As far back as 2014 the country of Venezuela was experiencing political and social violence and scarcity of food and resources. Its hard to believe its been 6 years since Hugo Chavez died of cancer.
At the end of that year Venezuela’s central bank announced that the nation had entered into a recession due to plummeting oil prices, their greatest commodity.
Between 2015 and 2016 food shortages were so bad that Venezuelans lost an average of 19 pounds! This was just from a lack of food across the board.
Thanks to the corruption of their socialist government Maduro was reelected despite being seated at the helm throughout this entire mess. Now, Venezuelans are combating the scarcity, rolling power outages and the possibility of a civil war. Things don’t look to be improving.
The desperate people of this nation have lost their doctors and supply lines for medicines and medical supplies are also compromised. For those who understand the natural world their only hope in dealing with injury and illness is coming in the form of plants.
Let’s look at 6 common plants Venezuelans are using to treat themselves through this growing crisis.
Wormwood
As an effective tea and tincture the wood plant known as wormwood is a powerful natural medicine. This plant can be used to deal with things like inflammation. You might wonder about the name and yes it can be used to deal with parasites and worms that are in our intestinal tract.
You can also use wormwood to ease stomach discomfort, which is always something we need to consider when dealing with a collapsed environment where food and water are likely contaminated.
Another interesting thing about wormwood is that it can be used as a mild antidepressant. The people of Venezuela could certainly use some help with depression.
Related: 7 Medicines You Should Know How To Make At Home
Moringa
The deciduous moringa tree is an incredible survival tree that doesn’t get the airtime it deserves. This tree is full of edible parts and you can even use parts of it to purify water! The powdered seeds can be used to sanitize drinking water.
On the medicinal side of things the Moringa tree is a mulit use means of dealing with injury and illness.
The Venezuelans who know about moringa will use the leaves as a tonic to deal with things like bronchitis, UTIs and things like diarrhea and dysentery. The seeds of moringa have antifungal and antibacterial properties.
It’s a powerful multiuse tree that any survivor should get to know.
Aloe Vera
An economic collapse is a harbinger of many things. One such thing is disease and infection. We get very used to having access to things like band aids and triple antibiotic ointment. So much so that infection is hardly a concern because we know we can just get a prescription of antibiotics filled.
For the Venezuelan people things are more dire. When the doctors and nurses file out of town and the medical resources stop flowing into town, you are basically on your own. People can die from simple cuts on their hand just as easy as they can die from the flu.
Aloe Vera, being a plant that grows well in Venezuela, is a great option for dealing with cuts and burns. Its also a big help with sunburn that might be useful for people who have no shelter. This is another symptom of economic collapse.
Aside from its topical uses, aloe also can be ingested and used to bolster the intestinal flora. That is to power up the gastrointestinal tract. These are many reasons why this would be helpful. The most important being to deal with the strange, inconsistent and likely dangerous diets of Venezuelan’s struggling to survive this situation.
Related: 9 Natural Remedies To Heal Wounds Faster
Lemongrass
This powerful and natural astringent is well known for its powerful antiseptic properties. It is found in Venezuela and is likely helping people deal with one issue.
While lemongrass is one of those powerful plant medicines that works on all sorts of ailments, the Venezuelans are likely using lemongrass to deal with gastrointestinal issues. That is how its most effective in its tea and other medicinal forms.
You see, without food or safe water, people put things into their bodies that will wreak havoc on the digestive system. Whether its bad water or rotting foods both are filled with pathogens that can cause harm to the digestive system or even illness that can end in death, if left untreated.
To deal with bad water quality and food quality lemongrass is a great option to help with digestive upset and gastro intestinal illness.
Rosemary
A plant introduced by colonizers; rosemary is hardly a native plant to Venezuela. However, it’s just as effective a healer in Venezuela.
This woody stemmed perennial a strong place in the herbal medicine cabinet. Rosemary can help your circulation, digestion and even your nervous system. In Cuba its burned to chase away bad spirits and burnt rosemary has a tremendous scent.
In Venezuela it is undoubtedly being used to prevent things like lice because of the lack of personal hygiene and resources. You see, along with helping with minor aches and pains and headaches a decoction or essential oil can be used to help things like lice and fleas. It can be taken as a tea or used as a rinse to deal with all issues both inside and outside the body.
Related: How to Make the Most Powerful Natural Antibiotic
Common Plantain
The astringent and antiseptic properties of common plantain are undoubtably being taken advantage of by the Venezuelan people. You see, they have been suffering resource shortages for years now and have been forced to learn what can be of use from the land.
Common plantain is a tremendous means of healing wounds in its poultice form and really helps when dealing with things like wounds.
In a fallen state like Venezuela one of the most dangerous things is infection. They do not have a consistent flow of antibiotics so simple cuts and wounds must be cared for with extreme caution.
Common plantain is one of the few plants that can double as a bandage and a poultice for expediated healing.
We don’t need to suffer an economic collapse or a collapse of any kind to call on plant medicines in our life. In fact, there are many people who depend on things like salves and decoctions daily!
These 6 plants are just a little piece of the full scope self-reliance that many of us are so intent on achieving. Why does it take sheer horror for us to return to the natural world for answers? We must eliminate all other forms of convenience before taking simple action.
At most, the processing of these plants requires some chopping and simmering or some chopping and steeping in alcohol.
Don’t wait till America is in calamity to get to know your own wild medicinal collection. You can also plant a bed’s worth of them in your garden this year!
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I’ve believe we should keep a close eye on what is going on in Venezuela, it may come here soon.
I agree, and I have also been watching it closely.
It is a good example of what will happen here if the Socialist Dumocrats take over here. Like that stupid “Green Deal” !
Also, If the US does actually invade Venezuela to overthrow Maduro, it will cause so much bad blow back here, and make our border invasion problem much worse.
Yes , History does & will repeat itself……. once a society turns to socialism it’s only a matter of time before it implodes. Many examples from the ancients thru the Soviets show it doesn’t work more than a few years…… can U say Bernie 2020 🙂
I don’t know Bernie is pretty old he may not make it that far.
not only that but socialism would barely work in a community of 500 people,much less than most countries in the world, socialism is an impossible pot dream that would never work in a practical scale
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Venezuela, what a great vacation spot. Not many places you can go to lose 19 pounds. I would have to go twice to lose that unwanted forty pounds I need to shed. Just be sure to only shake with your right hand while there. And there is no need to argue about which Restraunt you will take the kids to because there are none. Just go to the local trash can and if you are lucky hit the mobile smorgasbord called a trash truck. I think they have bells and music playing from them like ice cream trucks so you can chase the sound until you find them. Oh the memories you will make. Good times!! And if excitement is your thing then join the protesters and you can avoid being run over from Police armored vehicles. Or dodge bullets, or spend a few weeks in prison. Man, zip line and bungee jumping has nothing on that excitement. And if you get sick just beat the odds with no modern medicine and take this list of plants and make it on your own. Somebody needs to put together a brochure about all of this. Ahhhhh, VENEZUELA!!
Wormwood on the skin can cause chemical burns. So use with caution. Also, it’s toxic.
