Sunday, May 22nd, 2022. Week number 20

It’s a few minutes before 8:00 here on Sunday morning. I haven’t actually started moving yet but I understand but the day is starting and my week is starting.

I was a proper bum yesterday during my day off. I would not say it was a spiritual day but I definitely took my laziness to its limits. I ate a lot and slept a lot. I didn’t do anything of great consequence.

Late last night however, the buildup of carbs and energy in my system started to get to me and I did something I haven’t done really in quite some time. I did a light workout with some weights. Last year, I called this a meditation and religiously, every day at 4:00 I would come into the warm room and very quietly play with weights for about 1 hour. When I was recuperating after my hospital stay, I would do this twice a day in my ex partner’s apartment.

I got out of the habit when I got back to my house and started working. At first, I was just cutting a lot of firewood and setting up for all of the work that was to come. And then there were the boxes and all that dirt to be hauled. There was definitely enough physical labor to do and along with it, a ridiculous amount of pain and suffering. More than I needed, for sure.

Now things have calmed down quite a bit. I paid attention to everything that needs to get done and everything is just sort of running smoothly. There’s not really that much for me to do in the garden except for keeping out the weeding. Even that is not very extensive because until all that we planted begins to come in, it’s very difficult to know what to kill and what not to kill. The grass is easy to identify but you can’t go in with a tool and generally disturb the area.

Everything is coming in though. Within the month, I will not have to be chowing down on horseradish greens. I like horseradish greens but to be honest, it is a bit harsh. It doesn’t harm me or take away my energy, it’s just a little bit harder to digest than the stuff we are used to.

Other than this, I put in a call to Dima but he didn’t answer me. In Belarus, they don’t actually tell you the story up front. You never know when people are going to do what they say they are going to do. I thought he was up for doing the job of putting in the gutter system but most probably, it’s not his strength and the logistics of doing what he needs to do to make this job happen are probably more work than he wants to do. This would be pretty typical.

To be honest, I might even be happier just to keep the money in my pocket. Times are difficult. The war continues on, sanctions are getting worse. Europe is not planning on getting out of the car business anytime soon and Joe Biden believes in the auto business as the backbone of America unfortunately. I saw that coming.

I also have continuing problems with America unfortunately. I was thinking of doing an art project about this. I’m also thinking of making another round of looking for relief. I am unbelievably tired of being tortured. So unnecessary. Such a waste of resources. Honestly, when I think of the entire history of this debacle, the only thing I can say is that it’s probably a typical American story. Greed. Fundamentally, it’s just about greed and power and trying to pedal influence. It’s not my game. It’s never been my game.

When I was in the states, my answer to the problem of perpetual wage slavery was to do my own companies. These were simple landscaping companies. We built rock walls and such. I’ve talked about my method of management many times but basically, it was just anti-power. I wasn’t interested in accumulating massive amounts of wealth, I just wanted the jobs to run smoothly and I wanted an honest company. 

We used what we call now transparency as the basic currency. I bid the jobs a particular way and the guys working for me knew my system. The deal was that if we worked as a professional team, we would finish faster and would make more money. I wasn’t paying an hourly wage, I bid the jobs fairly and made sure there was enough money for my guys to get adequately compensated. If they worked like pros, they got paid like pros. If they laid back and goofed off, they got paid goof off money. This wasn’t my choice, it was just a set amount of money for the job. The same for me as it was for them. If we played, we didn’t get paid.

The results of this were amazing by the way. Even though the guys I hired were not particularly specialized, they worked really hard. We kept the work site comfortable. I didn’t wear a watch and I didn’t work on particular clock time. The only time of the day that mattered was the 8:00 breakfast meeting. After that, we let the work carry us along.

It worked out well. I made some money. The guys had jobs they didn’t mind. The homeowners that we worked for liked and respected us because we didn’t do this thing that my man Dima is doing to me right now. When we set up the contract, I outlined how I was to be paid and how my guys would work and that was all we did. I didn’t stack jobs, I didn’t sandbag, I didn’t create problems and I didn’t go back and find problems to raise the price. We just made a straight deal and did the work we said we were going to do and believe me, people appreciated it. 

