General Interest

The old barnyard comes alive

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DSC00627In the spring of 2022, I finally put two and two together and decided the time had come to work up the ground in part of the old barnyard to see if that might be a better place to grow vegetables.

My two existing garden plots closer to the house have poor drainage and low fertility issues that seem to aggravate the already challenging characteristics of the heavy clay loam soil. A few days without rain and it turns into the dreaded, unworkable hardpan. Not ideal for gardening, to say the least. The use of lots of straw mulch to help keep moisture in the soil, and to be worked into it after harvest, hasn’t seemed to seem to help much in the seven years I’ve been gardening here.

Meanwhile, the barnyard sloped gently and naturally toward my small portion of the old hay field. (The greater portion, stretching west between the forest on either side is now part of the Hope Bay Nature Reserve. A long story that: see ‘The Day Dow Came to Hope Ness’ in this blog.)

For 100-plus years the barnyard had been fertilized by livestock, beginning in the 1880s as a pioneer homestead, mixed farm. The barn was set up for beef cattle; first, oxen, then horses, were used to till the soil. The first temporary home for the farm family was built near the barn some time soon after John Heath bought the 100-acre lot in 1880 for $100. It eventually became a pig barn after the permanent house was built in 1895.

So, it was a given: the barnyard soil was bound to be fertile.

After I had the 2022 season garden planted by the late spring, I first broke the south portion of the barnyard ground with the 1950-vintage Ferguson cultivator. The 1930’s vintage drag cultivator worked best for the final passes. As a cover crop I scattered 50 pounds of buckwheat in early June when the risk of frost had passed. Despite its name, Buckwheat is not a grain, though it is often used like cereal grains. I use it along with wheat flour in my favorite muffin recipe; and I use it as my favorite cover crop because it grows high and dense enough to shade out and discourage the growth of twitch grass. Still a bane of an organic farmer’s existence, twitch grass, also known around the world by other names, such as couch grass in the U.K., is not indigenous to North America. It’s arrival sometime in the early 20th Century quickly spread and became a big problem for farmers and other plants because, among other attributes, it secretes an enzyme that discourages the growth of other plants. It’s no doubt one of the big reasons why Monsanto invented the now much-used herbicide Roundup.

The barnyard was overrun with twitch grass. Two, successive crops of buckwheat, the first mowed down to re-seed itself, is best to discourage twitch grass; but I wanted to plant a garden in the spring of 2023, so I made a point of cultivating before the first frost in the fall of 2022, and in the early spring of 2023 to expose the dense twitch grass root-network to killing cold. I used my 40-year-old TroyBilt rototiller sparingly (two passes – one shallow, one deeper – to prepare the soil for the planting of ‘the three sisters,’ rows of beans, pumpkin, butternut squash, and sweet corn.

Organic Cinderella pumpkin seed was acquired locally, from Franken Farms Seed. Untreated bean, butternut squash, and one variety of sweet corn came from Willian Dam Seeds. My old standby, early peaches and cream sweet corn, also untreated, and not bioengineered, came from Ontario Seed Company (OSC).

I started planting May 26, and finished in the first week of June. But, as Ontario farmers and gardeners know, the 2023 season began with a month-long drought in late May and early June. I hand-watered my three garden plots daily from a dug well. There’s nothing like rain; but I managed to keep the transplanted, started indoors pumpkin and squash alive; However, I feared the untreated corn seed in the new barnyard garden was a loss because the soil temperature was too low for germination; but, to my surprise, three planting of corn came up, at a rate of about 60 percent after the rain. Still, it was a joyful occasion.

And within a couple of weeks, the new garden in the old barnyard was flourishing. Indeed, I don’t think I’ve ever seen such dynamic growth, especially of the squash family, pumpkins (Cinderella) and butternut squash. Meanwhile, the sweet corn is growing so well I’m not going to bother with the usual side dressing of fertilizer for this heavy feeder.

I also hope in some way to honor those who came before on this farm, and worked so hard, for so little. From the barnyard garden I look out across that long, hay field reaching out to the west in the darkening sky. Soom enough the forest on either side will close in again, and their being here, most of them for less than 100 years, may be remembered only as a brief episode. I feel their tears in the soil as, on my knees, I pull out weeds by hand; but I see little of the twitch grass that drove men mad remains.

I see them smile and hear them say, “well now, isn’t that something. Good for you, young fellow.”

Acrylamide and Food: a shocking revelation

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Not that long ago in a ‘What’s on your mind’ Facebook post I recalled how as a boy many years ago in Toronto I happily walked several blocks along Queen Street West every Friday evening to get classic, always delicious, take-out fish and chips for our family dinner. I also remembered the best French fries ever were to be found at the nearby Sunnyside amusement park, now long gone to make way for the Gardiner Expressway.

Since then, it’s fair to say I’ve consumed a lot of restaurant fries over the years with burgers, toasted, three-decker, club sandwiches, as well as home-fried potatoes, in restaurant and home.

Feel free to check that box yourself, figuratively speaking, if the same holds true.

And then there’s the long-standing pleasure in more recent years, of baking my own bread – lately, a light rye specialty – and pizza crust, squash pies, and experimental, ‘necessity’ (Whatever ingredients are handy) muffins, so long as maple syrup is the key ingredient.

Have I ever left the bread in the oven too long, so the crust is thick and dark, and enjoyed it anyway with homemade soup? Yep, been there, done that.

So, to say the least, I was shocked to discover recently I may have been putting my health seriously at risk all that time by eating a lot of fried (deep-fried especially) and oven-baked food like bread and roast potatoes; and many other things store-bought, like potato chips, crackers and cookies. The list, as it turns out now, is very long.

It’s about acrylamide, also called, acrylic amide, an organic compound widely used, and government regulated, in industry for a wide variety of products and purposes, including water treatment.

