Invasive Species Pie

One of the joys I have is when my oldest son and I do some kind of cooking together. I believe creative cooking appeals to his artist’s soul. He doesn’t like to do everyday cooking but special things – like birthday cakes or Blackberry tarts. He likes to cook mushrooms they find in season on our farm. Even though he is 19 years old, he wants me to assist him – which I think is very sweet and it is one of the very few things we do together, though rare.

We have an Autumn Olive bush right at the edge of our driveway that has recently been producing very delicious berries and it was heavily laden. Friday night he got inspired to pick a bunch. There was some trial and error – trying to mash the pulp and juice out of raw berries through a strainer was impossible nor did using the blender work.

I read something about boiling them (it also deactivates the seeds since the plant is considered invasive). We gave it a try. It did not take a lot of heat in our Electric Kettle. We mashed them with a potato masher while they cooked. Only a few minutes really until they were ready. Worked like a charm and the pulp and juice went right through the strainer but not the seeds and skins. It created the most beautiful color of a puree that tasted better than the raw berries and it didn’t separate, even in the fridge overnight (many posts I read in researching this talked about the lycopene separating out from the pulp as juice).

Saturday, we made the crust and baked the pie.

Here’s our recipe –

Crust Ingredients and Directions

2-2/3 cups Whole Wheat flour
1 tsp Real Salt
2/3 cup Flax Oil
6 tbsp Whole Milk

We pressed just over 1/2 the crust mixture into a 9″ pan, very crumbly, reminded me a lot of a Graham Cracker crust. My son complained it was too dry and after we pressed it as firmly as we could, he brushed the surface with more milk. It soaked in as we cooked the crust at 400 degrees for 12 minutes. It came out good and solid.

Filing Ingredients and Directions

2 cups of Autumn Olive puree
1/2 cup Birch tree sugar (Xylitol)
3 tbsp of Whole Wheat flour as thickener
(though we didn’t think it needed it)

I did run the large crystals of the Xylitol through my coffee grinder to make it finer. We poured the puree into the crust and laid some lattice strips cut from the crust mixture over the top (my son added more milk to the leftover mixture until it was a consistency he liked).

Baked this for 15 mins at 400 degrees. The instructions were for 10 minutes or until the puree bubbles. Since the puree was cold from the fridge (and not at room temperature or warmer) we did the extra 5 mins and then decided even though it wasn’t bubbling, since we cooked the berries the night before, it was good enough.

The outcome was very sweet. My son thought we could have cut the sugar to 1/4 cup or even left it out. I think it depends on individual tastes. The original recipe called for up to 1 cup of sugar. I thought there was still a bit of tartness from the berries detectable. The crust being whole wheat added complexity. It held up quite solid and added a crunch since the filling was soft, a bit like a pudding pie.

My sons get a kick out of calling the result – Invasive Species Pie. We did make a few cookies with some leftover crust mixture from making the lattice, crystals of Xylitol sprinkled on top and a spot of leftover puree in the middle. They were pretty and we all liked the taste of them.

Visioning A Different Outcome

It breaks my heart to see that over a week later, my community remains raw with upset and divisiveness. Madison County Missouri is 98.3% white and they probably prefer it be that way. Quiet and non-contentious, perhaps echoing back to an earlier time in history. The world is changing and it is a significant moment in history.

We once had a black sheriff’s deputy. That didn’t last long. We have a black doctor but he doesn’t live here. One can’t help but ask why people of color don’t feel welcome in our community.

I remember my own youth. I was a high schooler from 1969 through 1972 and the Vietnam War was raging and that was our moment in history against a war that seemed wrong for our country to be involved in. On June 24, 2020 a group of young people came to raise awareness about what they see as their moment in time to make a difference. They are deliberately targeting predominantly white rural communities in which to make a stand. Some of the members of this group are residents of this community.

The rumors prior to the event were full of mis-perceptions and erroneous expectations – the protesters were being bused in from outside of the community, or they were coming to burn WalMart or spray graffiti all over the town’s buildings or perhaps break windows and loot the small businesses. They were terrorists or antifa or paid by George Soros to be there. With news of the planned protest, a Back the Blue counter-protest was planned in support of law enforcement but more accurately to trap the protesters in a ring of the community’s well-intentioned (some) citizens protecting the community from what they thought was going to happen. Some were blatantly racist – making monkey gestures, pantomiming a lynching, shouting the n word, etc

I never planned to be there on either side. I didn’t think it would change hearts and minds and I thought it could go badly. And it did. It was a circus. One aspect that contributed to the spectacle was that the courthouse is surrounded by a road that exits in 4 different directions. Counter-protesters were parked in spaces that face local establishments. The county courthouse sits in the middle. The protesters were staged in front of the south face.

Cars drove around and around, one played an obscene racist song by David Allen Coe. There were 3%ers and Boogaloos and LOTS of weapons openly carried. There were Confederate flags, Pro-Trump flags, Don’t Thread on Me flags and Thin Blue Line flags.

The only scuffle occurred when a young BLM protester attempted to unfurl an American flag with no ill intent and that was misunderstood by a counter-protester to be preparations for burning the flag. It took law enforcement a moment to realize what was happening and step in. After that, law enforcement became more vigilant and protective of the protesters who were outnumbered 5 to 1.

A veteran joined the protesters because during his time in the military, he had stood up for a black person in his unit. He is also running for our district’s state senator and admitted that he may have lost 1,000 votes by being there that day but it was ok. He was also berated by a local citizen for joining with the protesters but stood tall and proud and calm in the face of it.

Sadly, after watching livestream horrified at what was unfolding, by the next morning I could only see that the community had socially lynched the protesters. The thing is – they will come back. Many in the community are embarrassed at the portrayal of our community but it is factually what happened. Many in our community are unrepentant and have not changed their point of view regarding the whole BLM movement. Some probably do fear black people moving into the community and changing the nature of life here.

The county to the north of us has slightly better demographics with 92% white and almost 4.5% black. That is the only place in my own day-to-day living that I happily encounter black people. There was the black guy who used to work in produce in the upscale grocery store I shop at. He was always friendly towards all the customers who came in and I was always happy to briefly chat with him, letting him know how much I appreciated him being there. Sadly he left for better pay driving a truck.

There are my two favorite black people at Panera where I got carry home before the virus caused everything to shut down and I do miss my chance to smile with and exchange pleasantries with them. I have a very fond memory of buying an Etta James cd at WalMart after she died. I was taking it out of my bag to listen to on my drive home when two black girls stopped upon seeing it to tell me how much they loved her music.

The point of sharing all of this with you is, the protesters do plan to come back to our county seat of Fredericktown Missouri. Their sense from experience is that getting the town’s attention is necessary given their previous unexpected reception here. If this next event could turn out very differently, that would be progress. I do know there will be no vehicular traffic into or around the courthouse next time and that should help to cool things off a bit but not entirely. If the community would either stay away or come with the intention of quietly witnessing the protest in a civil manner, that would be progress as well. If they could leave their weapons at home, not bring in the contentious flags and not shout slogans back at the protesters, the community’s portrayal would be very different the next time.

Do I think that is possible ? In reality, probably not. Could I hope we could rise to the challenge ? I do and that is why I have written this.

