Remember this song "drip drip drop little April showers..beating a tune as you fall all around, drip drip drop little April showers...what can compare with your beautiful sound?" I do, it is a tune from Bambi, and I kept insistently singing it today to my fifteen-month old charge. That song, "Itsy-Bitsy Spider" and "It's Raining Life" from Fern Gully. Does anyone know any other kids rain songs? The only way I get through the day here lately is to sing about how much the Earth appreciates the rain; the rain that never, ever goes away here.
Also keeping me from going mad is my brewing process; I'm pleased to report that I tasted a little of the dandelion wine (it is way too early to be tasting it, but I did anyway,) and it tastes delicious! I'm so excited that it seems to be turning out well! I found a new use for condoms when I transfered the wine to the "distillation tanks" which in my case, are mason jars topped with condoms with the lube washed off to act as carboys. (What can I say, I'm cheap...) Anyway, it is quite humorous to go check on my wine and see the condoms full of gas and sticking straight up from the mason jars, erect with wine! (Now if I could only find a person willing to use my getting-stale stash of condoms...oh well...)
That and the beekeeping are keeping me sane. I went and helped my neighbor spread Linseed oil all over her hives to make them more waterproof; while she cleaned old wax off of some frames she is giving away. It was really fun work, all bundled up in the cold just out of the rain on the porch, talking about Peak Oil, Primitivism and the idea that I could possibly, just possibly, be part of her tribe when they move to Happy Camp California and become real hunter/gatherers....! How exciting! I told her I didn't have any money and didn't expect to after college, but I would be very skilled with plant medicine, suturing and of course, baby catching, so I would be a big asset to a tribe of hunter-gatherers...
I've been so excited about learning the ways of hunter/gatherer that I even found myself rambling away to fifteen month old Jack about it, explaining to him that modern day hunter/gatherers can't really be nomadic, since land is mostly owned by someone, and there aren't the herds of wild things to follow anymore either. So we would probably have to rely on some permiculture for some of our food, although of course we would try to hunt and gather the majority...
I really look forward to getting out of school in a few years and then spending at least a few years with this tribe...maybe forever, who knows? I have beautiful, romantic visions of giving birth in a long house, surrounded by folks who really love me and know me the most intimately. I want to know what it feels like to send an entire day gathering raspberries lets say, and then to bring them back to your folks and see everyone get a handful or so; I think that gives a whole new perspective on all the work that really goes into food, sustainability and the beauty and blessings of small gain from hard (but lovely,) work...I remember spending many a summer day in pursuit of wild berries with my sisters; the three of us, working diligently all day, meant a pie in the evening. I was thinking about all that and more, while feeding little Jack blueberries today; I was picturing how many blueberries he might get if he was in a tribal situation; how first of all, he would not be eating blueberries this time of year, secondly, when the women of his village did go to gather blueberries, he'd most likely be in a sling on someone's back (probably his mom's,) and how he would nurse periodically throughout the day, but how he would probably also be fed whatever berries or whatever the ladies where gathering; probably to the point where he'd have blue shit for a while. But he might only eat blueberries once or twice a year; something you eat mass quantities of when they are ripe and then, none at all the rest of the year.
Anyway, greatest love to all the indigenious family and wannabe indigenious,
Love ya,
Carrot
