Page 118 - ECOlogic Book

hope to fix our broken world by doing more of what we did wrong in the first
place. But merely stopping the wrong things will probably not be enough
either. Have we painted ourselves into a corner where our most clever
technologies will be required to extricate us from the mess we’ve created?
Or can we just change, each of us, to practices more in harmony with

natural systems? It will probably take a combination of both to pull us back
from the brink of the destruction we’ve been causing.

A Quiet Rebellion
I heard about a man who installed a native prairie where his lawn had been.
After he tore up his lawn, but before he planted it with native prairie species,
friends and neighbors were invited to a funeral. With pomp and ceremony,
he buried his lawn mower. While his lawn mower funeral might have been
unique, this man is only one of many. A quiet rebellion is brewing. The lawn

wars have begun. With any luck they will turn into a revolution. Although
still not in any great numbers, many Americans are questioning this
anachronism called the lawn.

Other cultural influences are accelerating the buildup of this war: the
average American’s perception that she or he has less leisure time;
legislation against certain toxic pesticides, looming water and petroleum
shortages, to say nothing of both gas prices and Global Warming. These

pressures and a profound shift in consciousness that is I believe is taking
place, will increase the number of enlistments in this war, as the knowledge
of alternatives becomes more widespread.

Each of us, in our small place, longs to reconnect with nature and its
blessings. That longing is everything. That desire carries the energy that will
bring us to a new place.

My Daughter’s Lawn
Although there may be cause for tentative celebration about some of the
improvements in the big picture, it still comes down to individual efforts. The
choices we make as individuals do add up to cultural change, or stagnation,
as the case may be. Embedded, as we are, in a culture that seems in many

118