WOW - We Own Wind!

           We go through our busy lives paying bills, doing laundry, catching a number of family situations – all generally without notice. Then one day we see something that draws us to take a turn in the road and so experience a very notable moment. So it happened with us a few days ago. Driving north on Michigan’s Highway 127, the one that leads to our historic masterpiece the MackinacBridge, when just an hour out of Lansing we saw tall towering gleaming white Wind Towers. Not just one or two, but many wind towers.  We turned east following the site like curious Don Quixotes, bearing instead our intention to embrace the concept rather than fight it.

            In our Crunchy Granola days experimenting with various non-polluting renewable resources we only dreamed of power significant enough to serve a grand population. Our little abode used passive solar techniques, but mostly we depended on wood from our little forest out back, and coal delivered to our local utility company. We watched more adventurous colleagues actually produce wind/solar power enough to sell energy back to “the grid”.

Over the years we have explored the advancing technology in both wind turbine designs and solar collection. We lamented that we might not live long enough to actually see acceptance of the advancing renewable technology against the resistance of high profit dinosaur bones, that the sucking of oil from sands and the flattening of mountains will use all of our human brain and muscle power until there is nothing left, before we try to catch up to the gifts that shine on us (sometimes blisteringly) every day.

            Here, in the summer of 2012 the giants stood before us – over 130 of them – quietly overseeing lush corn and soybean fields amid pristine farmsteads of Gratiot County, Michigan. They stand over 400 feet capturing gentle winds across this ancient lake bed flatland of mid-Michigan on some 30,000 acres. The wind towers generate enough electricity for more than 50,000 homes in the area.

These lovely machines are providing hundreds of jobs from production (General Electric) to raising at the sites (Livonia-based Aristeo Construction), to maintenance. They provide tens of thousands of dollars, millions of dollars over a few years, to the communities for roads, schools, and all the things that make for great places to live right here in my beautiful Michigan. This is just one of several planned energy farms in the state. Consumers Energy and DTE are swiftly moving toward the establishment of the wind farms in the “thumb” and the Lake Land Wind Farm in Ludington capturing Lake Michigan winds on the high ground.

According to Kevin Parzyck, vice-president of development in the Midwest for  Invenergy which oversees the construction projects, “Once things get rolling, you can put a couple up of (the towers) a day.” [Barrie Barber, The Saginaw News]

            This all came about with more urgency by Michigan’s Clean, Renewable and Efficient Energy Act of 2008 that requires 10% of energy output to be clean renewable by 2015. The projects are embraced by the energy companies for more than meeting that goal, accounting for over a billion dollars invested in the wind/solar projects.            

Standing among the beautiful farmland wind towers listening to the soft cranking of the rotating motors amid crickets and birds, it occurred to me that we are standing in the Future, no plutonium waste, no burning holes in the ozone, no gaseous spills in the water table. A sense of elation came over me – I am so grateful I lived to experience this moment.

By the way, if you research wind energy in Michigan you will also find a good deal of home energy products produced right here. Whew (that’s a little puff of wind celebrating a good world comin’).

Helene author of

A Homestead Decade, How Crunchy Granola Changed My Life, Amazon Kindle Book, a memoir, funny, serious and cheap $2.99.

 

AN INDEPENDENCE DAY TO REMEMBER!

Here comes another one, smack in the middle of the week!

We have had some memorable Independence Day celebrations, but only one stands out with fear akin to images of apocalyptic chaos. It was during our “homestead days” when we had moved to the country, lived by our garden and animals, and contemplated a world of peace and love. At that time we had not experienced a rural American Fourth of July.

All chores done, a wonderful summer meal settling in our bellies we decided to take the children – eight year old daughter, six year old son, and the baby in the infant carrier on our backs – to the county fair grounds for some country fun. Remember this is 4^th of July, not the charming harvest days in the fall. This was a completely different crowd.

The temperature soared past 90 degrees. Carney hawkers in smudged shirts with faces glistening from slow moving  streaks of sweat taunted for a piece of the money pie. To pass the time until evening when the fireworks would finish the day folks congregated in the grand stands to take part in bear fights.  Yes, bear fights as in Black Bear.