Spring Planting in the Forest

Bare Root Seedling in Plowed Groove

My family has spent most of the last week planting trees. Back in 2002, we entered into a federal government program to reduce soil erosion and contracted to have 18,000 mixed hardwood trees planted in the riparian buffers of our major perennial stream. For two years after that, my husband mowed between the rows of trees because we refused to use herbicides to kill off the Fescue and that was the compromise we had arrived at with the government to allow us not to do that and still receive their financial assistance. My husband also walked the rows each year and hand-planted seedlings to replace any of the trees that had died with new trees. During that phase we added in evergreens and the flowering trees, Dogwood and Redbud.

It was during that time that I was pregnant with our youngest and we were searching for a name for him. For personal reasons related to his siblings, my husband wanted a name that began with “T”. We have a lot of awesome rock here on our farm and one day he came home to me after some hand-planting work and said – “I have it !! We can name him Tree Stone !!” I said no, no, no that is not a proper name and then inspired said, “Let us call him Treston”. And that story in why in some of our most fun and humorous moments we will sometimes refer to him as “Tree Stone” or “Plant Rock”.

Last year the crazy restrictions and conditions for receiving state government assistance to plant more trees caused us to abandon that plan after many hours of researching and planning by my husband because it simply did not make economic sense (it was going to cost us a lot of money that we did not have at the time) and the risks it entailed (having to repay monies received and even pay penalties on it) if we did not perform precisely as instructed were simply not acceptable. Encouraging us even more, was the fact that the contractor who was supposed to do that work for us, simply would not return our calls. It was too large of a project to go forward with all things considered. So my husband and two sons hand-planted 500 evergreen trees. This caused my husband to grow concerned that he would not live long enough to fulfill his vision of replacing our pastures with new forest with what remains of his own lifetime at such a pace.

My husband has been in the midst of this year’s project for months with lots and lots of planning in advance. We even spent an afternoon with an older man and his wife in a neighboring county. Interestingly, we first met this man back in 2002 but decided not to work with him because his values at the time did not seem aligned with ours. Now this year, my husband sought to learn everything he could from this man’s experience in machine planting trees. Not only did we visit him but several times my husband had long telephone conversations with him before we were ready to move forward with financial investments into this year’s planting.

Tree Planter

We bought an implement for tree planting. My husband modified it to make it safer and more useful for including our youngest son in the family project even including a seat belt for him. Beginning in late February, after we had already ordered and paid for this year’s bare root seedlings, we had almost 3 weeks of snow continually on the ground – first 7″, followed by 5″. We had lots of single digit and teen temperatures during that time and there was a very, very slow melting of that snow, immediately followed by a significant rainfall.

When asked about when I thought we should pick up our trees and begin planting, I had suggested to my husband that he not pick up the trees until this week. However even though I thought we needed more drying out time but he went ahead picked the trees up at the nursery last week. Now the clock was ticking against us for the trees need to be put into the ground as quickly as possible once they are out of cold storage at the nursery. My husband still made good use of the extra “early” days by doing some replacement hand-planting of the rows that he and our sons hand-planted during last year’s effort and also hand-planting 25 Cypress trees into a wetland area.

Suburban Stuck in the Mud

By Sunday, we tried to start planting Walnuts according to his plan which was to start in the bottoms near some of the trees we had planted back in 2002. The field was simply too wet. I immediately got our Suburban stuck. At least we managed to do all the training sessions that first day – mine for shuttling trees and water, my oldest son for driving the tractor and my youngest son (age 10-1/2) for managing the seedlings, handing the appropriate trees to my husband and telling him the moment to “plant” in order to keep a specific distance between trees and our son’s instructions included picking a “wildlife” specie to be interspersed after every 6 hardwood trees.

Springfield Planting Plan

You can get an idea of scale by noticing the little house in the red square at the bottom left of this image. This is only about half the entire length of this particular field. We will plant the other half in some subsequent year.

My older son, Simeon, was in charge of driving the tractor.

Eventually the impossible wetness of the field caused my husband to give up on the idea of getting any more planting done other than a very tiny start we had made on Sunday afternoon. He’s a pretty persistent, determined kind of guy so giving up entirely wasn’t easy for him to do but the reality could not be denied. The drag of the plow on the planter in that mud would cause the tractor’s tires to spin even though thankfully the tractor never became stuck so that we ended up with a bigger problem on our hands. We didn’t even try to go out to plant on Monday but gave the fields a warm dry day to become more workable. Then, our oldest son (age 14) suggested that we really ought to start at the uphill part of the field or at least in the middle. My husband was able to agree to a Plan B to plant in the middle of the field but in an attempt to keep the spacing on his original plan, he went out and flagged the spacing for two of those rows according to the downhill Walnut row.

On Tuesday afternoon, we went out and started uphill from the middle with the Northern Red Oaks and managed to get through the Black Gum after about 4 hours as the cold wind and approaching darkness put an end to that day’s work. On Wednesday, we expected rain by 2pm for the next 48 hours and so we got an early start, expecting to have to quit early. The field was the driest yet and so we turned back downhill from the middle. Good fortune kept the rain at bay and we ended up being out there for 9 hours until dark. There were some light sprinkles that came but nothing strong enough to put a stop to the day’s work. However it did rain that night and was lightly raining on Thursday.

So on Thursday, my sons and I were given the “day off”. My husband went out and hand-planted the “wetter” areas that gave us so much trouble on Sunday (the Walnut rows) by hand. He admitted that it would take many weeks for that area to actually dry out. On Friday, we got an early start – not as early as Wednesday but still put in 7 hours (working until dark). We finished the big field but still had a lot of seedlings left over, so we went to Plan B below for the excess trees.

Halcyon Planting Plan

By the end of Friday, there were only 300 trees left and so my husband and older son took care of them in about 2-1/2 hours on Saturday and allowed myself and the youngest son to stay home. These trees went into the field to the northeast of my deceased in-laws old log cabin.

Here’s the tally for this year.

Total Hardwood Trees = 2,350. About 200-300 per species. The mix included – Black Walnut, Black Cherry, White Oak, Mixed Hickory, Shumard Oak, Sweet Gum, Northern Red Oak, Black Gum, Black Oak and Chinkapin Oak.

Total “Wildlife” Species = 360. The mix included – Black Chokeberry, Black Locust, Eastern Wahoo, False Indigo, Flowering Dogwood, Red Mulberry, Redbud, Slender Bushclover, Smooth Sumac, White Fringetree and Wild Plum.

And another 25 Cypress trees in the wetlands area.

The work is not yet entirely complete. As I write this, my husband is back out in the field on the tractor because we can’t leave the plowed groove “open”. The little rodent like critters would utilize that as a “highway” to munch on the roots ending the future of our trees. The diagram above represents the slow and tedious process as he uses one of the front tires on the tractor to close the plowed grooves. The dots represent seedlings in a row.

The long-range overall plan is to replant all the Fescue pasture that my husband and in-laws created back in the late 1970s/early 1980s in trees so that we won’t have to burn the fields to keep them open anymore. We will do that planting over about 5-6 years time in sections of about the same size or quantity as we did this year. By doing this intentional planting, we are modifying what Nature would do in returning fields to forest. In the natural cycle, Cedars, Locust, Sumac and Persimmons are among the first to take root in a fallow field. We have stands of tall Pines here that are described as succession trees, these are what grow next in the areas that once were crop fields. Later on the hardwoods begin to take hold. This cycle would create some marketable timber after 100-150 years of time elapsed.

At this time, hardwoods have the most commercial value as timber. We have planted a lot of hardwoods including quite a few species of Oak which do well and are native here. We are protecting the farm in perpetuity as long as there are descendants to live here as stewards of this extraordinarily beautiful land. Our sons will certainly be able to follow our Forest Management Plan which will have them in another logging cycle in about 30 years and therefore, they may achieve the long-term funding benefits for the continuation of this farm twice in their lifetimes. The trees my sons have been involved in planting may benefit them at the end of their lifetimes or will be of financial usefulness to their children some day.

