An essay by Tory McCagg, author of At Crossroads With Chickens: A “What If It Works?” Adventure in Off-Grid Living & Quest for Home
A friend of mine, Dan, once told me that, if he had the choice to come back in another life and another form, he would want to come back as one of my chickens.
I know better. Granted, our chickens are as safe and free as can be. They run feral through our gardens (except when bobcats and weasels roam) and are encouraged to voice their opinions, especially when my husband, Carl, and I take their eggs from the nest, an act that is stressful for all concerned because the girls are justifiably proud of their hard work. Their eggs are perfect, each one unique and so full of potential. And yet we take them, eat them. It’s a conundrum. Without us, the chickens wouldn’t have been hatched. With us, they must live by our rules.
And we, by theirs.
The Opportunity To Change
Climate change. A coronavirus pandemic. Demands for a complete and just restructuring of our social and economic system. It’s all so bracing, exciting, challenging, isn’t it? And begs the question — please let’s find an answer — how we as individuals might and collectively heal this human and earthly trauma?
Complicity and complacency. They are strong words, judgmental in their way. Since I moved to my husband’s and my off-grid home, now a farm, in New Hampshire — we call it “Darwin’s View” — I thought a lot about those two words and their meaning in today’s world. Mornings in my office, when nose-to-beak with our rooster Big Red, he out and me in, I wondered about the rightness of “owning” chickens for their eggs. As snow whirled and wind buffeted the house, the doors on occasion bowing in, the absurdity of human’s “domination” of the earth would strike me — even as species died off, the earth raped, oceans poisoned, all by human (in)action. And what, what could I do to make a difference?
With a feather as a sword, I declared war against climate change in February of 2013. As anyone might note, that war had little effect on the big picture. Clearly, I’m not a warrior. Worse, the harder I tried, the more complicit I became in the destruction.
We had logged the hilltop on which we built, killing trees that had held and protected soil that became eroded, exhausted. We had solar panels made with rare precious metals and transported by fossil fuels. The house might have been powered by the sun on sunny days but on rainy days? Ever-so-short winter days? Our backup generator uses propane: think fracked gas.
And then cock-a-doodle-doo roosters that didn’t have enough hens to keep them occupied and so they fought. We had taken chickens on for their eggs, not meat. Not testosterone. Blood on my hands when we needed to reduce their population. Apparently, I made a difference but not in the positive way I imagined.
Tick, tock. Over time, I began to meet other people with a deep love and concern for our planet. I was not alone.
Chickens and Simple Living
I met farmers who tended to their soils, their plants, and animals with the intention of reconnecting to and working with Nature. Now we, too, farm the land with the aim to heal it. The eroded dirt plain is morphing into a field of grasses and plants and swales that retain water and support diverse wildlife.
And more chickens. Every day, the solar-powered coop door opens, and the girls tumble out, embracing the day and what it offers. A ray of sun to bask in. Worms and grubs! A weasel’s visit and I have learned of life and death. I wanted to save the world. Instead, a small part of it, and that only sometimes.
Complicity. Complacency. Convenience. If only we would recognize the first, battle the second, and give up the third. Easier to say than to do, though to do is inevitable. That’s the elegance of evolution, of change: It happens anyway. The trouble comes when we cling, and we as a society aren’t clinging. We are clutching, thinking that our current way of being is the life jacket when, in fact, it is an old rusty anchor that will sink us to the bottom of the dead oceans.
How to un-cling?
See the Old and New Anew
Embrace old technologies. They work with nature, not against her and we need nature on our side. Example: Grow soil with compost and green manures, don’t kill it with poisons.
Whenever possible, choose to reuse, repurpose, or-the most cost-effective, “green” option: Don’t use it in the first place. Don’t buy that newest gadget, those rather fabulous shoes you see in the magazine that prove the perfection of life on earth, the biggest steak on the menu, the fastest car.
Do as I say, not as I do: Carl and I bought a Tesla Model 3. We have an amazing computer of a car that runs on the sun. Just think of all the resources used to make it. Count the externalities. Compare those externalities to a combustion car.
Learn, and listen outside of your comfort zone, and from people and organizations that are already working hard to create the world, we envision. The book Drawdown is an excellent 101 on 100 things we can do to lower our carbon levels. There are also organizations like American Farmland Trust and Regenerative International (saving farms and healing soil), Rocky Mountain Institute (energy and carbon drawdown), the Union of Concerned Scientists, and Corporate Accountability.
There is no single answer but each of us is integral to the healing process. Life is complicated. The troubles we face are deep, structural, and traumatic. But if we look at our complicity and complacency, not as an accusation, but as a very tangled roll of string, then we can begin to unravel, loosen, heal. With every step we take and every change we make. Starting now.
 |
About the AuthorAward-winning writer Tory McCagg is the author of At Crossroads With Chickens: A “What If It Works?” Adventure in Off-Grid Living & Quest for Home. She lives with her trombonist husband, one cat, and myriad chickens at Darwin’s View in Jaffrey, New Hampshire, where they all practice an experimental life off-grid and on the land. |
Feature image: 10259 Images, Pixabay