retired, he would never be able to afford again. I think the disappointment and stress took years off of his life and he ended up dying at a young age. He never moved on after losing his pension and became somewhat of a bitter man at the end and separated himself from the rest of the family. I only saw him once or twice before he died. My ancestors went from a family who spent two weeks together every summer to one never talking to each other, except on major holidays and at funerals. My dad and mom took it even worse. I never knew the lifestyle my dad and mom had when they were younger, because by the time I was born things had turned south. Dad started drinking right after the plants closed down and mom had to go to work to help support us. They never recovered financially from the closures, because of dad’s drinking and the fact they wouldn’t move from the area where they grew up. They stayed in the same place even when there were no jobs paying more than minimum wage. They spent the rest of their lives as minimum wage workers and over time lost everything just like my grandparents.“
“When I realized how my family members lost everything because of an unforeseen change in the financial situation in America, I was only a few blocks from home. I almost crashed twice as the full realization hit me how the whole thing was fragile. We work for others who could fire us at any
time. We work at companies in which there is no guarantee they won’t shut the doors because of a recession or because they want to move operations to somewhere cheaper. Our whole financial lives are unpredictable and out of most people’s immediate control. While we say we own a house or own our cars, we don’t. Try missing your house payment or car payment for a few months in a row and see how much you own them. In our old neighborhood, try missing your home owner’s association fees and wait to find out what they can do to you in the court system. Try missing property taxes and see how much you own your house. The whole thing is on thin ice and most people don’t realize it. There are no guarantees in life. I am not saying everyone should sit on the beach and play bongos all day long instead of working and trying to better themselves. I think we should be more careful on how we go about living our lives. This credit society which has built up over the last few decades is dangerous to most of us. I now believe we should keep ourselves in check and buy only what we can afford to pay for in cash. Yes, use a credit card so you don’t have to carry wads of cash around, but be able to fully pay it off at the end of the month.”
“The credit industry wouldn’t like that much, would they?” Mark interrupted. “They need those balances to be carried forward to keep their profits up.”
“I know. Some of the things going on today are because we let them grow over time. When was it written everyone needed a house with imported marble countertops? When was it written we needed to buy a car with all those gadgets in it? If you think about it, most of us only spend 5-10 hours a week in our cars. We don’t need all those things we only use once or twice a year like heated seats or heated mirrors. Many of us could get by with a simple car we can drive back and forth to work and go to the store in once in a while. Something simple enough so when it broke you could crack open the hood and fix it yourself. A car that does not need a computer system and an advanced engineering degree to work on if it goes haywire. Why is it we think we need cars so complex when we only use them about an hour a day? Auto makers with great marketing have been able to convince us otherwise over the decades.”