While in the vast majority of ways it could be said that the vast majority of the most recent Christmas/New Year period passed off peacefully in these quarters, there was the not-so-small matter of the senior bossman here having an unwanted meeting with – and kicking the ass of – Covid-19.
Having something like that loom on the horizon gives a body a lot of time to think. As if this corner needed any further invitation to engage in said practice. When talk of injury time and/or the final whistle crops up, things get put into perspective and you begin endlessly pondering what the future might hold. On a variety of different levels.
During the same period,a farming friend told me they’d had a batch of in-lamb ewes in cleaning up their grazing platform for the last while. That set the mind ruminating on a few different topics. Firstly, the glorious wooly creatures themselves.
Back in the day, my brother would’ve reared a bunch or two of lambs in partnership with a local butcher. There would be no interest in or intention of getting into ewes or lambing, but, store lambs are an avenue which there would be genuine interest in exploring. Convincing the more senior stakeholders may be a bit more difficult, but, if life has taught me anything, it’s to never say never. That said, even getting over as far as the yard seems about as faint a hope as that of the 45th US president winning a popularity contest.
Be that as it may, for a multiplicity of reasons – foremost among them maintaining some degree of stability around my mental health – any available opportunity to remain involved in farming of some sort will forever be snapped up in a heartbeat.If you’ve ever come upon my Twitter page, part of the bio should be instructive. Veg farmer whose heart will forever be in beef and tillage. That just about sums up current feelings perfectly folks.
Having said that, I did enjoy growing the veg last year. It was yet another avenue which Susie’s presence in my life. Indeed, such was the kick derived from giving it all a go – including the renovation of the shed and all of that which has spawned and will do from completion of the said project.
Doubtless, there are those who would scoff at the notion of sowing peppers in a bag on the window ledge in the office constituting real farming. Truth be told, the depressed part of me would be very much of a similar mindset. However, for the sake of my sanity, I have to believe it represents the sowing of seeds for something bigger and better. Though at the minute it must be regarded as the road to God knows where. Simply as the earnest hope would be that, for now at least, nothing can be ruled in or, more critically, out.
Indeed, such was the lift gained from sowing, cultivating, harvesting and, eventually, eating our own crops that the intention always was to expand operations this year. Even if it were only going to be fractionally so. How exactly that might, nay hopefully will, take hold has yet to be thought out, never mind played out.
The area you will have all come to know as ‘The Jungle’ will definitely be developed while the possibility of putting in a polytunnel is also worth exploring. If we had some of our own farmyard dung to assist with operations that would be all the better. I dreamed a dream of times gone by…