Writing this Blog is like having a conversation with myself. I only hear my thoughts. I can only go as far with a topic as the facts I have assembled, from research, from personal experience or both.

I asked the following question on our Facebook page recently: “Do you have a favorite Small Farm magazine? What is your source of inspiration?” I expected the answer to include a list of paper publications. Here is the response I received: “I like the Hobby Farms and those mags, but I find more inspiration here on FB from homesteading, canning sites etc and their blogs!”

In a very real way, what happens with a Blog is that the conversation we might have had around the table at a community dinner takes place instead at a virtual table that reaches beyond county lines. Each comment opens a new landscape. When I read, “I used to travel the country quite a bit, took road trips whenever I could; we enjoyed roadside parks for picnics… Still, I think the backyard is good… Dear grandson and I had watermelon on the porch this afternoon!” a comment by Curtiss Ann Matlock in response to A Movable & Portable Feast, it is as though a voice calls me back from my thoughts to ask me to sit still.

A Movable & Portable Feast explored the evolution of our picnic and outdoor living apparel. There are three basic views about tools and appliances and the things with which we surround ourselves to accomplish various tasks or take part in leisure activities. One view rejects all “stuff” in favor of older ways. The second view embraces new technologies and rejects the old. The third view sees potential in all ways.

The modern, portable grill simplifies a process, it does not prevent connection between people. The modern lawn mower simplifies a task, it does not prevent connection between people. One simple phrase shared on the spur of the moment by a kind reader sums up the place and time where everything comes to rest and whence it can begin anew: “Dear grandson and I had watermelon on the porch this afternoon!”

Yes, we go out of our ways to go to picnics and classrooms or research a topic, but it is in the moment when we stop that we have truly arrived anywhere. It is in the moment when we sit face to face and share real, spur-of-the-moment impressions and knowledge that we are contributing something. We are each other’s greatest classroom.

Even as we choose simplicity, we must choose the things, lawn care equipment, cookware and tools that make the most sense for our new vision of the world. Our talents and inspiration instruct this choice. Thus we continue to collect things, but do so more consciously. We surround ourselves with the things that make the most sense in terms of value, durability, and impact. Some adopt canning as a means of providing food for their families, others grow fresh produce in boxes on city balconies.

The observations readers leave on this and other Blogs are a reminder that it is real people who are the greatest experts. The gardener is a master gardener only in the practice of gardening. The cook is a master cook only in the practice of cooking. “Living it,” it seems, opens the mind in ways that science and study alone cannot duplicate.

Here are some recent observations by readers. In a few lines, they share experience and knowledge that matter. Their voices, in that instant, speaks volumes because it speaks from inspiration. It sums up the topic at hand by adding personal experience to the conversation. In the face of such comments, I sometimes think, “I should include this information in a part-2 article,” but almost immediately realize there is nothing I could possibly add. This person says it perfectly. After all, a diverse landscape is only possible because of a diversity in perspectives.

The Kale Chronicles, in response to Don’t Step on the Flowers, a recent article about lawns and grass. – “In the hierarchy of things, lawns are better than concrete, precisely because they allow the earth to absorb water. Many places, however, are not suitable for lawns by virtue of their lack of rainfall. If you live in a dry state, as I do, you should research native plants that can help with erosion and air-filtering, but you should probably not have a lawn. You are better off planting clover to enrich the soil, or vetch, and growing vegetables where the lawn used to be… the chemicals that people use to keep their lawns green and to kill invasive plants such as crabgrass and dandelions poison us all: humans, birds, bees, etc.”

The Kitchen’s Garden Project in response to Don’t Step on the Flowers. The author came to the United States from Australia. – “It has always amazed me though how MUCH manicured lawn Americans have… I need flowers, bees need flowers, butterflies need flowers but they mow all the wild flowers and do not have flower beds and instead have those huge expanses of perfect green and then sit inside in the air conditioning looking out at the lawn and saying you know I have not seen a bee in years!! Who killed off the monarchs! …I am a flower radical!!!”

It is so true that the American landscape has characteristics not found in other parts of the world. It is true, also, that we sometimes forget to think of consequences. I suspect there is some truth to this everywhere in the world.

Just a Smidgen, in response to The Kitchen as Life’s Workbench. – “I think this is why I blog about food. It is so integral to our lives. Just the other day, my son remarked that he loves that I am always in the kitchen cooking up some new dish to try:) Best compliment a mom could get! We bought both kids desks for their rooms.. but that was pointless, because the kitchen will always be the homework station and I’m glad now, that it is!! “

The Kale Chronicles, in response to The Kitchen as Life’s Workbench. – “While it is true that food preparation used to be more labor intensive (butter started with milking the cow), my Grandmother had seven children that she could send out to pump water, pick vegetables, shell peas or keep in the kitchen to peel fruit for canning. Many of us now cook alone, or perhaps with one helper.”

The Kitchen’s Garden Project on A Movable & Portable Feast. – “Oh we used to picnic all the time when we were kids. My mother was a great one for eating outside. We never had baskets or special bags tho dad made a big wooden box that was in the end so heavy it needed two of us to carry it and did not hold even half of what we took. It is about our own big family, and sleeping on the rug after lunch while the kids attempt to drown each other. I miss picnics. In my family they are called Pernick-nicks! I don’t know who started it but it has stuck down through generations… lovely memories.”

Values. I read this and other comments shared by readers and I think about values. They instruct our choices and it is when we share these values that we share the most important knowledge. Facts without values are like flowers without roots.  Whoever developed the concept of Blogging made a brilliant decision when he or she decided to include a comment section. Knowledge that is not shared is like a garden that never gets any sunlight.