Have you ever thought about what gives your life a sense of purpose? Lately that question has been rattling around in my head and I think I may have come up with an answer. At least it's an answer that suits the time and place that I find myself in right now....semi-retired, living out our dream in a new state, and post "raising children". Forgive me if I ramble today as I try to describe how much I am enjoying our new homestead lifestyle.
A few people have asked me why we choose to move to Tennessee.....some of those folks assume that living in Florida means you are constantly on vacation with no cares or worries and spend your days lying on the beach sipping a pina colada. The truth is, no matter what place you call home, you still have the daily work of paying bills, cleaning house, fulfilling social obligations with family and friends and sometimes have the added stressors of ill health of yourself or aging parents.
The last few years that we lived in Florida I felt like I was marking time......filling my days just for the sake of filling them with no real sense of purpose. Especially as I look back on them now in retrospect. After spending the majority of my life raising a family and then caring for my ailing mother-in-law, I found myself at loose ends when those responsibilities ended, even though I have an inordinate number of hobbies and interests to keep me occupied. (You know that's right! the number of hobbies, I mean)
Now that we live here on the farm, I know this is where I belong. I miss my kids, their spouses and the grandkids a lot.....and I hope we work things out so we can visit each other several times a year both in Florida and here in Tennessee. But if I selfishly just think about myself with no external forces tugging at my conscience.....this is where I long to be. It's hard to describe how grateful I feel that we've been given the opportunity to be stewards of this chunk of land for a few years. God doesn't promise us tomorrow, so, I wake up each and every morning and thank Him for giving me another day to enjoy the sights and sounds and work here on the farm.
I've had an interest in gardening for decades and have played with it since I was a young mother with a small back yard garden plot. Because of some health issues and allergies that developed over recent years, I've become much more concerned about where my food comes from, what pesticides and chemicals are used to grow it, and how nutritious is it for us to consume? And that, of course, led me to have an even stronger desire to grow as much of our own food as possible so we can control how safe and nutritious it is.
To that end, we now have chickens which free range and eat what they were intended to eat while basking in the sun and living the life they were meant to live instead of being held in tiny cages and living in horrible conditions which then lead to disease. No wonder animals that are mass produced need antibiotics. Our chickens should provide us with plenty of eggs rich in the vitamins missing from birds raised in confinement. And they will also provide us with meat.
The hogs we're raising get fed quite well and get lots of fresh air and water. No antibiotics or hormones to force them to grow at an alarming rate. We'll just wait for them to fill in on their own so their meat will be healthy for us to consume. And if we're really lucky, we hope to have a milk cow some day to provide us with milk.
Crossville has a Farmer's Market every Thursday afternoon and I've been purchasing raw milk from a farmer there. Each Friday I skim the heavy cream from the top of the icy cold bottles in my refrigerator and in half an hour I have turned it into fresh butter and buttermilk, enough to supply us for the next week.
So why tell you all of this? It's to explain that in growing our own veggies, raising our own hogs and chickens and buying raw milk I get a deep sense of satisfaction. Yes, it's that sense of purpose I was talking about earlier. There is just something magical about putting seeds in the ground, watering them and watching them grow into huge plants that then give you enormous amounts of produce in return. Then taking that produce into the kitchen and blanching, freezing or canning it so we can enjoy it all year long. And knowing that when we take pork or chicken out of our freezer deep in the winter months, we will be eating something that has all the benefits of farm raised meat that was lovingly tended, humanely slaughtered and carefully portioned and frozen to supply us with sustenance for many months to come.
I sometimes spend long days in the kitchen, especially now that the gardens are producing so much. But the sense of accomplishment I get from "putting up" food is so satisfying. I love pulling butter out of the refrigerator that I made the day before. And my guys are crazy about homemade pancakes on a Saturday morning made with the buttermilk I coaxed from the heavy cream. And don't get me started about using that cream to make homemade ice cream. Sure it would be so much faster to buy ice cream at the store, but it's just not the same, trust me.
My body may give out on me sooner than I'd like it to, forcing me to cut back on the gardening and farm chores. But as long as I am able I hope to continue this new lifestyle. Our lives now run at a much slower pace and are tuned to the rhythms of the seasons. So, please forgive me if my heart fills up with a sense of pride when I view the rows of jewel colored canning jars on a shelf filled with summer's bounty.
Growing and preserving our harvest is a most satisfying endeavor for me. In fact, it spurs me on to learn how to do more things here on the farm that make us even more self-sufficient. I've had a couple of friends tell me I have an "old soul"......because I enjoy doing things with my hands and truly appreciate how industrious our grandparents and great-grandparents were at creating something from nothing. The best I can do is to emulate them and pass along any knowledge I gain to the next generation.
This life Joel and I have choosen to live is most certainly not for everyone. Many folks get deep satisfaction from their jobs and bringing home a paycheck. Others, from volunteering. And others from working with their hands. Whatever gives you that sense of purpose is worth pursuing. So, why not go for it? We are so glad we did!
Should've done this decades ago,
Debbie
