This morning, as I was having my breakfast and favorite coffee, I began musing about what life was like in the early 1900's, when women put up food for winter and spring. I wondered how they came to know how much to can without being too much or too little. Too much might mean waste, and too little could mean a very sparse pantry.
Okay, soooooo, I thought, what changed so much in our country that it became entirely unnecessary to do any canning at all? What a convenience to simply go to a grocery store and pick up a can of Lady Elberta peach halves, or slices; or a can of green beans. What went out of "fashion" that foods that were organically-grown, non-genetically modified, with pure rainwater to refresh plants' thirst, became such a great burden and inconvenience?
Of course, there are many answers. I can think of one: When women become aged and found themselves too burdened to plant and tend a garden, let alone reap the harvest and preserve it. Good families took care of their own. More families than not did just that. The egrarian life although difficult, had benefits that we do not now know. I had a taste of it when I was a young girl and woman, and I realized the possibilities of a much better way of life than what I saw. There was less meat and more garden-fresh nutritionally-loaded vegetables.
Okay, sooooo, where am I headed in this? When you go into a grocery store, clearly 99% of what is in there is processed, contaminated, altered, and absolutely minimally nutritional. The facts that have come along for many years about the stuff that is put in 'foods' is downright frightening, and we really should think about this. Look at the packaging. Have you ever considered how much of our non-renewable resources are squandered on pretty colors and mega-size packages for minimal contents? How much toxic dyes used in manufacturing the containers have to be washed down the drain, to ultimately end up in water treatment plants and flushed out into our waterways?
When women canned their foods decades ago (and some still do today) they know EXACTLY what is in the jars and cans. They know! We have learned to take everything on faith because the Food and Drug Administration approves it. The FDA approves aspartame and other toxic sweeteners for human consumption even when evidence clearly has shown they are detrimental to human health. The FDA has approved, and will continue to do so until something changes this (meaning by that, that pharmaceutical companies cannot BUY approval), that most of what is available in our grocery stores is literally a bio-hazard zone.
I know this sounds extreme, but consider how prolific illnesses, allergies and diseases, are today. Ever more equipment and tools and drugs are being manufactured, and millions upon millions of animals are being tested on for their "safety". Are we healthier? We aren't better than a century ago - we have dozens more illnesses.
Something is terribly wrong with the direction we are going. The consumer is very powerful and all companies know this. Think about that. We have power to change things for the better, and quite frankly I believe that mostly women are going to make the changes necessary.
Isn't it strange that we have ONE International Women's Day per year? Just ONE day for a little recognition? Was there hoopla in anticipation of it so that when it came we all knew and.........and, what?
I know I'm on a tear today, but we've got to begin making changes. We need to listen to our own wisdom and do all that we are able to do to bring stability back. Broken lives, lost and dying loved ones, bearing burdens beyond what we ever should be - when does the last straw come? Will it break the proverbial "camel's back", or will it snap us into a new strength? It is not too late to make changes.
We've been sold a bill of goods that life will be much easier on us if we just "buy" into .........fill-in-the-blanks here. You know. Our grandparents and parents, and we ourselves, have bought into a way of life that is not working. And we know that, too.
Let's not try to go back to the good old days because we really can't; let us go forward with new resolve for a better nation.
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