Tylda Matthews - Fire Eater!

As winter creeps ever closer here in Ireland, we find ourselves favouring porridge first thing in the morning, instead of toast, to accompany our daily apples and coffee. Sometimes we make the porridge on the oven top, when our cooking range is in the right mood; when she isn’t we use our tiny two-ring gas cooker.

A few days ago, I was eating a particularly good raisin and cinnamon porridge, cooked on Big Bess, the Stanley range, and as the warmth from the bowl spread through my body I reflected on the transference of heat from the wood that I chopped to the porridge-powered heat inside me. The sun, essentially a huge fireball, gives its heat to the earth, growing the trees; the chopped trees heat the porridge, and the porridge heats me. This in turn brought to mind a conversation I had with an old Aurovilian in our past life in India. He told me that all energy is solar energy. Coal, gas, wood, whatever, all comes from organic matter grown by the light of the sun. The sun gives us energy in sheer abundance, but what is more tricky is how to store the energy. Coal, gas and wood are essentially batteries, in this respect, locking the energy of the sun inside them until we choose to release it back into light and heat.

To this end, I’m building a power station at the bottom of our little field. So far I’ve planted 22 willow trees, with eight more to come, and once the winter is fully upon us I’ll be adding alder and birch to the mix too.  I do like the fact that smart batteries are now called power stations too, and we have a couple of those in the house - one big Anker one that more or less powers the kitchen, and a smaller Bluetti power station that powers the Reco-heat pump that pumps the hot air from our wood stove in the lounge around the house. These batteries are powered directly by the sun, via solar panels.

Now some might say that burning wood is not particularly eco friendly. But when you look at a sustainable power station  like mine (also known as a coppice), then tell me, which looks better for the environment - a coal/gas/nuclear power station belching out heavy smoke, fumes and radiation; or a small forest, which gives life to the other plants and animals as it grows, and stores sunlight energy for me when I need it? And the beauty of deciduous trees like willow, birch alder and ash is that when you cur them down, they grow back again! More than this. A deciduous tree that might only live for 100 years will live for several hundred more, if you keep coppicing it; and with a tree like willow, once you cut one down, ten more will will replace it. Can you think of another kind of battery/power station that does that? It's miraculous!

But I digress. Porridge. Mmmmm! The day that I started planting trees in our filed I felt something fall into place. It was the last piece of the puzzle, so to speak, or closing the loop. I plant the trees that store the sunlight that will cook my porridge. I capture the fire of the sun, and eat it for breakfast!

Love and Light, with just a sprinking of cinnamon, Tylda!