However, it has only been since 2002 when, first in Sweden, concerns were raised about acrylamide’s presence in food processed or cooked at temperatures in excess of 120 degrees Celsius (248 Fahrenheit).

Since then, public health agencies in the European Union, the U.S. and Canada have been in the forefront of efforts to learn more about the risk to human health. The U.N and the World Health Organization are also involved. Studies involving mice and rats being given high levels of acrylamide, have shown it causes cancerous tumors. That has led to it being officially described a “probable” cause of cancer for humans; but more human-based studies are needed to be certain, the various health agencies stress

Meanwhile, in an abundance of caution, they have offered advice, suggesting people stop eating deep-fried potatoes, turn down the temperature where possible and not bake or toast bread beyond ‘golden brown,’ instead of dark brown; and definitely don’t eat burnt baking products, from store or home. Potato chips are among the foods with highest levels of acrylamide, and, shockingly, many baby foods listed in Health Canada’s monitoring.

A fresh batch of ‘golden’ buns, temp. 375 F instead of 400

Even coffee is suspect, because of the roasting of coffee beans: light or medium is better than dark, or give coffee up entirely. Oh, no, not my morning coffee! That’s a tough one.

Health Canada’s summary, Acrylamide and Food, is one of the best and most readable documents on the issue I came across online. The same agency’s ‘Revised Exposure Assessment of Acrylamide in Food’ and, the long list (Appendix 1) of branded, food products gathered and tested for acrylamide levels is important and revealing for people to know. (If there are problems with the links, google ‘Health Canada Acrylamide and Food,’ and ‘Health Canada, Revised Exposure Assessment of Acrylamide in Food.’) My only criticism of the latter is there needs to be more explanation of the PPB numbers, and symbols and how they pertain to the daily, body-weight impact of acrylamide.

The other comment I have is to what extent this important information about food and public health has reached, well, the public. I follow the daily news closely, I thought, and I’m sure there are Canadians and others around the world who are aware of the concerns about acrylamide in food; but I only found about it accidentally, while researching potatoes for other reasons, and the article I was reading happened to mention it.

There’s lots of troubling news ongoing that gets covered like a blanket: the political situation in the U.S., for one, and the war in Ukraine; but surely the possibility so many of the foods we – billions of us – routinely eat or drink every day may contain a compound that causes cancer, is as important as anything.

Finally, there appears to have been a relative lack of updated information in recent years since the initial flurry after 2002. For example, Canada Health’s Revised Exposure Assessment dates from 2012. Many of its related articles on the topic are already archived. Hopefully, that doesn’t reflect a lack of a sense of urgency.

Sometimes I wonder about the toxicity of the world we live in, the food we eat, the way it’s grown and processed, and what strikes me – yes, anecdotally – as the cancerous result when so many people I know, or know of, are getting sick.

The Herb Rosemary added to your bread dough will lower the level of acrylamide substantially’

On being reminded of human goodness: a wonderful moment

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The historic Great Hall of Toronto’s Union Station

“Keep your heart and mind open to the possibility of wonder: you never know what the next moment will bring.”

Recently, I have found myself saying that often, especially when someone I know, or have just met, talks about a personal struggle they’re experiencing to the point of despair, or how much they’re troubled about the terrible state of the world.

The wonder that might be seen, heard, or thought in the next moment may not save the world. It may be a relatively small thing in the broader personal or global context; but if it lifts your spirits to suddenly see the rising sun shining bravely through a small break in dark clouds, that is also wonderful. Let it lift and embrace you, and give you hope. “Anything is possible,” I often end up saying.

I took that attitude to heart myself just over a week ago when I ran into trouble trying to get to Kingston via Toronto to visit my daughter at her horse farm in rural, eastern Ontario.

I had it all worked out. At least I thought so; except what’s the point of having a plan if you don’t write it down and pay attention to it?

So, instead arriving at Guelph Central Station in time to catch a 12:55 pm GO bus to Union Station in Toronto, that bus had already left. I assured my good friend and son-in-law Ryan not to worry, and to head back north. I still had four hours to get to Union Station, even if I had to take another GO bus to Square One, in Mississauga, and then transfer to yet another one.

Fortunately, as it turned out, I took a seat near the driver, after he showed me how to scan my Visa card on a thingy near the door. Other people boarding the bus, most if not all of them, had something called a ‘Presto’ card to scan, as if they’ve done it every day, twice a day or more, for years, which they no doubt have. I, on the other hand, haven’t used public transit in the Toronto area since the virtual, technical Stone Age.

The Queen Street W. streetcar, circa 1950s

Yes, my children, I am old enough and far enough removed from those days to remember when a child could board the Queen Street West streetcar and drop a nickel into the fare box for a trip downtown. And then when the Yonge Street subway, Toronto’s first, was built and running in 1954, I could put a quarter into a fare box at a glass booth watched over by an actual person at every station.

So, to put it mildly, I was feeling my age, and like a stranger from the boondocks, though Toronto is my hometown (with a couple of breaks to live for a few years on southern Ontario farms). But it has been 42 years since I moved up to the Bruce (Saugeen) Peninsula, and I could count on the fingers of both hands the number of times I’ve been back. And that’s when I was still driving.

But then on the troubled trip some wonderful things started to happen, and this is the real subject of this story: the kindness of strangers who helped me on my way.

When the second driver gone on the bus to await his turn to take over the wheel at a stop before Square One, the first driver brought him over to where I was sitting and explained that I was trying to get to Union Station to catch a Via Rail train leaving there at 5:32 pm. The second driver nodded his head as he looked at me with an expression that told me he would do what he could to help me get there on time. And he did indeed, or perhaps I should say, he tried his best.

