Entry #24: Garden Pt.1

Life right now rules pretty fucking hard, aside from feeling like such an outsider and questioning my financial future. I'm just now trying to overcome the initial efforts of my first life goal: my feet are figurately getting wet. My major "goal" in life is to learn to feed and sustain myself, without the use of any fossil fuels and without any outside help. My first obstacle will be gardening, followed by finding a guide to teach me how to forage, and then possibly learning how to hunt (preferably without a gun) and then kill and dress an animal.

My parents have allowed me to use a plot of their land at our house in Medina that has around 3 acres. I've decided I want to grow perennials, and then possibly try and cultivate a small permaculture once I've gotten the hang of everything; I figure perennials would allow me to work a little less and experiment with more non-conventional fruits and vegetables.

Just in the last week I spent a few hours turning over soil:

I'm sure it could look better, and I'm unsure if I made any dire mistakes. For one, I had to use my shovel to loosen up the soil (instead of something more effective like a pitchfork), and for two I accidently dug near tree roots in a few areas (near the far left on all three rows, and near the far right on the closest row).
I'm going to wait two weeks before I plant anything, so I hopefully have sufficient time to find a seed supplier (probably online) and get something shipped. Ideally I would form nearby connections and get my seeds locally, but I'm taking a slight shortcut for the lack of time I have left before I have to plant. Possibly I may plant annuals in the closest row if I have problems attaining enough seeds or I don't have enough ideas come crunch time, if anything - arugula or eggplant. Right now I'm looking at planting a nice breeds of dandelion and boxthorn/goji.

Such a boring entry to anybody other than me, more than likely - but I'm so fucking happy that I'm moving on my first major goal. I worked my ass off for how inexperienced I am, and I have blisters on right hand.

I'm just slightly perturbed because gardening may again be something where I'm a fucking pariah and it's near impossible for me to get advice that's relevant to my intentions and ideals. It's already that way with medicine, organic food, sex, science, and various other topics - and it's horseshit. While at the Mustard Seed I asked a dude for advice on what to plant for fixing nitrogen into the soil, and whether or not runner-beans are perennials (or if there were any perennial seeds available in the store's selection). The produce dudes there were helpful as fuck, but they couldn't give me a proper answer and decided to call a guy who has a reputation for being a good gardener and works at another location. When I tried to explain myself I sounded incredibly amateurish (as I admittedly am on this topic), and said something along the lines of how I want a self sustaining garden. The guy laughed and said something to the extent of, "that's what all gardeners would want - but it'll never happen. Everybody has to treat their gardens with something." However, the guy's countenance on the phone was more patronizing or condescending than it was friendly and jocular. He was telling me how I'll need to get organic fertilizers and I'll need to add things to my soil like seakelp.

This shit pissed me off and confuses me. Agriculture has been around for a long time, and I'm guessing that centuries ago farmers weren't awaiting their overseas shipment of seakelp. I don't see why it's so radical or taboo for me to want nothing from an offsite source. Granted I don't have a farm, and I don't have animals producing manure - the garden itself is in a rural area, and I could get manure from local sources if I struck charismatic gold and befriended a helpful farmer. Honestly though, I'm going to try and mulch using recycled newspaper or cardboard boxes from my work - and I plan on starting a compost.

I don't see how reliance upon store bought products or offsite materials is the only option; the reason why I want to learn to feed myself is incase we reach peak oil or there's a massive food system collapse, in which case I don't think it's feasible for me to get in a car and use oil (that isn't there) to go buy a product that isn't made onsite (and is thereby shipped using oil) and probably wouldn't even be available.

Apparently Mother Nature uses a fuckload of oil, driving here and there and getting shit shipped to her to enrich her soil. Bull fucking shit. I eventually want to imitate nature, not rely upon shit that's not even geographically logical.

I feel too afraid to ask for any sort of advice, because I'm afraid everybody is either going to advocate synthetic fertilizers or they're all going to laugh at me, like fucking Carrie.

Aside from the garden, I just got a juicer and started juicing, and I started creating the framework for a fruit and veggie themed tabletop RPG.