Well then pass me the wormwood
Isn’t wormwood the stuff they use in absinthe?
It’s a different type of wormwood, called unimaginatively, absinthe wormwood, as opposed to common wormwood, which is also called mugwort
The wormwood in question is genus Artemesia, there are quiet a few species of Artemesia, some of which are deadly, and they share a similar appearance. A very important Southwestern U.S. herb for healing, physical and spiritual, and for ritual. Good idea to know exactly what you’re collecting before you make tea out of it.
Everything else is good advice to our poor Southern neighbors, victims not only of Socialism but also of endemic corruption and U.S. imperialism 21st century style. Don’t see how they can win…
Native Americans called Plantain the White Man’s Footprint. It was introduced in ship’s ballast and agricultural seed and it appeared everywhere my white ancestors settled and broke ground.
Wonder what’s really going on in Venezuela, we seem to have a complete media blackout on the subject. I get more and more worried about who or what is really running things here.
Gauido is another US puppet to inherit the regime overthrow in VZ by the US, IMF and bankers so they can take their oil.
Yet again, it is all about stealing resources from other countries. Follow that money, and search for the US backers of Gauido. The evidence is out there. Maduro and Chavez both told the US to pack sand, and that is why they are being ovetrhrown now.
It has nothing to do with so called human rights or lack of food, since their lack of food is mostly caused by the US sanctions on them to starve them all into submission to the empire.
as of now “social justice” and “human rights” can be used as an excuse for any crime,from disturbing the peace to flat out murder (exaggeration)
Thanks for your reply. I remember reading about absinthe and how regular absinthe drinkers used to suffer brain damage from the drink. That is a recollection of something I read many years ago, so is a foggy recollection at best. Of course, that absinthe was 180 proof might have had something to do with it also.
It was outlawed for years because it causes violent derangement after consuming it for a while, kind of like those skinwalkers on datura, but without the benefits.
I won’t argue weather the dumbing down of the populous due to Large Government is an accident or by design, but sadly in a situation of national emergency many will suffer because they don’t know any basic skills of living without gov’t support.
I can imagine the countries that boarder Venezuela are having a horrible time with migrants. I have never known true hunger and I thank God for that. Its terrible what their government has done to them.
Trouble with migrants? How bloody desperate would someone have to be to travel to Venezuela right now?! That would be like a Jew going into Berlin in the 1930s
Also it’s border. Not boarder.
Since we dont have an edit button for the posts we make, our mistakes in writing can not be corrected.
Ill keep an extra sharp eye out for those fat fingered posts.
Thanks.
Hi TheSouthernNationalist,
Thank you so much for your kind suggestion.
I will definitely work on finding a way for people posting comments to be able to edit their posts. Due to the fact that comments can be posted just by entering a nickname and an email address, and not by creating an account first, posts cannot be edited.
If you or anyone else posting a comment would like to edit/modify it, please feel free to email me at support@askaprepper.com. I will gladly make edit your comments.
God bless,
Claude
Whether**
Voter fraud and military coup. The people had nothing to do with it, only the greedy did. And complacency in the DNC. I wonder how much the socialists paid the dems to look the other way.
Well if Rosemary does not grow naturally in Venezuela chances are Venezuelans won’t be using it. Unless we send them about a million care packages
Lemon grass and rosemary are not native to the Americas but they may well have been in seasonings sold there in the past or grown in some gardens.
I hope folks there are finding things they can use for food or medicines.
There was a time I truly was starving. You feel like your belly is trying to eat your spine it hurts so bad. Your head hurts and you’re weak… Then it stops hurting so bad and the headache passes and you’re weak with times in between that almost feel ok. Then you just want to sleep. Drink water. It helps. Then eat anything in desperation and hope you’ll survive it after you swallowed it. I drank water with tadpoles and minnows. I tried to eat a salamander.
I cry when I read about folks starving and desperate. I’m still a bit food insecure. There is always food in my home. I still have a hard time composting anything except trimmings from food prep. I tend to clean my plate and wipe it with a slice of bread. It looks nearly washed when I’m through eating. I know that’s pretty wired But 51 years later I still carry that time with me. Venezuelans won’t forget these days either.
You are correct about hunger staying with you. A member of the Lions Club I belonged to was a Marine on Guadalcanal. You may or may not know, but the navy admiral who was supposed to offload supplies on Guadalcanal lost his nerve and pulled his fleet out before they had finished offloading the supplies, leaving the Marines to face the Japanese with all sorts of shortages, including food. As a result, when the army finally relieved the Marines most of them had lost a lot of weight. What kept them alive was captured Japanese rations.
The wife of the fellow Lion told me that she would often find him looking in the cupboards at the food they had there and when she would ask him what he was looking for, he would say, “Oh, just checking.” He was always insistent that they have plenty of food stocked in the pantry and she told me that if he felt there wasn’t enough he would go out and buy more food to put away. He wasn’t a preppier stocking food for a catastrophe. This was long before prepping was even on the scene. She told me she always felt it was due to the lean diet they had during their stay on the ‘Canal.
LCC. I hadn’t heard that bit of history. I’m sure those men suffered.
My uncle was in Germany when WWII ended. He had photos from a prison camp. Walking skeletons and skeletons stacked like cordwood in mass graves. Many have suffered seamlessly.
Dad was shipped from the South Pacific to Germany for mop-up because he spoke Dietsch, which used to be alt kens (high German). An uncle went up the Apennines and others to Normandy and so on. Tante, Dad’s second wife, was in the SS, a captain. What a brew master! But, after her second or third glass, she would start to speak of what she saw. She was in Berlin for her time in the military and not in a death camp, but the guilt never left, or her hate of the DNC, which she called America’s Nazi Party. It was the same with the stepkids’ one grandmother, a noncom in Auschwitz. When the kids’ mother would talk Nazism, she would tell her to shut up, it was evil. Like most, she was convinced at the beginning that it was to save Germany. The DNC does anything Hitler did, from socialism to chronic lies to us. Before he was elected, Hitler swore to fix social security, but you had to vote for to find out how he would. AKA the Pelosi doctrine, we have to vote for the bill (health care) to find out what’s in the bill.” peace. Hope all is well with you.
We have to keep the DNC out no matter what else. We need Trump badly and the Republicans. I was Navy 5 years and Army 16. The DNC is destroying the USA. I saw most of Asia and Germany before the Soviet collapse.
We need Trump! But, when the repubs get control, they act like RINOs, not freedom party. But, the DNC needs to go bust. All they are is talking heads. Vote for one, you vote for all. I had some serious discussions with atheists and others about the dems allowing in thousands of people who hate DNC-tried and true supporters. Hopefully, the dems did enough damage to lose the next cycle and hold off the Hunger Games for a while. The DNC wrecks our economy and Americans go hungry. Americans go hungry, a lot of folks around the world starve because we can’t buy their products, the dems know it and couldn’t care less. niio
Look for Blue Can water by the case, http://www.cabelas.com or other sales. It comes in 12 oz soda cans.
Great, thank you, I like this. A word of caution, always fact-check anything medicinal because some can be dangerous or even deadly if taken improperly. There are on-line course you can take on basics, and plenty of sites provide fact sheets on each herb. Food is medicine because most flavorings started out as medicine.
