Nasewaupee: A Place to Call Home

                
        "You only hate the road when you're missing home." These are lyrics from Passenger that are as catchy as they are true; at least for me. I ended my last blog briefly touching on some of the crazy experiences I've had these past few years. I've lived out of a car, out of a bike trailer, and out of a backpack and spent more nights in the houses of strangers or beneath the stars than I have in places that I called my own. I don't hate the road. In fact I know I will need to visit her again for I believe traveling and experiencing new people and places is essential to the human condition. But there comes a time when you want to just slow down and actually have a place to return to at night, a place where you can host friends and family, a place to experiment and learn, a place to invest yourself in, a place to call home. 
           Getting "home" was a tale all in itself. A nearly 24 hour journey from Chiapa de Corzo to Green Bay Wisconsin by plane, train, foot, and by car. The airports hadn't changed much in my 5 months away. The lines were still long, there was still no smiling, and the TSA was still horribly incompetent. I was flagged going through security in Mexico City for having a 2 inch allen wrench in my guitar case (used to tighten the neck of the guitar) that I was told could be used as a weapon. Using an allen wrench in a fight or as a murder weapon would be a disadvantage and more of a challenge then simply having the use of your hands. Anyway, I gave them the wrench, passed through security, and entered the terminal where a construction crew had left all their tools unattended for a renovation project. So I had just given up an allen wrench because it was a deadly weapon and here was an array of hammers, nails, and screw drivers sitting on the floor with no one watching that I could easily pocket and bring on board if I so chose. Then I went to a restaurant nearby my gate for dinner and was handed a knife with my meal. A Knife! The restaurant was so busy that I could have easily slipped it into my backpack or taken a knife from another persons plate when they had finished their meal. The good ole TSA keeping us safe and confiscating random items that take a stretch of the imagination to be seen as deadly while simultaneously offering passengers real weapons after the security screening. Ironically, I was the lone passenger ordered to go through a secondary screening at my gate; perhaps they were reading my thoughts at how easy it would be to smuggle these new items onto the plane. Other than my disdain with airport security the trip went off without a hitch. Upon re entering the States it was so interesting to navigate a transportation system where I understood everything - following signs, getting directions, buying tickets, and ordering a cheeseburger is so much easier when you speak the language. It's safe to say I have zero fear of traversing anywhere in the States now after traveling a bit around Mexico. 

          So I mentioned in my La Joya post how I wanted to be more like Arturo, having a place to call my own where I could eventually teach volunteers skills in sustainability or at least offer friends or weary travelers a roof and my hospitality. Well I've been given an amazing opportunity; property. 40 acres just outside of Sturgeon Bay complete with a barn, pole barn, garage/workshop, farmhouse, wetlands, and tillable land. I'm renting, but at an affordable price since I "know" the owners and I've already made a few commitments and investments that mean I'm probably going to be here for a few years. The high cost of land is the number one barrier keeping folks from moving to the country and pursuing the lifestyle they dream of. With student debt and the state of the job market many folks my age can barely afford to rent a 500 square foot apartment let alone rent or purchase 40 acres of land, for most it's a dream that can't be realized until they're well into their 40's or hell even until they're retired. I'm 24 and I'm getting the opportunity to pursue this lifestyle. I am blessed.

           It's not an operational farm (there's a local farmer who has been growing corn on the tillable acreage for the last few years but it hasn't been a true functioning farm for more than two decades, if not longer). This means there are no animals (other then the sandhill cranes, cotton tails, and barrel of dead raccoons that the farmer poisoned) and the barn is in dire need of repair (broken windows, doors off the hinges, and boards missing from the walls). So no this is not the picturesque door county farm, at least not yet. To put it simply, there is work to be done. I've got a list of projects; a list that I know will take years or even decades to achieve. These are lofty dreams and things may change, I may be out of here in a few years but right now I'm happy to know I'm going to be staying in the same place for more than a few weeks or months and that I have somewhere to invest my time and energy into. 

Barrel o'coons

All recycled material compost bin

         Start by doing what is necessary, then do what is possible, and soon you will be doing the impossible. These words are what I tell myself to keep me grounded. So in the month of May I've taken care of some of those necessary items. Getting some broken pipes fixed to have access to water, filling the propane tank and getting access to heat and hot water, cleaning a house that was empty for the last six years, finding an internet provider in an internet dead zone, purchasing furniture and housewares from thrift shops across NE Wisconsin, and making this place comfortable and livable. Taking care of those necessary items has allowed me to already pursue some of my "possible" goals. I gathered some scrap wood from a neighbor, found some old farm posts, and picked out a spot in the lawn so I'm ready to build my outdoor compost bin. It was frustrating to be in Mexico and realize that most people had no concept of composting, it's even more frustrating to be in the States and realize that people here still have no concept of composting! Part of living in the country is being resourceful and repurposing everything you have to the point where the idea of "waste" doesn't even exist. I've been on enough farms to realize that every farmer is more or less a hoarder because you never know when you might need that bucket of rusty nails or those 40 empty peanut butter jars. So composting directly falls in line with this way of thinking. Taking items that would otherwise fill a landfill and pollute the earth and turning them into nutrients that will feed the soil and feed you, for free. Some people pay inordinate sums of money via fertilizers and additives on their home gardens to achieve results that they could replicate if they simply took the time to compost. If you're not doing it, there's really not much stopping you. While having a bin, turning your compost, and layering and balancing your nitrogen and carbon items creates the ideal conditions for compost you really don't need to do anything more than throw everything into a pile somewhere on your lawn and nature will basically take care of the rest. See google for more options.
       

