Hello Everyone!
A meandering entry, The calorie game, Raw land options, Seasonal routines & Mushrooms everywhere!
I am up long before the sun today and although I have had the text editor open for a while now... I have yet to write anything in it! There is not much to report besides having gotten a full night's sleep and spending the last hour or so hoping this espresso will kick in and get me woken up fully.
Ha, I never wrote anything else yesterday besides that paragraph! I guess that I have reached the point where I just do not have much to say and flailing around complaining about the scenario that I am in is not all that appealing either.
At least the weather has been mostly cooperative and aside from some rain and lot of thunder... it has been kind of nice outside... aside from the sweltering heat during the afternoon hours. During the overcast times I have been getting up in the attic and sorting through stuff so that has been productive but it sure is hot up there during the heat of the day!
The entire day has passed and I never wrote anything else and now that it is late in the evening I am not feeling all that inclined to add much here... and yet here I am clacking away at the keyboard, unable to shake the notion that doing some writing would be good for me.
Lately I have been letting myself re-calibrate a good bit and not putting a bunch of pressure on myself in regards to pretty much anything and everything. Of course the pressure is there regardless but I am simply not applying any frigging more of it than what is necessary to achieve whatever I can each day.
Some days 'doing whatever I can' does not seem to amount to much and on others it seems like I wear myself out getting a lot done with nothing to really show for it. Which yeah often leaves me feeling like I am 'spinning my wheels' more than I should be in regards to my life and its 'yet to be determined' trajectory. Not that I compound it all with uncertainty but whoa is that a tight rope to walk!
Admittedly my thinking has been all over the place and although I have not been spending much time 'sorting through my mental landscape' I have been thinking on contingency plans for my life ahead. At this point it is safe to say that I am entertaining a broad range of lifestyle changes but I always fall back on thinking about having to start over on raw land.
What doing the latter would entail is assuredly more than what I might be up for at the moment but alas focusing on it seems to be important so I keep doing it. For the most part I keep thinking about 'simple' bushcraft setups that would not require much in the way of material cost or the transportation of materials.
It is not the first time that I have considered doing something like that instead of starting with a traditional camping setup. There are of course advantages to both but by and large if I were not building a cabin and were instead building a bushcraft shelter when I am starting fresh at a new site... then I could go from a tent to 'four walls and a roof' much faster... potentially!
There is undoubtedly some appeal there from a workload perspective but I am also considering the high cost of building materials, fuel and the food I will need to have the calories... to do the work... to have a home... and on and on! Seriously though it is a big trade off on quality of life between the cabin building strategy and the bushcraft shelter approach but who knows what I might come up in such a scenario.
Alright, I never wrote a single word yesterday and I feel like if I do not at least attempt to write something this morning... then I will probably not do any writing today either. The break has been nice and all but I best not let these days stack up too much and fall into the habit of procrastinating with the making of these entries.
The weather has been rather hit or miss but we did get a good bit of rain here and when I go hiking later I am expecting to find the meadow flooded once again. Somehow all those major storms that were heading this way over the last several days missed this area.
Which of course was good because even the smaller storms (that did hit here) produced a lot of thunder, rain and plenty of gusty winds. Overall the weather has kept me cooped up the last few days but alas I have still been getting outdoors when I can and getting things done along the way.
I missed another day of writing yesterday and should admit that I have retreated rather far into myself and yup not communicating with folks has been a part of that retreating. Undoubtedly it is not the first time that I have felt 'less than expressive' and I am sure that the inclination will pass sooner or later.
Earlier today I found myself in the woods (whilst hiking) where I paused for a long period while standing in a sunny spot... just soaking it all in... thinking that yeah I never really want to leave the woods! Even as I was swatting mosquitoes and gnats... and getting crawled on by various other bugs... I could not shake the feeling that I will simply never feel 'at home' outside of the woods.
It is not the first time that I have had such a moment while hiking lately and even more so since all the mushrooms have begun popping up around here. There are several familiar types but there are also many more that I have no idea what they are which is something that always excites me.
Mainly I am interested in some of the large boletes but today I saw an 'old man of the woods' which does not seem to be all that common here. Now that autumn is right around the corner I am expecting to see a lot more mushrooms and if I am super lucky some of these old downed hardwood trees will have some 'chicken of the woods' growing on them.
There is really no telling what will pop up around here as far as mushrooms go because even among the amanitas I can spot two distinct varieties. With all the rainfall that we have gotten it is no real surprise that there is so much fungi growing but the sheer variety is way more than what I noticed last year. As a side note, if more of them were edible varieties that would be awesome!
Well, it is another morning and probably a good bit later than when I should be getting outdoors and doing stuff but alas here I am zoned out on the computer! I have mostly been looking at maps, reading property listings, researching areas and basically investigating various options in regards to land and places to live and/or somehow invest in.
The entire endeavor is of course time consuming but hey it is a worthy usage of my time on this overcast day. As far as the weather goes it looks like it rained again late last night and will most likely do so again later in the afternoon... as a fast moving thunderstorm!
Although I have yet to go hiking today I doubt that the most recent rain did anything to alter how dry the meadow has become again. That area can really soak up the water and it is more than likely that all the pines there are partially to blame.
Aside from evaporation, ground absorption and the minimal vegetation soaking up the water... all those trees are probably the main culprit as to why the water does not stay there as long as it should. In short, given the density of the ground, its clay content and high threshold against absorption... there should be way more water staying on the surface in the meadow than there is.
It may all seem like a minor thing but the density of the pines around the rim of the meadow is problematic for a number of reasons aside from them soaking up a bunch of water. Not only do they create a fire hazard but they also choke each other out, create way too many pine needles which in turn acidifies the soil and essentially takes up space where other more beneficial plants or trees could be growing.
That particular scenario would be way better if say all those pines were replaced with persimmon (or cherry) trees because they would flourish along the 'outer rim' of the meadow and be way more beneficial. There is a good chance that a portion of the existing persimmon grove will eventually spread itself (on its own) into the meadow and it would actually grow in fast if it were not for all the dastardly pine trees.
Anyway, my mind is still stuck on this place and its ongoing projects, processes and observations which yeah is a hard habit to get out of with any place that I have spent any time at. Aside from day to day life having to continue (in spite of having to re-locate) there is just something about not neglecting the land or my stewardship of it... and that feeling of 'duty unfulfilled' is something that I do not want to let go of.
In other words it is challenging to disengage that part of my thinking and routines. It is especially so with seasonal routines that just go hand in hand with my lifestyle and even my survival. Although I have been dodging doing too much stuff in regards to this place the thinking itself is not so easy to stem and I find myself wanting to gather deadfall, cut back brush from the roads, create straw and/or hay, fill in potholes, clean out water diversions and do all the other winter prep stuff!
When it comes down to it I need a place to focus on and sort of 'shadow tending' this place in the meanwhile will just have to do! I mean heck even over the previous many weeks I have planted dozens of persimmon seeds just to do it... because it feels meaningful not so much 'to me personally' but to the critters and general habitat of the place.
Alright, another day has passed and I best stop putting off getting this edited and posted for much longer because writing in this entry has been really hit or miss! Like I was saying before, taking a break from the writing routine (and communicating with folks) has been nice and overall I am feeling way less overwhelmed than I did a week or so ago.
I hope that everyone is doing well and has a nice day/night.
https://peakd.com/c/hive-114308/created
