Sometimes I chuckle and other times I shake my head at how heavily influenced I am by our Material World. It is as if the continual onslaught of Messages has somehow forged tiny little ruts in my Brain. When I see a word, phrase or image in that rut, I just give a conditioned response. Such was the case with the images provoked by this little Button in the last few days.Melanie picked up this Button when she attended Farm Aid in St. Louis earlier in the month. Of course, Farm Aid is an advocacy group for Small Farmers. When she 1st showed me this Button, I saw the words "Power Tools" and my brain jumped to images of Chainsaws, Power Drills, Table Saws, and the like. Curiously, those concepts come right out of a Culture which is patriarchal too.
It took 2 days before I actually saw the real images on this little Button. At which point, my sometimes overactive Brain came to a screeching halt. I am surprised I did not get a kind of whiplash. But I just smiled and sort of chuckled instead.
On closer examination, I noted the images were of a Pitch Fork and Dinner Fork. These simple Tools are the Power Tools of the Small Farmer who produces the Food and the Consumer of Food which includes just about Everybody.
Can you even imagine the Power that we have in those Choices? I can see a transformed World where we either grow our own Food or know the Farmer who produces it. I can imagine that the Food on the Plate which looks up at us comes from our Local Area which has been transformed into something Healthy, Whole, and Complete. It becomes something we will be proud to pass down to the Children who follow. Plus that Food looks up to Humans who have become Healthy, Whole and Complete. Now that is Power. Everything else pales by comparison.
You will note the Button is on a background of Cracked Wheat which Richard ground for the Pretzels that Melanie is making this week. You will also note that the very tiny print on the bottom of the button refers to Home Grown, which Farm Aid created as place where those Two-Leggeds can connect to Farms and to Each Other. http://www.homegrown.org/
Those Buttons and Insights may surely be designed to wake us up a bit. They help to smooth out those Ruts toward the development of more Life Affirming Practices. Thanks, Home Grown...
3 comments:
Hi Glinda,
I drop in occasionally to see what's happening there.
You may or may not recall me...Rich gave me my allergy shots one summer (so I wouldn't have to find a clinic in town) when you folks were living in a cabin at Ruthven, IA. You were raven haired, Melody was an adorable toddler, Rich's hands were scarred with coot scratches, and I was an untested 20-year-old.
It seems a few things have changed since then.
Rich and I exchange a note every now and then. I enjoy the contact with a longtime friend and I enjoy your thoughts through your blog.
It seems you've traded academic labors for those much more physical. May you all be capable of maintaining this happy existence for years and years to come.
Jim Eilers
ISU '76
Jim...
I remember your name from those lovely years on Mud Lake. We were all little more than kids, just practicing our new skills at being adults. Richard and I were both pleased that you had reconnected with him after all these years. It is so wonderful to reconnect with Folks who we have journeyed beside if only for a short while.
I am honored that you would be checkin' out the Blog once in a while. Thanks for the lovely wishes. Life is surely a gift. The only moment without our grasp is now.
Good wishes always, glinda
Jim...
I am always amused at typos. I sometimes wonder exactly what they mean. The last sentence of the previous note should read: "The only moment within our grasp is now." Perhaps it was presumptious of me to state it is "within our grasp". Often it seems outside too.
Regardless, we just do the best that we can.
g
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