When I started teaching English here, I did everything I could to follow the same sort of ethics. I had a lot of people who showed up and wanted to sign up but I would not accept any student ever of any age without an interview. I agree, I did take some students that probably I knew were not going to make it. But I gave them a try. You never know. Basically though, nobody got into my class without talking to me.

Ironically, my problems with the Americans seem to be connected with this basic ethos that I had. This business if not agreeing to make a contract with anyone without a business meeting and a conversation came from when I lived in Vancouver Canada. For a while, I had the pleasure of taking care of an inexpensive travelers hostel downtown. But before I would let anybody stay there, we had to have a conversation about the rules. 

The rules for staying were not too complicated. You absolutely had to pay your bill on time. We did not play with money. We did not tolerate any problems with the female travelers. There was absolutely no violence or abrasiveness allowed.

These rules would seem to be pretty much understood at any place. You could probably say that it was unnecessary to mention this. What was important to me however was that they listened to me quote these rules. What was most important to me is that the people would listen to what I had to say and speak to me respectfully. This was not power on my part, it was self-preservation and my desire to keep the place running and stop it from burning down or needing the police to come in. What was important was that I understood that the people I let in had enough consciousness to be respectful. No, not everybody who wanted to stay with us got to stay with us. There were a few people who just would not show me that they were respectful. Not a failure to respect me, a failure to be respectful people.

This is the problem I think with most Americans these days. Most probably, the ethnic and minority communities know something about respect because they were raised with a lack of it. The Spanish language for example has a respectful variant of speaking to people. This is similar to Russian. It becomes apparent if he speaks some Spanish that you notice that Hispanic people speak respectfully to each other but when they break into straight English, their gringo lingo is laced with sarcasm. They literally speak not only to languages linguistically, they speak the two languages differently socially.

The Belarusian style of doing business is pure obsequiousness. They will smile in your face without ever having the slightest inclination to do what they said. Placation. It’s obnoxious really especially when you need some help. It’s hard to keep respectful and quite often, I find myself going directly to dismissiveness. This is especially true when people approach me smiling, hoping to make some acquaintance with me. I don’t believe in these meetings at all anymore. I brush people off with the least amount of effort possible.

This of course doesn’t add to my public face but in my estimation, it doesn’t matter one bit. They already had their preconceived objectification when they approached me. Nothing I can say would change things and being nice would only make me seem like a fool or an easy mark.

Of course we could take this thought and fly straight up into the sky, high enough to give ourselves a last overview of the landscape as a whole. Where do people live respectfully? Where do people respect their neighbors or each other? Where are we not killing each other or poisoning each other or poisoning the world or stealing from each other? Where in this miserable mess that we have created do we live well?

I tell you, I never found it. I believe I’ve been to 32 countries. People have been to more. People have seen more places and played more games. There are people with a lot more money than I have ever had who had opportunities to roam around in luxury. I managed to get around a little bit. I experienced a few things and lived through a few things. I have had enough life experience to enjoy the quiet these days. I’m not unhappy with my gates locked and a lot of time to spend on my own. I’m not unhappy about this at all. 

So I guess this week is getting started. I’m not going to eat a big breakfast. Probably today is going to be pretty active. We are going to put together one and maybe two boxes for pickles. These boxes are going to have to be trellised. The beans we planted will also have to be trellised but I have time before I have to set up either of those.

I went into the forest the other day and I found the tree that broke and fell down. Exactly where it went, there were several willow trees that also died. They were too dry. There are however lots of Willow branches that I will probably make use of for the trellising. In the past, I built with lumber or wooden poles. These are obviously really strong. I think though that I can make use of some natural materials this time. It’ll save money and probably the building will be more fun.

After this, I don’t really know. The office is up and running. I could get back into web work. It’s a pretty good situation for such a thing. When it gets really warm here, my office is remarkably cool. It’s a nice place to be and probably working on getting my websites together is a pretty good secondary application for this summer. Why not? I can sell some books or do some advertising for the English method. Who knows, maybe I will even get back on the social networks.