Men from the audience were chided to come down to the ring, pay a dollar and wrestle the brown bear who had been pacing the edges of the ropes in the ring. Ragged, aging men from a local motorcycle gang challenged each other with shoulder punches and loud laughter to show their toughness against the bear. One burly gang fellow was especially prodded by his colleagues to get in there and take that hairy (bleeper) down. When the human challenger took off his shirt he looked amazingly like his furry opponent.

The bear stood on his hind legs which made him tower over the human and lumbered toward the man. Mr. Motorcycle guy looked visibly afraid, while people in the audience began shouting for blood. The bear hovered above the man. The man began punching the bear. Punch. Punch. Until he managed to slug the bear’s jaw. The angry referee/owner pulled the bear back by his leash and ordered the man out of the ring. The audience went wild. We sensed serious danger and gathered up our children who wisely questioned our lack of wisdom bringing them to this event in the first place. As we left the grand stand, the motorcycle gang was surrounding the wrestling ring demanding their hero’s dollar back. Surprisingly the bear owner refused the refund! We got the heck out of there and decided to linger on the grounds until the fireworks started, which was not such a great idea either.

The crowds outside the arena pushed together tightly to get a close view of the explosions. As the rockets began to fire up to the sky, it became apparent that something was terribly wrong. Rockets were exploding too close to the ground spewing burning cinders on the crowd. We grabbed our children and pushed our way to our old parked pickup truck.  Getting out of the town turned into another event as we turned down one street to find police had blocked the way with flashing lights stirring up the atmosphere. We scooted down another street and finally got onto our country road, which was not idyllic as the song goes, but rather full of raucous alcohol crazies weaving across the lines, screaming and laughing and throwing big green bottles in the ditches.

 At about a half mile from our farm, smoke began floating from under the dash board, then the lights went out. No moon. We have to walk. The sense of danger swooped over us, when our little boy turned to his dad and said, “I brought my flashlight.” I almost cried.

We made it home safely to a joyful Amos who repeated over and over, “where were you guys?!”

There are lots of stories in A Homestead Decade - How Crunchy Granola Changed My Life, Amazon Kindle e-book (works on most digital devices) just $2.99. I hope you enjoy the book and the blog and send a little note about what you think. Enjoy a safe holiday this year. Thanks for stopping by.

Helene

EGGS

“After just a few weeks, the lovely little baby chicks became obnoxious, awkward, half-bony feathered adolescent animals. . . Why did the country life seem so appealing? And how did we get stuck raising 48 unruly chickens? . . .“

In pursuit of eggs (and meat) we impulsively bought an advertised 50# bag of chicken feed from a local feed store and as an incentive we were given a cake box size of 50 day-old baby chicks. The whole terrifying story is described thoroughly in A Homestead Decade – How Crunchy Granola Changed My Life (Amazon e-book, $2.99). As explained, we newbies to the homestead farm did not know how fast chickens grow, which included their rampant developmental stages (libido), and ultimate redistribution from our quiet little chicken yard to various outlets including a community freezer locker.

Four gentle hens remained in our barn happy to be away from raging roosters. Everyday their little nests offered up two or three big brown tasty eggs. Each morning I gave the egg time in admiration of its unique structure, value, and timely presence (24-hour production!). And yes, great appreciation to its original purpose. The hens developed a symbiotic relationship with us as we did with them. It was a calm time after the initial storm of 50 fast growing chickens was over.

Today, no longer on the homestead, I buy eggs in a grocery store. I try to purchase with a humane sense knowing that I have to trust the grower is really a local farmer and his or her chickens are as happy as our remaining hens. I know all the concerns – we as a nation just cannot satisfy the insatiable demand for eggs for our vast population with home grown free chickens. It is just not practical – unless . . . we carefully consider a small collection of backyard hens even in the middle of the city. What was that? Did I hear a groan? A quick calculation of reasons why chickens are just not an urban or even suburban animal? They’re dirty, noisy, they attract vermin. Not like dogs.  Wait ‘til I tell you about backyard goats. Just kidding . . . sort of.

