November has started with a great wind. Seems that we are in for some cold this first week of November and that is a good thing for the preparation of meat. We often have warm and sometimes hot weather at this time and it can make meat gathering and storage into a race as opposed to the earthworms pace of life. That it has cooled off is a good thing in that respect.
However, there is another side. The tomatoes, beans, Southern peas, corn and squash are still blooming. The tomatoes are heavy with fruit and the corn is making ears. So, the hope is that there will not be a frost. The prognosticators are conjuring up a frost for tonight and tomorrow night. One can only hope that they are struck down.
As the title of this post(Blod-Monath)indicates this is the traditional time for slaughtering of livestock and the hunting of game. This insures that the table will continue to be burdened with food for the winter months and the celibrations that occur in these same months. And so it goes that Deer Hunting season begins on Saturday. One might think that it would be cause for excitement out here on the rolling savanna, but that would be a mass understanding (also a misunderstanding).
The masses will come to the hills beginning tonight and tomorrow and shoot up the place. They will be dined by the towns 'club women and men' and keep the State's warden busy collecting revenue. They will drink deeply and feast greatly in the halls (converted barns) of the bankers, lawyers and oil men. From all appearances it will be a great and glorious 'hunt' for those "unintelligent, ignorant, myopic, incapable of psychical development, but prodigiously sagacious and prehensile" mass-men that come here once a year.
However, for those of us who are "of necessity fitted closely into the pattern of the changing year, who were of the earth and what grows in it," this weekend will be a time of 'staying in.' There will be great danger in the wood these days as the mass-minded are among us. The dogs will be kept inside, the children dressed in bright colors, and with God's mercy no livestock will be shot down.
There will be much to keep us occupied indoors. Vegetables to be canned or frozen, peas to be shelled, corn to shuck and bread to bake. So, in all even the moderate disturbances of the barbarians we will contue to be blessed and fill our days with joyful service to those who have been given to us as gifts.
SDG