Wormwood taken wrong is dangerous. It’s usually, today, used in conjunction with zinc.
Aloe Vera is eatable, within reason, but not other aloes (they’re still testing each variety). If taken internally, and it’s good, soak the leaves in water for a few hours. The water will turn yellowish (especially with older leaves). Use that topically. Do not consume the skin of the leaf, either, but use that topically. Cut the pulpy part out and it can be dried without losing any benefits.
Lemon grass, the thick part of the stems is strongest. You can buy seeds from Baker’s rare seeds. BTW, one plant will make 6-10 in a long growing season. Like aloes, it’s prolific. If you live in a cool climate, remember it’s only frost resistant to a degree. I live in zone 9A and I think it’s hardy into 7B.
Rosemary is the best spice to prevent botulism and to counteract food poisoning. Again, caution. We use one teaspoon of whole, dried leaves in one cup boiling water, cover, let it steep for ten minutes, then sip. No more than two cups/day or it can make you sick. This is the number one herb used by people who deal with gamy meat. If someone who believes (and there are still those who demand it) that a chicken is aged only after hanging in a hot attic by the tail feathers for several days survives eating that, you might, too 🙂
Common plantain is another that deserves the title, one of the best. We would walk through a pasture and pick it before allowing in livestock, or they ate it to the ground. We call it pig weed, because what all y’all call pigweed is amaranth to us, and given a choice, cattle, chickens, even goats and so on will gnaw amaranth to the ground before eating pig weed/plantain. Then for get having plantain.It can be cooked for a green when small, and I think the seeds are used for something ‘r nuther.
Much thanks for the article, it’s cool to read. Niio.
Amaranth leaves for greens. Seeds cooked much like rice or dried and ground into a flour. I haven’t tried the flour but the cooked grain isn’t bad at all. That’s on we have a lot of any place there has been disturbed ground. I see a lot of it on empty city lots, along driveways and anyplace I make garden rows. 🙂
The flour is five bucks a pound, labeled under gluten free. but, what ain’t? Our wild amaranth is called prickly amaranth, but the greens are good if taken young. It develops tiny thorns after bloom.
Interesting Red.
I live in zone 6b. Last year seed companies called us a zone 5. A dozen years ago it was a zone 4. Go figure. We still easily see between 0 degrees and -10 degree nights part of the winter. In the 70s we had several spells at -20 that lasted two or three weeks at a time. Days were -17F. 100 degree days happened but not often. Last summer we had a lot of days in the high 90s and some up to 104. We’ve had a crazy late spring. A mix of days in the 60s and 70s sprinkled with 90s a few times and one or two nights a week we’ve been 31 or 32F.
Most folks have lost a good portion of their garden to the cold nights. I gave up on a lot of things and either lost things from waiting too long to plant the seedlings or being away too long when my youngest son almost died in April.
I still have some determined things that survived and I’m planting in big storage containers. I may risk it and set some outside soon and just cover on cold nights. I will plant my heirloom dwarf corn. It usually makes 2 ears and is ready to eat in about 60 days. Its getting too late to plant the native dent corn from this area. Its usually planted some on April 1st and more on April 15. Figuring half or all will come up after Last frost. Most of it froze out this year. Its a staple food here. Roasted for fresh eating at summer feasts. Roasted and dried for later adding to soups or chili stews. Then what’s left is ground for corn meal. That thickens tomalli filling and other traditional dishes. Blue dent corn becomes tortillas for enchiladas and athole which is a thin gruel that is sipped on cold winter morning. Traditionalist add a tiny pinch of ground salt gathered at a salt lake 70 miles south of here. Younger generations add butter and sugar. I like both. .
Usually chili’s and cilantro are well up by now. Many families plant either traditional heirloom beans or pintos. Both are used for green beans and end of season dry beans. The shallots I didn’t harvest last fall are up and growing. A container of strawberry plants I moved with us are green and beautiful.
Its a strange food year. Midwest corn couldn’t be planted because fields were too wet weeks ago. Now they’re being flooded again even worse. Some tougher silage corn is just coming up in fields here. Usually there is a first harvest in late June. Its unlikely they will have two crops this year. That’s the winter cattle feed on ranches here.
I’ve never seen so many big tornadoes as the news reports of the last couple of weeks. Terrible damage.
Wild foods are coming up and doing ok. Just a month or so late. Mullen hasn’t come up yet but most of the edible greens are coming up enough to identify. I’m especially fond of Purslane and Lambsquarters. Fillaree came up in March and the desert mallows are just tall enough to identify now. The fillaree lies flat in a beautiful rosette just 4″ or 5″ across I have a patch that is plentiful enough to harvest a meal or two. My patch of wild sage is 5″ tall now. I’ll wait till its around 12″ – 15″ to harvest some. The wild tea is perfect for harvesting at a sons home in Albuquerque. We’re 1200 feet higher so I have to wait. I need to go Forraging for wild onions and wild celery. The wild celery is a miniature just 3 to 5 inches tall but it mostly lies down. Very intense flavor and one of of first green veggies that ready to eat in spring. Its gathered and dried for a seasoning. It is wonderful in a green chili stew. I’ve never seen it anywhere but here. I’m wondering if it would transplant to a garden area. Wild geranium don’t die down all winter but they are just now blooming. They are edible greens and medicinal plants. They grow everywhere here but I’m happy they grow on all our foot paths. Walking on them keeps mosquitoes away. There are lots of mosquitos in pools in the irrigation ditch between irrigation times. It runs outside along my west fence line. I take advantage of that by planning my berry planting and some fruit trees near the water.
The different nopal cacti I planted along my fenceline last year are rooting and doIng beautifully. One is a medium sized pad with some stickers. The other is a bit smaller and has wicked thorns nearly 3″ long and lots of the tiny ones thick around the base of the larger thorns. Both will bear edible fruit and the pads of both are edible when still young.
We’re fond of the fruit. Lower elevations grow even larger varieties and larger fruit. I’d like to try some of those here. The ones native to these higher elevations are small and one is even called Pigmy. The Pigmy has pads about 2″ across. We gather fruit from all we can find when they ripen. I make jelly, syrup, and even wine from the juice. Here the natives save the well cleaned seed to either dry and grind like a flour or boil and mash into a paste. The paste can be eaten as is or added to stews to thicken it some or cook it very thin on a greased flat rock. Sort of like the corn, paper bread, of the south eastern native peoples.
A batch of kittens, born inside because of the cold, destroyed my beautiful aloe Vera plants (digging in them), so I need to find more. I use the gel mostly for burns and added to lemonade for me to sip on now and then. It eases the discomfort growths on my thyroid cause. Not goiter but small growth up to 1″ across. Biopseyed, no cancer found. Cause unknown. Supposed to not eat raw broccoli as they think that can make the growths larger. They are just uncomfortable and have taken my singing voice. Aloe Vera juice in lemonade eases the discomfort. I just sip it slowly through the day. I’m using a jug of “alloe vera” from Wal-Mart. It does help but fresh is way better.
