One perfect strawberry. With an abundance of garlic chives in the background.
Where are you placing your focus?
This anecdote is a powerful incentive for those who could not care less about consequences of fossil fuel consumption.
Total electric bill this late spring/summer by month so far:
May 2011: $6.92 (PEPCO carrying charge); solar output exceeded usage
June 2011: $6.92 (PEPCO carrying charge); solar output exceeded usage
July 2011: $6.92 (PEPCO carrying charge); usage exceeded solar output, but by less than the extra output in May and June
Wow! How much was your monthly electric bill in the Southern and drought states? Do you know any one who would be persuaded only by the money? Tell them what a great investment it is, and they will start thinking seriously about it. Putting a dollar value on social good is the way to get through to those who only look at the numbers and do not see how budget numbers relate to real living beings and honoring the beauty of the web of creation (this would not be a veiled reference to something going on in that big domed building down the street; definitely, not).
It may not always work, but putting what you want in the language of those whose actions and beliefs are not in synch with yours is the beginning of communication and change. These cost savings say, in the language of those who care most about the money, that alternative energies are worth considering.
This morning I went to my community garden plot around the corner before I got ready to head into Georgetown to volunteer at The Lantern Bookshop.
I ws delghted to find enough snowpeas for a good-sized stir-fry and several zucchini almost ready to be picked (I only get zucchini at the very beginning of the season before the squash borers invade, but if I start early enough, I can get a few pounts of squash and a couple of meals worth of blossoms before I surrender and plant something else).
The tomatoes were flourishing (no sign of blight. If you have your own plants, keep an eye close for blight; it’s aleady been seen in Maryland. Cherry tomatoes are more resistant, so I’ve concentrated on those).
I should have the first cucumbers big enough to pick next week, and I have plenty of lettuce.
The radishes, though, had exploded. “Should I have a radish-themed dinner party?” I thought. “What am I going to do with all of them?” I am not especially fond of radishes. I plant them because they mature very early, they thrive on benign neglect, I have friends who like them, and they give the same crunch I’d prefer from a cucumber weeks earlier.
I’ve also discovered I like them cooked. Just as you can prepare turnips and their greens together, it also works well with radishes.
As I was walking home with a bunch of radishes that I could hardly get my hands around, I bumped into a neighbor. I don’t know her well, just recognize her face. “Do you want some radishes?” I asked, hoping I did not sound like I was begging. She hesitated, but then seemed to realize that she would be doing me a great service by accepting them. “You can cook the greens,” I said as I handed her a nice-sized bunch, “and also the radishes themselves if they are too strong.”
“I’ve never done that,” she said.
Here’s the recipe I gave her on the street (with a little more detail here):
Wash radishes and their greens well. Cut radishes into thick coins (this works best with oblong radishes sich as French Breakfast). Cut off the white part of stem nearest radish. Then cut the bunch horizontally so that you have half inch wide shreds. Mince some garlic, onion, and ginger. Stir-fry aromatics in peanut, safflower, or canola oil until translucent. Add the radish coins and stir until well-coated with oil. Add greens, stirring continuously until all the greens are wilted. Add some rice wine vinegegar and cook until absorbed and the grrens are just tender. Take off heat and sprinkle with soy sauce or Bragg’s Amino Liquid and toasted sesame oil to taste.
“What a nice morning,” my neighbor said, “fresh radishes from the garden and a recipe.
This bush was full of tufted titmice and sparrows. They were all simultaneously chirping with excitement.
I imagined some of them agitated and anxiously saying of the unseasonable warmth hat it was not normal and something needed to be done.
The rest of them were loud drunks on the spring warmth. “Life is short. Enjoy what has come.”
Perhaps there was one truly wise bird who was saying that both of those are true and that recognizing both truths was a door to harmony.
It is a gloriously cool and breezy morning of the type that is common for New England and very rare for DC, especially heading into Independence Day weekend. I had a longer and earlier walk than I usually do. I have an early morning meeting at the Internal Revenue Service.
As I walked down Constitution Avenue past the museums and federal buildings, I wondered how many of the hundreds of millions of people whose lives are impacted by the IRS ever think of it as a building with real, live human beings working inside of it.
It can be tremendously difficult to see a broader perspective when faced with things that cause us burden, obligation, or challenge. One of the key reasons to practice yoga, and in Anusara yoga to practice (it is indeed a practice we have to work on) opening to grace, is to recognize our humanity and the light in all things so that life feels more beautiful even when we are struggling.
