And the Flatirons wept

  I've always thought bio-dynamic gardening was just a bunch of bare-foot boulder hippy chick hooey, and it probably is. Thing is I'm not the gardener to prove or disprove it or about any theory of gardening that requires actual record keeping and comparisons of results in anything of a controlled method. Me, I'm the guy who meticulously labels the tomatoes by variety in the garden and then saves the seeds in an unlabeled container. 'cause Oh heck, I'll remember the Pink Bulls are in the little square Tupperware. - or was that the Pink Giants and the other ones were Heart of the Bull - or wait, Oh the heck, with it I'll call 'em both Trav's Hearts after Travis who gave me both seeds. I can just start two pots of each and see what grows -brilliant! Till only one type sprouts and I'm trying to decide which one to replant!! 

  The day is an in between day. Overcast and neither warm nor cold, snow on the grass from the last little storm but the raised beds are clear with little sprouts of onions and garlic popping up. AKA it's spring in the Front range of the Rockies. 

 The music is an odd choice Mambo Cubano. A Cd set that I could find nowhere in the choices on YouTube. Thus the link is to Tito Puente which will at least get you in the flavor. 

  This Sunday is Palm Sunday and Passover which I believe are biblically tied with the full moon that falls on the same day.   Any bio-dynamic practitioner worth their compost tea will tell you it's about more than moon cycles but that is about all my small brain can latch on to. Even in that my brain really is overwhelmed in spring by an uncontrollable urge to plant. The urge really isn't rational and certainly isn't able to take the time to consult some chart on moon phase. I simply count back from our last average frost date of Mothers Day 8 weeks and know that I should start indoors my tomatoes and such around St Patrick's Day. That is as I've said tempered with warm days who's primal urges leave me crawling the walls to stick a seed in the ground. (Yes damnation I shoulda waited to plant the peas but I couldn't!)

  Thus I was kinda amazed when in writing this I checked the linked Bio-dynamic Moon Calendar and darned if March 14th wasn't, spot on, the beginning of the time to plant those tomatoes. It was when I did it regardless. So am I some sort of toes in the dirt bio-savant. Or is there something to this stuff? I mean when planting the tomatoes one of the pots had a sprout popping out of the bottom of the pot - seeds just want to grow - right?    

  I am honestly fascinated by cycles or at least the idea of cycles. Moon cycles are tied to tides and apparently all things water related (like garden seeds). The sun has a sunspot cycle of around 11 years. The sun cycle has been tied to a variety of earth weather related phenomenons (including the stock market via the weather's effect on crops and soft commodity prices). Ben Davis has put forward some compelling or at least interesting arguments that the sun's longer cycles and various conjunctions effect earths weather, vulcanism, and ice ages quite directly. The authors of The Fourth Turning speak of a human cycle of 4 generation types repeating thru modern history with an associated repeating set of wars problems and triumphs. To go back to moon cycles lunatics as a word is derived from the Latin for moon.

   I believe the associated belief that the full moon has any effect on crime has generally been discredited. That said, I do believe there are some humans who are more sensitive to the sturm und drang of societies cycles. Or perhaps I have the cause and effect inverted or heck who knows. I do know that yesterday a lunatic decided to kill 10 people just north of here at a Boulder grocery store.

 Murder is always a horror and somehow multiple murders seem like multiplying infinity it remains just horrible. Certainly as a society our media will endlessly dissect this and the all too many other instances looking for a pattern, a reason, perhaps a cycle of lunacy. Is this like the murders in Atlanta last week and thus a hate crime? Perhaps the killers religion makes this more a Charlie Hebdo or Fort Hood murderer? Perhaps it's something about Colorado, Aurora or Columbine? We want reason, a pattern, a why to know it won't be us. It will be decided that the corrolation is guns. A few will argue no it's mental health. Some like myself will offer half-heartedly that it is simply the times not to be understood or solved.

  Politicians will most assuredly want to offer a solution. The likely solution in these times is guns. More exactly some further limiting of the Right of individuals to own guns. I'm an old hippy who just wants to grow a garden and live in relative peace. So fewer guns you bet! Thing is most of the guns, tanks, planes and bombs are owned by government. Most of what we call history is politicians and leaders using those guns and such to kill and murder their neighbors and citizens. The math isn't even close when you compare government sponsored mass killing events with that of, well, lunatics like Boulder. So less guns - you bet count me in. Let's start with government.

 Ah but there is the twist! Will the Federal government of the US reduce it's gun power? How about China or Russia or Myanmar or pick your favorite stupid little country. Yeah they always have a reason why they need guns. Sadly, the power to protect against invaders is often used internally against some unfortunate group. I offer a list but honestly the evil of government guns is too long and really doesn't leave one feeling good about any country or piece of humanity and it's already a grey day. But spring has arrived a time of revolutions and a time of little green sprouts of hope. Stick a seed in the ground and remember that Revolution has the word love within it. Doug A.