He was driving the bus when it reached Square One. I was the last person to get up to leave when he told me I’d be better off to stay on the bus as he drove it south into Toronto to the Kipling bus terminal where it was to be parked for the night. There, he said, I would be able to get on a Bloor Street subway train, which would take me to the Yonge Street subway; and then I could take a southbound train to Union Station. My experience years ago on the subway told me he was right. It was my best hope to get to Union Station quickly by avoiding surface traffic.

I thanked him for his help and checked the time. I had less than 45 minutes to get on the train to Kingston. “Be sure you get off at the St. George stop, and go south on the Yonge Street subway,” he said helpfully. I nodded my head and reassured him I understood.

I want to say something here for a moment. I don’t routinely identify people by their ethnicity. I believe there is one human family of many nations, and I don’t think that’s a contradiction.  I am proud of Canada’s multicultural, welcoming diversity. I want to make a point of saying both these drivers appeared to be of an east Indian nationality, likely either immigrants to Canada or first-generation; and they are my friends now even though I only met them once and may never meet them again.

I missed my train by five minutes; but that’s my fault: with their help I almost made it.

I maybe could have stayed overnight somewhere in Toronto and taken a train to Kingston early the next morning. But my daughter Susan, who I was going to visit, wouldn’t hear of it. If I could take a GO train as far east as possible, to Whitby or Oshawa, she would drive there from her farm north of Kingston and pick me up.

With help from a security guard at Union Station, I quickly found the GO Rail area. I approached a woman identified as a GO employee, there to help folks like me. She helped me use my Visa card to buy a ticket to Oshawa, then walked with me to the platform where that train would soon be arriving. She was genuinely kind and helpful and wished me well.

It was late when my daughter and I reached her beautiful farm-home where I spent a lovely week. The trip there did not go as smoothly as I had hoped; and yet I have nothing but good thoughts about it as I think about the kindness of the good people who helped me.

Pepper, sweet mare.

I also think about the woman and her husband on the GO bus who were on their way to Pearson Airport and with whom I had a pleasant conversation. Turns out they had recently been guests at a friend’s cottage on the peninsula, and they were also avid gardeners.

It was ‘all good.’

Going for a walk in the woods with Sora

A message of profound hope for a world turned upside down

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It’s still there in my list of favorite movies; right up there with Carl Dreyer’s Day of Wrath and The Passion of Joan of Arc; Akira Kurosawa’s Rashomon; Ingmar Bergman’s Virgin Spring; Tennessee Williams/Elia Kazan’s A Streetcar Named Desire; Elia Kazan’s On the Waterfront; Grigory Chukray’s Ballad of a Soldier; and most recently Larisa Shepitko’s The Ascent.

Although the original film version of The Poseidon Adventure, was the top-grossing movie of 1973, most reviewers didn’t regard it as anything that special: just an above average example of the then-popular disaster-movie genre with an exceptional cast. They included previous Academy Award Oscar winners Gene Hackman, Shelley Winters, Ernest Borgnine, and Red Buttons. It was nominated for eight Oscars, winning two second-tier awards, one for Best Original Song, ‘The Morning After,’ the other for Special Effects. Hackman won the British Academy Film award for Best Actor in a Starring Role, and Winters won the Globe aware for Best Supporting Actress. Summarizing 25 reviews, Rotten Tomatoes gives The Poseidon Adventure a modestly good score of 6.94 out of 10.

I’m not even going to go there, other than to say 20th Century Fox, the producers, and director Ronald Neame could have done a better job of first realizing, and then focusing more on what I regard as the story’s powerful, allegorical message of hope.

Based on a 1969 novel by Paul William Gallico, I can only suspect “adventure” was added to the book and movie title to attract a mass audience. Fair enough, especially if, as a result more people get the message consciously or subconsciously; and remember it now meaningfully, as I do, in a world turned upside-down.

Here in a nutshell is what The Poseidon Adventure is about: The Poseidon is an aging ocean liner on its last voyage before heading to the scrap yard. It is New Year’s Eve, and the clock is about to strike Midnight. There has been an earthquake deep in the waters of the Mediterranean Ocean. A huge Tsunami wave strikes the ship, causing it to capsize. Sensational scenes of chaos and death ensue in the great banquet hall where New Year’s celebrations are in full swing when the everything is suddenly turned upside down. There appears to be no way out as explosions rock the ship, leaving only a small portion of the hull above water. However, learning from another passenger that the thinnest part of the hull is at the propeller shaft beyond the engine room, Reverend Frank Scott instinctively sees hope. He begins to urge people around him not to give up and soon has a small group willing to join him in a journey through the bowels of the stricken ship. He calls on others to join his little group and climb a tall Christmas Tree raised up to a door in the now upside-down banquet hall. Most survivors gather around the ship’s purser, the officer in charge of money and material needs. Others try to climb the tree after all, but under the weight of too many people, and with the explosions continuing, the tree falls.

Rev. Scott, played by Hackman, and his group begin their journey. They include a Jewish couple from New York on their way to Israel to see their newborn grandson; a police detective and his wife, a former prostitute who he loves dearly; the ships singer; a young brother and sister going to meet their parents on holiday in Greece; and a mild-mannered, life-long bachelor obsessed about his physical health.

With Rev. Scott’s help and advise they overcome many obstacles. At one point, he gets into trouble swimming underwater in a flooded area to find the best way forward. He is saved by the middle-aged Jewish woman, played by Winters, who just happens to have been a competitive swimmer. But as a result, she has a heart attack and dies.

They come upon an area where the way forward seems impossible. Down below is a deep chasm of burning oil. Before them, just out of reach, is a valve spewing burning-hot steam. The detective’s beloved wife slips and falls to her death. The broken-hearted detective, played by Borgnine, angrily blames Rev. Scott. He in turn vents his anger at God.

“How many more sacrifices? How much more blood? How many lives?” the admittedly unorthodox minister asks God. “You want another life? Take me,” he cries, before jumping over the burning chasm to grab hold of the burning-hot valve.

