animals
2008: a new home, new ways of living, new thinking
2008 was the year I predicted, somewhat casually at some point in the previous 12 months, that the proverbial shit would hit the fan with regard to the world economy, climate change, and fossil fuels. It gives me no pleasure whatsoever to have been right, but the end of rampant, unfettered consumerism—or at least its death throes—affords us new opportunities to learn how to work with, instead of against, the natural world. We spend less, we cut back on usage, we make less waste, we recycle more. That’s the hope, and it makes sense financially now as well as environmentally.
We started off this year in a new home surrounded by boxes and chaos, but we quickly settled in and almost immediately set out to begin realising our vision of a back garden filled with chickens, bees, fruit and vegetables. I contacted the Battery Hen Welfare Trust and four ex-bat ladies were retired to us in February, near-featherless, weak-legged, often motionless, and traumatised for the first few weeks until healing of little minds and bodies began. They discovered the joys of being handled gently and compassionately, and seemed to marvel at the wonder of worms, bugs, slugs, grass, sky, earth and (mostly wet) weather.
tags: 2008, 2009, anniversaries, Battery Hen Welfare Trust, battery hens, Big Brother, blessings, broomstick culture, cultural memes, Druidism, eco-towns, environmentalism, intensive farming, meat, moving house, Paganism, politics, privacy, spirituality, technology, Tesco, Witchcraft
