Note how the title goes F, G, H? So it's right that the first word of this blog would be "I."
I met a Frenchman when we were in St. Malo who swore that English food was the best in the world! I couldn’t believe he would say that, or even think it! At the time, I was talking with Olivier and Cécile about how much we love French food. This fellow overheard us and had to put in his opinion.
I agreed on one thing, however. English breakfasts with sausage, eggs, and biscuits (the original McMuffins) are wonderful. The problem is that they are not healthy. Nowadays the health part is more important to me than it was 50 years ago.
Mandy, my daughter-in-law who studied in Aix-en-Provence for a year and teaches French in the local high school, told me about a movie called “The French Revolution,” all about the pesticides in French agriculture – wheat, peaches, apples, and everything in between. I got the film from Netflix. I didn’t want to watch it, but finally, after keeping it for five days, had to.
Scenes of tractors moving through fields and orchards spewing foggy clouds of pesticides, with the drivers dressed in leaky scuba gear, were terrifying. Even more awful were the statistics of cancer rates in rural agricultural communities where you’d think the air would be clean and clear, being far from city pollution. Not so.
The mayor of a small town in the Languedoc, the same “county” as Nimes, decided to do something about the health risks his citizens were facing by farming with pesticides. He declared that the school would provide only organic food to the children. The mayor is leading the new French revolution! The change to organic food was well-received by many of the parents, some of whom decided to go organic at home, too.
The children planted a garden and learned about the rich, full taste of home-grown vegetables. Other communities got interested so the school kitchen expanded to cook for them, too.
Then the mayor took a drastic and courageous step. He brought together traditional and organic farmers to discuss the issues of health and economics.
“If a farmer won’t eat his own produce, I don’t want to, either,” was one of the comments. And after seeing the health problems of those traditional pesticide-spraying farmers, I agree.
The discussion was civil, and I think some of the traditionalists learned that organic can be profitable, and that pests can be controlled by means other than chemicals.
It takes about three years to change a traditional field to an organic one. That’s how long the chemicals hang around, showing up in the produce.
Any search on Google will show that American produce is rife with pesticide residues, evidence that this is a worldwide problem leading to worldwide health issues, and the associated economic issues of health care even for people who think they are eating well.
I have spent the last two weeks working on my garden. Zucchini and spring pumpkins planted inside grew and were transplanted today. Lettuce is up and thriving; chard and kale were planted today. The apricot and peach trees are full of little fruit.
My hopes are high for the fruit trees, which look happy, but out here with the desert wind, the fight might be too hard for them. Nevertheless, I know that whatever survives will have a sweeter and deeper taste than anything gracing the queen’s table.
Visiting Mandy today, I saw their garden. Hundreds of seedlings are peeking out of the soil! They’ve planted tomatoes and zucchini under their pear and apricot trees. What a feast there will be, and it’s all organic for both of us!
Oh, one disappointment: the tulip bulbs from Versailles are languishing. I’m hoping they are soaking up nutrients and sunshine so that next year will be a different story.
The motto for the gardener: Never Give Up! Never Surrender! (Thanks, “Galaxy Quest”.)
