Like most bloggers, Loosely Speaking tries to reach readers in distant places, through discussion of a diverse array of topics, including blogging, business strategies, sports, and balancing work and family life.

In contrast to the long arm of the blog, many folks are talking these days about growing and purchasing food that has NOT traveled a vast distance to get into your fridge or pantry.

Our family supports that idea and has, in fact, bought shares in a local grower’s planned 2008 harvest. My own gardening efforts are less than stellar, so I plan meals that take advantage of locally grown foods during the peak of the Farmer’s Market season and rely on veggies grown my my dad-in-law who lives next door. Eating healthy local foods is a goal I don’t always meet, but I know when I get my exercise locally, on the lakes and trails near here, and when my dinner table includes local produce, I feel energized and my work life benefits from that effort.

My blogging friend J.J. Murphy, known in the blog world as as WriterByNature.com successfully combines her writing and photography talents with her other passion, which is nature.

In her guest post which follows, quite fitting for the middle of a lovely autumn here in North America, J.J. shares her observations on this year’s harvest and her progress toward becoming a “locavore.”

This is just one portion of the locally grown and foraged food in my house.

There’s more winter squash and nuts. There’s also a refrigerator full of veggies and a freezer full of berries, mushrooms and wild greens.

I feel really proud of my locavore harvest.

I already know that next year is going to be a challenge. My current CSA, Harmony Farms, is closing. I’ll have to travel more than 20 miles to the next closest CSA farm.

My goal is to work on the farm as well as collect my share of the harvest. There’s nothing better than freshly harvested food, especially when you are sinking your fingers into warm earth. Something about the aroma of healthy soil and the textures of earth, root, stem, leaf and blossom contributes to my eating experience.

Part of it for me is a physical connection to the world of my childhood. I was raised on a farm. Make no mistake, farming is hard work. The sun gets hot, insects abound, I don’t bend as easily as I used to.

But I’d rather dig in the earth for my vegetables – wild and cultivated – than eat in a fancy restaurant. I’d rather spend hours seeking and harvesting my own morels than pay $60 a pound in the specialty stores.

Most everyone I know is too busy to shop or cook, let alone farm. I see farming and foraging as an investment in my health. One of my universal truths is “If you don’t pay for it one way, you pay for it another way.” I’d rather bend my back in the field than spend time in the doctor’s office.

I have a long way to go to be a total locavore. I like avocados, oranges and chocolate too much to give them up completely. I do eat less of those foods than I have in the past.

Of course the other added benefit of weeding a garden, is that it’s easier to harvest the wild edibles when they are growing in rows alongside the cultivated veggies.

I’m going to miss Harmony Gardens. At the end, they were adding purslane to their mesclun. I had fantasies of demonstrating how to use chickweed and lamb’s quarters in salads and side dishes next year. Harmony Gardens farmers were also not afraid of mushrooms. One of them even made a steam-pit cooked meal. Ah, reminders of my survival school days.

But I’m determined to find another local farmer, even if I have to travel farther to get to the farm.

Thank you, J.J.!

Ah, fall. As you nestle in to the shorter days, longer nights, and your winter woolies, enjoy this season of soups and breads and pies. Whether you get to harvest some fallen nuts or spend a little extra time in your kitchen kneading fragrant yeast breads, may you find some inspiration in getting away from the computer and into the larder.