Here is a post I strongly urge you to read.
One of the forces affecting what gets written here is my sense of the need for something to be written. If something is not being said, then let me take a stab at it. But when others write eloquently on a topic of importance, well, then it’s time to give them our attention and not simply clog the works with more verbiage.
That’s how I feel about this piece by my friend, Christian Ford.
He has laid out our physical predicament as clearly as anyone has to date. If we are to move on, we need to absorb these facts and follow their repercussions where they take us.
More on this soon, I hope.
Unfortunately Hogsalt does not accept comments. If you would like to respond, feel free to do so here. I’ll see that he reads it.
Horizons of Significance 
Tony,
Thank you for posting Christian’s link. Superb!
In a world that seams so abundant, so few really comprehend how thinly spread is the biomme. That which is life, is constituted of life, and that which is returned to life in death.
In the natural world, the stuff of life is constantly recycled. The proteins and complex organic chemicals, the colloidal minerals and salts and chelates, the complex carbon molecules, all of this accumulates in the biologic systems over Melania. Nature only replaces a small amount from dissolved rock and photosynthesis. The rest of life is rather an accretion over time. The stuff of life is either concentrated in biomass (living tissue) or it is broken down and re dispersed for re use by death and rot or consumption. So life and death goes.
Here lies a problem, our species devours these and all other resources, and then cheat the worm his due! We are basically the ultimate end user, and thoughtlessly so. As an intelligent species, should we not pay as much attention to what comes out our backsides as we do with that which we put in or mouths? It is absolutely necessary to return our excrement and it’s nutrient load back to the soil and back to the sea. We call it all ‘waste’, without considering that it shouldn’t be wasted at all. It is so valuable that it should be a commodity, but we conveniently flush it away, mix it with household chemicals, industrial waste, poisons and heavy metals and call it sludge!
Even in death ,we cheat the worm. Our corpses are either pumped with toxic embalming fluids, placed in hermetically sealed coffins, and buried in a concrete vault, our vital nutrients toxified and lost permanently, or we are cremated at great fuel expense and our two- point -six pounds of mineral salts and dry ash stuck in a jar, scattered in the wind or dumped at sea.
Perhaps,maybe, we need to get past the “Soylent Green” revulsion. Not so much in the way of little green cookies, but as to how best to return ourselves to the great abundance.
I have found a “green” cemetery on Whidbey Island. I plan on being buried UN-embalmed, wrapped in old cotton sail, lying in the bottom of an old wooden skiff, with my oars on one side and my favorite fishing rod on the other, and a penny whistle in my pocket. In time I too will be lunch for the worms and eventually part of some big red cedar.
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A beautiful and poignant post. Some of the best writing I have seen lately. Thank you.
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I stumbled upon Christian Ford’s work while doing a search on Google. I must say that I am in awe of his work, its depth and its breadth. I can only begin to imagine the enormous investment that went into researching and preparing this. As a blogger myself I am inspired by the beauty and the sheer force of his words. I began searching for more about the man and really could not find much. I found a wealth of blog posts but very little about the man. This is a shame. I would love to know more. I hope that my next visit my old stomping grounds will lead me to an opportunity to meet the man in the flesh. On LinkedIn I found: ” Food System Activist / Recovering Filmmaker.” As one food activist to another and as a filmmaker from another lifetime, may you please forward this to Christian? This is my passionate love child. Feel free to share! https://youtu.be/IeO6BfGaP68
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Glad you enjoy his work! I’ve forwarded your note.
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