If I find something natural to help nerve pain I’ll stop my prescriptions and try that. I really believe natural meds and natural foods without so much processing are healthier for us. I fight Fibromialgia and idiopathic neuropathy. I know marijuana and hemp are both supposed to help. I’ve ordered a hop bine. The flowers have an effect of making harvesters sleepy. Dr suggested a beer in the evening with my meds. I’m not fond of beer so I’ll try the natural plant. It’s related to hemp!
Out walking this morning I discovered a container I grew mixed lettuce in last fall has some red lettuce about 3 ” tall and just one green leaf lettuce. I’ll start taking care of those and add seed in a few weeks. It looks like a container garden year. The corn will go in a couple of old watering troughs. Not a big planting but we’ll have some to eat and fresh seed for the future. Radishes and short carrots will go around other things in containers. I have a long flower bed across the front of a building facing the road. I will plant bush beans and beets there with some marigolds. They do well in that sunny spot. The beats will be fine. Hope the beans survive. They are more tender. We usually mix rabbit droppings in where we will plant green veggies so that bed will have some either dug in or side dressing for the rows. That won’t burn plants like other fresh manures. That is best for fast green growth. Composted horse or chicken manure is good for overall growth and blooming and fruiting time.
Guess I’ll go check on the Mullen again today. I don’t see Plantain here at all. I figured it grew everywhere but I haven’t seen it in 42 years. We used some every spring in most areas of California, Washington, and even a rural town in north west Texas. Mom fed me a little plantain and a lot of lambsquarters when I was little.
Here, 9B, or 9A, depending on if you’re into global cooling or global warming. 🙂 Donno if I should recommend them, but trifolate oranges will grow in Zone 5. Prickly, thorny, and the fruit is medicinal and used like lemons. It tends to spread, badly, though. Just a thought.
Can they remove the growths without causing more damage?
Fewer cats, more life 🙂 Purslane here is a monsoon seasonal. Then, one plant takes over half the yard out front. Looks good, too, with red flowers. I have 4 aloe vera barbar., the tree aloes (and about a hundred other types), but only one is in the garden yet. That un has a pack of pups around it. Which hops? Neomexicana? That’s native up your way. It still needs a lot of water, but it’s heat and drought resistant. It’s supposed to be a lot stronger than European hops. I have one geranium, planted because the planter (4 feet wide and maybe 6 long) looked empty with only rosemary and some Mexican tarragon. It bloomed all winter, now is dying back with the heat. One type of wild geranium is a sweet, once grown for the roots, uplands mallow (marshmallow is were the candy came from). Small flowers, vining, and nothing eats the leaves but sheep. I have Mexican domesticated nopales and wild ones. The wild ones here can get a pad nearly a foot across, but thorny. The Mexican nopale are mostly thornless and can, if conditions are good, grow to 12 feet, I’m told. Not that they will with my greed for nopalitos 🙂 We have Santa Rita, as well, but, it blooms and the fruit dies. It was bred for cattle feed and has only glochids, but the pads are thick with them. Flower, yo, medicinals are common now as ornamental. Canna seeds, dulce, the best, are inexpensive from JL Hudon. They should handle your winters if well-mulched, though I’d take roots in to store like potatoes just in case. With shelter and heavy mulch, canna is wintered outside as far north as Virginia. The seeds are hard to start and have to be filed to cut into the shell. Some folks just feed them to cattle or goats and collect the manure, like starting new mesquite. 🙂 the red amaranth is growing well, despite predatory doves and quail. The chimoyo are in bloom, but do not like the heat,but did well when it was cold every night, so I’ll be picking more soon (already got some red ones). I got mullein seeds, but I’m leery of planting it. It does like to spread. Started the moringia and more lemon grass because the others didn’t sprout from the cold.
Fibromialgia! My stepdaughter suffers that. She needs to get back on an all-organic diet but it’s too expensive outside New York. BTW, how is your iodine intake? When I get a craving for seafood (something I never cared for), I take a little iodine and swab the inside of my elbow. An hour later, the craving leaves. And aunt saved her thyroid gland that way. On the 12th, the VA wants to put a stint in. Apparently, PTSD took a new turn. Too much time in the land of taxes and dead dreams, Pennsylvania, mebbe. Army? Perish the thought! Army is gentle and giving and nice and the sergeants are even human (on occasion 🙂 God bless ‘em! (And they wonder why I have hearing loss.) There was a problem with a one aorta growing calcium from time to time, now one developed into aortic stenosis. Well, like a cousin says, ever’body gotta have a hobby, ‘mano…We’re praying for you. for strength and health. niio
I read about trifolate oranges. Interested but I’d want a method of containing them in an area. I’d love the chance to try those large pad nopales. I like napolitoes but even better is road a young pad till soft and finely dice with roasted, peeled, NM chili’s with mashed garlic and finely chopped cilantro leaves and stems. Or a young pad grilled till soft and laid in a hamburger. Purslane is a monsoon plant. If I see some small ones getting started I’ll water it.
The hops I ordered are descendant from European. I should look up Native Seed Search and see what’s available there. I have donated heirloom seed and purchased seed in years past.
The wild geranium here grows spread out and low. Its just started blooming the 1/2″ lt blue flowers. A lot has come up in pathways. Walked on it is unpopular with mosquitoes. That makes me happy. I have a big pot of domesticated geraniums. 5 different colors. They will bloom in a window most of the year around.
Doves and quail are busy with. Cute nest fillers. They will eat grain with my chickens and love the amaranth but its late this year.
Iodine probably on the low side. The unexplained growths could be removed. But I’ve choosen no surgeries for a while. Here’s why.
February 2018 broken leg just above the left ankle and broken ribs.
In May I was bagging trash on the floor of a singlewide mobile home I was helping tear down. Suddenly right foot on the dirt, left foot still on the floor and all my weight landed on the right wrist and forearm. Not broken but very painful.
June emergency galblader surgery with an extra cut to clean the gut cavity because the infected galblader dissolved across the liver and the one very large stone was impelled into the liver. Healed up ok on antibiotics but could easily have been dead in the first 15 minutes.
Then September surgery to pull the forearm bones back out of the hand and a wedge cut out of one. Its still tender and weak but the pain is relieved. The bones were chewing up bone in the hand. Dr used a bar and 7 screws to hold the cut bone so it could heal.
December 23rd I walked to the church kitchen to fix my plate for our Christmas potluck. I stepped on something slick and my left foot shot out in front of me just as I stepped on it. Drs verdict is hamstring injury with muscle tears and tears in tendons. One torn tendon tore in two. I’m doing nothing about that one. Mostly have gotten tired of staying off the knee and getting around with crutches until recently finally able to walk but on uneven ground its still hard.
I’m healing but get tired pretty fast right now. That will change as I get more active again. Today was community cleanup day. I bagged and loaded 12 full big bags in the pick up. Neighbor needed gas money so I gave him $10 and the keys to my truck to go dump the trash for me. I was too tired to do it.
I’m interested in moringa. Once my planned walapini is dug I could grow smaller trees in there. I plan a dirt rocket stove for heat when needed.
Easy to plan for now but Its going to be work to finish those plans.