Most people do not have such a long-view regarding what they do on the land they have possession of. I believe that is why it is somewhat rare for anyone to put so much time, effort and money into planting trees – they see no personal benefit in doing so. Certainly, serious environmentalists will always consider planting trees beneficial for the planet and all her creature’s health and vitality.

A Root Cause of Discontent

Being a child of the 1950s and a product of our public school system, I grew up with a particular cultural mindset and acceptance of democratic ideals. I didn’t realize how much these were ideals and not realities until September 2011 when the Occupy Movement was born. I suppose that because I did come of age at the tail end of the 1960s and the Vietnam War it was easy for me to embrace an activist point of view. Because the Occupy Movement had my personal attention, I gave contemplation to the points of fact that they were informing anyone who would listen about. I came to realize that I have been asleep at the wheel and putting my faith and trust in a democratically elected government to represent my well-being. How naive I was !!

The topic for Blog Action Day this year is Inequality. One of the harsh realities I was forced to recognize was how little equality exists even in the United States of America which I still do believe is a fortunate country to be born into but I am not often proud of all this country stands for or does out in the world as a whole.

All 535 members of Congress have a median estimated net worth of about $966,000 according to data analyzed by the Center for Responsive Politics. The most recent numbers available from the U.S. Census show that the median net worth of the typical American household is $66,740. One cannot help but question whether our legislators can actually understand the financial pain most of the people in the United States (and in truth everywhere on this planet) face and a question of whether the affluent can effectively represent the common citizen despite the fact that they themselves are so very well off should be asked of one’s self before they enter the voting booth to make a choice. If our legislators do not actually represent the interests of the common citizen, who do they actually represent ? If one is able to recognize the inequalities existing in our system of government honestly then the likely answer to that question is not hard to realize. Our legislators understand best and relate the best to those who are most like them and not surprisingly those interest groups that fund their re-election campaigns.

Rich taking from Poor

For almost a decade now I have been studying the very ancient wisdom of the Tao Te Ching along with Science of Mind and other spiritualized perspectives. Just yesterday, I was contemplating Verse 53 as expressed by Stephen Mitchell in his book “tao te ching – A New English Version” –

The great Way is easy,
yet people prefer the side paths.
Be aware when things are out of balance.
Stay centered within the Tao.

When rich speculators prosper
while farmers lose their land;
when government officials spend money
on weapons instead of cures;
when the upper class is extravagant and irresponsible
while the poor have nowhere to turn –
all this is robbery and chaos.
It is not in keeping with the Tao.

The problem for me is that it becomes very hard to simply accept the continuous decline in my family’s standard of living under the vise of the enduring economic contractions and hardships when I know that there is a rather large contingent of wealthy persons making out like bandits and with way more financial resources than they can personally utilize or even effectively give for the well-being of all people. They may certainly give some but I would suspect it is but a tiny percentage of all they hold. How many cars, houses, even shoes and designer clothes, does one person or one family actually need ? Not that I begrudge any person for receiving a fair compensation in return for their efforts to share their gifts in life. And I certainly appreciate how it feels not to have to worry about how much money one has in the bank when some need requires spending it. I’ve been there and it is a good place to be. I would be happy to feel such ease and lack of concern again. I wonder if it is simply one of those “good ole days” memories never to be again . . .

Howard Beale in Network

So, it is safe to assume and I will confirm here in this blog that I am NOT content. And it is the insult and the wrongness of this huge and growing inequality along with the collapse of the middle class that we have personally experienced that troubles me into a discontent. Even that old American Dream that if one works hard and plays by the rules they will prosper seems lost in the current economic environment. To be entirely honest I could quite easily say what Howard Beale said in the 1976 movie “Network” – “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore !” Yet it remains to be seen if there truly is anything that I can personally do about the realities that currently are the state of existence for the majority of any countries citizens. What I do know is that having woken up to the reality, it isn’t possible to forget the truth and that sad realization in me, that I do not live in the country that I grew up believing that I lived within. This sadness and a sense of despair may never leave me. Yet I do hope that somehow our society could become more equally democratic again. Simply having the right to vote, which I do honor and exercise nevertheless, doesn’t cut it.

I am NOT content and the root cause of my discontent is this truth of EXTREME financial Inequality.

Rockpile Mountain Wilderness

It is my tradition to hike somewhere unfamiliar for my birthday, which occurs around Memorial Day each year. This year being my 60th, we came up with something “special”, an idea to hike in Rockpile Mountain Wilderness, which is actually in Madison County, where we live. Even though I have been here 25 years and my husband 40 years, we had never gone there. In trying to find some information about the place, we found that there is very little, by way of written reviews or photographs to prepare for such an experience. We were fortunate to discover a book copyrighted in 1999, “Unspoiled Beauty – A Personal Guide to Missouri Wilderness” by Charles J Farmer. Therefore, we assume he must have visited the area sometime in the 1990s.

Mr Farmer’s book was VERY helpful to our experience; and at the same time, we did not entirely have the same responses to the area that he did. Therefore, I would like to add our experience of the place, for anyone who might be inclined to visit the area in the future. It is definitely worth however much time you might have to give your own explorations.

We found Mr Farmer’s directions helpful but not completely accurate. One encounters Madison County Road C just off of Highway 67, south of the gas station stop known as Cherokee Pass at A Highway (which leads to Marquand). Mr Farmer had stated it was 10 miles to County Road 406 but we encountered that road at approximately 3-4 miles. Thankfully, we have GPS and could determine that there was not another entry for County Road 406 further down Highway C. Next, I would like to point out that the marker for Forest Road 2124 is simply a brown wooden post, about the height of what one would use for a rural mailbox, with numbers applied like one would put at their home to identify it’s location. Fortunately, at least it is clearly marked.

There is a nice viewpoint on County Road 406, where my husband did remember an acquaintance taking him 40 years earlier, but being new in the area, he didn’t truly know where he actually was at the time but as we came upon it, he said “I’ve been here before !!”, though he had not been to the Rockpile Mountain Wilderness before. There is a large outcropping of glade-like rock at that point.

The forest road is a bit rough. We have a Volvo Cross-country Stationwagon. Any good utility vehicle would do fine but an urban intended low to the ground car would have great difficulty getting there.

The trailhead is well marked with a bulletin board complete with all kinds of warnings, a modest amount of information about the area and a registration or sign-in form, so something is known about who visits, their intentions and for how long they do expect to be there. The large granite marker remains at the trailhead with the carved words “ROCKPILE MTN WILDERNESS”, though the carving has faded somewhat over time.

The blog author at
the granite marker

Our neighbor who is with the volunteer fire department warned us that people get lost and have to be rescued from there every year. He also expected that we would encounter a lot of blow-down from storms due to the Derecho of 2009 that did great damage clear across the width of our state of Missouri. Fortunately, I can state the damage was not so bad that it impacted our enjoyment of the wilderness there, but it was noticeable and in places does obscure the forward path of the trail but “walk-arounds” have been created by visitors at every point.

