I Was Thinking ...

in Rant, Complain, Talk6 days ago

Times are changing in every sense of the word and those who want to live well, not just survive, need to adapt to the new conditions. The rest, who think they are smart by not adapting or evolving, will be left behind. These are the people you hear saying "I could do this or that" but they never do any of it because they can't and don't want to either.

I was thinking.jpg

My dad likes to make his own walnut liquor and needs 40 young walnuts for the flavor. If you think of it, 40 walnuts is not a lot, but in this case I'll show you it is. He has two walnut trees, one young, and the other is around 50 years old. 40 walnuts you usually collect from one short branch, but he was not able to collect 10 from 2 trees this year. Lucky him, his neighbor went foraging and found some walnut trees at the side of the road and brought him what he needed. The funny thing is, even if you don't have walnuts, you still have to clean the yard from leaves and that's an everyday job for a month or a month and a half. It is definitely annoying, but needs to be done as you don't want to walk in ankle deep leaves.

20220504_112630a.JPG

The reason why he has no walnuts this year (no one has any in that region) is the cold wave we got when the trees were flowering and pollination should have happened. It didn't affect just the walnut, basically most of the fruit trees have the same faith this year.

This damage was caused by cold and excessive rain, but it's not the only damage we have to deal with. After the rain and cold, comes the heat and drought, which kills the plants that have survived.

20220504_112723a.JPG

Needless to say that obtaining a satisfactory harvest is almost impossible these days if you are gardening the traditional way and you need to invest in technology and equipment to be able to get the results you want.

Easy to say, and easy to do when you're gardening on your own, but in villages where gardening is passed on from generation to generation and there is more than one gardener, things get complicated.

20220504_112741a.JPG

I remember when I was a kid, my grandparents wanted to teach us, grand kids gardening and things. Not that we were interested, but they wanted to teach us anyway because they thought what they know is the only way and only they knew everything. Back then there was no internet, you could barely find any information or studies, so what they learnt decades ago was used for ages. After things changed, information was widely available, people started to learn new ways and techniques, but the elders saw this as a threat to their knowledge and chose to reject anything new, saying it's not going to work and the only way is their way.

20220817_121159a.JPG

My dad has not been any better. I've tried to convince him to change things based on what I've seen in TV and on the internet, but took me years till he was ready to listen. Today we do things differently and he's more open to change and he's searching for new ways himself, but so many are still stuck in the middle ages in this regard. His neighbor is younger than me, but he's the most stubborn and pigheaded person I've sen, so he's still refusing anything new.

My granddad passed away 30 years ago, but I was thinking what would he say if he would have the opportunity to come back for a week or so. Imagine him learning about hydrophonic gardening or that you can harvest hectares of tomato with combine harvester and one man in an hour and the combine harvester can also separate red tomatoes from the green ones. What would he say when learning that you can analyze the soil and choose seeds according to the soil, to have a better result. I knew him very well and know his first reaction would be to dismiss any new invention, any new development and say this is an insult to gardening.

20220817_121000a.JPG

It would be fine as he's never coming back unfortunately, but the problem is there are so many like him still living and rejecting change because they feel threatened or it's just easier to not change anything and blame everything that is new. It's a way to hide their ignorance if you like. I feel sorry for those who are forced to live with their parents, grandparents and have to do what they are told till the day the older generation is no longer capable to dictate.

20220817_122154a.JPG

Things are even worse in countries where kids are taught to listen and obey the elders blindly and they not only never obtain their freedom, but they do the same to their kids as some kind of revenge. These societies are never going to get anywhere ever. Brainwashing people for personal gain, to show supremacy is the worst. Every revolution required some blood spilling, but the end result worth it :)

If you're a newbie, you may want to check out these guides:


presearch

Sort:  

such interesting reflections here!! Sadly I do not know very many people who grew up gardening but, I do feel sad for people who aren't willing to adapt, who just dream about what they should do and never actually do it. I like how you applied your parents & grandparent's lessons to gardening and I do wish more people would be open to combining the information they learned from elders with modern techniques.

Those who are not willing to adapt and keep up with life, are going to suffer a lot. Stubbornness has a price.

Some call it tradition, others who have tried to take power here, in our country, want to go back a hundred years. They're using uninformed people; they're also being helped by the church, which is the most unrepentant keeper of "traditions"
Despite glorifying the past, they used the internet to promote themselves. The Internet, which means novelty, information, and evolution. I think they won't succeed.

Well, some churches are working on preserving tradition in a good sense of the word but so many are just manipulating the herd and serve different political interests, while the church should be impartial.

Some societies have some growing up to do.

Trying to take people back to stone age is not going to work.

Yeah, that's what I hope and believe.
Hi, @erikah, how are you? I have not been present here in the last couple of months due to medical reasons, and I see some upset, as well as those who give negative votes to comments.

I'm really sorry to hear that. Are you better now?

I'm ok, thanks for asking. I'm working and studying like crazy. Don't worry about the downvoted, dumb blurt people looking for attention.

things are changing a lot on last generations here, parents can't be arsed to pass any knowledge to their kids, they let them be, on the other hand kids are not interested in learn and listen (in general) so everything of the elders is going to disappear sooner or later, even stuff like dialects

It depends on the individual and parenting, but after a certain age every individual is responsible for their own life and actions.

My grandparents are the same—they believe their way is the only way because that’s how it’s always been. But like you said, times are changing. I feel like we, the younger ones, have to find a way to mix both: respect the past, but not be afraid to move forward

My grandparents are the same—they believe their way is the only way because that’s how it’s always been.

This is the most annoying thing and causes the most problems.

Sometimes it’s a matter of tradition, and that’s fine, but what’s not fine is forcing others not to look beyond. Of course, societies like that, and people like that don’t evolve, nor do they let others find their own paths, until change eventually comes by force... I imagine you know what I’m getting at.

As expensive as food keeps getting here in the United States, people are eventually going to have to learn gardening to grow their own food. When I was a teenager in high school, I remember hearing a broadcast on the Voice of America shortwave radio station about New Yorkers in Manhattan who grew their own vegetables and fruit provided that they had a large enough plot of land in their backyard.

When I was living in New York City, I had considered moving from Queens to Manhattan. If I had gotten a place that had a backyard, I probably would have liked to have done something like that to take my mind off of all the hustle and bustle of the big city. After I moved to Los Angeles, I remember this one family that had an orange tree in their front yard. I thought that that was cool. By the way, I gave your article a thumbs-up. 😃