Grow a Revolution

Empowerment + Self-Reliance = Resistance + Resilience = Liberation

I have been thinking about a quote from writer Elizabeth Gilbert:

If life gives you lemons, don’t settle for simply making lemonade – make a glorious scene at a lemonade stand.

Photo: Freedomain.net

Friends, we are facing difficult times worldwide. In the US, the massive funding cuts, the political machinations of a madman and his cabal of cowardly and complicit elites, and the dismantling of democratic ideals, respectful norms, and laws are generating a collective fear and uncertainty that is palpable in our communities.

Last month, the Trump Administration cut $660 million from school food programs and $500 million from national food banks. The GOP is currently considering slashing SNAP funding, a program that helps feed 41 million Americans who struggle to afford food. Food insecurity continues to increase: nearly 50 million Americans, including 1 in 5 children, experience hunger. Over 7 million seniors live with food insecurity. Hunger exists in every American community, and many Americans are one paycheck or medical diagnosis away from living with a lack of food. ¹

Hunger in a country that grows and exports more food than any other country is appalling. In my agricultural county, 20% of residents live with food insecurity.

We have little to no control over government policies and corporate practices. Yes, we must raise our political voices daily in whatever ways we can. Still, we are discovering how fragile our form of government is, especially when the elite abandons any sense of decency and compassion.

Since the pandemic, we have all experienced the rising cost of food. Food policy experts warn us that food production costs will continue to increase as fertilizer, pesticides, labor, and transportation costs rise. The effects of climate change, disease, deregulation, and corporate monopolization of food production will also continue to impact food costs.

Benefits of Growing Food

This month, I am chitting potatoes, turning heavy wet compost, propagating sweet potato slips, sowing seeds, and prepping for the planting season in my garden. Though the snow has melted, the temperatures are still not conducive to vegetable gardening (25F this morning!). I am thankful to have the opportunity to grow some of my food and thought about the many benefits of growing food, herbs, and flowers:

• Nutritious, toxin-free, and a diversity of foods

• Daily time spent in nature

• Enjoying a garden economy (e.g., saving money)

• Physical movement

• Experiencing wonder and awe

• Engaging my brain through learning and problem-solving

• Daily creative expression

• Sense of empowerment and self-reliance

This year, I am grateful for the distraction of time in the garden; it offers hope in each seed I plant.

We Are Better Together

We have a choice: we can be defined by the actions of a corrupt government, or we can define who we are by our actions. We can’t tie our well-being to things outside of our control. Nobody is coming to save us. We can take back some of our power and engage our communities in resistance and resilience by following Joni Mitchell’s 1969 advice offered in her song Woodstock:

We are stardust

Billion-year-old carbon

We are golden

Caught in the devil's bargain

And we've got to get ourselves

back to the garden

Revolutions usually start small and are responses to tyranny. One way to regain some of our power is to grow some of what we eat, support small farms that serve our regions, and lend a helping hand to those in our communities who live with hunger insecurity.

Permaculturalist Bill Mollison observed nature and Indigenous ways of living and said,

“All the world’s problems can be solved in a garden.”

Let’s begin a garden revolution. The concept is not new: during WWI and II, citizens planted victory gardens to supplement their rationed food and boost morale. I want to take back the president’s recent mockery of the word liberation and use it to define our resilience effort: Liberation Gardens.

We can create abundance in our communities, build a locally controlled food economy, and escape some of the political and financial control by the wealthy and powerful. Let’s make a glorious lemonade stand to celebrate our determination and abundance. I think it’s a grand, creative opportunity for the elders to initiate.

Will you join me?

Food for Thought and Actions

• Start a garden. It doesn’t have to be big or require land. Grow lettuce, greens, and herbs in containers on a patio or balcony. If you have a yard, create a few raised beds for tomatoes, zucchini, potatoes, and green beans. Create a Three Sisters garden (squash, corn, beans) in your backyard. Better yet, put it in your front yard to inspire and share.

• Join a community garden. Connect with your neighbors to learn more about growing food and share the abundance.

• No community garden? Start one. (see resources below)

• Raise hens. Trade your eggs for vegetables from gardeners. (Bonus: Watching chickens is fascinating.)

• Shop at farmers' markets and support your local market growers, who are not subsidized by the federal government and won’t receive bailouts like commodity farmers because of the tariffs.

• Learn to preserve summer’s bounty by canning, fermenting, and drying food for winter’s use.

• Avoid the price increases of tariffs and transportation on imported food. Commit to eating seasonally and regionally.

• If you eat meat, source healthier grass-fed and pastured meat from regional producers.

• Start a seed library at your local library branch. (my post below offers resources)

• Buy seeds from small regional growers and seed organizations focusing on heirloom seeds, such as Seed Savers Exchange.

• Participate in gleaning projects. Gleaners harvest unpicked produce from orchards and gardens and, in some areas, food from restaurants. See if your area has a gleaning project.

• Learn to forage greens, mushrooms, and berries sustainably.

• Learn to fish and/or hunt.

• Start a school garden. (see resources below)

• Contact your local food bank, food pantry, or soup kitchen to learn how to best support their efforts. You can search by zip code here.

• Offer free workshops on gardening, cooking from scratch, and food preservation.

• Complete your region’s Extension Service Master Gardeners and Master Food Preservers programs.

• Mentor a new gardener.

• Become a non-profit board member for an organization that fights hunger and builds a local food economy. I wrote about my regional non-profit that has significantly contributed to local food production.

Our defining gift as humans is our power to choose, including our power to choose our collective future. It is a gift that comes with a corresponding moral responsibility to use that power in ways that work to the benefit of all people and the whole of life.

David Korten, author of The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community

1. Feedingamerica.org

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Resources

The best website I have found about growing, foraging, and preserving food is Ashley Adament’s Practical Self-Reliance. I refer to it regularly. She also has a Substack:

Starting a Food Garden

How to Start a School Garden

USDA School Garden Overview

Community Gardens

How to Grow a Three Sisters Garden

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  Alright, community. Share your best advice about growing food, herbs or flowers. Favorite fermenting or canning recipes? Other tips for growing a revolution?