on being radical

The more I connect with the natural realm the more radical I feel myelf becoming. Now by radical I don't mean fanatical. I mean getting in touch with the root, or foundation, of things - the bottom line. This thought came to me as I was out in my garden picking beans - not the green beans that most people grow in their gardens, but the kind you leave on the vine until they're completely dried up and then you harvest them as dry beans (pinto, kidney, lima, etc.) that you can store and use throughout the winter. The only crops I had previously grown that could be stored for later use were winter squash (butternut, primarily) and potatoes. This year I tried my hand at corn and beans, letting them grow, mature and then dry on the stalk/vine until dry enough to harvest and store. As I was harvesting these crops this fall I thought, "Wow, so this is how it feels to actually grow the food that is going to sustain you throughout the winter. This is how people used to do it for thousands of years. This is what it means to be connected to the land. This is really radical!"

rad-i-cal, adj. 1. going to the root; fundamental; basic 2. favoring extreme social change or reform; extreme

Come to think of it, maybe I am a bit fanatical or extreme as well. I don't think it would be such a tragedy if our financial system totally collapsed and more people would be forced to grow their own corn and beans to survive. As I sat around the kitchen table, first joined by my 14 year old and then later by my 12 year old (and eventually by my wife and older son), all of us shelling the dry beans, I thought, "this is how our ancestors used to pass much of their time!" It might be a stretch to call it entertainment, but when you didn't have TV or the internet, or even radio, it did help you pass the time in a statisfying sort of way to sit around the table together with family and possibly neighbors, developing the fine art of conversation (which is fast becoming a lost art in our e-world of cyberspace) all the while contributing to a basic (radical) need of your (or your neighbor's) family.

One of my older sons made a very perceptive comment that ties in with all this. He said that when he has access to things like television and the internet he ends up watching or using it because it is so easy/accessible and it does bring a kind of immediate pleasure. But if he's in a situation (say, camping out in a remote place) where these things aren't an option he finds he doesn't even miss them. The reason, I believe, is because these electronic devices don't tap into the most basic, fundamental aspects of who we really are. If I had a choice between these electronic devices and shelling beans with my family and neighbors I wouldn't even have to hesitate to choose the face to face, hands on experience over the electronic option.

Am I just a hopeless old fogey refusing to face up to "future shock", to a world that's changing faster than I can adapt to it? Those whose lives are so inter-twined with the electronic media of the day would say I'm hopelessly stuck in the Middle Ages. Maybe there are true radicals out there in cyberspace as well - I'm sure there must be and I would like to meet them. All I know is that I prefer to stay close to the food production end of the spectrum (i.e. the land) because that's pretty basic to something called health and survival. I'll never forget something my grandpa Welch used to say: "When you get old there are only two things that really matter: health and family." He wasn't known to be a radical, but I would call that a radical statement.


p.s. I think I have discovered where the expression, "spilling the beans" or "don't spill the beans" comes from. As we were taking the dried beans out of their brittle shells or skins, every so often a bean of two would inadvertently pop out its shell and land on the floor or some unexpected spot (like down the neck of your shirt!). As hard as we tried it seemed like we couldn't avoid spilling at least a few beans in the process of shelling them. So have some compassion on those who just can't help "spilling the beans" - it really is hard not to!