There are moments when you open an email and are unexpectedly inspired. I hope you are equally inspired by the sentiments of Ken Kailing from Good Food World. While we are on seperate coasts, this note made that distance seem insignificant:
'History shows change is inevitable and sometimes occurs abruptly; at tipping points. I believe we are about there when what economists call "externalities" are going to become key variables. I also know there is an alternative food movement because I work within it every day. It isn't perfect of course, but compared to the way things have been with corporations determining everything, we have become a milestone and are being recognized. What's interesting is the speed with which young, new food producers, processors and marketers are inventing a new system at the grass roots--much faster than bureaucrats or academics (for the most part) can comprehend it.
It is definitely a people's movement, learning and building structure as it develops. Our president had it right with "Yes We Can!" at the beginning of his campaign. I don't know if he is there anymore. But we are there; we know change is upon us---natural and social systems have reached the threshold of stress, realignments are occurring.
All I'm sure of is that the old economics is finished and the weirdness of a lot of nuts rolling around cracking into each other, in Washington DC, is just a symptom of the gross instability of a [worn] out monetary program and never-[gonna]-get-well economy.
I'm seeing a new kind of stability occurring at the grass roots. It's amazing. The corporate industrial complex is becoming inefficient (waste, recalls, breakups, you name it...) whereas, locals are joining up do things in days that normally take bureaucrats and industry years. There still isn't a machine that comes close to the human mind for ingenuity.
At my age, I need to have faith in something. I've worked in academia, government, and the private sector and been a part of the never ending rationalizations. So now I'm turning back to my [mother's] pragmatism, growing up on our small organic farm in Minnesota where everything was efficient and we all were very healthy.
All of us are the real people being screwed by this system; we are screwing ourselves. But there's someone near you who could use a hand loading up their vegetables for the market. Find them, get busy and share the good company.
As my best buddy used to remind me (he's gone now), "none of us are going to get out of here alive" so "don't let the bastards get to you."
So we still have choices here in the US; in that, we are very lucky. Most of the negative pressure on [us] is psychological, NOT real. And even with addiction, there's recovery.'
