N is for Nature
Our greatest delusion, our most destructive belief is that humanity is separate from nature–not animal, not of the earth, not returning to the soil under our feet or the air over our heads. We create specialized ghettos for nature, with national parks and pretty coffee table books that fertilize the delusion of our apartness, and then we lead lives imagined to be wholly of our own construction.
Good small farming is a deliberate rejection of this delusion, a daily practice of being part of nature through more careful cooperation and competition. The small farmer’s every task is determined by the natural world. Farming strips off the rose-colored glasses that give rise to the absurd assumption that we are well and truly apart from nature and returns a bit of awe and love and respect to the soil and air to which we belong.
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Reading this week: Holy Shit: managing manure to save mankind by Gene Logsdon (terrific) and Two Cheers for Anarchism by James C. Scott.