My family was prepared with backpacks including a tent for our overnight visit. We expected to follow Cave Branch down to the St Francis River to camp, as Mr Farmer had raved about that part of his own experience. He shares – “In mistakenly heading west for a mile or more on my first visit, I became enamored with the miniature beauty of intermittent Cave Branch. When I checked the topo map and realized my mistake, I decided to follow the branch all the way to the St Francis River. The miscalculation turned out to be a blessing. I enjoyed the natural beauty along the river and then a tour of Turkey Pen Hollow and the hidden treasure of the virgin trees that I had read about. It was among them that the seed for a future overnight camp was planted. The ultimate camp in Rockpile is near the river, with its bluffs, caves, and springs, and the ravine of special trees. A southern loop trail passes through the ancient rock site then veers northwest to Cave Branch and east to the main north-south route back to the trailhead.”

For scale, at this large glade, I am standing on top of a large rock with our tent to the right.

Mr Farmer had planted the seeds in my family to do likewise. However, having now spent two days in the wilderness there, we disagree and say that the ultimate camp in Rockpile is the large glade at the top of Rockpile Mountain within site of the ancient stone circle. That place is magical with rock, moss, grass and a big open view of the night sky. There was no litter there, which Mr Farmer and earlier visitors had lamented about, before the area was designated wilderness and perhaps shortly thereafter; but there were two major firepits pre-existing in that place, which we saw during our time there. One fire ring was right in the center of the large glade, and one just off from there, on a smaller, more secluded, glade.

I am seated facing the firepit with the large cairn behind me.

We started our hike about 1pm in late May 2014, just after the Memorial Day weekend. Each of us had walking sticks and I would say having them is NOT optional. It is VERY rugged terrain and the trail, while well-worn goes immediately down a very steep hillside. There were orange survey/flagging ribbons tied on trees along the trail, which made identifying the trail easier, especially at blow-down areas where walking around the debris was necessary. However, we did not know who or why the ribbons were there and had no certainty what they indicated or for how long in the direction we wanted to travel they would continue. The reader is to keep in mind the temporary nature of such markings, as these tend to degrade rather quickly over a few years time. Indeed, early on the trail, a couple of the ribbons that had been around large trees, had fallen to the ground. But if the ribbons are still there on the trees along the trail, they will most likely take you all the way to the ancient stone circle. Based on our experience, you may feel more assured than we did, of that much.

Fowler’s Toad photo by Simeon Hart Yemm

We came upon a clearly man-made water catchment pond with some pond vegetation, small lily pads and tall spikes of vegetation which included the joy of seeing many frogs and toads leap into the water at our approach. We saw toads along the trail at 3 different times during our visit. We had pepper spray with us because we had been warned of the possibility of wild hogs and we also hoped that it might be helpful if we encountered poisonous snakes such as copperheads or timber rattlers but we didn’t even encounter squirrels. My older son did photograph a red broad-headed skink at the beginning of our trail. Later, we encountered a beautiful garter snake. This was the extent of wildlife that we encountered, though there was a lot of bird song always.

Red, broad-headed Skink
photo by
Simeon Hart Yemm

Garter Snake photo by
Simeon Hart Yemm

A GPS and good map are critical as well. Since we lacked certainty about the nature of the orange ribbon markers and as they did diminish to be less frequent the deeper in one traveled, at one place where the blow down confused the trail, we did begin to follow an old logging or local road that was disappearing back into the forest but which had a well worn foot path alongside or within it. Fortunately, we checked our bearings and quickly discovered we were no longer heading in the direction of the stone circle and backtracked to a point on the trail that we were certain of. So, the presence of a trail in this wilderness may only mean you are not the first to mistakenly go in that direction.

We began to see some rock cairns; and then glades and large boulders, and were walking along the obvious crest of the mountain. We paused for a break and discovered that we had actually arrived at the ancient site. It was already going on 6pm by that time. Including our mistaken journey along the wrong path, it had taken 5 hours of mostly continuous hiking to arrive there. Thankfully, we decided it was too late to head down to the river and camped right there.

Southern half of ancient stone circle

The stone circle could be underwhelming but it is clearly ancient. The sheer volume of smallish rocks piled deliberately to create a circle or squarish enclosure is unmistakably the work of people without the modern technology to move heavier rocks further. Some of this enclosure seems to have collapsed or spread out over time. There are a couple of smallish cedar trees growing in the circle and the squarish center rock described in Mr Farmer’s book.

Northern half of ancient stone circle

As mentioned by John Karel (former Missouri State Parks Director and currently director of Tower Grove Park in St Louis), writing before the area was designated wilderness in 1980 (during the 1970s, a grassroots citizens’ campaign identified and ultimately resulted in the protection and designation of eight tracts of federal land in Missouri under the National Wilderness Preservation System) about the ancient circle, “this structure is still easily discerned and continues to provoke questions for which hard answers are unknown. Most people wonder if the rocks mark a burial site or a sentinel post, or perhaps a ceremonial site where rituals were performed. When was it constructed, and by what group of people ? Has the environment around the rockpile changed since its construction ? Is it likely that in the past the open barrens were more extensive and that more commanding vistas marked this peak as a logical center of activity ? Other peaks in the region are higher, others can be found with broader, more commanding views. Why was this knob chosen over the others ?”

After our return from the area, my husband and I theorized about the area. Could it have been a seasonal hunting camp ? The big glade would have made a nice and less buggy work area but we have rejected that possibility because there really isn’t any water convenient to that location. We are left with the sense that it served some kind of spiritual purpose. Twice, I spent time sitting in the middle of the circle facing the squarish rock at the center. I felt a deep sense of well-being while sitting there. It was not a gee whiz, fireworks or visions, type of experience. It was a quiet, subtle feeling of simply wanting to remain seated there, of time not seeming to pass, of an aliveness to that place that provoked deep feelings of peace, calm and an emptiness of thought.

Spiderworth blooming in ancient stone circle

The night we arrived, there were within the ancient stone circle, numerous wildflowers standing on tall stalks with buds, that I did not immediately recognize as the Spiderwort, that these proved to be when I returned there the next day with my morning’s cold instant coffee, to “wake up” while sitting in the circle there. I was awed and kept exclaiming “oh, oh, oh” at the sight the flowers, for all of the plants in the circle and immediately adjacent to it had bloomed overnight. I had never seen Spiderwort so tall, as our own grows in forested places close to the ground.

Close-up Spiderwort

Campsite between large glade and ancient stone circle.

We camped just off the big glade and I would highly recommend it to anyone planning an overnight there. Visitors in the twenty years, since Mr Farmer visited the place, had destroyed the patterns of stone that he found there. There remained a central and rather large cairn (probably the 3 ft high one he describes below) and a large rock-lined firepit in the center there. Here is how he described his own encounter with it – “The rocks were laid out on a bare granite slab with one red cedar tree protruding conspicuously. The rockpile had four directional spokes and a three-foot-high granite rockpile in the center. At first, I was excited that I had found the ancient rocks, but a few minutes later, I began to think that this strange circle of rocks was modern. The location of the pile pretty well fit the description I had read, but it was just too neat and well preserved. Still, the circle was interesting, and I wondered who would have taken the time to build it. Was the counterfeit a ploy to keep others from finding the real rocks, or was it modern man’s way of honoring the ancients whose traditions and ceremonies brought them to the mountain ?”