Gradually, slowly, with painful effort he turns the valve off. But his strength is fading.

“You can make it,” he calls out to the survivors of his group. “Keep going,” he says.

He turns to the detective, still grieving the loss of his beloved wife. “Get them through,” Rev. Scott says, falling to his death

And so the detective does, until they finally reach the point where the propeller shaft goes through the thinnest part of the hull; but they have no tools. What can they do? They hear a sound outside, the roar of a helicopter engine, and boots walking above them. They begin to bang on the hull. Those above hear it. Soon, an acetylene torch is cutting through the metal. A hole big enough for people to get through is opened. Hands reach down to pull them up.

Then we see the helicopter taking off again into the sky with the only survivors of the Poseidon aboard.

That’s hardly a ‘nutshell,’ I guess.

So be it. Just as well: it doesn’t leave much room for too many words of discussion, analysis, and argument about the meaning of it all. Some might say there is none; others of a certain evangelical religious bent might see a transcendental message, the helicopter being a metaphor for the long-awaited fulfillment of ‘end time’ prophecies

If he were alive today, I might ask Paul Gallico what meaning he meant; but from what I’ve read about him I have a hunch the very prolific author/journalist would laugh uproariously.

I won’t judge or question. I will only I say what I still see: a message of profound hope: hope for life, and for those who weep and struggle in these seemingly hopeless times to keep up their spirits, but who ultimately renew their love and their faith in life, and do not give up.

Speaking of the back field and the nature of heritage

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More than 40 years have passed since I came here to help the late Wilma Butchart and her son Cliff bring in the hay from that beautiful back field that reached out to the depth of their original 100-acre farm lot, with the mature hardwood forest on either side.

Wilma and Cliff were the first Hope Ness residents we met in June of 1979 when my then wife, Colleen, and I moved up from Toronto to Hope Ness. They welcomed us in the traditional way, with a gift of home-cooked goodness, a generous smile, and kind words. We became friends, and thanks to Wilma and Cliff we learned a lot about the history of Hope Ness, especially the Dow Chemical ‘takeover’ in the mid-1960s. (I have written previously about that in Finding Hope Ness at this link.)

Hope Ness was saved from the terrible fate of being turned into a huge quarry when Dow decided not to go through with its plans, and the Ontario government ended up owning the 2,000 acres (810 hectares) Dow had bought for a measly $5,000 acres per 100-acre farm. Most of the homes and barns had already been demolished, except for the Butchart farm, where Dow had set up its on-site base of operations. Wilma and Cliff continued to live there as tenants when the province took over ownership. Eventually, they managed to get title back to the house, barn other out-buildings, and 5.9 acres. They were also able to continue cutting and taking the hay off the back field to feed their livestock. That permit stopped eight years ago when Cliff passed away. Coincidentally, the province decided about the same time to stop issuing any more such permits on its Hope Ness land. That includes the Hope Bay Nature Reserve which surrounds the former Butchart home and property which I now own, and where I live.

I keep the hay cut on the small part of the back field I own. Beyond that I can see the new tree growth is now well underway. Already, that part where the forests on either side were nearest has begun to close, like a door on the past.

I remember being out there with them, Wilma driving the same Massey-Ferguson 65 tractor I’m still trying my best to keep in good shape, me tossing the bales up onto the hay wagon, and Cliff building the load. And so it went, back and forth to the barn to unload, for several days.

Invariably now, as I stand beside the barn and look out from there over that field as the trees and other seasonal-wetland vegetation take it over again, I also think about the years of back-breaking work that went into clearing that land. And also, the intense work that went into digging wells to help drain it, as often happened in those days. The most remarkable, where the back field begins, is a 20-ft deep well, carefully and expertly walled with stone and cement. That well also served as the main source of water for the house and pasturing livestock. It seems almost unimaginable, and yet I can see it after all in my mind’s eye: the men down below in the darkness, rocks and soil being hauled up by others. By the end of the spring run-off that well is always full to the brim. I use it to water my market garden as needed, which is often, this dry 2022 season especially.

The first house, later used for livestock.

All that work began in Hope Ness after 1880 when the first owner, John Heath, bought the 100-acre lot for “one hundred dollars,” according to the Crown Patent. Other Hope Ness settlers arrived about the same time from down south, or from ‘the old country.’ They had hopes; they had dreams; they worked their hearts out. For some it was too much to bear. Others stayed and survived, with more hard work that we nowadays can hardly fathom. Eventually, by the time the man from Dow showed up that fateful day, there was “a farm on every hundred acres,” as I heard it said in the summer of 1979. And even then, it was still a hard-scrabble, subsistence way of life. So, $5,000 must have seemed like a lot of ‘cash money,’ and maybe a once-in-a-lifetime chance for something better.

I do know that Wilma Butchart (Tucker), born and raised in Hope Ness, never wanted to leave. She loved this land, and the walk through what she called “the Cathedral Woods” to the lookout over Hope Bay, and Georgian Bay beyond. It was her refuge, her special place.

As a child and young woman born and raised on the nearby Tucker homestead, she loved to walk through the woods. She told me of seeing First Nation people from their nearby Nawash community across Hope Bay as they gathered edibles and natural remedies in those same woods. She spoke respectfully of that experience. I’m sure she would have joined them, being who she was. She certainly would not have thought it amiss in any way; on the contrary, she would have welcomed them.

As I look out across that field, I wonder also how much time it takes to have a true heritage, a feeling for a place, the land, the waters, that goes so deep it becomes an essential part of one’s being. Less than 100 years of non-Indigenous settlement had passed since 1880 by the time Dow showed up in the mid-1960s; and little more than 100 years since the Treaty of 1854 that opened the Saugeen Peninsula for settlement was signed under controversial circumstances. The era of settlement is not “since time immemorial,” it is fair enough to say.

