Eating the Sun

       One quote that stuck out to me in this section was when Pollan states that "it's a foolish culture that entrust its food supply to simpletons" (221). He couldn't be more correct. The second part of Pollan's book, "Pastoral Grass", really pulled me in more than the Industrial Corn section. This is probably because this organic farm section included people -- I wasn't distracted once throughout this section, and the charismatic farmers (especially Joel) made it easier for me to connect to the information given in this section. My concept of "organic" is changed entirely from reading the second part of the book; the "Supermarket Pastoral" that Pollan mentions is exactly what my mindset was like beforehand. Whenever I would have to go grocery shopping for my mom, and she sent me to the huge grocery store as opposed to the small food co-op we usually frequent, she would give me a list of what to get. Next to nearly every item on the list, there would be parentheses surrounding the single word "ORGANIC!". I had always connected huge-supermarket-organic with healthy-free-range-farm-organic, and never stopped to think twice about these assumptions. I never, for example, thought that on an organic farm, they would use synthetic fertilizers. I thought this was only a concept linked to industrial food, and the sad thing is (as Pollan says): "organic farming has increasingly come to resemble the industrial system it has set out to replace" (151).
       Like we were talking about in class, in order to get real change in terms of consumption in the U.S., we'd have to have a food revolution; this is a huge issue, and it would require a complete change in lifestyle from the majority of the population. The one thing I agreed with Gene Kahn on was when he talked about being thankful for the small amount of progress we have made -- at least it's a step in the right direction. Change isn't going to come about right away, and small steps towards better nutrition and food practices will be the key to changing the country's mindset. Right now we're all about money and time; Pollan says that the reason why we go industrial is because it is "simply more cost-efficient" (161). It'll take a while to change this mindset.
       The human interactions in this section were what really drew me in. I loved the part when Pollan mentioned talking to a small farmer, one in particular that was criticized by an industrial organic grower, and he snapped right back and put the industrial organic guy in his place. I also loved that Pollan didn't just write this stuff or solely research it; he went right in there and experienced things for himself. I especially like the section where he goes to Polyface and works with Joel. The idea that the farm is all connected, from the sun providing free solar energy to the grass to feed the cows and chickens, which is fertilized by the pig manure. It's a huge organism rather than a big machine.