My thoughts on Covid-19

Before I start this blog post, I have to apologise to all the people that comment......I can't work out why, but I can't reply. I thought it was just that I was trying to reply on my phone, but I can't seem to reply on the laptop either.......so if anyone knows what I'm doing wrong let me know....I use blogger.

For a while now, I've been interested with the idea of "the village community". I've always "done" better when I've been part of a community - be it the school community when the kids were young, our farming community or the market community when I was doing them. I think it's a natural human emotion to want to belong to a community.

One thing they've found in two of the Blue Zones that I know anything about, is that community played a large part in people surviving into their 100's. Both Okinawa and Sardina list traditional diet and lifestyle and the community surrounding them as factors to longevity. Community in this sense means family, friends and the village community. Often several generations live under one roof. We currently have 2 generations under one roof - will that mean that we'll live a longer life!

So, if community is such a big factor in health and wellness, what is happening now that we are self isolating. Grand parents are being encouraged not to see grandchildren and vice versa.  Fortunately, thanks to technology, contact can be maintained, even if it doesn't include a hug! There is a growing sense of community amongst various facebook groups and this is also good for most of us, but the extreme extroverts are probably struggling! I find that the sort of groups I'm in or the pages I follow are trying to keep up more regular contact and a conversation happening, even if it is only online.

One solution I thought of for a slow coming out of isolation, is to try and stick to small community areas. For example, we live near Bungendore and most of the essential items we need are available there. We could set up "working hubs" so that office workers could work together but on their own work externally still. At least they would be working "with" people. If there happened to be a covid outbreak it could be monitored and traced back to where it started. If many people got it, then it could still be contained within that community.

The benefit of that would be that local shops and local producers are supported and people can start moving about within their community instead of being isolated. We're pretty lucky that there are five of us in this house and we go out each saturday to the local farmers market. Some people could be in a household of 1 or 2! That would be very lonely!

What will the other side of Covid-19 look like? People are learning or re-learning skills. Gardens are being planted. Chickens being bought. Bread being made. Parents are home-schooling. People are shopping at farmers markets or direct from farmers. No one is going out for coffee! People aren't travelling, planes aren't flying and cars not driving! So many things that Climate Change Activists have been campaigning for for a long time. We've been trying to get people to take a look at their lifestyles and make some of these changes. I'm not sure if there is any noticeable difference in carbon in the atmosphere - some say there is and some say not. But surely if we could keep it up, there would be changes!

We're aiming for self sufficiency with eggs. Having a grandchild around is also going to increase our resilience!

Supporting local producers - good for community resilience.

I also acknowledge that there has been a lot of economic damage done, but maybe we just need to change aspects of our industry and business world. One thing that has been highlighted is our reliance on imports (and exports). We don't make things in Australia any more, so we may have to re-skill some of our baristas to become factory workers. We have all the raw materials that we need to make most things, so maybe we need to start making our own things. Like toilet paper and packaging, basic things that we rely on buying from overseas.

We only need one of these stickers!

We certainly need to look at being a little more self sufficient - both at a Country level and a local level. Being more self sufficient and less reliant on imported products, will make us more resilient. I think we need to be careful that our self isolation does not destroy our sense of community and that we can continue to be involved in community while also maintaining sensible distancing efforts. We are also lucky in Australia that we seem to be keeping things under control with very few new cases, but I also think we need to be careful to move away from isolation slowly to prevent uncontrolled outbreaks.

So take care out there - keep a physical distance, but not an emotional distance.

In the country - Wamboin NSW

We have finally moved out of Canberra. We've been about 2 weeks here and finally unpacked and fairly settled in. It was a bit of a rush in the end, as we wanted to get out of town before any lock down's occurred. We are so much happier out here and don't know how things would be if we'd stayed in Canberra. This house is large and has plenty of space for all of us.

My main focus after moving, was to get a veggie garden started. What I didn't realise was how hard it would be to get veg seedlings. I really wanted seedlings as the weather will cool down very quickly and we may not have time to get seeds up. I did eventually track some seedlings down - akin to finding things on the black market. Chickens still allude us! They are impossible to get. Who would've thought that it would take a pandemic to get people to start thinking about food security. Climate change needs to organise a new marketing campaign.

The seedlings are now planted and we've had a little rain, so hopefully they'll explode with growth - although I don't know how, it's so bloody cold already! We have a large orchard and garden area that has been neglected for a few years, so we just had to dig out some grass and plant and mulch. I even bought some cow manure! Never thought I'd have to buy that!

Not sure what all the trees are, but I'm sure we'll find out in time.

Lots of brassicas, some leeks, turnips and strawberries.

Snow peas and broad beans

I had made some wicking beds and planted up one with herbs and the other with silver beet and celery.  they are doing much better now that they can get more sunlight. Sunlight was a bit limited in the house in town. Luckily there were a few pots of herbs here and a lovely big rosemary plant so we've got a good supply of most herbs.

Foam box wicking beds

We've also inherited a pumpkin which has a few on it so that should keep us in pumpkins for a while. Trouble is I don't know how long I'll have before the vine is finished (from frost and cold) and there's still quite small ones on. The pumpkin vine area also had quite a few tomato bushes so each day Astrid and I go out to pick "marties" She doesn't like them but does like to pick and carry them home.

There is a pumpkin vine under there somewhere. I think the netting is to protect it from the rabbits or maybe the kangaroos.

The owners obviously love roses, as theres rose bushes everywhere.

It's autumn in Canberra and we're just starting to see the leaves changing. It's getting cooler, with this weekend being very windy and cold. We have 3 fire places in the house, so they've been getting lit most days. We may even get snow in winter......