Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[Laurie Ann Powell <laurie@powellclan.com>]

Quote: One truck hauling a thousand dozen eggs is less of a problem than 500 cars driving out to get 2 dozen eggs apiece. 

I'd like to mention that part of the shift a person has to do when s/he learns to cook "slow food" and live without super-markets is more long-term planning.  Suburban housewives will have to fill their freezers and add pantries and larders back in to their home-keeping concepts.  Presumably, suburban housewives will do what rural housewives already do: grow some  themselves, plan ahead, combine trips and cooperate with one another.

To use eggs as the example, no one should have to drive a long way to obtain something that can be produced in an 5x10 strip of land virtually free.   Changing people's perceptions of animals is necessary so that chickens, pigs or goats are making the most of the space and producing food within walking distance. Then, distance shopping can be much more occasional. 500 cars making a 45 minute trip to the farm once or twice a month for real food in bulk  may balance out with however many trucks pour daily into the freeways to drive 10 hours to deliver Egg Beaters and Twinkies.

I'm no statistician, but I think my logic is right: everything will have to change, not just one element of the picture. And it is changing: as Carrie reported, we are having a constant influx of people who are ready to live well, be well and reconnect with the land. 

Let's get busy inviting people into this life, and giving the benefit of the doubt that change is possible.  If this "born in Boston" girl can butcher her own chickens and stand in manure in an Oklahoma thunderstorm wiping scour-y goat bottoms, I think just about anybody can!


Laurie Ann