A stint can be an amazing thing. You need good blood flow for good strong health. It can be a simple fix for a big problem.
My son that was in Desert Storm has PTSD.
So do I from the trama of my first marriage. That was long enough ago there were no women’s shelters and laws favored husbands as owners of wives and children.
Lol right, Army so gentle and quiet. Sargents such thoughtful sweethearts. ?
Bless you Bro. Prayers for you too.
Trifolate are thorn bushes. Make sure they’re legal in NM. I know they’re hardy in south Pennsylvania because they’re taking of outlawing them as invasive. The fruit is harsh, more than a Bearss lemon.
Roast that garlic, first! 🙂 Or fry it in oil to use for garlic butter. I’ll take nopalitos any way I can get them. We do a bean bake by taking a gallon of boiled pintos (or whatever we have frozen), put it in the bottom of a roasting pan, then, nopalitos, onion, I used a pint of chilpotles in adobo and roasted sweet peppers, then covered it with raw chicken legs. When the legs are done, take them out and if you don’t have roasted peppers, put ripe raw ones skin side up over the beans and roast till they’re getting black. Bone the chicken and add it to the beans. We do it just a little different with deer meat and beef, slower cooking, up to 4 hours, and the peppers all go on the meat. That tastes like sweet baked beans but has no sugar.
I wrote to Native Seeds late last winter about neomexicana hops, but they can’t find a local source, yet. But, the passionfruit will like that end of the arbor. JL Hudson is looking to stock neomexicana because people want that, if only to have it growing in their area, again.
Yeah, I haven’t seen wild geraniums here, just the mallow plants. But, mallows have their uses. I weed with a shovel, cutting them off below the soil line. That leaves the root intact, but kills it. The root is fertilizer, and the tops good for mulch.
And, a lady from east Tucson told me, expect the price of fresh tomatoes to triple. I said I raise my own fresh ones, and do not eat those from the store. Canned, yes. So, I’ll stock up because the punta banda did not like the cold and kicked the bucket. The Porters are coming up, after being planted a month ago. And, worse, one of my brothers lives in Ohio. He said no one planted anything, no corn, beans, nothing because of all the rain. Small farmers are, they can broadcast oats and barley, but not the mega farms and those are the one who supply the feed lots. The Amish are going to make a killing with their corn this year, again. Feed lots are begging ranchers down this way to plant corn and soy.
I’m just getting the amaranth out. Started today, with seedlings.
Ouch. All that’s missing is your body cast. Here’s what I did when I had a long string of bad luck. I was told, you can bind it and throw it back on whoever is throwing it on you. I did, maybe took ten days, but it was gone. And, my stepdaughter said her mother was in the hospital for a triple bypass. Ya, she always claimed to be a nazi witch.
And now my stepson, who she talked into letting her sponge off him, is in prison. I keep getting this idea in my head of her happy, smiling, stoned (she does love her pain killers), and dressed in one of those goofy gowns they make people wear in the bughouse. The boy was a major sore point between us, and how badly she was to her daughters. I’m Pop, her they call by her first name, but we weren’t married, just together. She refused once to go to Mexico with me because my ex there, a Tarahumara, wanted to see if she could fly. Those Tarahumara, haha. But, they always wanted to have the kids come live with them, to teach and to learn. My ex has family in Redtown, San Antone and they all knew about him. All 3 kids have PTSDs from growing up as they did. My boy is a weapons expert who studied with the NGs and Reservists in our area from the time he was 9 or 10. When he went into the Army, an uncle in AI started to train him. He has a fixation problem. Anything he does, he has to the very best he can be.
If you want to see well-prepared preppers, look at them. Most still live in the old way and have little or nothing to do with the government. Guns are illegal, more or less, but a lot of them are very well-armed today. Yet, they can take a piece of manzanita wood and some ponderosa pine and have a very good bow and arrows in no time.
Yeah, my sergeants were real good. It was that durn boot trying to pass the No Entrance sign that helped kick-start many a brain. I had little trouble with them thanks to being raised by an old Army sergeant…Several, in fact. All my uncles were in WWII. A couple went on to Korea, and one to Vietnam. We have a lot to remember each Memorial Day. Give your boy my best. My prayers are for you. niio
I know about binding… Need to do it.
I suspect a stepson and his wife, a self proclaimed witch. He and his step sons were cooking drugs, reselling his medical marijuana and stealing my things and things my mother left. I ended up doing a 30 day no fault eviction on them all. They left with all my tools, antiques back to my great great grandparents. They turned 3 beautiful acres into a mess that looked like a county landfill. I’ve worked hard, friends helped and I spent thousands of dollars hauling off trash. They were so lazy they’d filled my mothers camp trailer with trash bags until they couldn’t close the door any longer then they started making a mountain of black trash bags in the shop building. My lifelong bookcollection is mostly gone. The only family he has left is a sister and my two younger kids are half brother and sister to him. I’d let him live here several years and all he was supposed to give me was the money to cover the taxes. He didn’t even do that. Enough said but Its doubtful we’ll ever be close again.
Most folks here lost tender spring plantings. I have a dozen tomato plants just because I was at the hospital a lot in early April. Then we kept having more freezing nights. I’m going to try putting some of them out Monday. I have a couple of jalapeno plants in bloom and several nice bell peppers. I lost the rest. I still have plenty of seed to replant shorter season plants. Most of my friends lost their entire gardens. I’d planned to try selling at the local farmers market. Guess that won’t happen this year. Might sell some rabbits and crafts if I bother this year. I need to buy some more canning jar lids. I’ll can or dry any extra this year.
One of my young hens proudly walked through my yard yesterday with 6 cute week old chicks. I have 20 young hens that are just old enough to start laying. They were fall chicks. I’m pretty sure there are half a dozen young Roosters just right for fried chicken. I haven’t started breading the rabbits yet this spring. I should cull a few older females and let them give me some young ones for fryers and new young stock.
I’m wanting to get new chicken and Duck houses put up. I have most of the needed wire. I also have several solar motion lights. I mount the solar panel outside and the lights inside. Its nice to walk in, wave my hand and light appears.
So many areas are not having good garden seasons. Wonder how that’s going to play out.
Well church is a two hundred mile round trip. Need to be up early to hit the road.
Yeah, chickens…If you like the broad breast, dark cornish are for sale all over, again, and great on range. But, they were used as a fighting rooster and tend to be a little aggressive. Someone said, they’ll case off coyotes, lions, and then beat an elephant to death, then eat it. Pappy, one grandfather, had a pet Rhode Island red rooster for a pet. It never bothered my uncles, but went after skirts, clawing the girls. He told them to carry a stick and the rooster avoided them so long as they had the stick. One day he came home from work and Nana had his favorite, chicken and dumplings for supper. She told him it was his pet. He got angry, but she showed him bloody bruises on her calves from the rooster. He agreed, because Nana was more important than a chicken. She then put the club in the wood box.
