"Nature is our teacher…All we have to do is pay attention"
Before the garden of Eden was privatized by Christianity, it might have been a socialist cooperative. Ok, there were only two humans, one made from the rib of the other, and it's a Bible story with limited geological or historical evidence of existence. Abundance can be shared with sentient non-human creatures, all the same, and gardens can create communities that do not judge others—instead, providing the sustenance of community and vegetables.
Growing your own vegetables is the most human of activities.
Food Not Lawns, inspired by Food Not Bombs, is premised on the idea that abundance is the norm, and scarcity is intentionally produced. Growing food is about mutual and pooled capacities, solidarity, and exploring what can happen "when friendly neighbors share seeds, land, tools, labor and resources?"
Focusing on how to grow food in urban areas, permaculture and wild edible plants, and intentionally considering the ecology of space, Food Not Lawns is a decentralized autonomist political intuition and force, pushing back against manufactured dream capitalist lawn culture, cultivating food and conviviality.
"Using friendship-based community organizing and principles of permaculture, gift economy, and mutual aid, Food Not Lawns has been turning yards into gardens and neighborhoods into communities since 1999, when we were conceived by the Food Not Bombs family in Eugene, Oregon. For more than twenty years small, self-organized groups of grassroots gardeners have been organizing local seed swaps, joining together for garden work parties, and making lots of friends while learning more about the simple act of growing food can radically improve your home, your community, and your life."
We need food. Food is vital. Vegetables can be grown on the earth. The earth is round. People live on land. Sometimes that land is occupied by colonial powers and settler colonists, and zoned to control use. Sometimes we have backyards or window sills. Sometimes the landlord or city representatives either outlaw cultivation or destroy these gardens. Sometimes they do not.
For more information about permaculture and gardening, check out the Eco Design Hive. "Nature is our teacher. The earth teaches us how to be sustainable. All we have to do is pay attention."