No, I do not believe in any of this at all. I don’t believe anything will come of any of this. I don’t even feel like saying something like “you never know”. It’ll just be something to do and if there is any luck left in the world at all, maybe I’ll find a way to enjoy it or find a partner I don’t mind doing it with.

Time to get going. I’ll check back in a little later with an update. Forgive me if the tone here this morning is a little dismal. There is just too much open killing going on in the world. We are a failed species as of the moment. We are destined to die despite the existence of understanding. I don’t need to point anywhere else but myself for this. I know I’m not the only one who thinks this way. But if I can think of variance and alternatives that do not lead to hatred and violence, this means that alternatives to hatred and violence exist. Unfortunately, that’s not the way the money game is played. And apparently, the money game doesn’t give a shit if everybody dies in the end.

***

It’s 1:30 p.m. and we’ve been going for about 3 hours. I am taking a sit down on an improvised bench on top of one of my boxes. I built the second box for the pickles today in a straight line after the first one. We agreed that the trellis should just go straight up and down. We are feeling the vast majority of the box with unbelievably beautiful Forest dirt. It doesn’t take much, only five wheelbarrows and thank God my ex partner is here to run that machine.

It’s been overcast all day and I would not say that anything particularly special is going on. The boxes are all growing. I would not say wild growth except for a few exceptionally ambitious cabbages. It feels nice though. It looks nice. It looks as though we are being moderately successful.

The only bad spot is a series of four fruit trees, fruit and nut trees, that just don’t want to do anything. I understand it’s about the amount of water they get but really, they are exactly in front of where the chicken woman Parks her car. A lack of water may be part of it. I have watered these plants five or six times though. I’m thinking that it might just be poisonous soil.

My thinking though is that the roofing panels are definitely helping. It wasn’t my entire idea to put roofing panels on the ground like I did, my original thought was to build a roof that would drop water. The evidence that this is a reasonable thing to think about comes from another part of our field. I have several cherry plum trees (алыча) and if you look at the ones that are being fed from the roof of my woodshed and the one standing free in the middle of the field, even at the end of the May. The one that’s getting fed water is green and lush and the one that is just standing in the field is already looking very poor and dry. For what it’s worth, the trees in the forest are also looking very dry.

A regular plum tree that I placed a roofing panel under is looking lovely this year as is my own cherry plum. Where there is enough water, there is fruit. When there is drought, all the sweetness goes away.

For some reason, my ex partner has decided to bury nettle leaves in the pickle boxes. She believes this is excellent fertilizer. I know that if you touch nettles, it hurts. I think in English we call this poison ivy or poison oak. Maybe it’s not the same thing but the reaction is good anyway she’s going in for another bunch to bury in the left box. We are almost ready for planting. 

It’s been a nice day in the garden. It’s not too hot and not too cold. It’s a quiet Sunday without too much nonsense from The neighbors. We are getting along okay and all would seem to be wonderful. Well, probably it’s not going to be a lot of intimacy now that I’ve seen her carrying Bunches of nettles. That’s just not friendly.

***

It’s a little after 8:00 p.m. and my ex partner has just gotten on the bus back to town. Today was a good day.

I built the second box for the pickles and we went and collected some excellent dirt from the forest to fill them up. It took five trips, much easier than the full scale boxes. The planting went well. It was a little prejudiced but everything got into the ground.

My ex partner played favorites. She had a few high-end and well developed plants, I had one group growing from some select seeds, high-end seeds from the store and another group that truthfully looked a little wiggly that simply came out of a glass that the previous owner had pulled out of local pickles. She did not want to plant the weird looking ones. In the end though, everything went into the ground and everybody looked good.

Actually, everything everywhere looks really good. The cabbages are genuinely starting to grow and a couple of them are showing off. I’m very pleased with myself for these boxes. It looks like they are excellent places for things to grow.

After this, we went down to the bean field and did some more weeding. Everything was pleasant today. We got along very well. There was no sharpness or issues between us. Both of us were quite gentle and respectful with the other. At the end of the day, we climbed into the house for some dark chocolate, fresh roasted peanuts and a pot of tea. We crashed on the couch and watched this buster Keaton movie, Sherlock Jr.

