Urban Edibles Part 1

I have horrible news. I didn't get to go thrifting with my favorite slam poet this past weekend. I promise, that post is coming, but I am switching gears just a little bit for the time-being...

Everyone from your parents to the First Lady wants you to eat your veggies, right? Some of you probably even like veggies, much as you hate to admit it. But that’s just fine. As you grow older, the more your palate matures. Give veggies a chance. They’re delicious -- mostly…even I can’t eat okra -- and they are good for you in about a gazillion ways.

And to grow them, you hardly have to impact the planet at all, if you’re careful.

You can grow a vegetable garden to feed your family for a whole summer and into the fall from a six-foot by eight-foot raised bed. No, not like your super-comfy sleep-a-pedic mattress. That would be a waste of a perfectly good piece of furniture, plus the plants wouldn’t like it.

A raised bed is a simple wooden frame that is built above the ground in your gardening space and filled with super-powered dirt. Don’t panic, I’m going to give you directions on how to do this. For now, let’s focus on the why; then we’ll move on to the how.

When you grow your own produce, your carbon footprint shrinks. And what exactly is a carbon footprint? Well, it’s a super-complicated interaction where humans do things that create nasties called greenhouse gases. Those gases contribute to global warming which, in turn, is causing problems all over the world. There is a much better definition here: http://www.livestrong.com/article/159514-carbon-footprint-definition-for-kids. Check it out.

But you’re just minding your own business, right? You’re not creating any of those noxious gases, right?

Wrong.

Next time you’re in a grocery store, check the itty-bitty label on the strawberries or the cucumbers. Chances are, they weren’t grown in the United States. If they were, that’s an improvement, but it’s still not ideal. Most of the vegetables and fruits you buy from the store, even an “all-natural” grocer, are transported hundreds, sometimes even thousands of miles to reach their destination. This requires gasoline which uses a limited energy resource and increases our fuel dependence on other countries. It also means that what you buy isn’t fresh at all; it’s been boxed up and transported anywhere from days to weeks depending on the product. So what’s a tween to do?