 Another "possible" goal is getting rid of my lawn. I don't understand western society's obsession with Kentucky Bluegrass (no not the music, the species of grass that is grown universally across most of Europe and North America). I hate this plant, and I don't say that lightly. The amount of time and money that is spent on supporting this species is utterly ridiculous when it should never exist in the first place; it is quite frankly alien, invasive, and utterly useless. Grass requires heavy watering (at a time when drought is a very real threat), heavy fertilizing (that contaminates our ground water as well as our rivers and lakes), needs routine cutting (which means spending time and typically gasoline to maintain it's look), offers no food or habitat to bees or other wildlife, has no flowers or attractive colors, and ultimately offers no real use or benefit to mankind or the earth. Yet in every city, from the desert yards of Utah, to the local parks of South Dakota, to the highways of Virginia, you will find this plant grown, supported, and maintained, for no apparent reason other than tradition and social normalcy. What's worse is that when I was in Mexico this phenomenon has caught on. People trying to grow grass in places where it is near physically impossible without continual human support and intervention for the sole reason of having the appearance of wealth. Just think of how much money and water we would save if we didn't have grass. Now think of how much beauty and life could be fostered if we simply let grass be overtaken by native plants or decided to plant a garden or wildflowers instead. There is a crisis right now with a shortage of bees which among other things has been linked to a lack of habitat and food. Many people don't realize that the fate of the bee and man are intrinsically linked as bees pollinate nearly 1/3 of our food crops - apples, avocados, almonds, cucumbers, onions, strawberries, cherries, cranberries, carrots, and many more cannot reproduce and feed us without our insect friends. So what am I doing about it and what can you do about it. Overseed your lawn with clover instead - it's drought resistant, grows to about six inches in length and then ceases to grow, produces attractive blooms, fixes nitrogen into the soil thus fertilizing itself, feeds honeybees and other wildlife, and is just more attractive in general. Or you can simply let your lawn grow. Sure the first few years will be rough, probably full of some "weeds" and other unattractive species attempting to reclaim and resurrect the land but after a few years you'll have the first stages of a forest, or a meadow, or of whatever is supposed to be there. As far as I'm concerned the only place grass should be is in the football stadium or soccer field. Just let it grow, who are you fooling, you never enjoyed mowing your lawn anyway!

Strawberries

           My last recent "possible" goal is the start of a vegetable garden on one part of my giant lawn. I read up on all the different techniques and strategies undertaken for gardens from tilled row gardening, to raised bed square foot gardening, to sheet mulching with companion plants. I eventually settled on the cheapest and longest lasting method I could find on the internet, the hugelkultur method. Hugelkultur is German for "mound culuture" and it is a gardening style that has been used successfully for centuries in eastern Germany and is just now being realized for its ingenuity and simplicity. Hugelkultur in it's simplest form is burying a pile of logs in soil and then planting atop this pile or mound. Taken to it's extreme you can add in layers of cardboard, leaves, grass clippings, compost, and straw in a pattern leading to hugels as tall as six feet. The advantages of this style are that you are creating more surface area in your garden thus gaining more yield per square foot but more importantly once established you have little to no watering or fertilizing for the foreseeable future. The hugel attempts to mimic the natural forest floor with the buried logs slowly rotting and giving off important nutrients over the course of years while also serving to store water during rainy periods and slowly releasing this water to the mound during dry periods. An effectively constructed hugel can remain untouched for twenty years and yield better results than more intensive forms of gardening like your typical raised beds or row gardens that need attention every week. So I now have some 30 square feet of hugels only about two feet high planted with an array of herbs and vegetables. In the future I'd like to put more thought into what I plant and where I plant it but seeing as how I entered the gardening season a little late I'll be happy just to see something grow! I want to get to the point where through canning, drying, and a root cellar I'll be able to provide my own produce year round but like I said before; all in good time. 

           I'm in new territory; socially, mentally, and physically. I'm surrounded by farm fields littered with the stalks of last years corn crop. Now as I write this paragraph the land has been tilled and the new corn seedlings are already emerging. Soybean, corn, wheat; those three crops account for nearly 3/4 of what is grown across the entire US and the demographics in Wisconsin don't look much different. Much like the phenomenon of Kentucky Bluegrass, Americans are fixated on a few species that require heavy intervention and heavy machinery to attain yields. Call it tradition, call it comfort, call it government subsidies, call it the demand of the market, call it just getting by, whatever the case I hope to be doing something different on this property with the tillable acreage in a few years time. As I walk my land I come across a single red tulip in a sea of grass. The symbolism strikes me. I hope that'll be me; offering some beauty and diversity of life, in a place where mono-cultural homogeneity is all that I can see.  

        There are many things I do not know, but what I do know is that I have dreams... dreams of sweet dripping honey, of black soil between my hands, of colorful wildflowers on a forest floor for as far as the eye can see, of a babbling brook off in the distance... she ain't much right now and truth be told this property has already broken me down and made me scream in anger more than once these past few weeks... the journey won't be easy, but then again anything worth doing hardly ever is. For all the cursing to the gods that has taken place here I have had an equal number of instances where I was screaming with joy and laughter at the sweet victories that I have achieved. Turning my faucet and getting water, feeling the heat come through the vents of my furnace, eating my first breakfast on my porch in the morning sun, witnessing a pair of cranes forage in the wetlands while a flock of red winged black birds alighted on the cattails around me, the construction of the hugels and the first life emerging from them, and the realization that I finally have a place to call home. I've seen most of this country and no doubt I will continue to travel and seek out those special places and make friends and memories along the way but there comes a time when a man needs to put some roots in the ground both literally and figuratively. I'm done searching for Eden, I'm ready to start creating it.