This past spring, I made a decision about the garden that probably should have been obvious: grow what we would actually eat or use. In previous years, I bought tons of seeds, overplanted, and watched too much go into the compost bin (and before you come at me, I always gave away a ton and offered to local resources). Part of that was learning what I could grow well and part of it was sheer delusion on what I would create with it, but I digress.
This year, I still went a little overboard on the tomatoes, but in my defense, how was I supposed to know that one plant would do that well? So, I learned to cook with them, which if you know me is really SOMETHING huge. (Let’s just say my mom knew how to make reservations, not cook.)
That’s one small change in one garden, but it gets at something I want to talk about, because it reaches well beyond what any of us plant. I said it on a panel in NH when we were talking about the legacy we want to leave behind, and it keeps replaying in my head:
If we don’t start thinking more like stewards of the earth, there will be no legacy to leave for future generations.
We can spend our lives building something to pass down, but all of it depends on the world being able to sustain the people who come after us. We tend to leave that part out of the conversation.
We talk about leaving our children some financial security, opportunities we might not have had ourselves. Those things matter, of course I’d like to make their lives a little easier when I’m no longer here. But clean water and soil that can grow food belong in that conversation, too. We cannot take them for granted while carefully planning everything else.
The word stewardship asks something of us that ownership alone doesn’t. Owning something gives us choices about what to do with it. Caring for it means thinking about what those choices will leave behind, including after we’re gone. For me, that’s the responsibility we should be talking about more.
Now, before this starts sounding like I have a perfectly sustainable life and I’m judging anyone who doesn’t, I need to declare it here, I DO NOT…at all. There are things I could do better every single day. Like most of us, I’m a work in progress; however, I also don’t want our inability to do everything perfectly to become the reason we do nothing differently.
Whether we’re gardening, choosing what we put on our skin, in our house or buying locally when we can, it all adds up. We won’t always have the same options, but it’s worth paying attention to the ones we do have.
That includes keeping an eye on the laws being proposed and changed, even when following it all feels exhausting (and depressing). I also don’t expect to change a law myself, but I can change a purchase. We can think about where our money goes and what we’re supporting when we spend it.
We’re not going to get every choice right. I certainly won’t. But we make these decisions all the time, and I think we sometimes underestimate the influence we have through them.
That’s where I am with all of this lately. Learning to use what I grow, being more thoughtful about what I buy, and looking at what care means in the work I create and share. I’m sure I’ll continue to get some of it wrong. I’d just like to get better at noticing.
I’d love to leave my children something that makes their lives a little easier. I’m beginning to think more about what I need to take care of now for that to be possible.
With love from Dragonfly Farm,
Indie
“I also don’t want our inability to do everything perfectly to become the reason we do nothing differently.” - spoke to me so much. Thank you!