I do have a fascinating egg story. In checking on the history, value, and cultural attachment to eggs in Wikipedia (www.wikipedia.org ) I saw that eggs were also used along with vegetables as a form of vandalism that insults with little damage. The story goes that when Candidate Harry S. Truman made a train stop through town, the local newspaper stated that he was pelted with rotten eggs.  River Grandma (also in the Crunchy Granola book) who  had a strong partisan political view, scoffed at the news story muttering loud enough for family nearby to hear, “the eggs were not rotten.”

Here’s to a pan of boiled eggs in the refrigerator for a quick protein boost.

Enjoy!

Affectionately,

Helene author of A Homestead Decade - How Crunchy Granola Changed My Life (Amazon Kindle book, $2.99)

A Tribute to Pets in Our Lives

A few days ago my dear brother, Leon, took his beloved golden retriever, Bridger, to the veterinarian to be released from a debilitating terminal cancer.

I am sure Leon will share many stories about Bridger in the next decade or so. Amos, who is described in his own chapter in the Crunchy Granola Book, is still the star of so many of our homestead decade episodes. That’s how it goes when a loved one dies. Those of us who have loved another animal in our household know very well the intense feeling of affection for them as well our human loved ones.

Here’s one for you Leon about Bridger in your family:

At one of those events at your house that involved lots of family and friends on a brilliant summer day, your nine-year old daughter played joyfully with the household pets including three dogs and a cat. Because Bridger was the oldest and most obedient at the time she decided to teach him “tricks” – jumping through hula hoops, racing through a child-designed obstacle course, and with full exuberance accepting the “reward” of barking-screaming laughter and big furry hugs. The young one did this training with so much enthusiasm that her 14-year-old sister, who had been trying to be sophisticated among the ‘tweens, wrestled with boring teendom or the pure joy of her baby sister and beloved dog. We watched the moment of submission when the 14-year-old decided that she deserved one more childhood fling and to Bridger’s happy surprise the two girls unabashedly played, ran the course, jumped the hoops and rolled the earth with their big furry buddy. It was a sight I will never forget.

It hurts so to let them go. Amos taught me so much about living on beyond dying. I am so grateful to have had him in our lives as you are with your Bridger.

 So this little blog today is a tribute to all who love and all who have loved a cherished pet friend. May your memories be superb.

If you like funny stories and a couple of sad stories I hope you take a look at the book A Homestead Decade -How Crunchy Granola Changed My Life (Amazon Kindle, $2.99, for all types of reading devices). Thanks for stopping by.

Helene   

Three Children, 13 Years, No Television

“No television?!”  a parent at one of the school functions exclaimed loudly to me during our homestead days. I was surprised at her reaction as if our choice of not having television was a crime against our children. I tried to explain, but as we humans often do when we have a strong opinion about a social topic, she looked at me pretending to listen, but I could almost hear her brain calculating a dozen loud reasons why we have to have television. And there it was. Before finishing the last word of my explanation she was on me with a barrage of considerations why I must bring the box back into our lives.

GROWING UP WITHOUT TELEVISION

“What do you do at night?” another parent interested in the almost conversation asked. We talk, we make cookies, we read. I read the entire series of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie. The children went to bed comfortably sharing their thoughts about each chapter. Years later my daughter listened to her college dorm mates discuss Little House on the Prairie with events she never heard of until she realized they were talking about the television series of their own childhoods.

Our children became voracious readers each checking out seven to ten books at a time from the library. One day they practically demanded that I read C.S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe so we could talk about it. As I read this famous “children’s” book, I was horrified by so much of the violence and prejudicial innuendos. I had to write out my thoughts so we could discuss the piece calmly. That was the essence of our life without television – we had conversations.

For 13 years the pop culture world influenced by television went on without us. Think about your experiences a decade ago – life changes subtly but surely so that at the reflection moments of ten or more years we are shocked at what was and how our personal world had changed. Thirteen years in a child’s life is a very long time.

AND THE RESULTS ARE . . .

