You Plant Your Fields

My little seedlings are finally starting to get a move on in the growth department. These are mostly varieties that I ordered from Southern Exposure. I am very impressed with their seed quality. These just busted forth quite exuberantly only a few days after I planted them and soon outgrew the smaller starter holes in the tray below. My seeds from Baker Creek and a few others have sprouted but took much longer and just haven't shown the life, I guess you'd say, of these others. Now, some of these other seeds are from a couple of years ago and a couple I messed up by planting too deep but the Southern Exposure seeds just seem much more robust.
We are still getting a few frosts now and again and our traditional planting dates for hot weather crops are not until mid-April. Many of the older folks here plant right after Good Friday. So, knowing these would never make it in the teeny starter slots I transferred these to individual peat pots until I can get them in the ground. I have started zucchini, crookneck yellow squash, 2 types of cucumber, Amish Paste, Black Cherry, Moneymaker and Yellow Pear tomatoes, Black Diamond watermelons, Edisto 57 melons (cantaloupe), a Santa Claus melon, eggplant and pepperocini peppers. I also started some dill and some little mini, decorative pumpkins, just for fun. I will direct sow green beans, corn, okra, purple hull peas and probably some other stuff that escapes my memory at the time.

I hope I did not sound presumptuous or holier-than-thou in that last post/rant. I don't mean to appear to think I'm all that and a bag of chips too. Compared to some other folks doing 'green', I'm a horrible slacker. I know I have a long way to go but I'm working on it. What bothers me is not that people don't live like I do. Everybody is different and everybody has the right to live as they choose. What pains me is when I see friends and family, or even people that are not close friends, who are obviously unhappy and unhealthy but do not seem to realize the source of their trouble. They work long hours on sometimes 2 jobs to uphold a standard of living that basically amounts to eating, sleeping, watching TV and shopping for worthless crap on their few off days. Or, they work long hours to avoid their spouse. They feel bad physically and bad about themselves because they can't seem to lose weight but they don't seem to realize that melted cheese is not a vegetable and that cases of diet soda won't cancel out all the other crap you eat. In fact, many studies done have shown they will actually make you gain weight, not to mention wreck your blood sugar levels. They complain about having to take so many prescription meds and will believe anything a doctor tells them but make fun of me because I use baking soda instead of chemical laden toothpaste. And what astounds me most of all is they will question me and see how I live, that I don't take drugs, that I don't need to lose 50-60 lbs. or more (although I admit I could lose 10), that I'm not burdened by untold amounts of debt and then STILL smugly scoff at me for planting my own food or not having the latest Crackberry or Ipod or whatever the shit they have.
And most painful of all is that they are teaching their children the exact same habits and lifestyles, almost guaranteeing their future unhappiness also. They claim they have no time for outdoors or planting or anything of that sort and I suppose if they are at the mall all the time or chauffeuring their children to way too many activities, they don't. I don't buy that however. When I was a kid we grew a large garden and raised much of our own meat and we, the kids, had to do a lot of the work. But we still had time for extracurricular activities and fun time with friends. In high school my sister was in the band and my two brothers and I were all the annual staff photographer. I got to go swimming at the fancy city pool with girlfriends. However, I had to finish weeding and watering sometimes before I could go. But we were not secluded farm children that never socialized with society. Hell, we even dated some! Well, my siblings did; for the most part I couldn't buy a date in high school. But anyway...the idea of not having time or kids not having any other life is ridiculous, but I guess what it boils down to is that people make time for what they want.
On the rare occasions that I see my family they all look tired and wore out. Other people and friends seem stressed and upset and it just makes me feel bad for them. To live a more simple life is just that,... simple. It's not rocket science. But I guess the lure and habit of rampant consumerism is more than a lot of people can avoid. And, as some of you pointed out, most people just don't stop and think. They don't realize they don't have to live that way. As one of the boys I worked with told me once, 'it's not debt unless you can't make the payment'. That is their way of thinking. But you can't really say anything to people about stuff like that. It's their choice. But I do feel bad knowing that people I care about are going to continue to suffer ill health, work related stress and rising debt and they won't look around and see what is going on.
But ya'll don't worry about me, seriously. I like being different; always have. In fact, I have a overwhelming urge to dread my hair or pierce my nose in defiance of normalcy and to proclaim my hippidom!!. Tattoos are cliche' now but I could come up with something different. Wear bones in my hair? lol!!!