Positive Vibrations (A Hadley Farmship Update)

Two years ago on the same Monday after the Bear Stearns collapse, my son arrived at his work place to find the doors shut. I was working on an elementry school in Maricopa and I remember sitting around the job trailor (do they still do that?) with the other foremen and discussing a thirties style run on the banks. Well, the feds more than doubled their garuntee on our deposits to 250,000 and garunteed another thirteen trillion in toxic assets that the "to big to fails" had dined on and everything was fine. Unless you happen to be one of the twenty five percent of us that earn our livings making stuff.

At that time I was smack dab in the middle of my investigations into our industrial food chain and our cities resiliency. One line from an article by a U of A professor published in the AZ repub. stands out. At some point in the near future unless you have learned to forage locally, Arizonas big city residents will not have enough food. (I paraphrase) I sat there that Monday evening and here is what I saw: The US Empire was dying economically and would begin using military power as its economic power recedes. Our urban areas would become death traps as the supply lines shut down. Our Monoculture food chain would cease to feed us. I basically was expecting some sort of historical event similar to “The Great Leap Forward” famine of the 1930’s China.

That potential is deffinately still there, the boulder is at the top of the hill, but at least it has not started rolling down. Our economy is not any better today. (the toxic assests are still there and garunteed by your great great great grandchildren) The industrial food chain still provides 99 percent of our food. Our economy is still 70 percent consumption, and a return to consumption would still hurt the Earth. Yet today I have hope. Why? what could possibly be giving me hope in this day? It certainly isn’t Obama with his appointments of the likes of Larry Summers and Tim Gietner, and his escalation of the war in Pakistan. It isn’t anything you could read in the Paper, no it is the people I have met over the last two years. We the people are giving me hope.

Its been a big week at The Hadley Farmship. I met many new folks this week. Chris from the ASU school of sustainability interviewed me on Friday afternoon. All of the students I have talked with from this school get it. The fact that this school exists and that young folks like Chris, Bradon, and Lauren understand sustainability, well that would be enough for hope all by itself. Then Saturday we had a good market day, and OUR FIRST TOUR. Rose’,(aka The Herb Godess, or The Pomegrant Lady) set up a tour with her garden club. We certainly enjoyed the visit and I personally am energized every time a person is enthused by our project.

So I sit today in the compost yard at The Hadley Farmship, and this is what I see: With a simple six months head start, Phoenix could feed itself. There are real unindoctrined people who are working on just that. Overt consumption is becoming unstylish. Most people would consider themselves enviromentalists. Many people understand that not only will the economy not come back, we don’t even want it to.

I see, The Nuestro Barrio project bringing the reality of urban agriculture and the stability of permaculture to our inner city. I see The Downtown Phoenix Public Market creating an economic niche for the socially responsible or the desperate. I see the cooperation between city hall and The ASU School of Sustainability. I see AZHS, The Permaculture Guild, and Rose’s garden club bringing us togeater and giving us strength. I see the succesful organic commercial enterprises like Maya’s and Carl Seacat. I see The Transition Movement gaining strength. I see people with eyes wide open.

The above are solutions to a problem. If you do not believe there is a problem, than obviously the solutions fall on deaf ears. I have created a list of premises for which The Hadley Farmship is a solution. If you agree with the following statements, than I suggest that The Sustainability and Local Food Movements are your best recourse.

-Environmentalism is the issue of the day. Weather from a belief that Mother Earth has unaliegnable rights or from the notion of human survival, our physical environment needs our undivided attention.

-At some point in the future, fossil fuels will become scarce. It would be prudent to enact a “controlled descent” program for our fossil fuel use, rather than wait for shortages to reduce.

-The industrial food chain and industrial pollution are the cause of modern chronic diseases including behavioral abnormalties due to neural toxins.

-Not only is the economy not coming back, we do not want it to. Full employment based on cunsumption is unsustainable.

-competition is not the correct method for dispearsing finite resources for basic human need.

- (extra credit) “The War on Drugs” is ineffective as an answer to addiction, and instead is an instrument of state control. I include this on my list, because the people who will provide the labor for the movement are the people most effected by drug control measures. We need to free the lower class from the fear of arrest for private behaviors.

I am a believer in the ascension of the Human Race. We are temporary players in a movement from more brutality to less. If we do not persue our own slight bump in the right direction, why are we blessed with the opportunity to walk the face of this planet?

Peace--Charly