Rural Routes/Margot Ford McMillen

Thanks for Caring

With so much going on — and you know what I mean — it’s hard to find things that anyone thinks we can affect, policy-wise. At the federal level, policies that help ordinary human beings are few and far between, and that’s true at the state and local level also. All these years of being asleep at policy’s wheel have driven us into the ditch. So, let’s find a way we can have an impact — and that’s with our families and neighborhoods.

The holidays are upon us. And, as if to prove that Americans will fight inactivity with every last cent, Christmas spending now stretches from Oct. 31 — through Halloween — to Dec. 25. While fewer Americans go to church, religious-ish celebrations get more public attention and energy than ever because they have morphed commercial bonanzas. Halloween (and, yes, the roots are pagan, then Christian) is a good example, with an estimated $8.8 billion spent on decorations, costumes, and, of course, candy. Twenty-nine million of us dressed our pets for Halloween.

Well, here at Rural Routes, we’re taking a stand for Thanksgiving—the holiday of gratitude, grandparents, and gluttony. We recommend finding a locally-raised turkey and supporting your favorite farmers by using as many of their products as you can find. For Midwesterners, that means pumpkins and apples for the pies, sweet potatoes and local greens for the side dishes. Pear cider. Local wines. This is the only four-day holiday in the year and we can make the most of it, community-wise.

Industry’s problem with Thanksgiving, apparently, is that we don’t spend enough on it. As if to make up, the Friday after the holiday is a major national shopping festival—Black Friday—which is followed the next work day for an on-line spending spree known as Cyber Monday.

But, for folks that care about our local communities and who want to take a stand for things we care about, we can convert the weekend to express our values by joining a not-spending campaign: Buy-Nothing Day on Friday, followed by shopping local during Small-Business Saturday.

This year, we can stand up taller for the things we love by bringing our values into play as we choose gifts and travel to see our favorite folks. If you’re worried about microfibers in the ocean, look for clothing made of natural fabrics—wool, cotton, linen, silk. And if you’re worried about vapor trails left by jet planes in the air, take the train to visit little Sadie. It’s only by living our values that we can be taken seriously at all. And now, to be taken seriously means to be grappling with climate change. We can only say “grappling” as none of us really know how to convert our wasteful lifestyles to sustainability. Jane Fonda says she’s not buying clothes any more, but she still flies to protests in D.C.

Now here’s a question for you: Which makes the biggest difference? Traveling by train from New York to Washington, or wearing last year’s dress to the Oscars?

The late, great Donella Meadows was a climate change pioneer, although she died before the concept “climate change” became fashionable. She wrote about systems, limits to growth, and sustainability. She taught that when we produce or consume something, we need to look at the big picture. Creating a sweater, for example, takes the energy of a knitter, but also involves a mill to make yarn, a source like plastic to make fiber (or feeding a sheep and shearing wool), and all the human energy, transportation, electricity, and shelter that it takes to create the yarn, knitting needles, buttons and so forth.

One of Meadows’ columns in The Progressive Populist marked how much of a car’s manufacture contributes to the car’s lifetime carbon footprint (although that’s not what it was called back then). It was about 30% of the car’s lifetime of pollution. Today, there’s debate. Depends on the car. Depends on the driver. Some manufacturers increase mpg every year, so that buying a newer car means a smaller carbon footprint if you drive a lot. But, if you’re a low-mileage driver, keeping the old heap is a better choice than commanding the system to mine resources, ship parts around the world, expend energy in assembly and so forth. Donella Meadows said we should look at the whole resources picture, start to finish.

When it comes to the holidays, we can really express our values: Goods get twice the life when we buy used instead of new. And, for the folks that “have everything,” we can just skip the holidays altogether. Or just give to the littlest friends and family members. Or give donations to favorite charities rather than shopping for things.

And, of course, if you really want to make a point about what you believe, give a gift membership for your favorite independent media—community radio stations are a good choice and a subscription to this newspaper is another way to inform with a gift.

With so much going on—and you know what I mean—the gift of information might be the most valuable gift of all.

Margot Ford McMillen farms near Fulton, Mo., and co-hosts “Farm and Fiddle” on sustainable ag issues on KOPN 89.5 FM in Columbia, Mo. She also is a co-founder of CAFOZone.com, a website for people who are affected by concentrated animal feeding operations. Her latest book is “The Golden Lane: How Missouri Women Gained the Vote and Changed History.” Email: margotmcmillen@gmail.com.

From The Progressive Populist, December 1, 2019

Populist.com