And what of me? Am I, who wasn’t even born here, entitled to feel that I truly belong here, this place where I feel so much at home, which I love, as if it was always meant to be? Or is that a foolish thing to say, let alone think under all the circumstances?

I ask these questions sincerely, without any underhand motive. It’s just a question, from my heart to other hearts who know what it means to love their heritage.

Corn, squash and beans growing in the front field, August, 2022.

On the hopeful resilience of gardening, and Lawrence O’Donnell’s interesting timing

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In these most troubling times, with among other things the world’s first and greatest modern democracy in grave peril, I look daily to my garden for relief and consolation, and hope. I trust I’m not alone. Others, I know are doing what they can in their own way to keep their spirits up.

Every annual garden season in this little part of the world has its challenges; and the 2022 season has been no exception: unseasonably cool weather and drought in spring held held back the growth of plants started indoors then transplanted outdoors in late May. Seeds planted were slow to germinate. Many hours spent pumping and hauling water from two dug wells helped keep the garden in survival mode. When the rains finally came, it was never enough. A good soaking rain a week or so ago for a couple of days finally did wonders for the ‘three sisters,’ corn, squash and beans, and the prospect of Roma-type tomatoes for homemade pasta sauce.

But most of all I am again reminded of the determination of plants, and the strength of the life-force to overcome hardships, not the least of which is the heavy, clay-loam soil in these parts. Before the recent rain, when I set about to dig the first row of Yukon gem potatoes, I had trouble getting the digging fork into soil that seemed to have turned into virtual cement. And yet, there they were, good-sized plentiful tubers, showing only slightly the struggle it must have been for them to form. My habit of mulching with a generous depth of straw surely kept some moisture in the ground. But I give the potatoes most of the credit for their fortitude. Then came that soaking rain and the digging became easier.

Before the rain I was wondering how the sweet corn – the original, Ontario Seed Company, ‘peaches and cream’ bicolor – was ever going to fully develop and ripen. But within a few days, the development of the cobs was remarkable. And now I fully expect to have lots of corn ready for harvest by the end of the week, and on into the Labor Day weekend, and beyond, with a good, old fashioned corn roast to celebrate.

Likewise, the Roma tomatoes looked good alongside a bumper crop of Genovese basil, and another called ‘Sacred.’ That name reached out. I had to have it.

And so I am reminded again that hope, the appreciation of life’s rejuvenating powers, is the spiritual harvest of gardening and life. Good things can still and surely must happen. We must not give up.

By the way, for further context, I submit the following link that appeared on Youtube again a couple of days ago, with interesting timing regarding the recent Search Warrant that retrieved certain documents from Donald Trump’s home in Florida. The question has been asked what he might have done with them, or done already.

The Corn is up

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Here, just south of the 45th Parallel (halfway to the North Pole) in the upper Great Lakes area of Ontario, Canada, the appearance of rows of little green sprouts of sweet corn in the first week of June is enough to make me break out into song and dance. I kid you not.

Corn has been described as a ‘tough crop,’ and so it is. But it’s also fussy: a warm-weather crop that won’t germinate if the soil temperature isn’t warm enough – a minimum of 21 degrees Celsius – and it won’t tolerate frost.

In southern Ontario, May 24 has traditionally been the date for planting such crops, on the assumption there’s no longer a risk of frost. But that’s not always dependable, as the 2021 growing season reminded us, when a hard frost a week after that date did a lot of damage; for example, annual strawberry crops then in pre-fruit flower, were wiped out in many locations, including mine.

Vast quantities of fungicides and other pesticides are used in modern, industrialized agriculture in the production of corn. Some fungicides are used to prevent seed corn from rotting after planting if the soil temperatures are not high enough to bring on germination for too long.

However, some growers, large and small, myself included, choose to use untreated seed. I think it’s fair to say that increases the risk of crop failure if after planting there’s a period of unusually cool weather. In my admittedly anecdotal experience, the weather in recent years has become less predictable, or reliable.

So, on May 17, with the weather and the soil warm, I knew I was to some extent taking a risk planting a few rows of sweet corn. But as a neighbor said, and I agreed, “sometimes you have to take a risk.”

A previous crop of sweet corn in Cathedral Farm garden

About a week later, after a nice rain, I was relieved to see those rows had emerged, and what’s more, showed 90 percent-plus germination. So, I took a deep breath and planted the rest of about 1.3 kilograms (just under three pounds) of seed – one seed, one row at a time, taking about eight hours in total. (Those single-row, push planters don’t work well with corn.)

And then, of course, the weather turned dry, and cool, though sunny. Fortunately, the soil embraced the heat of the sun sufficiently to keep the seed warm enough for germination; and then, a couple of days of much-needed rain was well-timed.

Watering by hand daily from a dug well will keep the garden alive. But there’s nothing like rain to turn it on. This morning is cool, but the whole garden is happy, virtually singing a chorus of relief and new growth as it, and I, look forward to a few days of sunny weather.

I’ll give the soil a chance to absorb the moisture for a day or two before weeding, and then laying down a thick bed of organic straw mulch for the strawberries, potatoes, and tomatoes.

The mulch keeps the clay-loam soil moist and helps avoid the hard-pan problem. It also keeps the potato plants free of potato beetles and helps the tomato plants stay healthy.

Herbs, including lots of basil, as well as the classic, “parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme” are going to be transplanted into a new raised bed, as soon as the weather warms up a few more degrees.

I am reminded just now of something my grandson Daniel said a few years ago when he was here helping me plant corn. He stopped for a moment, looked over and said in a wonderful way, “you don’t think of anything else when you’re doing this, do you.”

“You’re absolutely right, Daniel,” I said. “There’s lots of great things about gardening; and that’s one of them.

I think of that now because of the terrible things happening in the world, that we surely need to be aware of, try to understand, and do whatever we can to help.