Your stepson sounds like the stepkids’ mother. Her kids are clean crazy. Not fanatical, but too messy and they start to clean. Their grandmother was from Saxony, GR, and said a good broom made a good worker out her daughter. My stepson has PTSD, and when it starts, he fights it by cleaning. You can get used to the vacuum running at 3 AM. I lost everything from parents and grandparents, from antiques (but usable) and so on when the kid took up the needle. His mother’s reaction was, that’s kids. After a sergeant told her if the boy ODed, no more disability. Before he got his disability, she used to say if she had it that bad, she would take a gun in the woods, find a nice place to lay down and end it. But, God repays. The kid is in jail, so she doesn’t have a free ride on his back anymore.
I think I have one Chimoyo seedling chili left. It got too hot for them. The other three are trying to bloom, but it’s getting hot now. I did get ripe chilis from them when it was still going down in the 40s. Had to send for more Porter tomatoes, but no Punta Banda. Maybe next year. This one is too cold for the Punta–in south Central AZ 🙂
In PA, my sister is complaining the Mennonite store raised the price of lids all the up to 2 bucks a dozen. If I could, I’d go back to that swamp and buy a case. As it is, I have a lot of bail jars and juice jugs (some of the kids’ mother’s old vodka bottles 🙂
With all the corn fields not being planted, not even to cover crops, anything depending on corn is going to skyrocket. Meat, milk, and so on. We’re picking up canned tomatoes and -juice a few at a time from Dollar Gen., but the price there is already climbing. Mexico and other areas are losing their tomatoes to the cold.
200 mile round trip? Wow. How are you on starting a prayer group? Not saying to give up that trip, but having more ‘family’ in the area would be a godsend. When you see someone, you offer a pray or just God bless, and a hug. You’re a grandmother, it’s expected 🙂 Invite folks over for coffee and end it in a pray, thanking God for good friends. Many a church and synagogue started with less. Just a thought while trying to be nosy 🙂
Very good list. I have all but the Moringa, but I am in a waiting list in a seed company for when they have them available. I have other tender trees that I bring inside in the winter, so I want to add that one also. The leaves can be eaten as a salad.
Hi Red. Had to laugh. I’ve been talking about Bible studies here. That was how we started the church here in 1977. Home, to someone’s building, a 30×30 tent then in 1991 build the church here. It’s in dire need of shingles and ceiling repair. Built 2×6 framed. 3 classrooms, 10×20 office, kitchen and dinning room, 40×41 sanctuary and a 16×16 offset entry area with bathrooms. I’d love to get it repaired.
I have a now and then Bible study at a neighbors home. My home isn’t finished yet. Walls are painted and wood flooring in living room but lots more to do.
My 45 day tomatoes passed down from grandma are about ready to transplant. I lost many but there were seeds that came up slow and 6 are beautiful now. I found old seed for tiny yellow pear tomatoes. Going to start them tonight. Hope some will make it.
I have a few bell peppers and jalapenos starting to bloom and needing to be transplanted. Most of garden is lost but I’ll plant faster things and have some food by late July. Nothing in volumn like I’d planned to have for selling at a farmers market. I’ll eat and can most of this garden.
I hate seeing news right now. Watching the Midwest storms and destruction was like watching California burn in recent years. I mostly grew up in California. We helped build 9 churches in the states with tornadoes and flooding and know many people in those states.
He’s hoping preppers have gardens that are doing well. Foods may get tough by next year.
Sunday I pastor 100 miles from here. Then every other week we meet with a Bible study group 12 miles from the church. That group is planning to build us an 8×8 porch with steps and a ramp off one side. I have sturdy steps from a deck we tore down last Fall. One of the guys is salvaging a 3 year old 2×6 built ramp. I’ll haul it on my 16ft flatbed trailer. I have cement base blocks and 4×4. Group will work on getting the rest of what we need. That’s a blessing. I haven’t been able to move in heavy things orca refrigerator. I’m doing ok without but it will be nice to have a refrigerator again and my better washing machine.
Husband likes cold drinks so heading out to get ice and a bell pepper to cook with deer sausage, potatoes and onions.
Walk blessed
Good! I was worried you had no ‘family’ close by. For the southwest, 12 miles is around the block, so to say. This is why I prefer to live close to us indigente folks, full-bloods and metis/mestizos. The older you get, the more precious you are. Um, about like little kids, the locitos (senile folks 🙂 and other crazies. There’s a young woman, white, who walks around town shouting and cussing. Some granny will come out on her porch and say, Ah, you poor thing. don’t worry. you’re a woman and you’re strong. This, too, will pass, chica. That calms her down. She has ‘sister’ who care. Another one is a skinny young woman who is a peeping tom. The old women say, Ah, well, she does this so she knows who is here. She lives in terror, that little one. Both women suffered violent rape at one time. Both are frightened of men, but only the first one ‘might’ grow violent. The other one runs away. People like this are special needs, not sloughed off to a home some place like in liberal states.
Yeah, more of the Punta Banda tomatoes are up, now that the temps are to their liking, upper 90s every day. Cold, they do not tolerate well, so if they can’t handle a few frosts like Porter does, no more of them. No chiltepin or Chimoyo seeds survived the cold snap. That’s odd for both because they do well when they self-sow. A strange year, but not unexpected. The 3 chimoyo that survived winter (2 in the house, one outside) produced a nice mess of peppers, but it’s too hot for them now. Pollen gets blasted. I finally got the garbanzos and corianders picked. Both are in a bucket waiting to be cleaned, then stored till January. Got the last of the biet alpha cucs out, and the kanjari honeydew look good. So do the Ancient watermelons, the pumpkins and so on. the white turnips are about done blooming, at last, and the collards can go to seed.
Planting is done indegente style, something comes out, something else goes in, and then more as that ripens. Mulch covers a multitude of sins and feeds the soil, as well as insulating it. Next month, 4 Spanish Dagger tops go to neighbors, and that should come back fast for next year. The peanuts are sprouting fast, and I put in more Apache Red sorghum for grain and syrup, as well as to break up hard soil deeper in the ground.
Yeah, I have fam up in Ohio. No one is planting this year. Anything that depends on corn is going to shoot up, gasahol, feed lots, eggs, milk, cheese. Mexico is having trouble, too, so expect problems from there. Hope NM chilis are doing well. We go through a bushel, roasted, every few months. I pray we weather this well. And, it shocked me none of the welfare farmers are bothering to air-seed cover crops. Just stand there like good slaves to Jimmy Carter watching their top soil wash away. In Arkansas, folks are telling me they can’t get the rice in, either. Asian rice is tender. Too much water is worse than too little.
I have to call the DAV about a ride down for this surgery. I hate to be a pest, but try to give some money every week or so.
You take care. Walk in beauty.
Average precipitation here is 12″ per year. Natives have been hunter, gatherer, farmers for many centuries here far predating the Spanish arrival 500 years ago.
This was the wettest and coolest May on record for many decades. It’s supposed to rain for two more days but I don’t see anymore predicted freezing temperatures. It’s going to be in the 40s tonight. I’ll work on preparing a group of swales and berms for the fruit. The strawberry bed will have plenty of composted material. That helps with moisture retention.
I plant as I learn from native elders where ever I live. They know the climate of a place best.