Are you a fan of Buster Keaton? I am. A friend one time suggested that Keaton was better than Chaplin. At the time he said it, I didn’t believe it but since then, I’ve had a lot of chances to see the difference. Buster Keaton, at least in the early films that he was running by himself as a Maverick filmmaker in Hollywood was the king. The corporations ended up swallowing him up. That’s the story of how he lost his riches and eventually his Fame. That’s a Hollywood story.

I’m not going to wax romantic here but it was extremely nice having my ex partner around. We have been around each other for a long time and we know each other pretty well. She is a comfortable face for me and though she hates my beard, I am a comfortable face for her as well.

She also makes keeping this Garden up a lot easier. When she comes by on Sundays, she handles the workload much better than me. I agree that if she was really not a part of this, it’s quite possible that my garden would function a little bit better for a lot less work. If I was making all the choices and suggestions, I would definitely not have chosen such work intensive vegetables. I would have gone completely perennial and done nothing more than dig a few holes.

But now we have what we have and it is pretty cool. The garden boxes are much, much better than working in the field. I know it’s completely unusual for this region but I much prefer working in isolated places where I can control the quality of the dirt and more easily get to the plants inside. Just having the edge of the box to lean on means everything in the world and not having to work directly on the ground is exponentially better for me.

I did some weeding in the bean field. The bean field has a border but it’s not particularly a raised bed. I much prefer to separate the growing spaces from the walking spaces. But it’s not fun for me. It’s pretty awkward and painful and I don’t get any particular feelings from the effort. It’s just more work of a quality that I’m really not comfortable doing. I can do it and I can finish what I start. I just don’t like it very much.

I mentioned that I’m putting together a book from last year’s website. I’ve been collecting essays from its pages. I’m removing the links and just leaving the essays themselves. I’m debating whether the children’s books belong in there or not. Maybe they do and maybe they don’t. But there is some ecological literature in there that I wrote and that I’m pretty proud of so maybe those vignettes will carry the book.

The reason I’m talking about this is there is one s in there that I find kind of amusing. The essay is called Why I Hate Gardening. I wrote it last year at a time when I was completely convinced that I was going to do nothing but fruit trees and berry bushes and perennials. This was before I ended up planting an entire field in potatoes by hand. This was definitely before I got into building garden boxes and the watering system. This was before all of this that I have been doing this year. 

Maybe tomorrow I’ll print this. I’m just not so sure that it’s true anymore. I can’t really say that I’ve caught the bug. I’m just saying that working directly with nature and helping things grow really does have a profound effect. It really is an amazing thing to have in your life.

Perhaps the thing that really made today A beautiful day was the appearance of our first wildflowers. Until today, we had a few dandelions come up and flower and turn to a puffball and send their seeds along but we didn’t really have wildflowers. Today when we were taking a break and sharing my improvised bench on the corner of one of our boxes, I noticed how many gorgeous little yellow flowers were appearing amongst the greens.

I talk a lot about the obnoxiousness of my neighbors and their weed wackers and they’re Nazi fetish for killing as a way of gardening. I am doing a lot of weeding this year and therefore killing plants. I’m not saying that favoring one particular plant over what God wants to put there is bad. If you want what you want to grow in your garden, you have to feed it and take care of it and keep bullies away from it. There are not many plants that will just automatically dominate their surroundings and need no help.

The real business though is all of this short cropped grass may have some visual aesthetic to it but what it really does is prevent the appearance of wildflowers. Of course, we do not necessarily eat these plants but that does not mean that they have no value. It’s charming to have those little dots of yellow appearing everywhere. It’s beauty. It’s nature’s beauty. Literally it’s sexy. There is no other word that truthfully describes it. And to take it out and destroy it just to follow some skinhead idealism of appearing to be an orderly family is just ridiculous. It’s a false road. And what’s worse, it makes no sense if you’re a beekeeper like my neighbor. He’s just taking away their food.

Yes, that was an absolutely beautiful moment. She was tired and came over and sat next to me on my bench and we looked at the newly appeared wildflowers growing in the meadow. The birds were singing many different tunes. And in this one moment, we remembered why we like each other.