the Legacy of My Fathers

Bring Back the Victory Gardens

March 21, 2010 at 12:37 am (Politics) (economy, guns, second amendment, survival, survivalist)

If Americans wait to roll up their sleeves and get their hands dirty, it may be too late. We need to get closer to the earth now, so that the earth can nourish us; and so that we can rediscover the things that matter most.

WHEN WE MOVED IN NEXT TO A SWEET OLD WOMAN in a rural area three and a half years ago, there was a horse in her corral. By the end of 2008, the horse was gone. And, in the Spring of 2009, the corral was planted fencepost to fencepost with vegetables, more than the little old lady could possibly care for, keep, or eat. But her kids came every week or two and worked in the garden.

My guess is: It was her idea. After the economic meltdown of 2008 she knew what to do, and prevailed upon her children to put in a garden, and she was thinking more of them than herself when she made them do it. The woman is old enough to remember the Great Depression and the Victory Gardens of World War II.

My mom used to say, “I don’t know what people are ever going to do if there’s another depression. When I was growing up, pretty much everybody had a farm or knew someone who did, and that’s how they ate.”

Ladies and gentlemen, food doesn’t come from grocery stores; especially when one can’t afford it because it is four times as expensive as it was a year or two ago, and definitely not when hyper inflation makes prices rise many times higher than that.

The government will likely be forced to hit the reset button on the economy. That means the value of the dollar will sooner or later go into free fall. If it does, many people will lose their life’s savings, which is something they can survive without. Bank accounts don’t mean much anyway when people can’t eat.

When my neighbor lady planted a garden she was too frail to keep, she was using her native good sense and experience to do what matters. So what if she was maybe a year or two or even three early? Her kids and neighbors got some good produce. Chances are, if she can get them to do it, they will plant again this year, and maybe this year or next year they’ll need it. You don’t want to wait until people are turning hungry and violent to say, “Maybe I should plant a garden next Spring.”

One thing’s sure: on the course the economy is taking, not to mention the government, we are going to need something like the old Victory Gardens of World War II. In those years, the people of the United States ploughed up available spaces and furnished 40 percent of our vegetable supply from non-farm sources. This freed up billions of dollars to fight the war and saved lives. And, of course, people’s health improved from better diet and exercise.

Let me lay out a scenario: Parts of this country now depend on having almost all of their food shipped in. What’s a person to do when food prices go so high that people can’t afford them? First, people must start breaking in and looting. Then, they must start using guns. When they are done raiding the neighborhood grocery store, they must begin ranging farther afield.

Fine, we all buy guns and defend what’s ours, especially our gardens. What happens then? You shoot a hungry looter. You feel terrible about it. But the next time, the looters show up in a gang, only they don’t tell you. You think there’s only one and walk right into an ambush. They take your food and leave you for the ambulance to pick up. Or maybe just one shows up, but he’s carrying an Uzzi. They are going to make sure you are out-gunned.

Really, that is no solution. What we need to do is take personal responsibility for growing as much of our own food as possible. But let’s not get so hung up on the issue of responsibility that we let other people go hungry who can’t plant a garden of their own. Growing our own food will relieve pressure on the food supply and keep prices down. Then we need to think about neighbors and family. It’s time to learn what it is to be a community again.

But we shouldn’t stop there. We ought actually to be shipping food to food outlets in the cities. Too much work? Hey, we are in a crisis; and it will get a lot worse if we don’t do what needs to be done. My elderly neighbor understands that; but it’s time for a younger generation to figure it out.

So let’s do this thing. Let’s have Victory Gardens with the idea that it’s us, We the People, and not the government mandating it. And the victory that we’re fighting for is a victory over our circumstances and over the tyranny of a government that wants to, but can’t, pick up the pieces. Only we can do that.

And we need to plant some signs next to our gardens too, saying:

Victory Gardens:
From Your Friends and Neighbors, Not Your Uncle Sam