Author: Articles of Confederation

Do You Believe in Mother?

A Parable by Útmutató a Léleknek

In a mother’s womb were two babies.  One asked the other: “Do you believe in life after delivery?”

The second baby replied, “Why, of course. There has to be something after delivery.  Maybe we are here to prepare ourselves for what we will be later.”

“Nonsense” said the first.  “There is no life after delivery.  What kind of life would that be?”

The second said, “I don’t know, but there will be more light than here.  Maybe we will walk with our legs and eat from our mouths.  Maybe we will have other senses that we can’t understand now.”

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What Would Temüjin Do?

Over the past few days, I – like most of the rest of the world, I would imagine – have been riveted to news of the most epic boondoggle in American history. I couldn’t help but obsess over how a real leader would have handled not just Afghanistan, but the entire passive-aggressive, effeminate state of affairs in these “United” States since the end of World War 2. As usual, I always circle back to the most maligned (in the West) and misunderstood (in both the East and the West) leader over the last couple of millennia – Temüjin, known to most folks as Genghis Khan.

If the reader is so inclined, pick up a copy of Weatherford’s Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World. It reads more like a fascinating biography than a classical history text, and I’ve made sure my elementary and middle school children have read it along with The Art of War. I wanted them to consume real history and Eastern philosophy before they get into high school and are forced to write essays on such illustrious American topics as The 1619 Project or I Have Two Daddies.

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Texas Isn’t Leading Us to the Promised Land

Now I know there are MANY fine, upstanding citizens on Burning Platform who are from Texas. Good folks through and through for sure, and I am sincerely praying for all of you. No kidding. But you’re going to have to face the facts. Texas is a shit show and it pains me to say it, but them’s the facts. It’s a terrible travesty what’s going on there and we have to pray that our patriots in charge at the White House will declare a national emergency. Or something.

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RE Llpoh: If Not Now, When?

Llpoh,

Today marks the 2-month anniversary of your article asking the readership the simple question: When? I believe I have an answer for you. But first, let me append to said article the following facts:

It did not happen when suicide, increased depression, and substance abuse dramatically increased in America. See here, here and here.

It did not happen when suicide, increased depression, and substance abuse dramatically increased throughout the world. See here, here and here.

It did not happen when our children’s futures were impacted, despite a 0.0%-0.3% death rate and about 100 total deaths. In fact, children have a 5x greater chance of death by fires. See here, here and here.

It did not happen when our small businesses were adversely impacted. See here, here and here.

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Survival

The game of life is one of survival. I would love to adopt Hardscrabble Farmer’s positive vibes toward mankind, but now is absolutely not the time. The First Official Chinese-American President (FOCAP, pronounced fahk-ahp) will be inaugurated today. With that, this country’s power structure will lovingly embrace everything that is morally repugnant in a fallen world. The crimes against children throughout the globe will not only be condoned but accepted as normal. Exhibit A is the FOCAP’s son, Huntard. But it won’t stop at the most heinous and insidious of abuse. Oh no.

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Obedience to God is Liberating or: How I Learned to Love the Bread Box

The crops we grew last summer weren’t enough to pay the loans
Couldn’t buy the seed to plant this spring and the Farmer’s Bank foreclosed
Called my old friend Schepman up to auction off the land
He said, “John, it’s just my job and I hope you understand”
Hey, calling it your job, ol’ hoss, sure don’t make it right
But if you want me to I’ll say a prayer for your soul tonight
And Grandma’s on the front porch swing with a Bible in her hand
Sometimes I hear her singing, “Take me to the Promised Land”
When you take away a man’s dignity he can’t work his fields and cows

John Mellencamp, Rain on the Scarecrow

My wife and I spent a couple of hours the other day setting a corner post for our chicken run expansion. We own a high-quality, Amish chicken coop, but the design was lacking a large enough run for breeding chickens. Hence the expansion. I also wanted to “do it right” – that is, one time and one time only – so I purchased premium black locust lumber from a Midwest lumber company. They didn’t disappoint. The posts will be standing for an easy 50 years if not longer.

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Shun the Shysters Update

I figured I’d give a quick update after my last post. Overall, the responses have been extremely positive. If I had to attach numbers to it, I’d wager 90% of the replies (email, online, text) were extremely encouraging and positive. Folks are genuinely sick and tired of non-critically thinking anarchists taking over entire city blocks, Marxists denigrating cops and their families, looting, non-socially distanced rioting, and tyrannical politicians destroying small businesses and jobs.

I don’t post on mainstream social media and likely never will, but if I did, I’d try and push #shuntheshysters, #metronashvillestrike, and #starvethestatusquo. Just for starters. Forget the silly recalls – as if the current system will produce any justice – and peacefully and disobediently hit them where it hurts: The stomach.

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Defund the Police? No, Defeed the Destroyers

There are times when all the world’s asleep
The questions run too deep
For such a simple man
Won’t you please, please tell me what we’ve learned?
I know it sounds absurd
But please, tell me who I am
Supertramp, The Logical Song

Nashville bombing captured on police camera

I had sincerely hoped I would make it through 2020 without a major system shock. I’ve spent a lot of time over the last few years preparing as much as possible for whatever our garbage government would screw up and/or make worse. I was able to roll with the punches, even while my children’s social lives, education, and well-being were torn asunder by our fearless and ever-talented “public servants”. I watched in helplessness as my closest neighbors lost their jobs in addition to nearly everything they had strived so hard to achieve. Retirement, savings, inheritance – all drained.

However, on the morning of Christmas, the day on which I celebrate the birth of the King of Kings, I got that major, full- system shock. Nothing, it seems, is sacred anymore in these godforsaken times. There’s no walking back my seething rage; even if I could, I wouldn’t retreat into dispassion. So please forgive me ahead of time for being unable to speak without calm or without emotion. I do not possess the eloquence of Sam Adams, nor can I convey a thought as effortlessly as C.S. Lewis. Admittedly, I’m now a resister who will not cooperate with evil from this point forward.

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Modified Hügelkultur Mounds for Fruit Trees

Following the same theme as my previous permaculture articles on blueberry beds and living fences, I’m going to provide some reasonably copious notes on my current process of constructing modified hügelkultur mounds for our fruit tree orchard. It will not include my efforts on the mini-gardens in between each tree (i.e. either in-row or between rows), nor will it include detailed information on the tree cultivars and rootstocks. However, this time around I will embed some accompanying images to serve as layman’s helpers. Hopefully my efforts will serve the reader well enough to facilitate the printing of a how-to guide.

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On Living Fences

“Dear Sir — Your favour of the 15th, with the seed of the honey locust came safe to hand, and claims my particular thanks. I have but one doubt of its forming the best hedge in the world; and that is, whether it can be sufficiently dwarfed. If this cannot be effected, the other purpose mentioned in your letter, and a valuable one too, of subserving stock, is alone sufficient to induce the cultivation of the tree.”

 

One of my ongoing projects over the last two years has been the construction of a hedgerow, otherwise known as a living fence. Man has for thousands of years dealt with incursions of one sort or another, from warring tribes to animal predators. Get your defenses wrong and you’re as good as mincemeat. Still, I cannot imagine any of them posing a greater threat to cultivators of the Mid-Atlantic and Upper South than filthy Anglophiles and the white-tailed deer. Since I didn’t see myself worrying about the former anytime soon (what a shame, seriously), I chose to focus a tad more on the latter. But I strived to do so with a conservationist mindset.

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