There are ancient gardens set on a flat bed of rock. You can see the equal rectangles outlined by “petrified dirt.” Sort of prehistoric raised beds with sheltering walls around each early season garden. The rock helped hold in heat and moisture. That made short growing seasons just a bit longer. Those ancient gardens are near a natural spring that isn’t much more than a seap but it put water close enough to carry to the tiny garden plots. It’s interesting seeing desert survival history and how little has changed.
Being honored as an elder in a community certainly has its blessings. Young adult Hispanic men stop to lend a hand. I knew their grandfathers when they were teens when I fist moved here 42 years ago. Native youth also greet me in public with genuine happiness and warm hugs. I often don’t recognise babies and little kids now grown but they know me. I like that. In Anglo communities unless I was a close personal friend I’m just another old lady. Nothing special. In the Native communities a grandparent may have been my friend but I’m family still to kids who don’t really know me yet do know me. Its very different.
Even with the differences between church families and traditionals I’m old enough to be cared for. It is special. I learned foods, gardening tips and medicines from my elders. They in turn cared about us. An ancient medicine woman here gave our daughter a tribal name. Not many outsiders were honored that way. When that daughter was born at home it wasn’t half an hour later and there were 30 native women standing in my bedroom greeting that baby girl and amazed because in their experience few women outside of their local reservations had home births. I’ve always loved the family sense of love and acceptance. It made returning to my land in a real sense a home coming. I go to McDonald’s near here and I’m greeted with hugs from young adults who’s parents were my students in the church school.
I’d like to reestablish the church here. Many who used to attend were driving in from anywhere between 11 and 45 miles on rough dirt roads. Here on the desert that isn’t far. When my children were little we pastored the group here where we lived. We had service on Sunday morning and Wednesday evening Bible study and 45 miles away we had Sunday night service and Thursday night Bible study.
Now I pastor 100 miles away with service every Sunday AM. Then every other week we meet with a Bible study group 94 miles away on Sunday afternoon.. Then, now and then, we meet at a neighbors home here for dinner and Bible study with 30÷ in that group. Many in this newest group knew me but none were in church when I left 14 years ago.
Life is an interesting journey.
Glad to be back in a place where I’m loved. So much of the world has little care for the elders or infirm in anyway. They even look out for my husband who is a stranger here but his dimentia is pretty obvioue.
A few months ago I had a flat tire. We were in a hurry to get to a Dr appointment an hour away. I set out the tire iron and spare tire and decided to finish up later. When I came home it was changed. And the tool was laying on the spare by the car. It has to be a neighbor. No note.
Most of my neighbors here are silent peppers. Not much is said. Just a remark dropped here and there to make sure I’m laying back food and have a way to get water. They are interested in solar but no one has tried it. They all ask questions. I tell them about my light in the rabbit room. A small Solar panel outside ANF the motion sensor light inside. Walk in, close door, wave hand and light comes on. Very simple and inexpensive.
I have solar panels, 50 amp hr batteries and inverters toward lights and power for two of my three sheds. One will be woodshop. Another will be sewing and crafts. Third will be a shop and place to hold my art classes. I’ll add more batteries in series as I’m able.
You walk in beauty. What can be done for the dementia? For you and hubby.
When a kid, I worked with a rancher to help rebuild old stone walls the ancestors put in to slow the runoff more than a thousand years ago. Behind them, after the first rains came, grass and brush sprouted in barren earth. The seeds were there, waiting for God knows how long for someone to fix the walls. One wall had to have been abandoned after the Apaches moved in, just before the Spanish arrived.
Ya, I took a neighbor’s trailer to the trash transfer yesterday. son of a gun, if he didn’t find a solar battery charger. It works, too. I confiscated plywood and some 2-x-6s that were in good shape. When I heal, sometime in July, we’re supposed to take his bog trailer to Tucson to get shredded brush from tree trimmers. It’s free for the hauling, and is good insulation for the garden. With all the wood buried in the garden beds, they’re holding moisture fine tho it hasn’t rained since 16 May. The only plants that get watered are the fruit trees, and seedlings set out. And now a volunteer sweet potato came up in the herbal bed. I had some in there last year, and thought I got them all. Strange that it didn’t freeze last winter. But, one came up in the garden that survived winter.
It looked like rain, yesterday, the clouds coming over the mountains to the east, but not a drop. The mountain tops got wet, but nothing more. Still, that helps with the water table. Yo, I remember a trick truck patch grows use for cool weather. Plastic over mulch. Plants were set in thru the plastic, then, where it got warm, more mulch over the plastic.
I get impatient because it’s hard to do anything now. I have some concrete to make the compost pit/gray water filter, the pit is there and filling slowly with dirt because I can’t work. 12 June, I have to be at the VA for surgery. Then, have to have a ride home, but they have one for me. I’m more worried about the dog being alone for 12 hours than the surgery. He’s tough, but is a rescue dog. I’ll leave the back door open and the neighbors will come visit him with their dogs, but he never eats or drinks if I’m gone to long. If Jose or Magdalena bring their dogs, he’ll be fine. Magdalena and Greg have a female Ger. shepherd my dachshund is in love with, and her, him. so, Bubba’s beloved owner is something on the back burner.
Ya, and when I’m better, solar hot water heater on the roof, tie it in with the gas water heater. Were there a few acres with this place, nothing would be wasted. (Sorry, Rush Limbaugh, but yes you can recycle used toilet paper. Methane!. 🙂 A trip to an abandoned mine for red sandstone for the retainer wall/terrace. Water tanks in-ground, and…and.. a lot of fun doing it till I drop.
Peace to you. I start each day with a prayer asking to have the spirit of a good and faithful servant. I thank God I walk in beauty because He is beauty. You walk in beauty, niio
Lol. Volunteer potatoes. Mine must be a red potato. I grew some in that bed two years ago.
I’m still studying out what may help my husbands dementia. I have changed the time of day he takes meds from am to bedtime. Now he awakes more in reality and fewer hallucinations till evening. It was the other way around and harder to keep him safe. He wonders off easily. Now he’s mentally with new more of the day.
I have used black plastic to warm cold spring ground and hold in moisture. We’ve been too wet this year along with very late frosts. Not a normal year at all. I don’t know how much moisture already but a normal years is just about 12 inches total between summer monsoons and winter snows.
I bought a short handled shovel. Its easier for me to dig with. My fruit trees and berries arrived yesterday. I already had grapes here waiting to be planted. I’m hoping it won’t rain for a few days so we can get some planting done.
I plan to use my electric chainsaw to cut up the aged wood pile. Its easier to start with this somewhat weak right arm. Its healing but frustratingly slow regaining strength and control. I’ll use the chipper on the little stuff. My husband may still be able to help with that. He wants so much to help but he’s weaker and tires quickly.
I lost a lot of plants but I’m amazed at how many different things one or a few have survived. It will make an ok garden. Nothing spectacular but ok. It should give me plenty to do some canning and maybe drying as well. My 2 jalapenos are blooming. I see tiny flower buds forming on some early 45 day tomatoes handed down from my grandma. They are 4-6 oz sized tomatoes and very flavorful. I have plenty of sweet basil and lemon balm. Shallots, green onions and garlic are doing fine. Some of the lavender, cucumbers, yellow squash, zuchinni, and marigolds still look good. There are bell peppers almost ready to bloom. A few gray Hubbard’s have survived but the rest of the winter squash and pumpkins are gone. Most melons are gone. I have plenty of seed for quick growing things. I may try a Crenshaw Mellon if I can plant very soon. The berrys are a better bet for fruit this year.