Being alive, trying to appreciate that as much as possible; planting and caring for a hopeful garden; loving and caring for family and friends, and especially for children; being there for a stranger in need; keeping spirits up; taking a moment whenever possible to love yourself, to give yourself a break. Yes, that too … all that and more. We cannot, we must not, lose hope about being alive.

Line 5: A Great Lakes disaster waiting to happen

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The view of Hope Bay, with Georgian Bay in the distance, from a Bruce Trail lookout.

You could have knocked me over with a feather when I heard the propane truck backing down the driveway the other day. It hadn’t been that long ago, I thought, that I had the two tanks feeding the furnace filled up.

Turned out it was March 23, a month and a half ago, so it wasn’t that outlandish. Still, I was surprised, and told the driver I wasn’t sure I needed a fill-up. I was just about to turn the heat off for the season, with spring finally arrived after an unusually cold April.

And then he surprised me, to say the least, when he said, “there might not be any propane” come next fall.

“Oh, why’s that?” I asked. He said it was about the possibility something called “line 5” might be shut down by then. He explained that’s pipeline that brings oil and natural gas liquids from Alberta to Sarnia, Ontario by way of Michigan. Propane is a by-product, and if the line is shut down Ontario and Quebec, as well as Michigan and Ohio, would be faced with a severe shortage.

Meanwhile, the price of propane has, along with other fuels, greatly inflated in price this past heating season. With no indication that’s going to turn around any time soon, I chose rather reluctantly to get the tanks filled up despite the unexpected expense just then.

Coincidentally, just the day before I had been to the local gas station to get my 20-litre container filled up with diesel fuel for my tractor. I stopped at $40, not quite full. A year ago, that would have been $20.

The attendant muttered something about “Trudeau” and “pipelines.” The current inflation problem, regarding the price of oil in particular, is not a political problem, unless consumers think government should intervene in the free market, and then be accused of being dictatorial. It’s a supply and demand problem: as the economy bounces back from the covid-pandemic, economic slowdown in the past couple of years, the demand for oil and its byproducts is increasing. But producers are not ramping up supply fast enough to meet the demand while cashing in on the higher prices. Meanwhile, the war in Ukraine has also helped drive up the speculative price of oil, as war always does.

That’s bad enough. But as a long-time resident of the Saugeen/Bruce Peninsula and the Great Lakes region I was also shocked to learn a section of the 69-year-old Line 5 pipeline goes underwater as it crosses the Straits of Mackinac where Lake Michigan and Lake Huron connect. That’s up to 87 million liters of oil and natural gas liquids daily.

I should have known that a long time ago, of course. To be honest, in recent years as the owner a a propane furnace installed five years ago, I didn’t think much about where the propane came from. But now, all I can think is how utterly foolish it is that such a thing exists, and also how lucky the Great Lakes are that a catastrophe has not already happened. The fate of Line 5 is now before state (Michigan) and federal courts in the U.S., and also being discussed as a treaty issue between Canada and the U.S.

In November, 2020, Michigan Governor Gretchen Wittmer ordered the pipeline’s Canadian owner, Calgary-based Enbridge Energy, to shut down the underwater section of the Line 5 pipeline within 180 days. That action came after a state review of the state easement Enbridge obtained in 1953 allowing the pipeline to cross the straits underwater.

“Enbridge has imposed on the people of Michigan an unacceptable risk of a catastrophic oil spill in the Great Lakes that could devastate our economy and way of life,” Whitmer said in a statement at the time, as reported in an Associated Press story. “That’s why we’re taking action now, and why I will continue to hold accountable anyone who threatens our Great Lakes and fresh water.” 

Wittmer said over the years the company had persistently neglected requirements under the easement to properly maintain the safety of the line. Parts of the underwater line are not adequately supported, the state claims.

A statement currently on Enbridge’s website says the underwater section of the line was “built in 1953 by the Bechtel Corporation to meet extraordinary design and construction standards, the Line 5 Straits of Mackinac crossing remains in excellent condition and has never experienced a leak in more than 65 years of operation.”

“We’re working hard to keep it that way,” the statement continues. “We monitor the Line 5 Straits crossing 24/7, using both specially trained staff and sophisticated computer monitoring systems. We also carry out regular inspections of the line, using inline tools, expert divers, and remote operating vehicles (ROVs), going above and beyond regulatory requirements.”

Enbridge defied Michigan’s 180-day, shutdown deadline and took the state to court. The situation became more complicated when the question of which U.S. jurisdiction, state or federal, was more appropriate to hear the case. Then the Canadian government raised a treaty issue.

Meanwhile, Enbridge has a plan to rebuild the Straits of Mackinac section of the line, through a tunnel under the Straits, instead of above ground, underwater. The company has applied for a permit, which has so far not been approved.

There has been no public indication recently that the complicated situation may soon be resolved. It could be any day, or weeks, months, or years. The continuing uncertainty is troubling.

Let’s hope the condition of underwater pipeline is being closely watched by Enbridge, government agencies, and organizations concerned about the well-being of the Great Lakes.

Every day the Great Lakes have to wait for that aging, underwater pipeline to be shutdown is an obvious and unacceptable risk to the well-being of the precious lakes and the socio-economic future of millions of people on both sides of the border.

In praise of Russian culture: it deserves better

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A scene from Ballad of a Soldier: a Russian mother waits for her son to come home from war.

I suppose this may not be the best time to say anything good about Russia and the Russian people. But no sooner do I write that than I think, on the contrary, this may be the best time.

The atrocious brutality of one man, and his corrupt enablers, whoever they are, have certainly cast a dark shadow over Russia and its people, who are apparently as gullible and easily manipulated as any nation of human beings on this long-suffering planet. Tragically, that appears to be one of the most fatal flaws of our imperfect species; otherwise, brutal, murderous tyrants, like Vladimir Putin, or would-be tyrants like Donald Trump would be laughed off the stage before they did too much harm.

