Movin' On Back

 While I hear constantly, "move on", "look to the future", "don't dwell on the past", I am taking a complete turn and am looking back. Today I began my first food dehydrating attempt. I am not good with food additives, thus packaged foods that are laden with preservatives and other chemicals to heighten the colour and flavours are not my friends. I can't use the famous soups that come in little parcels or the noodles that form student fare. There is something put in most of them called MSG. It makes me very ill.  But all that aside, I love to have a cup of soup, just one nice warm mug of it as my comfort food. I've tried cooking up a big pot and freezing it in smaller portions but somehow it isn't as easy. I like something faster than thawing and heating. I want to scoop out a couple of spoonsful and mixing in some boiling water and partaking with a smile. More than that since I have taken up drying green onion that makes my home smell like a garden, I am moving on back. Most of us who live in Canada, cannot boast growing out of its soil. We came here and settled here and yes, developed it but not always favorably. My opinion. Those who had been here for thousands of years before us ARE the land. We forgot to learn from these, our elders. How these ancient cultures existed without electricity or big box stores with all of their conveniences, living within Nature as part of it, intrigues me. They survived the icy winters and times of non-growth, of sparsity and enduring the forces all around them in complete bravery and harmony is to me, a miracle. The people then, grew from the very soil and waters and air. When we go into the woods and forests and mountains we take along all of our gear and batteries and should be filled with admiration for those who had none of these but lived every day of their lives in the wilds. They learned, out of need and created ways to live with their surroundings unlike those of us now, who have no idea how we could do that, if we had to. The old ways are forgotten in favour of cell phones and computers and governments in far away places that we pay money to, to take care of us and tell us how to live. Back then, the people of the land, were their own government and formed their laws and practices from their environment and lived by their findings, because if they didn't, they could not survive. They needed each other, the protection and guidance of their own people. The elders were given honour and were listened to. These days, elders are tolerated and pampered, but when their stories are told, few want to listen. We do not learn but continue to make the same mistakes over and over again. To me, food supplies of the ancient peoples and how they preserved and stored it, is very interesting. They dried much of their summer foods and stored them in places that allowed for preservation. They knew the herbs for flavouring and the ones that were medicine. When I smell the vegetables and fish, drying in my dehydrator, even though it runs by electricity rather than the sun this winter, I respect and admire those who came long before, those who ARE this land.