Saturday, February 4, 2012

Rolling on a River of Love

The first Sunday in February 2012. A new year, a new day.

It's been over a year since I've been in this blogging world. As you can see from my last entry, I got a little discouraged by the locavore life attempt. This morning I am reflecting on how my locavore experiment exploded in my face. The experience was like jumping into the icy waters of Lake Michigan where I grew up in the middle of February. The stinging reality of that cold water was just a little more than I could handle. (I'm not a big fan of cold plunges by the way.)

Growing food to meet our needs in the southwest is just REALLY difficult. Way more difficult than doing it in the bread belt of the Midwest where my formative years were spent. Sure, Native peoples feed themselves successfully for hundreds or thousands of years in the southwest on a diet of squash, beans, corn, wild edibles and bison. But the other piece of that puzzle is they didn't do it for very long -- they had a life span of 30-40 years on average. As I am 37, I would be dead or well on my way there with that diet. A fact I could handle if I hadn't already been expecting to live until I am 80.

So what did I learn from my locavore experiment and where am I now with all of this you ask? Let me fill you in...

1) TIMING IS EVERYTHING and DO THE RESEARCH FIRST

My advice for you all is not to start the desert locavore life in Februrary. Get your feet and your pallet wet by starting at the height of the growing season when the successes are many and the research not so hard. Having said that, whatever time of year you start, do the research before you begin being a locavore at all, otherwise it is just an experiment in frustration. Trying to find a source  of local wheat may take you a few weeks, so if you don't want to give it up, or do not yet have the cooking skills and knowledge to work with the limited alternatives, you'll want to know where you can get it before you engage being a locavore. Otherwise you'll get discouraged at how many trips to the grocery store for wheat shipped in from Egypt you'll have to make.

Luckily, I work at an organization where researching being a locavore is part of the work that we do, so I put my staff on creating a locavore guide. Unfortunately, as none of them had themselves dived deeply into bring a locavore, the end product wasn't super useful to me. But we are working on improving it. So, you may want to wait to enter the locavore world in Santa Fe until we publish that guide if you don't want to spend months doing that research yourself. Otherwise, give yourself a couple months to do the research before you jump in. Start by going through your cupboards and deciding what you can and can't live without. Then make a list of those things you need or want. Then start by educating yourself on seasonal availability of foods. Visit the local co-op, see what they have available at any given time of year, talk to the produce and the bulk departments to see what else they might be able to get you on a seasonal basis. Visit the farmer's market and talk with the farmers - especially those that have fresh produce in the dead of winter. Research the farmer's market website for clues on which farmers are part of their network and what they offer. Ask your friends, call local food-related organizations. Keep in mind that condiments and grains tend to be the hardest to source. Learn how to make your own ketchup.

2) JOIN A CSA
There is no substitute for growing your own food as that is really the only way to know where your food is coming from and how it was grown. But, Steve Warshawer of Beneficial Farms now has me convinced that backyard gardeners and local farmers each have a role to play in a local food system -- and we can't, and shouldn't do it without the other. Gardeners can focus on the specialty items they can grow more easily in the microclimates they are able to create in their yards like tomatoes and herbs. Farmers than can be freed up to grow those items that need a lot of space - like grains, protein, etc. Together we might be able to come up with a complete diet a la MyPlate -- the new and much simplified nutritional guide recently released by the USDA. That said, join a CSA that specializes in local food. I joined Beneficial Farms CSA a few months ago. It is a co-op CSA utilizing farmers within 300 miles -- meeting my desert locavore standards for food miles. This has provided me with a supply of organic wheat and quinoa that I had no idea where to get on my own. It has taken the pressure off of me a bit in terms of sourcing local food as they are doing a bunch of it for me and 50 other families at the same time. I highly recommend joining a CSA as part of your locavore package.

3) COMMUNITY

George Strait is singing to my heart this morning from the playlist on the iPod my husband left in my car for me to listen to. I'm in a very different place this morning...rolling on a river of love really. Although there is still no water in the river near our house this year, I have been blessed with a growing connection to my community (specifically my neighbors), lots of learning, and patience. Find a few like-minded home/land owners and plan with them on what crops you can each grow and share with each other. Share bulk buying and split up the consumer research. Enjoy meals together and plan impromptu potlucks from whatever is available in the garden. You'll grow more food and grow life-long friendships in the process.

2) SOIL and WATER

A friend of mine who is an ecology professor at UWC here in Las Vegas, NM believes that the carrying capacity of this desert region won't even provide for the number of people that currently live here. So there is that when considering building a local, sustainable food system. Our two big limiting factors are soil and water. We don't have much of either of those, and without them growing food for a state of even 2 million is challenging. The reality of soil building in Santa Fe at the moment, is that it is entirely dependent upon the input of materials from the industrial agriculture system. Not to mention when you lay it down in the spring, the wind blows it away almost immediately (be sure to cover your compost with heavy mulch immediately). Readily available sources for compost in Santa Fe include horse manure and kitchen waste. Most kitchen waste originates from imported food sources, and horses are fed a steady diet of alfalfa shipped in from Texas or even farther away locations. Part of being a locavore requires going against the grain and being limited by the status quo food system. Get comfortable with compromise and do the best you can.

At this point in time, I am not working exclusively on being a locavore. I'm am attacking the whole sustainable lifestyle one piece at a time. Last month my husband and I had a successful buy nothing month. When practicing buy-nothing, you really have to watch yourself with online shopping. I somehow blanked out that I am actually shopping when doing it online as I am in the comfort of my living room rather than in a store with beeping of the cash register to awaken my senses as to what I am doing.

Working on living sustainably in the United States is a life-time endeavor. My main focus now if to make sure I am enjoying the ride!

I hope you will share the tips and wisdom have you learned on this journey in the comments.

Christina

1 comment:

  1. So good to hear from you again! You have such good words here, and the depths of your commitment to living well in all parts of your life shines through. It is such a challenge to live up to our own high standards for ourselves, I think. I've been learning to relax a little and to enjoy more, rather than having strict rules about how I want to live. Happily, I continue moving in that direction in an organic way, making progress in many parts of my life, while not getting burned out too bad.

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