Tchaikovsky

Putin claims to be the Great Defender of everything Russian, including Russian culture. He references the current, conspiratorial ‘cancel culture’ mindset when he says Russian culture is in the process of being ‘cancelled’ by the west, led by the current U.S. administration under President Joe Biden. (No one should underestimate the extent to which Trump’s loss in the 2021 presidential election upset Putin’s grand plan for the takeover of Ukraine, including Trumps likely withdrawal of the U.S. from NATO).

But I dare to say, Russia, Russians, and Russian culture most of all deserves something a whole lot better than Vladimir Putin.

I hasten to say, I am not expert in Russian culture. What I know comes from personal experience and appreciation of the works of certain Russian composers, writers, and filmmakers. I can honestly say, from the heart, that my spiritual life has been enriched immeasurably, and my life changed, since the time I was a teenager by the listening, reading, and watching the great, creative works of the rich Russian culture.

Sergei Prokoviev

I think I was 16 when I first heard Canadian pianist Glenn Gould play Sergei Prokoviev’s 7th Piano Sonata with the dramatic, ‘Precipitato’ final movement, like nothing I’d ever heard before. Thus began my life-long love of Prokoviev’s diverse, creative genius. He stands on a par in my book with Beethoven, possibly even higher; and, with the 9th piano sonata especially, he reached the sublime, ‘edge-of-the-universe’ musical expression of J.S. Bach at his best.

Again, as young man barely out of my teens, I saw my all-time, favorite movie on the unforgettable Elwy Yost’s, Saturday Night at the Movies, on TVO. Despite the less-than-ideal title in translation, the 1959 Russian movie, Ballad of a Soldier, is a classic of world cinema, with the most gorgeous and evocative musical score and wonderful cinematography. The scene at the well in the Russian railyard, when the heroine, holding back her long hair, drinks pure, spring water from a rough iron tap, is a life-lasting image. The hero, the young, Russian soldier, Alyosha, on leave for heroism, finally makes it home to his village with no time to spare. His mother finds out he is home almost too late, runs desperately through the field of grain, reaches the road as the truck carrying her son is driving away, then calls out to him, “Alyosha, Alyosha.” He hears her, but they have so little time to speak. Sixty years later it still brings tears to my eyes.

Scene from Ballad of a Soldier

How many Alyoshas, kept in infernal, misinformed darkness by Putin, died in Ukraine today, I wonder.

Most recently, my new most favorite movie is The Ascent, by Larisa Shepitko, regarded as one of the best women directors in the history of cinema, Shepitko was born in the eastern Ukraine. Her father was Persian. She went to Moscow when she was 16 to study filmmaking and immerse herself in the former Soviet Union’s rich, though tightly controlled, cinematic tradition. For example, Sergei Eisenstein (Battleship Potemkin, 1925, Odessa Steps scene) is regarded as one of the greatest formative directors in film history.

Made in 1977, two years before Shepitko’s tragic death in a car accident, The Ascent follows the fate of two Russian partisan’s as they try to find their way back to their group through the bitter cold of a Russian winter after ambushing a German patrol. They reach a farm where they are given shelter but are discovered and taken to a nearby village. They are sentenced to hang along with a group of villagers. After torture, one of the partisans agrees to work for the Nazis to save his life. The other partisan goes to his death with courage and Christlike faith. It is one of the most deeply moving movie scenes I have ever watched.

A scene from The Ascent

The historic Ukraine-Russia connection, early and late, is complicated, and forged on the crucible of frequent, foreign invaders, notably, Mongols, Napoleon’s Grand Army, and Germany’s Nazi regime. It’s no wonder a good deal of paranoia underlied the empire-building policies of Tarist Russia, the former Soviet Union, and now Putin’s Russia.

Ukrainians suffered greatly during the mid-1930s under Joseph Stalin’s brutal, dictatorial leadership of the Soviet Union. Millions of Ukrainians died of persecution and starvation as a result of famine deliberately engineered by Stalin. Whatever brotherhood may have existed between Russia and Ukraine before then was destroyed by Stalin’s brutality, much like Ukraine is now, again, being destroyed by Putin.

Thus have the evil deeds of two, ruthless dictators led to the current war in Ukraine, and the real possibilty of a global catastrophe. The Ukranian people deserve better. So do the Russian people. And so does the world.

You would think ‘in the best of all possible worlds’ the historic suffering of both the Russian and Ukranian nations would lead them to a mutual understanding of how to live in separate, sympathetic peace.

But this is not the best of all possible worlds, so long as autocratic tyrants are allowed to take and hold absolute, undemocratic power.

Morning thoughts (11): The plot thickens

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Sir Alan ‘Tommy’ Lascelles

Finding a good book, or books, to read is one way to survive these frigid January days of a Canadian winter. The one I recently purchased on-line has been thought-provoking, enough to distract from the bitter cold as we, the dogs and I, took our morning walk down Cathedral Drive.

I should clarify, the dogs went about their usual busy-ness of sniffing out whatever creatures had been about during the night, and so on. I was the one distracted with thoughts about what I had been reading in King’s Counsellor, Abdication and War: The Diaries of Sir Alan ‘Tommy’ Lascelles. That name may ring a bell for the millions who have watched the Netflix series, The Crown, a dramatic rendering, not necessarily totally accurate, about the ongoing reign of Queen Elizabeth II.

