Location Taken: Rest Area most likely in Ohio
Time Taken: May 2011
There’s an odd aspect of rest areas: they’re located in areas where the land was cheap and available, which usually means far into the country. They’re surrounded by forests and farms, sometimes right on the other side of the fence.
I’ve got farming in the blood. Mainly dairy farming, but still, farming. None of my close relatives farm, though. My grandfathers both became engineers (Civil on Mom’s side, Mechanical on Dad’s). Their kids followed suit with more technical fields, and the grandkids are the same. Still, I’ve got some second cousins who grew up on farms and likely will farm. Oddly enough, that’s on the sides of the family I spend little time with. I did visit a family dairy farm once when I was younger, the one and only time I spent a full week with my paternal grandmother. That whole side of the family is really not at all bit on talking and family gatherings, though. My Mom’s side is much more social, though my maternal grandmother’s side (the one I spend most of my time with) is oddly social, given that we’ve got a strong genetic tendency towards social phobia. Our yearly family reunions tend to be quiet events. My Grandpa’s side is more social, but I’ve barely met them. They do farm, though, and one of them still works the farm my Great-Grandpa owned. Technically when this posts I’ll have already gone to my first family reunion on that side, but I’m writing this early.
Gardens are much more my speed. My mom has a decent-sized garden, and her mother has a large one. Me, I’ve got a few houseplants. I’d kinda like to try greenhouse or hydroponic gardening at some point. My problems with sunlight make standard gardening less than optimal. I like homegrown veggies and herbs, though. And it’s solidly a good idea health-wise and budget-wise, assuming you eat as many veggies as I do.
I also like the looks of the wall gardens I’ve seen, and some of the indoor climate gardens, the ones that provide clean air and cooling for a building far better than AC does, if nowhere near as easily. Maybe I’ll try some of those when I get my own space where I can experiment with such things. My house is too small, plus the only room I feel comfortable messing around with to that degree is my bedroom, which I keep too dark for just about every plant. The new shoots for my ZZ plant
keep coming up very pale…
