posted on Dec, 25 2013 @ 01:58 PM
We are a different species up here in the Upper Peninsula. Many of us like to have a garden and hunt and fish. Many people here are accustomed to
living on less yet but many have started to shift to dependence on consumerism over the years. It is depressing. Not many people would go out and
fish or pick berries for a while, but the trend is starting to go back to this. I like that, it makes us less dependent on the corruption that runs
society. The problem is that those who want us dependent on them are on the increase and holding firm, trying to shut down the fruit stands and small
stores. I think this is stupid for us to let them do that. We need to be self sufficient, we can buy local and support our own. The thing is that
people have been brainwashed that commercial food is better and it is safer. That is false, the treating of the food to slow it's oxidation and stop
it from being eaten by bacteria and fungus is causing problems. Veggies have natural chemicals to keep these from happening for a short time. The
problem is extending the time it takes to get on our table is using up all that natural resistance and the food needs to have chemistry added to make
it last longer. This chemistry, organic or inorganic, is often a problem. A little isn't bad, but there is way too much being added.
So up here there are miners who get paid well, the money they make is spent. But these people don't support our local small stores much anymore,
they have been convinced big chain or online shopping will get them more and more makes them appear richer. Buy local Yoopers, buy what you need. If
we buy local than there will be more jobs here and everyone will be happier. Screw the rest of the country, they are not our kind. We are our
kind.
Treat the tourists well and they will return to spend more money and make more jobs, but do not let them destroy this natural paradise we have here.
I love the maples and pines. They make walking in the woods beautiful. Don't destroy the blueberry patches by not going there, they need the
nitrogen we can provide for them and by picking the berries and dripping our sweat on them it develops the patch. They need animals as much as we
enjoy their fruit.
We are having homemade blueberry pie and homemade tart cherry pie today made from the cherries on my brothers tree and the blueberries growing in the
woods. I never got to pick wild apples from abandoned trees this year to make real applesauce,but I won't mess up next year. If you prune an old
tree and give it some nutrients, it will start making good apples again. You do not need to replace the tree. When you get a new tree, you fertilize
it, why not spend that time helping the old tree to produce fruit for you.
I never even considered leaving the UP. I wish I could convince people here not to try to keep up with the Jones and to buy local when possible. It
seems that all the old hardwares that stocked everything are disappearing today. What a shame, it's boring to go to a new hardware nowadays.