If this were an experiment on the effects of this dominant connection to the world I can tell you the response from these children and their use of television today is bonded with the changes in the medium itself. Television is now cable, but even more it has taken a broad and narrow path in communication all at the same time. Each of my adult children pays at least $200 a month for the broadest reach of their TV, particularly sports and movies. They are frustrated if the service is interrupted, partly because the television is also “bundled” with numerous other communication “devices” in their homes including The Computer. This is our brave new world. The effects of thirteen years without television? Nothing. They never missed a beat. They moved smoothly onto the super cyber highway.

As for Joel and I, we too have joined the world with computers and smarter than us cell phones. As for television itself, hmm . . . we still abhor the endless repeated commercials that treat us as if we had only one cell functioning in our brains. We watch a few commercial television shows and resent that we are paying for those commercials. We are fortunate to get the Canadian station CBC for a wider perspective of The News. Then there is PBS – Public Broadcasting System.  

Ah, PBS beauty and thought-provoking, uplifting and challenging, and the distinct absence of commercials every 7 minutes. America Revealed, hosted by Yul Kwon, has had a big influence on my reflective thinking about our homestead/business experiment days. We have all changed terrifically. We are facing an exciting new world in food production, renewable energy applications, global sharing. Wait a minute, maybe it isn’t so new, but rather founded and expanded on things learned in previous days. Just what did we learn then? I’ll let you know what comes out of those considerations in another blog.

Your feedback is greatly appreciated. I hope you get a chance to read A Homestead Decade: How Crunchy Granola Changed My Life (Amazon – Kindle good on any e-reading device – there’s that word again). C’mon back soon.

Helene 

What's for Dinner?

Every day my mother asks me, “What are you going to make for dinner?” At 90, Mom is still cooking fantastic meals even for one, though she does buy more convenience foods than ever before. She taught me without recipes, “Think in threes,” she used to say, “Three items on the plate – a salad or vegetable (vitamins), meat (protein), and starch (carbohydrate).” This guideline has basically served me and my family well over the years. Both of my daughters are very good cooks, so the simple message in balance has been passed on.

Maybe not so simple. In the years between Mom teaching me and me teaching my children the world has spun around several times. Food designs are a dominant issue with Americans and maybe all cultures. It is more than sustenance or even hunger, it is art and recreation, it is a measure of economic status, it is cultural identity. When we say, you are what you eat, we are not just referring to fat levels and vitamins. We really mean you and I are what we eat.

Before the crunchy granola era of my life, I relied more on crutches within my balanced “threes” – a quick premixed basic for such things as biscuits and quick bread, ground meats and bacon, and greens poured out of cans to be heated on the stove. It was a matter of confidence or lack thereof. Fear of failure drove our meals to the aisle of mediocrity.

Then came the first wave of “whole foods” for whole bodies all linked to the awareness of corporate food dominance over our meager meal dollars. Since then we have been in a vigorous race between mass production and personal charge of food gathering. On one side is production for masses (and the masses’ money) that includes an array of development issues – packaging, uniformity, transportation, distribution, volume both of product and of sales, often with an equal array of deep issues including animal care and overdose chemistry.

On the other side are such things as beautiful photography of food, a dozen or more television how-to cooking shows presenting not only fresh foods but glorious combinations of world cultures with unique crops tantalizing our very dreams.

When crunchy granola came along we did not have access to the television or the fresh food stores, we had to bravely learn the specifics of making our own bread and cereal and grow/preserve our own vegetables and fruits. And for protein, we city kids had to face the deepest of all issues:  taking the very life of the animals we raised to put true and good protein on our table.

It has been an interesting ride. These days in our family, we continue to seek out the least modified food because we now have greater access and cook up a grand feast of every variety to nurture our souls using color, texture, herbs and spices. We still throw a few apples in a pan with unbleached sugar and cinnamon and a sprinkle of nutmeg – cook it for a few minutes, mashing it with a fork for sweet hot applesauce. We still can our own minimally salted tomatoes in pints, hot water bath for a musical ping. We still make breads – flat breads, fruit breads, and fine breakfast cinnamon rolls. We have container gardens and fresh herbs during the season. All easy stuff.