Three Kings: L-R, Edward VIII, George V, George VI

I was especially interested in the early episodes focusing on the abdication of Edward VIII in December, 1936, less than a year after becoming King upon the death of his father George V. After ascending to the throne, Edward, formerly Prince of Wales, had hoped to marry his lover, Wallis Simpson, when she obtained a divorce from her husband, Ernest Simpson. But the ensuing constitutional crisis went against him, leading to his abdication. His brother, Albert (Bertie to his family and friends) the Duke of York, became King, as George VI. As a result, his daughter, Elizabeth, now Elizabeth II, became heir presumptive, or first-in-line to the throne. Edward got a new title, Duke of Windsor. Wallis did get a divorce and they married, in France, months later, making Wallis Duchess of Windsor, but not welcome as part of the Royal Family.

In the midst of all that, to a significant and influential degree only fully revealed in recent years, was Alan ‘Tommy’ Lascelles. The grandson of Henry Lascelles, the 4th Earl of Harewood, Lascelles initially struggled to find suitable employment as a young man after graduating from Oxford University, and twice failing the Foreign Office exam for a possible diplomatic career. He served as an officer in the First World War, earning the Military Cross, after being wounded in action. Crucially, for future events, he became Assistant Private Secretary to Edward, then Prince of Wales, in 1920. Initially, he was impressed by the young prince, already a world-famous celebrity who travelled the British Empire and Commonwealth extensively. Edward visited Canada twice formally in the 1920s and liked the country so much he bought a ranch in Alberta.

But Lascelles’ attitude toward Edward changed drastically, mainly because of the lack of moral character he had observed time after time in Edward’s behavior. He finally resigned his position in disgust, in 1929, despite being a married man with a young family to support, and no immediate job prospect.

“Tommy came to regard (Edward, Prince of Wales) as hopelessly selfish and irresponsible, and quite unfit for his future role as Sovereign. So disgusted was he with the Prince’s behaviour that in January, 1929, he resigned,” Duff Hart-Davis, the editor of King’s Counsellor, wrote in an introduction to the book.

Also of interest to me, though not included in The Crown, is the fact Lascelles became Secretary to the Governor-General of Canada, Vere Ponsonby, the 9th Earl of Bessborough, in 1931, serving until 1935. If the reader is curious about the reason why I’m interested, I refer them to this link.

In late 1935 Lascelles was offered the position of Assistant Private Secretary to King George V. He was reluctant to accept because as Prince of Wales, Edward would immediately become King when his aging father died. However, assured by Royal officials that the King was in good health and likely to reign for at least another seven years, he accepted the position. But as fate would have it, George V died within a few months, and Lascelles again became Edward’s (as King Edward VIII) assistant private secretary, until he abdicated. Then, Lascelles served in that position for George VI, before being promoted to Private Secretary. He was knighted by the King during a successful Royal tour of Canada in 1939, which Lascelles helped organize. He remained Private Secretary during the first year of Elizabeth II reign, starting in 1952, until he retired in 1953. Sir Alan ‘Tommy’ Lascelles died August 10, 1981, at Kensington Palace, at the age of 94.

His close connection with Edward through his several titles and manifestations is one of the great ironies of Lascelles’ long life and career in Royal service. His character as depicted in The Crown is that of a stern, ‘stuffed shirt’ of a man with an unpleasant personality, rather shallow, and lacking in sensitivity. Despite, how little I knew of Lascelles, except intuitively, I sensed the depiction was not accurate. My reading of his own words as recorded in his daily journal, letters and other documents confirm my sense of who he really was: thoughtful, sensitive, a good judge of character, and with a timely sense of humor to lighten a too-serious moment when needed in conversation or conference. It is noteworthy that he and King George VI were on exceptionally good terms, the king, who suffered from a speech impediment, being especially grateful for Lascelles’ “encouraging” attitude.

However, King’s Counselor, also reveals Lascelles as a man of his times, and perhaps his particular culture, in a disturbing way. In 1947, in the midst of a Royal Tour to The Union of South Africa, in a letter to his wife Joan back in England, he describes a “country of supreme beauty” where he might be “quite glad to live … if only it wasn’t for the blacks” who greatly outnumber “whites.”

Also, in journal entries near the end of the Second Worlds War, his lack of empathy for the countless victims of massive Allied bombing of German and Japanese cities was more than disturbing: it showed the extent to which war can bring out the worst, even in basically good people. Lascelles’ journal entries themselves stopped after the war ended. I hope he found it in him to feel differently about those attitudes.

Winston Churchill

The moment I found most touching in King’s Counselor was what Lascelles wrote in a letter to a friend dated January 30, 1965. He had just attended Winston Churchill’s funeral service which he called “deeply moving,” adding, “I cried a good deal. I was very fond of the old man, who was, for many years, abundantly kind to me. And I am more sure than I am of future life that, but for him, I should not be sitting here a free man.”

King’s Counselor is the most recent of a series of several books based on Lascelles’ journal and other papers stored in the Royal Archives. As Hart-Davis, the editor of the books notes, Archive officials were stubbornly reluctant to permit publication of certain documents for the second book, In Royal Service, published in 1989, which included an earlier period of Lascelles’ royal service; but it did not include a “devastating retrospective assessment of the Prince’s character and behaviour,” Hart-Davis wrote in an introduction to the 2020 edition of King’s Counsellor. Both that edition, and the earlier 2006 edition of the same book contain that revealing document, which corrected errors in the previous historic record.

For example, Lascelles shot down the prevailing sentiment that Edward, “a lonely bachelor, ‘fell deeply in love’ for the first time in his life with the soulmate for whom he had long been waiting.” Lascelles called that “moonshine,” adding, “he was never out of the thrall of one female after another. There was always a grande affaire and, coincidentally, as I know to my cost, an unbroken series of petites affaires, contracted and consummated in whatever highways and byways of the Empire he was traversing at the moment.”

I will say I found that interesting as well: apparent proof that it was entirely possible Edward, Prince of Wales, before he became Edward VIII, and then the Duke of Windsor, left inconvenient, illegitimate children behind him as he travelled the Empire; one in particular, and under circumstances that cast a long shadow to this day.