I bought rosemary to start again. Most years I cover it and baby it through the winter. I lost mine this spring.
I’m praying for your surgery and for your dog. With a visit from a friend your dog should be ok. I ask for steady hands and protection. The same things I asked for my emergency galblader surgery when I faced it alone. It was scheduled for 2:30 pm but no one was there yet when it had to be hours sooner. It felt peacefull after prayer. It was still touch and go but the surgeon handled it well and it healed quickly.
Yes I believe we walk in beauty. It’s a way of life as much as anything. To walk in blessings is a choice.
Yeah, I planted some blue potatoes, once. Had perennial potatoes after that, till a brother dug them under. Good keepers, but were bread for sugar, I guess, for candy. Best thing, potato bugs pretty much avoided them and those purple leaves. In the fields, feeder pigs were used to find any missed, and got fat on them. Then, they would be sold because it leaves a faint, soapy taste.
I do not have a spirit of fear, but a sound mind. The stepkids’ grandfather used to tell me that when I visited him. He had some kind of a siesure during a surgery and lost a lot. He always loved a good joke, and now would say outrageous things to the nurses and his wife. They would just sigh, the poor man. But when no one was looking, he would wink at me. He was one of my trainers when studying under a sacred person. In his day, he studied to be a Methodist, Latin, Koinonia Greek, ancient Hebrew and
Aramaic. A lot of this had to do with his oldest son studying World Destroyer and following that. He used it as an excuse to not use the sacred pipe.
I tried a tent of clear plastic last fall. The Flaminco tomatoes dried, and the sun burned the tops off the Porters. While I had tomatoes going till Christmas one year in Penna., the sun is too intense here. But! A dozen Porter tomatoes are up, so I’ll have plenty for canning.
You got a short-handled shovel? When can I expect you to come dig the hole for the goji bush? 🙂 With this soil, dynamite works. The pick is getting worn, and the shovel, too. The bush is due on the 7th, BTW, and a Bradly pear. Till then, I’m getting the hole ready, and will throw in a quarter cup of sulfur, then fill it with water. That should eat away some of the caliche.
According to exorcists, you close your eyes, see the pain, grab it, and throw it out the window with a command to never return. Bind it away from you. Do this when it bothers you. It sounds silly, but when the arthritis is flaring you, I do that, and most times the pain leaves. If nothing else, it sets into your mind to refuse the problem and hastens healing.
Ah, funny one. You know how powerful a sacred person is. When Maria and I married, she had to go back to Mexico, so we went. As she is injun, she could go over the border no trouble. Just show her ID. Her grandfather, though, got on the pow wow grape vine, and had my bio, facts, figures, and rumors. He knew Mom’s longhouse and called me a witch boy and a few other things that can get a body dead in Indian Country. After Maria told him she made her choice, he ran me out. Later, he helped me take training south of their country. I had to spend the night in a Mouth of Hell. 🙂 Not a good experience, but with plenty of tobacco, the children of xotliotl usually leave you alone (yes, a lot of women have to take that test). I fell asleep and had a weird dream xotliotl was stlking me, but I would blow tobacco smoke at him and he’d catch fire. That happened over and over. When I woke up, all the cigars I rolled were stubs. Something else that scared Hell out of me 🙂 And, Maria told me a while later he did it because he wanted me to die there. Had I been a witch, xotliotl would have had the right to take me to the under-world for eternal torture.
there’s lemon balm growing in the shade, but so far, no go with basil. It bloomed great last year, but I guess the ants got all the seeds.
I have cousins who are psychologists, one now retired. One thing psychiatrists and psychologists today recommend is go to a house of worship, church or a synagogue is best. Even if anti-Christian, go, sit in the back. No one has to take part in the services, so take a nap. It’s one hour of complete peace out of a whole week of troubles. When I could get the stepson to go, he would fall asleep and we had to wake him up, even during Bible study. And, no PTSDs for several days after.
Thank you for your prayers. I take the love to heart. May the road be smoothed for you as you follow ancient paths. niio
I can definatly tell the weather is changing. Just a week or two ago and we were getting a night or two at freezing. Last night I was sitting in the cross draft between west and east side windows and I got cold. Sun will soon be up so its the coldest part of the night. Its 49 degrees. Lol
So blessed the neighbor got the tractor running. He used the backhoe to break up the soil for a strawberry bed after digging the holes for the trees. Yesterday I ran errands, picked up husbands perscriptions then planted 6 more fruit trees. By the time I watered the trees in and pulled 150 ft of hose I could barely walk back to the house. This periferal neuropathy and Fibromialgia added to being past 70 makes for too little stamina and too much pain. Actually those are improving but the torn hamstring is a real pain. It’s also improving but very slowly. I’m wanting to ignore it all and turn back the bodies ability to last years abilities.
This younger batch of kittens has been both entertaining and destructive. I have homes for most lined up and they will soon be gone. They dig in everything. Chew everything almost as bad as puppies. But they care playful and fun to watch. Husband is quite enjoying them. That’s funny. He’s always disliked cats. The kittens love him. When they’re tired they crawl up and go to sleep all around him.
Funeral today for long time acquaintance. He’s 6 months younger than I am. White guy married native. Funerals are good in that families get together but sadly remind us all how fragile this life is.
My family was a strange mixture. About all I missed from the modern gene pool was Africa, and the Orient. I’ve lived on or next to reservations for the last 45 years. I feel more at home there than anywhere. Funny how that works. Ancestors died to stay off reservations and my generations seeks the community that survived on reservations.
My wild sage is almost 9 inches tall now. A grand daughter is wanting some for smudging. I prefer to wait till its at least 12 inches tall. We’ll see. I hunted where the Mullen grows. I found one plant. Not too tall but about ready to bloom. It’s always been an early spring plant and a tall bloomer. This speaks to a rush to reproduce. Makes me wonder what surprises winter holds for us?
Well time to leave. You are remembered for tomorrow Red.
Everyone else have a wonderful day. I hope you are all learning the wild plants of your area. The herbal medicines have always been with us. It seems its mostly a few grandmothers of a place or the native medicine society that seemed to know them and how to use them. Everyone seems to have known a few favorite wild foods. It will take more than a few to sustain life.
I could give a thousands ways it does work, but, government induced socialism is there strictly to help government, not the people.
A family is a commune. A village which supports people is, as well. Socialism as introduced in the Bible and common in Native America are acts of love. No one is forced to do anything. The individual must stand out, away from the crowd for this to work. Private property rights must be strictly enforced for the good of all. Individual rights are more important than the community. All individuals must live for the welfare of all other individuals in the community.
You’ll never see the latter in Euro socialism. But, as stated in post before, Columbus thought he found the lost ten tribes of Israel much because of how we lived. It was and is an act based on love. The reason I wrote this is because people like Marx will take this love and pervert it to gain power. You see that every day from liberals. niio