Local Bounty, Forgotten Harvest

Earlier today I went for a walk into the hills south of my house. In addition to my comfortable walking shoes I was armed with one of my cameras and a sharp eye, intent on capturing some images for my daily photo blog. With my senses tuned to notice some of the details that I ordinarily filter out, I wanted to see and document my surroundings. What I saw, over and over again, was an incredible bounty. Beautiful, ripened fruit hung from trees all around me. More than half of the properties I passed had trees bearing some kind of orchard fruits, many of them cherry and apple, some of them pear. With so much fruit ready to be picked and enjoyed I wondered for a moment why nobody seemed to be harvesting from their own trees. Why would a person waste what's free and easily accessible? Then I remembered that as a group, humans-- particularly those in "developed" countries--choose what must be purchased over what is plentiful, and they do it frequently. We squander. Why?

Is it that we're used to the presence of bounty and so it has long since failed to merit our attentiveness? I believe this is part of the reason. I can't imagine that humans living through subsistence in a less forgiving climate would allow ripe, edible and delicious food to go to waste. But in this country, where the majority of us buy our food from grocery stores--buildings that house and categorize a remarkable number of ostensibly "edible" options from around the globe--we fail to see the local bounty all around us.

I believe, too, that we've become so pressed for time that we prioritize exchanging hard-earned currency for cherries picked, washed and packaged by the hands of another over spending a couple of hours twice a week for a month or so to pick the cherries growing in our yards. It's much more expedient, after all. I know this is how it is for many of us. I see this as a problem. And not just because it wastes food. But I'm only covering the scope of things related to our forgotten harvest today, so I will let the time issue lie for now.

Additionally, there is the problem of harvesting equipment. Most of us with orchard fruit trees of any maturity are going to need ladders in order to harvest the fruit. Do you have a ladder? I'm a renter and not a homeowner, and I don't have a ladder. I know a few homeowners in the area who are also without ladders. We're all hard-pressed to gather the fruit without a little something to stand on. But how many of us know our neighbors or someone who would lend us a ladder? Do you see where I'm going with this? The logistics of harvesting fruit from trees becomes complicated rather quickly. I think that we've witnessed some fundamental cultural shifts in the last several decades that have put us into this predicament. I have to imagine that the original property owners who planted all of these trees did so for more than ornamental purposes. They must have done so with the realization that they would need ladders. And while ladders are commonly owned by homeowners, I imagine that a few decades back more people knew their neighbors and could depend on them for the use of equipment from time to time.

I also assume that earlier generations of folks were much more accustomed to the physical labor required to pick. There is ample evidence that as we continue to invent and acquire labor-saving devices, as more and more of our paid work takes place from a seated position or within a narrow range of motion, we're all becoming more physically dysfunctional. Muscles and joints that, in our grandmothers and grandfathers, were sufficiently developed through a wide range of physical activities, are, in us, losing functionality and leaving us very susceptible to chronic pain and injury. A dear friend of mine recently spent about 3 hours picking berries in her yard and her back bothered her for almost a week afterwards. I should also point out that this friend would be widely regarded as "fit" and "active.

It's this person's opinion that we've misplaced an awful lot of priorities in recent decades. In this state, where hunger coexists with ridiculous excess, we're wasting what I would estimate to be tens of thousands of pounds of fresh, edible, and in many cases organic food, growing in people's yards. And those of us that would like to change this find no shortage of obstacles in our paths. I recently moved into a rental house that has two giant cherry trees, now burdened with lots of ripe fruit. Because I can't find a ladder to use I am left to watch, helplessly, as the fruit drops to the ground and rots. We need neighborhood equipment exchanges. We need willing and healthy bodies. We need to care about and invest in our local food security. We need to find the time to feed our neighbors and ourselves. Anybody got any bright ideas?