Perched on a tiny speck of soil on the tip of Farmer Brown’s left boot, Millie and Milford Microbe watched the film “Kiss the Ground” with a thousand or so of their friends. Afterwards, they felt somewhat smug.  And why shouldn’t they?  The movie portrayed them as heroes who could save the Earth.

        “Kiss the Ground” explains how farming practices such as no-till planting, cover cropping and wise grazing techniques can lower farm costs, enrich the soil, grow healthier food and draw excessive carbon out of the air then lock it into the soil.  All that by simply capitalizing on processes Mother Nature initiated millions of years ago.

        Milford excitedly explained all this to his nephew, Mikey, who had missed the show. “Carbon is the central building block of all life on Earth.  Remember how plants draw in carbon dioxide from the air and expel oxygen?  Using sunlight and chlorophyll, plants manufacture carbon sugars so they can grow.   You know – photosynthesis!

        “But get this!  (And here’s the part where we come in.)  Plants leak some of their juicy carbon sugars!  And when they do we’re there to gobble them up.  Then we microbes, as part of the food chain, get gobbled by fungi, protozoa and tiny worms called nematodes who all gobble up each other too,” Milford paused.

        “I want to tell the part about being heroes!” Millie interrupted. “Burning carbon-based fuels, like coal and oil, has resulted in way too much carbon in the air – almost twice the millennials-old average.  The whole carbon cycle is out of whack and causing a climate crisis.  Luckily - Ta-Da! - when we and the other critters in the soil eat the carbon sugars (and each other) the carbon gets imbedded in the soil making it healthier and more productive.  The trick for farmers is to keep it there by using the wise farming practices described in the film.”

        “Wow! I want to see ‘Kiss the Ground!’” Mikey cried.  “You’re in luck,” Milford said.  “’Kiss the Ground’ is on Netflix anytime.  Or you can watch it on-line for FREE through Monday, April 26 by going to: https://tinyurl.com/f6tz374 .”

         “Hey guys, today is Earth Day!” cried Millie. “What da ya say we partner with farmers across the planet to rebalance the carbon cycle and build a better world right here on our only home where we’re all forever… Earthbound.”

        Hugh Mandude and Bette Erhalf strolled hand-in-hand down the path soaking in the first hints of spring.  Snow banks were melting, and COVID vaccination rates were climbing.  “It’s feeling like things are beginning to get back to normal,”  Hugh commented.

        They walked on a bit more.  “Normal would be good, but…,” Bette’s voice trailed off.  “Before COVID there were a lot of things about ‘normal’ that weren’t so great,” she continued.  “What are you getting at?” Hugh asked.

        “Well, there was too much traffic, and too many wasteful practices.  People bought too much ‘stuff’ filling too many attics, garages and storage units.  Too much trash crowded landfills and littered our landscapes.  Too many harsh chemicals from manufacturing, fertilizing and cleaning products polluted the soil, water and air,” she concluded.

        “I get it,” Hugh agreed.  “And how about too much unhealthy food consumption, too little exercise for many folks, too much injustice, too little opportunity for life-sustaining employment and even too much loneliness.  But COVID has given society a kind of pause.  As we sort of ‘re-start’, this seems like a terrific time to make ‘normal’ even better.  But how?”  Hugh asked.

        Just then, Bette and Hugh found themselves standing in front of a small, neat cottage.  A wizened woman beckoned them to come in, so they did.  A small nameplate - M. Nature – swung from the gate.  They felt so at-home with the friendly figure that they were compelled to share with her all the “too-s” they’d been lamenting.

        “I’ve heard this sad tale many times before.  It’s what happens when people forget.  They forget that the quality of life isn’t measured only by the growth of monetary wealth.  They forget that social and environmental well-being are equally and perhaps even more valuable.

        “But you two must be hungry; stay for dinner, won’t you?  I’m having my special stew.  It’s kept me in good health for longer than I can remember,” the woman smiled.  Bette looked at the strange collection of canisters the woman was drawing ingredients from:  Diversity, Balance, Fractal Organization, Life Cycles, Subsidiarity and Symbiosis.  Bette suddenly felt famished, hungry for a fresh beginning.  She wondered what she and Hugh could garner from these intriguing ingredients.

        So join us for some special stew next time and learn about M. Nature’s lessons for creating a better world, right here where we’re all forever… Earthbound.

     Camping with her family, six-year-old Jenny and her brothers had collected a variety of berries  - red raspberries, black-caps, blackberries and others.  She helped her mom craft a “campfire” pie.  “What kind of pie should we say we’re making?” her mom asked.  Jenny considered her surroundings and the variety of ingredients. “Nature Pie!” Jenny cried.


        No doubt like most of us, Jenny felt she was in “nature” while camping in their tent.  They’d filled the pie with goodies found there, so Nature Pie was an entirely appropriate name for the goodness they were about to enjoy.


        We each have our own concept of when we’re in “nature.”  But where does “nature” begin?  Is it when we step out the door of our home or when we walk into a park?  Is it when we leave the city limits or enter a designated “natural area”?

 
        Or could we be in nature as we sit at the breakfast table eating our cereal and drinking our juice?  That food came from somewhere – from “nature”??  And our bodies at the breakfast table each include 100 trillion microbiota that we each carry on and in us.  Microorganisms actually comprise 57% of that creature sitting at the table.  Seems like that variety of ingredients chomping on corn flakes may be a sort of “nature pie” too.


        Our egos tell us we are completely separate, independent beings.  As such, we feel entitled to as much “stuff” as we can accumulate and have “earned.”  Unfortunately, that frame of mind has created problems.  The Anthropocene epoch is upon us.  We’re in the period during which human activity has become the dominant influence on climate and the environment.  The results include the advent of the sixth extinction in which species loss is 1,000 to 10,000 times the background rate.  Also, humans now consume 1.7 Earth’s-worth of resources.  Clearly, not a pathway to long-term success.


        What to do?  Perhaps we need to remind ourselves that “nature” isn’t somewhere out there in the park or beyond.  Each of us is part of nature; we ARE nature as much as the wild berries in Jenny’s pie.  Understanding that we are OF nature may dampen our inclination to mistreat that from which we are inseparable.


        So enjoy being an ingredient of this bountiful Nature Pie.  At the same time, respect all life that shares our collective home where we’re all forever… Earthbound.