THE NEW VICTORY GARDEN

Historically, the federal government has raised many banners to promote agendas considered vital to the national interest. Wars against nations, the war on drugs, the FDA dietary pyramid, and the campaign for children's literacy are examples. While the effectiveness of these programs has varied, there is no question that in many instances, federal activism has fostered collective achievement. Now, as the nation and the world awaken to the enormity of the environmental crisis, the federal government should step up its involvement in environmental affairs. As a part of this new leadership, the government should begin to actively promote organic vegetable gardening.

Humanity arose in the garden, and, recent lapses of awareness notwithstanding, we still depend entirely on the plant kingdom for our sustenance. Acknowledging this dependency and recognizing the significance of agriculture, our myths and stories invoke the garden to symbolize regeneration: The garden is the boudoir of procreation, the sanctuary of nurturing, and the field of bounty. The symbols of the garden uplift us, and during the difficult times ahead the garden's affirmations will help carry us through.

Just as importantly, a federally sponsored renaissance of organic vegetable gardening will improve public understanding of environmental challenges and ease public acceptance of lifestyle changes that future policies must bring. While the roots of the environmental crisis are myriad, many radiate from a node of ignorance concerning food production. As an urban nation, we tend to think that bread comes from the supermarket and that water comes from the tap. Even though most people intellectually recognize our link to nature, our daily lives and thoughts have become separated from the ecosystem that sustains us. Thus the public pays little heed, for instance, to the fact that many of the world's key agricultural aquifers are being tapped at unsustainable rates. To an agrarian culture, news of imminent water shortage would occupy the headlines. In our technological bubble, such matters are relegated to basement offices.

To rediscover the truth of food, and to recall our circumstance in the scheme of nature, we need to kneel. On hands and knees, we need to witness the intimate conjugation of soil, water, air, sun, and verdure that gives birth to our caloric fuel. We need to observe this interplay in its bare form, unobscured by the concealments of synthetic pesticides and fertilizers. With this candid view, we can relearn the facts of life-including the hard fact of the failed crop.

Beginning with the passion between seed and earth, the life of plants is a romping romance. Horticulture, however, is a marriage-a sustained union between human being and nature. Long-term success is neither guaranteed nor easily won, and becomes possible only with deep understanding. But success at difficult tasks generates confidence, and fresh food from the garden is hope itself.

Around the middle of this century, the federal government prompted Americans to plant victory gardens as a means of increasing food production and outlasting the enemy in a long and difficult war. The environmental struggles of the next century will try our spirit and economy more severely than did that epochal contest. If we overcome, it will not be by vanquishing a foreign foe, but rather by restoring health to a relationship that shapes the center of our being. That's no light chore. It's time we dig in.