An Underappreciated Value of Contributing

On a recent Sunday, I went to buy vermicomposting worms from a 12-year-old who decided that he wanted to raise them to sell. Though he was at flag football practice, I picked up the worms in the parking lot from his mother. Two pounds of worms at $20 a pound. I spoke with his mother for a few minutes, during which time she told me that her son knows a little bit about composting, but that she is also interested and available to answer any further questions that he does not know the answers to. She also said that the money is his because it's his business.

That previous Friday, I took my mentee and her friend to a Reds game to participate in the Green Team, collecting recyclables during the last few innings. I thought that she would complain that she had to take people's trash. In fact, after we had committed to participate in the Green Team, I got an email from the mentoring program that there were free tickets available to that game. We had already made that commitment, but I also thought it would be valuable for her to learn about keeping commitments and working for what she got. So as we moved from watching the game to collecting recyclables, she told me that she found out that she thought baseball was boring. Yet, as we were leaving the stadium, she asked me if they did the Green Team at every game and if we could come back to do it again. If we had taken the free tickets from the mentoring program, she wouldn't have enjoyed the night at all.

I juxtapose these two stories because my worm supplier has access to the knowledge and materials he needs to make money and feel a sense of accomplishment from his work. My mentee comes from a different background, and those skills and opportunities have not been as readily available to her. Yet, the work of working the Green Team, something I provided because of my access to a group of university students who also participated in the Green Team, was fun and fulfilling to her.

I think this is why I'm so interested in gardening and urban farming as means of teaching and involving people, as ways of building community. Richard Louv (author of Last Child in the Woods) writes and speaks of the tangible benefits of access to nature. When he came to Xavier last semester, Will Allen (founder of Growing Power in Milwaukee) told the story of his urban farm's success in increasing the reading levels of students who were involved in their program that integrated working on the farm with educational activities. Food deserts limit the access to healthy foods in some neighborhoods, more often those with fewer economic resources, which significantly affects behavioral and learning abilities of children. Gardening and urban farming give people the chance to develop their communities, learn new skills or advance skills they already have, and contribute to the world around them. Gardening and urban farming give people the chance to solve the problems they face on their own terms. As my mentee and my worm supplier's stories show, this is something of incredible value, to give intrinsic worth to children and adults of all backgrounds.

There is a distinct value to telling people they are doing well at something, even when it comes along with suggestions for improvement. There is a distinct value in telling people that they are contributing to the world around them. I think it inspires them to contribute more. It certainly does for me.

Public Transportation as Simplicity

Jerome Segal, author of Graceful Simplicity, wrote, "The federal government built the American highway system. Without it we could not have developed into the automobile-dependent culture we have become. As a result of the abandonment of a genuine commitment to public transportation (for instance, the sort found in some European countries), we have vastly increased our need for income through our dependence on cars, and we have inflicted upon ourselves all the attendant destruction of our public space, be it in the form of air pollution or the aesthetic pollution of never-ending commercial strips along our pathways. We have transformed housing patterns and given rise to long commutes and the tension of traffic jams, road rage, and the risk of accident."

I'll admit, my desire for increased public transportation is largely selfish. I don't want to own a car. I want to be able to get to and from work, friends, etc. through a combination of biking and busing (or taking the subway or something else). And though I have a car now, I'd rather not have it - and I'd rather not have to replace it when I graduate and pass it back to my parents. Part of this is because I actually do not WANT to drive... though sometimes it seems easier.

But the advantage of increased public transportation, as Segal writes of in Graceful Simplicity, is that it lowers the cost of necessary aspects of living - transportation. Better public transportation is better, as well, for those who cannot afford to own any cars or even cannot afford more than one family car. So it's a social issue as well.

And it's not absurd to say that it is something the government can or should do. After all, we expect the government to maintain our streets that we have now - and to build new streets. That's infrastructure spending that favors those who can afford personal automobiles. Let's move toward infrastructure spending that favors all people. After all, wouldn't it be nice if you could read do some work or relax in any other way on your 20-minute commute to work rather than adding the stress of your day through interactions with traffic, running late, possible accidents, etc. Let someone else worry about that, as you take a relaxing trip to work on public transportation. Or if you walk or ride a bike - isn't it better that your daily workout also serves an external purpose of transportation rather than just working out to stay healthy?

There are so many advantages to public transportation or active transportation. And yet our public policy in the past has always chosen to favor personal, passive transportation. What will the future of U.S. public policy look like? What will the future public policy of your city or state look like? What will you ask of your elected officials?