We noted that there was something about the place that just makes people want to pile up rocks. There were numerous little cairns along the trail and just off the trail at various places in the wooded area. Mr Farmer notes the “effect” that being there had on him. “. . . I had . . . a strong sense of power from the modern circle, I felt wonderfully at ease reclining on the smooth slab of granite just outside the circle of rocks. Afterward, I thought it strange that I did not immediately rush in all directions trying to find the authentic rocks.” In fact, he goes on to note that he actually – “. . . dozed there for about forty-five minutes and then quickly rose to my feet as though awakened by an alarm. . . . I ran smack into the real circle of ancient rocks just south of the trail . . .” (deb’s note – still true to the actual location) “I had actually walked within three feet of the spot on two occasions without knowing it.” It is right ON the trail, but to the south of it, so at this time, one following the trail would not fail to find it right there.

The next day, after breaking camp, we did determine to get down to the St Francis River via Cave Branch. We saw two “markers” – both diamond pieces of metal. One was on a forest service type post with the hand written words along with an arrow for direction “stone circle”. The other on a tree downhill to the west from there along an old logging or local road that remained visible. However, we did not have that luxury of road or trail for very long. Thanks to GPS we made our way towards Cave Branch and encountered it after about an hour of hiking.

Cave Branch

I would strongly recommend Oct-April for hiking this wilderness. There was no avoiding the poison ivy everywhere we attempted to hike. There was a significant amount of greenbriar around but it is mostly easy to avoid. It is very rocky and rough and steep. The walking sticks were crucial not to tumble or stumble there. Cave Branch is worth visiting. It is magical and beautiful. It was dry when we were there until close to the river. We were grateful for it made hiking easier for the most part. I could imagine it running with Spring run-off and being very exciting to behold. There were some grandfather Sycamores growing there as well.

However, close to the river we encountered a “Private Property, Trespassers will be prosecuted” sign on the south side of Cave Branch, so we stayed to the north side. There we ran into stinging nettles along with poison ivy, greenbriar and dense vegetation. Arriving at the river was underwhelming for my family. The bluff that Mr Farmer had so prized was barely visible in the fully leafed trees and no caves could be seen. I don’t think we ever even tried to locate Turkey Pen Hollow, so I can’t really say if that is worthwhile or not. I suspect it is actually on private property.

The St Francis River was wide and dirty brown, not all that exciting when we arrived there after noon. We went upstream a short way to an elevated gravel bar with shade and had lunch. Following along a dry high water channel parallel to the river, we passed some ancient and beautiful Cottonwood trees. I’m not used to seeing them here in Missouri, I grew up with them along the currently “dry” Rio Grande River in my childhood (1960s-1970s).

Getting back uphill from the river was not the most fun part of our hike. It was difficult, bushwacking the vegetation at the beginning and very steep climbs up. We came rather soon upon a bit of barbed wire fence that we were able to cross with the aid of a tree branch that had collapsed the fence, at one spot. Just past that, we encountered a flat metal post that announced “wilderness” and forbade motorized vehicle traffic beyond it. That led us to believe that at some point along Cave Branch, we had actually left the park and entered private property unintentionally.

There were at least two land features, a large bald knob and a very large rock outcropping on the way uphill that would be worth revisiting when the vegetation is diminished in the colder seasons. I’m certain there might be some amazing views that time of year. I would never recommend to anyone that they chose the river to camp overnight at. We passed another man made catchment basin that seemed a bit less active with amphibians.

We eventually made our way to the remnants of an old logging or local road that still shows up on GPS mapping. We followed that back to a T junction of the ribboned trail, where one passes between two ribbons marking that junction. We were well worn out, so the climb back up to the trailhead was long, slow and difficult; but the experience of being in Rockpile Mountain Wilderness was definitely well-worth my time spent there.

Sharing the Pain

There is a family, the Davis’, for whom I feel like this, this morning. It is for those left on earth, especially one, who the angels are so very sad for, this morning. One young man is wrapped in heavenly arms, against the sadness that would crush almost any living soul. Comfort in a time of deep sorrow and remorse to these humble, quiet people. I wish I could take all of their pain away. Sadly, I cannot.

On Friday, Feb 28th, as we were celebrating my oldest son’s 13th birthday; and thereby becoming a teenager, another family, intertwined with my own in quite amazingly ways, was being crushed under a burden so great, that my mind has had difficulty coming to terms with it. Two young men, ages 24 and 26, traveling down the road on a Friday evening. Who knows what was on their minds ?, what plans they had for the evening ? Who knows what actually went wrong ? It was still daylight, only 5pm.

But the car left the road and struck a tree. The 26 yr old, Daniel, was thrown from the car; and was pronounced dead, at the scene. The 24 yr old, his brother Eric who was driving, suffered only “minor” physical injuries and refused medical attention. But at the soul level, oh, at the soul level, what injuries – this is hard, very hard for that young man to bear. It is a cross that he is likely to carry his entire life. One wonders at the soul contracts that brought this to pass.

The 26 yr old, Daniel Wayne Davis, had only just celebrated that birthday, 5 days earlier. He had a young son. That boy who’s physical incarnation is now ended; and for whom, there are no more physical difficulties in this world, was 4 mos old and in his father’s arms – at my husband’s and my wedding, in June 1988. This man, Dale Davis, his wife Bobbi, his brother Danny and his best friend Tim Inman, along with this baby boy also named Daniel, were leaning on the large rock that is my altar, at that sacred place, the pool that we swim in during the summer time, that my in-laws camped at when they first arrived here. I see them now, in my mind’s eye. None of us could have known then, what has happened now.

My husband and I were the only non-family members at this man and his wife’s wedding, just as they were the only non-family members at ours. It is not that we have been “close”, all these years since. We were their employers. They worked for us – the 3 young men, back when I first came here; and my husband had a woodworking, furniture making shop, in a 100 yr old wooden plank and very primitive cabin. My husband had created a trail through the forest, for this young man’s father, Dale, to come to work via, on his all-terrain vehicle. I remember his father as a quiet, humble man. I remember the family as always struggling in poverty, and managing the best that they could. I remember that they have always worked, mostly doing the physical kinds of labor that keep our world manifesting Life, in the manner it does.

After he married, he brought his young wife, Bobbi, with him for a few days, to pick-up Walnuts from the trees around the shop, while he worked, in order to supplement their income. Our family tried to assist her in getting her GED; after she had a baby, pregnant even before marriage or graduating from high school. And then, had a second son Eric, and a daughter, April. Then, their marriage ended at some point after that. We were no longer seeing them regularly, by that time. The paths of our lives, that had us walking alongside – diverged and we went our separate ways. Until this last weekend, when their private tragedy, caused them to come flooding back into our memories.

But I remember visiting them one night, 25 long years ago, in a very old ramshackle farmhouse, owned by a wealthy farmer in our community, near the town of Marquand. They had convinced the farmer to let them live there, though it was hardly fit for habitation. The young men, who worked for us, had stupidly taken two baby raccoons, from their mother. I did not realize then, that the wildness of a raccoon makes it vicious; and reached out to touch it, because it was so very “cute”. Luckily, I was not bitten. We brought one of the two babies home with us, hoping to “save” it. For a long time, it lived on our backporch; and we brought it wild plums to teach it a bit about wild foods, and fed it cat food to supplement it’s diet. It had a collar and a long chain. It would climb up the porch supports to watch the sun go down, from the roof of our farmhouse, at the end of the day. We intended to release it, before winter came, once it had all it’s adult teeth. But one day, we came home and it had made it’s escape, with that collar still around its neck; and then, we worried about that, too.

Raccoons come to visit us every summer still. For many years, decades now. A mother brings 2 or 3 babies with her to eat the leftovers of our 3 backporch kitties; and at summer’s end, they quit coming and I often wonder if these are the descendants of that raccoon we once rescued.

