Introduction

I was always told I'd be a late bloomer. My thirties are fast becoming a thing I talk of in the past tense, though it still feels weird to say "when I was in my twenties". But the main difference between who I was and who I am now is that while I used to be happy to talk a lot, then make excuses to put obstacles in the way of actually doing anything, nowadays I've run out of excuses so I guess I'm just going to have to knuckle down to walking the walk.  As the man said, ain't nobody gonna walk it for me!

The thing I always talked about wanting to do was to have a go at doing for myself what my dad tried (and to a degree succeeded) to do when I was little. That is, self-sufficiency. He moved us out to the middle of nowhere and worked a fair sized plot of land with fruit, veg, livestock and so on whilst striking up deals with locals to get the things he couldn't produce himself.

I dare say in some ways that was easier in the late 70s and early 80s, when health & safety legislation wasn't as prohibitive to the smallholder as it is today.  But on the other hand, he had 7 or 8 mouths to feed while I have only two (and sometimes three): myself, my 15 year old daughter and my occasionally visiting 17 year old who just left home to live in her friend's spare room so she can be closer to college.

Another advantage I have over my dad is that I live in a time of EU grants and subsidies, and I live on a large country estate where I rent my home from the aristocrat that owns it - along with various tenant farmers who, as per the landlord's preference, practice sustainable, organic farming methods. I live between two deer parks and the meat from the shoots is sold at the local butcher's. I also regularly volunteer at a working historic windmill which produces flour from local grain by wind power.

So, since I haven't got the excuse any more of being a single dad with two small kids in a small flat on a city council estate without a driving licence, it's about time I began to put my money - and my time and the work of my hands - where my mouth has been all these years.

This blog will chronicle the process of me trying to obtain increasing proportions of my diet and daily necessaries from within as small a radius of where I live as possible. Here in the heart of Lincolnshire - England's bread basket as it's called - it shouldn't be difficult.

But unlike dad, I don't aim towards self-sufficiency. My aim is more to get myself into harmony with the land here that I love, and to let it provide for as many of my needs as possible, though that doesn't mean I have to produce everything myself. I want to find out what others in the area are producing and coordinate with them, get producers and consumers in the area talking to each other.

That's the theory. Time, and this blog, will tell!

The title and URL are inspired by one of my favourite folk songs :)