This month I hope to whip up some fictional blog posts as part of the August NaBloPoMo challenge. Today’s question posted by the NaBloPoMo gang was:
What is your favorite book?
My name is Susan and I am a bookaholic. While some folks may have closets full of shoes or clothes, I have a home that is overflowing with books. I make good use of my local library and local independent bookstore. My dad was a bookaholic too. When I was growing up we used to hit the library on Thursday nights until closing time, always bringing home pile of books on different topics. I’m sure my dad is smiling from heaven as he sees me reading all these books.
My pile of bedside books: August 2011
Since I’ve got a touch of ADD, I am usually in the middle of at least 3 books at any one given time. My bedside table usually gives a good clue about what I’m up. I just clicked this photo today. As you can see, all of these books are non fiction and most of them are about gardening or composting.
Let It Rot! The Gardener’s Guide to Composting
Second Nature– a collection of essays by Michael Pollan on gardening
Grow the Good Life – What a Vegetable Garden Will Make You Happy, Healthy, Wealthy and Wise. A nice read by Michele Owens.
The Earth Knows My Name by Patricia Klindienst. A great ethnobotany book about gardens and culture.
Holy Shit ( great title huh?) Managing Manure to Save Mankind by Gene Logsdon
and last but not least, on the top of the pile lies Navigating the Coming Chaos by Carolyn Baker.
How does that last book on navigating chaos fit in with all the other books on gardening and composting? That’s a good question, let me explain. The premise of Navigating Chaos is that we are witnessing the collapse of industrial civilization. If you stop to think about it, we are facing challenges like never before when it comes to the environment, the economy and to energy. All three of these “E’s” connect directly to the food we eat.
Environment: climate change, global weirding, whatever name you want to give to the wacky weather we are now having. Droughts, record heat, along with floods and heavy downfalls. This sort of weather really gets in the way of growing food. For example, last summer Russia had such extreme drought conditions and fires that this year, they could not export any wheat which in turn drove up the cost of grain worldwide.
Economy: here in America, our cheap food is killing us. Don’t even get me started with things like obesity, allergies and questionable chemicals in all the crappy edible foodlike substances we eat! Want to eat real food? That’s going to cost more money. Sadly, we live in a country where a happy meal cost less than a healthy meal. As the weather gets wackier, the cost of food gets higher.
Energy: Our industrial food requires fossil fuels every step of the way. Some studies show that we use 10 calories of fossil fuel for every one calorie of food. The cost of these fossil fuels continue to rise as the easy to get fuels become more scarce.
Needless to say this is some heavy duty stuff to be reading before going to sleep. But this is exactly why the gardening and composting books help me to sleep at night.
One solution to the many challenges we face is to simply get our hands into the earth and grow some food. There is no better solution than starting a garden.
I dream about a world that has enough clean, safe, healthy food for every one to eat. Food that doesn’t make a mess on the planet. Food that is close to home, food that anyone and everyone can grow.
I dream of a world where every school has a garden. Where parents don’t have to get angry and fight about crap in the cafeteria, because the food in the cafeteria comes from nearby gardens instead of the Sysco truck! Those parents are putting their energy into helping those gardens grow instead. Where all parts of core curriculum are connected with the garden and of course, composting. A worm bin in every classroom to help schools become zero waste and to help create fertilizer for the garden too. As a result of gardens being incorporated into the school day, kids would be stronger and would think more clearly than they do eating junk food.
What books are at your bedside table? Do they help you to build the future you want to create?
