"The problem of sustainability is simple enough to state. It requires that the fertility cycle of birth, growth, maturity, death, and decay--what Albert Howard called "the Wheel of Life"--should turn continuously in place, so that the law of return is kept and nothing is wasted. For this to happen in the stewardship of humans, there must be a cultural cycle, in harmony with the fertility cycle, also continuously turning in place. The cultural cycle is an unending conversation between old people and young people, assuring the survival of local memory, which has, as long as it remains local, the greatest practical urgency and value. This is what is meant, and is all that is meant, by 'sustainability.' The fertility cycle turns by the law of nature. The cultural cycle turns on affection."
-- Wendell Berry
The quote above is from a lecture Wendell Berry gave a few weeks ago as the recipient of the Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities, a very high honor granted to one person a year who has made a significant contribution to the humanities. It's a very moving and relevant talk and I basically think you should just stop reading this and go straight to the National Endowment for the Humanities page and read it in its entirety. But before you do, or just in case you don't, I would like to briefly pick up and emphasize Mr Barry's point about affection and sustainability, and how it relates to dirt.
We value the things we love (or care or have affection for,) and we deepen that affection through contact, and through the intimacy that arrises from that contact. For a farmer who works in the fields every day of the year, soil is not an abstraction. But for those of us who also depend on this soil because it grows the food that we eat, it can be quite abstract. We don't know its smell or texture or its particular shade of brown or black or red. We don't know what has grown in it in previous years, what kind of minerals it is high in or how much rain has fallen on it. And yet without soil, we would die. How can something so intrinsic to our health and life be so removed from our affection? How can that be good for us or the soil or life in general on planet Earth?
I suggest, therefore, that if you eat, then you might want to concern yourself with dirt. You might want to get a little closer to the soil that grows your food, become acquainted with it's scent and secrets. If you don't want to roll around in it, or at least grab a handful and raise it to your nose, then how can you imagine eating something from it? Do not let this fundamental stuff, this absolutely essential substance, remain unknown.
Visit a farm, or your own back yard, or bring a pot of soil home and try to grow something in your window. Enter into the cycle of sustainability. Find the value and urgency that is keeping you alive. Get your hands dirty.
Related: Weekend Meditation: Some People Grow Things
(Image: Thomas Hart Benton)
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That's so true,.l:)
I can't stand dirt. I don't like farms (I grew up in farm country--I know farms well). If I lived in another century and had to be a farmer's wife, I'd be one cranky lady for life. I love living in a huge city. I love that the farmers come HERE, bringing all the great stuff they grew, with a minimum of dirt. I'm delighted that people out there WANT to deal with dirt, and manure, and irritating farm animals, and weather, and all that. But for me: no. I don't even like dealing with the dirt in a little pot of herbs on the windowsill. I have a black thumb. So hooray for the farmers--and leave me out of it.
Kudos on choosin a Thomas Hart Benton painting as illustration...very fitting.
I began reading Wendell Barry's "The Unsettling of America" yesterday, so today's post resonates. I have also begun my first garden this year and "dirt" resonates as well.
Thank you
LOVE Wendell Barry, glad to hear of the award. Have seldom read anyone who can instill in us the affection for the simple, for dirt, good food, smiles... You won't find a more worthwhile read than anything he writes.
Lovely post, thanks. I'm off to read the lecture in its entirety.
QUOTE: If you don't want to roll around in it, or at least grab a handful and raise it to your nose, then how can you imagine eating something from it?
This comment speaks to my spirit. I just stepped out of the shower after a long, sweet afternoon in the garden. I definitely looked like I rolled around in it and, in fact, the idea is not unappealing :)
After working with horses for many years, I've developed an affection for dirt. After a day at the barn, I come home covered in dust, dirt, sweat, poop particles, and hair. Sometimes I think I've gotten a tan, only to have it wash off in the shower. I'd rather eat something that fell on the ground there than just about any public floor. I don't mind the dirt.
Wendell Berry is so inspiring. His poetry is as beautiful as his prose, and often glorifies the common, dusty, earthy moments in life. So glad he has received this honor.
It's been ages since I've commented, but this post and the Wendell Berry link are so marvelous that I wanted to thank you for this post.
When I followed the link to his lecture, I had that curious feeling when I read it how certain writing bears so much more meaning than other writing. I hope that we will harvest the fruits of the awareness that posts like yours bring during our lifetime!
I turn this on it's head in some way... Dirt that abstraction could be anything that we tend to avoid, or turn away from. What is it that turns us towards that which we try to scrub out of our life? what happens when we do. Be it dirt or feeling bad or the myriad other things I forget are all an important part of my life. I don't have to scrub my life clean. It is already clean.