I have wandered so readily off from the pain – seeking escape from the pain I feel, in the comfort of more pleasant memories. My daughter, Misha, was my maid of honor. She knew these young men as our employees. She even went horseback riding here in Missouri, with Tim Inman, the best friend of this young man’s father, who also worked for us. Today, she shared with me these thoughts – “Being compassionate is the result of trying to understand how another must feel and it is difficult to do this without sharing that pain.” So profound and true.

It is as though it crushes so heavily – that others must bear a portion of it; or it would simply be too much, it is too much – even with others taking a portion of the load. Last night, I stopped there where we were married, as I do each evening, to offer up my prayers for the day. Mostly, simply to be grateful for my day. Nothing to ask for, just grateful to have the safe security of this forest to wander about in.

I prayed for Divine Love Healing Energy to surround this Davis family. I prayed mostly for the son, Eric, who was driving the car. I prayed for angels to come and wrap him in comfort and soothe him, so that he can bear what is now his to bear throughout this lifetime. And then, this morning, my friend Amy, sent her Angel (the image above) to me, to release some of that pain, through me, for this family.

The Right to Educate

I credit this year’s Blog Action Day with getting me to read the Human Rights Declaration created by the UN. In general, I found it a good basis for global civilization’s expectations and practice – though the reality falls far short of realizing it, even more than 60 years later. This declaration was completed before I was born; yet I am definitely “mature”, fast approaching 60 years of age.

From The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Article 26.
• (1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.
• (2) Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.
• (3) Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.

Related to Article 18.
• Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, … and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his … belief in teaching, practice, … and observance.

From reading this, I was led to sign a petition this year in support of the proposed Parental Rights Amendment to the US Constitution, due of the provisions in a UN Treaty identified as “CRC – Convention on the Rights of the Child” (Comment 1 on “The Aims of Education” – http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/(symbol)/CRC.GC.2001.1.En?OpenDocument).

Though homeschooling has made huge strides of acceptance in the United States, it remains at times and in some places “under fire”. There was a recent news story about a family who was homeschooling their children, actually losing custody of their children in Germany – on the basis of a point in this proposed treaty, similar to what is found under Comment # 1 regarding Education intended to provide “an enhanced sense of identity and affiliation (29 (1) (c)), and his or her socialization and interaction with others”. The German youth welfare officials are seizing custody of children based upon the belief that children not in school, lose the opportunity for socialization and interaction with others, and live socially isolated lives.

Further comments there regarding the UN perspective on Education include the use of the word “home” in connection with education but do seem to indicate some compulsion regarding – “8. Second, the article attaches importance to the process by which the right to education is to be promoted. Thus, efforts to promote the enjoyment of other rights must not be undermined, and should be reinforced, by the values imparted in the educational process. This includes not only the content of the curriculum but also the educational processes, the pedagogical methods and the environment within which education takes place, whether it be the home, school, or elsewhere. … education must be provided in a way that … enables the child … to participate in school life.”

This comment does address in item # 8 one of our own objections based on stories from parents with children in the local school system regarding the use of corporal punishment without parental consent – “The Committee has repeatedly made clear in its concluding observations that the use of corporal punishment does not respect the inherent dignity of the child nor the strict limits on school discipline.” We do agree.

We feel the methods that we employ in educating our children at home include the perspective addressed in item #9 of that comment – “the curriculum must be of direct relevance to the child’s social, cultural, environmental and economic context and to his or her present and future needs and take full account of the child’s evolving capacities; teaching methods should be tailored to the different needs of different children. Education must also be aimed at ensuring that essential life skills are learnt by every child and that no child leaves school without being equipped to face the challenges that he or she can expect to be confronted with in life. Basic skills include not only literacy and numeracy but also life skills such as the ability to make well-balanced decisions; to resolve conflicts in a non-violent manner; and to develop a healthy lifestyle, good social relationships and responsibility, critical thinking, creative talents, and other abilities which give children the tools needed to pursue their options in life.”

We feel that the methods we employ in educating our children at home include the perspective addressed in item # 12 – “12. Fourth, article 29 (1) insists upon a holistic approach to education which ensures that the educational opportunities made available reflect an appropriate balance between promoting the physical, mental, spiritual and emotional aspects of education, the intellectual, social and practical dimensions, and the childhood and lifelong aspects. The overall objective of education is to maximize the child’s ability and opportunity to participate fully and responsibly in a free society. It should be emphasized that the type of teaching that is focused primarily on accumulation of knowledge, prompting competition and leading to an excessive burden of work on children, may seriously hamper the harmonious development of the child to the fullest potential of his or her abilities and talents. Education should be child-friendly, inspiring and motivating the individual child. Schools should foster a humane atmosphere and allow children to develop according to their evolving capacities.”

The proposed Parental Rights Amendment reads –

SECTION 1
The liberty of parents to direct the upbringing, education, and care of their children is a fundamental right.

SECTION 2
The parental right to direct education includes the right to choose public, private, religious, or home schools, and the right to make reasonable choices within public schools for one’s child.

SECTION 3
Neither the United States nor any State shall infringe these rights without demonstrating that its governmental interest as applied to the person is of the highest order and not otherwise served.

SECTION 4
This article shall not be construed to apply to a parental action or decision that would end life.

SECTION 5
No treaty may be adopted nor shall any source of international law be employed to supersede, modify, interpret, or apply to the rights guaranteed by this article.

The petition can be found and signed, at this link – https://www.thedatabank.com/dpg/385/personal2.asp?formid=signup

I am also staying informed regarding and have looked into the movement known as – Common Core State Standards (http://www.corestandards.org/).

I recently came across this quote, on an old “tweet” – “Peace is the respect for the rights of others.“ (El respeto al derecho ajeno es la paz) – Benito Juarez

I am not against public or private educational systems per se. I see they serve a purpose in society and that some professions definitely require more advanced and specialized educational opportunities. I am inspired and encouraged by the story of the Harding family of Montgomery, Alabama who have 10 children, all home-schooled. Their perspectives match my own – their mother says “We find out what their passions are, what they really like to study, and we accelerate them gradually.” This has resulted in 6 of their children entering college at age 12. Their children are gifting society by becoming a doctor, an architect, a spacecraft designer and one is a college freshman who realized at age seven, that he wanted to be a military archaeologist.

College may sound like too much pressure for the pre-teens to handle, but the Harding parents insist their kids are thriving, not suffering. “All our children would have to tells us is, ‘You know, this isn’t fun any more’,” says their mother, Mona Lisa. “And we’d do something about that.” Kip agrees with his wife: “The expectation is that you’re going to have a fun day,” he said as he watched his children play in the backyard. “Not that you’re going to come home with A’s.” Indeed, the couple insists that despite their accelerated education, the children have led normal lives. “We didn’t limit their experience,” said Mona Lisa. “They’re taking college classes, but socially, they are just teenagers.”

This has been our own perspective as well. Inspired by a book by an unschooling friend of mine, Rain Perry Fordyce – “I Am Learning All The Time”, her title became my mantra. We go out of our way and have experiences we might not choose otherwise, except for wanting to give our children breadth, depth, and a stimulation of their creative imaginations. In response to concerns about “socialization”, we have only to look back upon our own public school experiences to know clearly that putting our children with only their own age group, predominantly, would not serve our intentions that they be independent thinkers and unconcerned about social pressures to have premature sexual experiences or to participate in the usage of recreational drugs of unknown purity and origin. Our children are NOT being socialized to such experiences but they are socialized to the whole range of humanity – from infants to the elderly – and we believe that is a superior kind of socialization for them. Mature adults are primary role models for our children, not their peers who are still undergoing early development.