All of this growth, it should be noted is without hostile judgment. We are very aware of population issues and the planet – land and water. And we do still love our Little Debbies (sorry if we offend the purists). We also know it isn’t over, this great big awareness and choice of how we will eat in the future. We know energy sources are changing, capturing water, growing vertically, eating locally grown products, finding protein in more efficient resources where the production costs are far less than the anticipated outcome. We personally began with crunchy granola as a life change, but honestly, in the big picture, we humans are on the verge of wonderful new ways to feed ourselves and our neighbors, we just have to work together, diligently, to make it happen.

Wishing you good food every day,

Helene

To Journal or Not to Journal

“Keep track of every day the date emblazoned on yr morning.”  - Jack Kerouac

Ninety years ago Jack Kerouac was born and I’m sure soon after began leaving an interesting legacy to all of us about loving life and keeping it close to our memory. Kerouac may have lived his vision much differently than most of us could, but his words to be vigilant are greatfully received.

I apply Kerouac’s advice to keeping a journal. Yeah, yeah, I know – eighth grade English class or that little locked diary your brother managed to find. No this is a journal, a record of life’s little joys and sorrows and maybe the weather.

My first real journal began as a garden record of that big garden described in the Crunchy Granola book. Somewhere along the entries of how the peas were growing a note slipped in on how the children were growing as well. Soon the children were far more interesting than the stoic vegetables. Once the journal was in gear, there was no stopping the dates emblazoning our mornings and nights deep into the decades of our collective life.

To share the value of recording in a journal with you I started looking back – waay back – and found some funny little pieces, like cherished photographs.  Amid the tremendous task of building a house, birthing a baby, and learning to make cheese, there are the little quips and moments of enlightenment. Here are a couple:

A three and a half year old, feeling secure in her family, watches her father leave the room for a moment. “You’re such a handsome king,” she tells him. Then she looks sweetly at me and says, “You knew that.” Or when she flops over her brother and turns to us, “look, Dad, I caught a turkey.”

Nine year old son was asked one day if he knew what body language is – “Yeah,” he answered, “that’s when your stomach growls at you.”

A magazine article suggesting children write to the President to receive an autographed picture sent our son into a long stare into space when he got the idea – “where are my school pictures?” He was going to trade with the President of the United States. His sister, two years older, exclaimed “Exchange pictures!? With the President?” and burst into a long stream of laughter that followed her through the house.

I found journal entries where the wisdom of the eleven year old first born caused me pause – the baby sister cried wildly when her father cut her toast. Big sister explained calmly to the parents that the baby wanted to eat a hole in the center of the toast first.

It wasn’t always children. Sometimes the journal included worldly issues of the times. I love this one:  In July 1975 the Russians and Americans are performing a milestone in space with the dual experiments of the Soviet  Soyuz and U.S. Apollo space maneuvers.  Meanwhile we are all wrapped up with our own exhausting house building project. Amid these two huge constructions, Joel wakes up one morning to tell me in his half sleep, “There are two great campers up there in the sky, checking out each other’s toilets.”

I had completely forgotten most of these incidents and now these many years later with adult children cuddling their own babies, I embrace the vision of them giggling in front of me. I cherish recorded mile markers in time, “14 years married next week”, “its been 28 years with my good friend, my partner, my love”. It has been many more years since then. These scratchings on paper remind me of the treasure in keeping a journal.

Warning: in this search I also discovered the down side of recording passionate thoughts in the journal – words of wisdom (or so I thought at the time) that are meaningless and boring.  Or worse, opinions about people and life that my ego wanted to share, opinions flopping around in the muddle of youth, my youth that show an immaturity that surprises me.  

Keeping a journal is definitely a personal preference, but overall, if anyone reads these when I have “passed”, I hope they enjoy the jokes and bypass the rest. Thanks, Jack, for the advice.

Please check out the e-book, A Homestead Decade How Crunchy Granola Changed My Life,(Amazon Kindle Book) to help understand the basis of this blog. It was great fun to write. The journals are the backbone to the memory.

Talk with you again soon.

Helene