Today is Wendell Berry’s birthday. He writes on his farm, Lane’s Landing, in Port Royal, KY where he lives with his wife, Tanya.
Berry’s writings have influenced my thinking and in some cases, reinforced my thinking about topics including work, family, taking care of the earth, and eating. I have read three of his fiction books (my favorite was Jayber Crow), one poetry book, and four of his essay collection books.
One of my favorite essays is titled “The Pleasure Of Eating” and it appears in What Are People For? (1990). Berry begins the essay by writing that when asked what city people can do about the decline of the American farm, he answers, “Eat responsibly.” What does this mean?
Here is his list in a nutshell:
- Participate in food production to the extent that you can. Grow something to eat in your yard or container, make a little compost with kitchen scraps.
- Prepare your own food. You will eat more cheaply with better quality control about what you are putting in your mouth.
- Learn the origins of the food you buy and buy food produced closest to your home. Your food will be fresher, most secure, and easiest to know about.
- Whenever possible, deal directly with local farmers and gardeners.
- Learn, in self-defense, as much as you can of the economy and technology of industrial food production. What is added to your food that isn’t healthy and what do these additions cost?
- Learn what the processes are for good, responsible farming and gardening.
- Learn as much as you can about the life histories of the foods you eat.
I love these guidelines because they are true and make sense. Couldn’t most of us grow a tomato plant and a few herbs each summer? Is it rocket science to discover that okra came from Africa? Could we visit our local farmer’s market more often? Watch videos on food production in our country? Doesn’t it make sense to do these things for ourselves as well as our American farms?