Certainly, the public education system frees parents to work outside of their home and have lives not focused solely on their children’s growth and development. It is quite freeing, and in most cases necessary, for parents to put their trust in strangers, and let the government make choices regarding what their children will learn and experience in school. However, I don’t believe that those of us who have the luxury (my husband and I work from home, so we are here anyway, and we are older parents, so we do selfishly desire as much time with our children as is possible to us) and the inclination to be the primary educators of their children, should be hindered from doing so. That is the “universal right” closest to our hearts – the right of educate our children in the ways that we as their parents feel is for their highest good as productive citizens contributing fully to tomorrow’s realities.

* * * *

Church Suppers

I’ve been thinking about, for sometime, getting more active with this blog. My original thought was to use it to record an uncommon way of life and that is still my predominant intention. I have not pursued that intention really, with any consistent activity, and have mostly used this blog to participate in the annual Blog Action Day event, coming up in mid-October. I intend to post a blog again this year.

There won’t be any photos, though I think they would have been a great addition to this blog. I have been thinking about that also. Photos give the eyes some visual candy to help the wordy stuff go down better. It was on our drive to an annual “church supper” fundraiser yesterday that my mind was caught up in the realization that the event would be great in pictures. I did have my iPhone 5 with me and considered that but for now I stayed my inclination, it felt “intrusive” somehow but maybe I will grow into it.

Our closest neighbors belong to a humble, little rural country church, a Methodist associated religion, called Rhodes Chapel. For most of the 25 years that I have lived here, we have gone most years to participate in their fund raiser, though we have missed a few. So, first we went with my in-laws, then we added children to our family, then my in-laws left us and so, now it is my husband, my self and our boys.

They serve fried chicken (they have a little enclosure out back to cook in) and dumplings, green beans, mashed potatoes and corn and a few other sides along with ice tea and lemonade. The dinner cost us $8 for adults (of which my oldest son now belongs to that category) and $5 for children. There are homemade desserts – pies and cakes – as well. I ate too much, even though I took small servings.

After supper, they have a quilt auction. We usually look at the quilts before leaving. I always looked for the traditional quilts, pieced together in traditional patterns, from scraps of fabric. My favorites are generally the tiny floral and patterned kinds of scraps. Some of the quilts are modern printed material, batted and embroideried and well “quilt” stitched. There was one like that with a Buck Deer and Doe embroidered over the print.

We have stayed for some of the auction, in the years that my in-laws were alive. It is a “true” auction with a fast talking auctioneer and pointing at people who fidget in the least. It always amazed me, the prices the quilts would fetch. $100, $200 and more sometimes. This is not a wealthy church nor people with a lot of disposable income. It is quite humble in size and décor and it is a “family-run” church to a great degree. The family that our closest neighbors are part of and why we go to be supportive of their fund-raiser.

We are always at the end of supper serving time each year and so, we go the fastest route, over the one-lane, cement bridge that the Castor River (tiny yesterday – raging when it floods and closes the road) flows over. We always take the “long-way” home, past the natural artesian well that still flows and was once crucial to early farmers and pioneers in the area. The water is sweet with minerals and very cold.

We pass Denman stables on the way to Marquand. They always seem to be ending a day-long trail ride as we pass the place after a Rhodes Chapel supper on a Saturday evening in mid-Autumn.

These are some of the things I love about living in rural isolated wilderness, long-haul community, simple pleasures and basic living . . . maybe next year, I’ll take some pictures of all this.

Deer Season

I have been writing a daily essay for a few weeks now, each day in that day’s Daily Guides, a group that exists within the Living Metaphysics community (a location on the Ning platform)  It is a community that originated within Zaadz  (begun by Brian Johnson, a philosopher), which continued in the community when he sold it to the Gaiam Corporation, only separating off when Gaiam closed our doors, with very little time to remove content.

I am definitely enjoying the challenge.  I have committed myself to do a year’s worth of these.  It is my first genuine attempt at a disciplined and focused kind of writing, that might be of publishable quality.  I write these in the format of a Science of Mind magazine Daily Guide – in homage to, in hope of someday maybe, and just because I have for so many years appreciated them.  Mine are quite long by their standards; but I figure they could always be shortened, by editing if necessary, and perhaps these will be a book someday; or at the least, a legacy of my personal philosophies on life, that I can leave to my children and grandchildren.

Since today’s topic is quite universal, I thought to share it, as a blog here at my WordPress blog, because in Missouri – Deer Season is a bigger holiday than Christmas.  Your comments and perspectives are quite welcome.

 

A Year of Daily Reflections by Deborah Hart Yemm
November 10th

 

Deer Season

 

“Hunting for sport is an improvement over hunting for food,

in that there has been added to the test of skill

an ethical code, which the hunter formulates for himself,

and must live up to without the moral support of bystanders.”

~ Aldo Leopold

 

“God is life.  Life cannot produce death.

Death is but the shifting of a scene,

the moving from one place to another,

an impatient gesture of the soul as it seeks freedom.”

~ Ernest Holmes

 

It is opening day of this year’s Deer Season.  Living in a somewhat remote, rural, forested wilderness means that this conservation wildlife practice has a real impact on our lives.  Just up the road, our neighbor has an active “deer camp”, right there on his property complete with the recreational trailers of distant relatives who have arrived to be closer to the less inhabited areas, adjoining our neighbor’s home.  It is actually remarkably “quiet” of gunfire within hearing this morning but we will curtail our daily jogs and hikes, and replace them for 10 days, with family hikes after dark which even include our 3 cats.  Though all of us actually enjoy this alternative to cabin fever, we only hike in the darkness of our forest (of course, with headlamps) during the “forced” daytime exile of deer season.

I thought about an article on oneness perspectives I read this morning in the Science of Mind magazine.  Could I somehow apply that perspective about finding common ground with others and see them as “just like me” ?  Can I lean upon the spiritual perspectives that I have spent a lifetime in learning, to transcend separation; and so align my awareness with the spiritual realm, that I can feel connected, through a Taoist kind of balance with both the hunter and the hunted ?  Can I see a wholeness in what is happening all around me for the next 10 days ?

In truth, hunting goes to the core of human beings as a species of life.  We are composed of 2 million years of evolution which began with our survival supported by being hunters and few could argue that human beings have evolved to be the most effective, most adaptable and most successful predators on the planet.  One Vermont hunter, named Robert F Smith describes that his reason for participating in the practice is that “Hunting is an ancient dance as old as life itself, written into the very core of what we are as humans”.  The old Disney movie “Old Yeller” portrays our early pioneer life with a realistic inclusion of hunting as a necessity of existence, in which young boys are initiated into manhood by bringing home meat for the family.

Hunter Smith goes even further to idealize a long ago time in human evolution, describing it this way – “Hunting a deer or antelope or harvesting wild berries or nuts is only a few hours of intensive work for several days’ worth of food, while raising, feeding, watering, and protecting a herd of sheep or goats, or planting, cultivating, and harvesting a field of grain, is unending labor. While the tribal system of hunter/gatherers led to equality and leisure time, agriculture brought in slavery, religion, caste and class systems, and the plight of poor peasants and field workers that continues today around the world.”  It is a perspective worth considering.

