The Red, White, and Green

Photo via Flickr: Cherrylynx

I usually like to keep things pretty positive here, but the other night I had a dream I just can’t seem to shake. In it, I was told that the earth’s population will be a mere 2 billion by the year 2103, having reached its peak of 9 billion sometime in my lifetime and then drastically reduced by whatever catastrophic consequences are set into motion by global warming. The message imparted in the dream was that I should focus on teaching my future children how to be self-reliant, for they would need all of the survival skills now lost to most of us in a modern society: how to grow food, harvest medicinal herbs, sew, make soap, bake bread from scratch, etc.

Now, there are those of you who may argue that the future survival of the planet hinges not on what to teach our children but rather, whether or not to have children at all, but that wasn’t really the point of the dream. I believe they were mentioned as a way to illustrate the necessity of passing down knowledge and skills that will be essential in the coming years.

The population of the world declining by over 80 percent in little more than half a century is certainly a doomsday scenario, and maybe I’ve had DIY on the brain since attending an Urban Homestead event a couple of weeks ago, but this sentiment of self-sufficiency is one I hear over and over again in the environmental community.

A documentary filmmaker friend of mine, who was an integral member of the environmental movement in the ’60s and ’70s (and is still an unending advocate for social justice and green issues), echoed this in a recent conversation we had. “If I were young, and just starting out as an environmentalist, I would be learning all the skills that were so important in years past — especially how to grow my own food,” he said.

Now I’m not writing about this to scare you. In my waking life, I still believe that we have the chance to reverse a lot of the damage, especially when it comes to technological breakthroughs that will take us away from our dependence on fossil fuels. But there’s no arguing that we’ve already started to see the effects of climate change — just yesterday, two German merchant ships made it through the Northeast Passage after global warming and melting ice opened a route from South Korea along Russia’s Arctic coast to Siberia. And there is always the wild card factor: Let’s not forget that the Black Death wiped out a quarter of Europe’s population in the Middle Ages. Public health officials are already planning for how to deal with the spread of infectious diseases due to warmer temperatures.

OK, so maybe it all is a bit scary. But in the days since the dream, I haven’t been dwelling on the fear. Instead, I feel committed to taking reasonable steps to prepare for an uncertain future. Let’s hope that everything turns out OK and I just wind up with some new bread-making skills to show off to dinner guests.

–Jennifer Grayson

Do this now: Learning how to grow food isn’t only a beneficial skill to have for what possibly lies ahead; it’s also a great way to lessen your impact on the environment now. For an in-depth experience, consider an internship at a local farm. Check out the National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service for opportunities.

Related posts:
Small steps to sustainability
The planet will survive, but will we?

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