Missouri has a serious conservation ethic regarding all aspects of our natural world.  In Missouri, the deer and turkey were almost eradicated by indiscriminate hunting – and the population was much smaller then.  With modern food distribution, the population is no longer dependent upon hunting for basic survival; but the season that brings many hunters into our community, from the more populated areas of our state and even beyond, is a significant source of revenue for many of the local businesses.  I have also contemplated this practice as a need in some human beings for a particular kind of experience, even though it is not one that I personally yearn for myself.  An overpopulation of deer does actually pose a danger, when driving on the state highway at night, a danger that I am ever alert to, when the necessity to do so puts me in that position.

In Missouri, the influx of settlers in the last half of the 19th century coincided with the rapid decline of the deer population.  By 1925, the number of deer left in the entire state was estimated to be only around 400.  With concerted regulation by law and efforts to restore the population by bringing new deer into the state, by 1944, the deer population was estimated at 15,000.  Now approx 500,000 hunters participate each year in the harvest of approx 300.000 deer statewide.  I think in the best of circumstances, the hunter is reverent, the hunter connects with the animal, even blesses it as some traditions do, for being willing to give its life in the food chain that is our world and even, yes, face mortality, face the reality of what death is and does.   There is something truly somber about connecting with the eyes of an unarmed animal who you know will die in the next moment by your own hand.  Personally, I forego such experiences but I try to understand, that hunters are just like me and so are the deer – the latter is easier for me personally; but the predator must be understood as well.

~ perspective

 

I understand a circle of Life that has ever been part

of the wholeness of this planet.

I sense the yin and yang,

the Taoist perspective of wholeness,

in the expression of the hunter and the hunted.

I seek to understand the deep roots that connect

whole families to the history of their intimate tribe

and to the fact that family’s survival

was dependent upon hunting.

I am grateful for modern wildlife management practices

that consider environmental conditions, population changes,

fairness and historical, as well as economic values,

all inherent in the practice of a deer hunting season.

I am at peace, with the realities of life and death, 

in all of the many expressions, upon this planet Earth –

I am of it, it is all just like me,

for it is all one Life force diversely expressing.

 

I wish I could find a scene from Old Yeller that shows the older boy hunting for the family’s food but these “theme song” with movie scenes will have to suffice.  If you’ve ever seen the movie, perhaps you can appreciate my using it for illustrative reasons.  If you haven’t and are looking for a light-weight, feel-good entertainment, perhaps you should rent it some Saturday night.

I believe that we idolize the pioneer days because life made a kind of basic sense – living by day/night cycles, growing crops, tending livestock, hunting game and all the attendant dangers of living remotely.  It was a “hard” life physically; and easily endangered in so very many ways, that the movie does a great job of graphically portraying.  There were not the modern conveniences that we so take for granted but there was not the complications of our modern way of life, with its own serious stressors either.

Yes, WE can do it !!

In the late 1990s, my husband, my self and my in-laws attended one of our monthly Historical Madison County Society meetings, during which we were given a viewing of an old film shot around the county courthouse in the 1930s.  What has remained stuck in my memory was this astonishing fact – there were nothing but lean and thin people present.  Of course, there have been throughout history, some people who were “gravitationally challenged” – King Henry the VIII or “Chubby” of the Little Rascals.

However, something happened after the 1930s; that was already becoming clearly evident, in the 1990s.  I think I have found at least a couple of the “major” suspects – High Fructose Corn Syrup; and the trade group “Center for Consumer Freedom“.  High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS) was not introduced into the American food supply until the 1970s.  Coincidentally, about the same time that partially hydrogenated oils were also “added”.  These rapid changes to the overall content of processed foods have led to the epidemic levels of obesity, and the highest rates of disease along with the lowest life expectancy of any industrialized nation.  This is NOT a coincidence.

Becoming a well-informed consumer is certainly the “first step” in personal responsibility, as publicly promoted by the Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF), founded in 1996 – those “friends” of every disease vulnerable American consumer (Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Kellogg and Kraft are some of the known entities)  Their website says many of the companies – food companies and restaurant chains – supporting the lobbying and media campaigns of the CCF prefer to maintain their anonymity – Why ? – their website states that they are apprehensive that vegetarians and health activists might threaten their privacy and safety.  I would suspect that they are MORE apprehensive that their profits might be at stake.

 

Sadly, the Center for Consumer Freedom

 isn’t even able to see the irony in their own hype.

I have inherited genes that are particularly vulnerable to excess sugar in my blood stream.  So, although I’ve had an interest in nutrition since the 1970s, I am in a “getting serious” mode now, thanks to threats of pharmaceutical interventions for diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol.  What I see with my own eyes, so many overweight people out there, is both scary and sad.  Last fall, my activist heart (born in the late 1960s but dormant for many years since) was re-awakened by the Occupy Movement.  Thanks to Occupy, and other collective efforts to educate the populace – I have now learned, and I can’t go back to not knowing.  What has been happening, while we, the people, gave the elected government politicians a free reign, is not pretty.  Large multi-national corporations are in control, not only of the law itself and the economy overall; but even in such places as the Dept of Agriculture and their funding resources, as well as both national and state food policies.

“YES, WE CAN DO IT” –  we can change the nature of the human diet to be nutritious and wholesome again; and this is something that every man, woman and child can easily and inexpensively chose to make contributions toward and participate in.

There is HOPE.  We, the people, are collectively sharing information, through more “alternative” channels than ever before and over which, we have individual discernment.  We are “finding” one another – our real friends who care about our genuine quality of Life – and we are supporting and encouraging one another to just say “No !”, to some of the most biologically addictive substances yet devised, which coincidentally ? boost the profit margins simultaneously for Big Agriculture, Big Food and Big Pharma.  Now, I’m not trying to suggest that there is an intentional conspiracy among these 3 globally-influential entities; but the actions of each of these are supporting the revenues of the others.

Not only is there a growing and impregnable collective, of nutritionally-conscious individuals that can’t be infiltrated by any external entity; but we have “heroes & heroines” willing to put themselves “out there” on the front lines; and they are not going to be silenced, until we succeed in taking back the health of the people of this country, and encourage similar activities in all other countries that have been similarly damaged by a profit-driven, market oriented approach by multi-national corporations, to the global food supply.  We, the people of the planet, will not fail; because our very lives, and even more especially a “good quality” of Life, utterly depends upon our success.  One who is sick cannot enjoy living, in the fullest sense of that concept; and is unable to contribute fully, to the evolving  of a “next – better” human society – for disease captures fully the human attention; and does not let us go, until we die.

Here are a few names and links, just some of my own personal “heroes & heroines” –

Dr Mark Hyman – pioneering nutritional approaches to wellness and spearheading a “Take Back Our Health“ movement – in our schools, for our communities, in our workplaces and our places of worship, for our democracy, through our media and from a “sickness-oriented” medical perspective.

Michael F Jacobson, PhD of the Center for Science in the Public Interest and sponsors of “Eat Real, America !” on Food Day, this 2012 year on Oct 24th; as well as the long-time editor of Nutrition Action Healthletter and a dedicated activist, at the political level.

 

Whole Living Magazine for encouraging healthier lifestyles and for their yearly Action Plan.

 

Marianne Williamson for her perspectives in A Course in Weight Loss.

 

Geneen Roth for her retreats and workshops to heal eating disorders; and her books- including “Women Food and God” and “When Food Is Love”.

 

John Robbins, author of Diet for a New America, and Ocean Robbins, founder of YES (Youth for Environmental Sanity) and author of Choices for Our Future – and their co-founded organization – The Food Revolution Network.

 

May WE all be well,

May WE all be happy,

May WE all be free of suffering,

May WE all be at peace.

 

Yes, WE can do it !!