In the beginning....

My name is Colleen and I believe that things can be different than the way they are. I believe that food is a product of the earth and should be grown and shared freely. I believe in being unique, doing what makes each of us happy, and absolute personal freedom for those who aren't stepping on anybody elses toes.

Planting Crops in Parking Lots started as an idea, a vision actually. I was speaking with my landlord about the parking lot sinkholes that need to be filled each year with new gravel. He explained that 100 years ago, Passionfly clothing was a drug and sundry store, and that the parking lot had been an apple orchard. When the trees were removed, they were cut at ground level, leaving stumps in the ground to slowly degrade. I blinked and saw, for just a moment, what that parking lot must have looked like with an apple tree in every sinkhole, and was struck by the beauty of the idea. I could not get the ghostly apple trees out of my mind, and the novelty (by todays standards) of having a small personal orchard behind a business made me grin. Why not? The concrete wasteland of a semi-industrial downtown Bellingham grated against my nerves, all the wasted space that 100 years ago was food producing land. Something had to be done.

As a first time gardener I spent the winter of 2008 researching garden plans, reading about seeds and supplies, and began formulating a plan of action. The more I read, the more in depth my own vision became, and the more knowledge I wanted to gain. Spring 2009 is the beginning of something big. Over the winter, as I giddily explained my idea to anyone with ears, over wine at dinner parties and beer at bowling alleys, the same question was posed to me by several skeptics: "What if homeless people steal your vegetables, Colleen?" The first time I was absolutely overwhelmed, I laughed out loud, and said "well, that's kind of the point, right? If I can grow nutritious food that will go to feed a hungry person that is about the coolest thing I can think of!" now when asked the same question I just smile knowingly. Food should be shared freely. We should NOT have to pay to live. Who are we paying, really? Rule makers and boundary setters, taxed of our existence, of our time , of our money which is really our energy. How many hours are wiled away in unhappiness while we earn our weekly grocery budget?

Something has got to give, eventually. By growing copious amounts of food and giving it willingly I hope to provide an example. There is all of this space, everywhere! Rooftops and parking lots are perfect full sun locals for vegetable gardens. At the turn of the twentieth century Americans and Europeans planted millions of "victory gardens" at private residences and businesses. The idea was that by taking pressure off of the national food supplies, everyone would have more resources and the American and European citizens would survive the economic hardships of World war I and II.

Somewhere in the age of convenience, where everything is purchased, everything is 'supplied' by a larger organization, this idea was buried. Quietly set aside and discouraged. Now it is 'patriotic' to buy buy buy, rather than become more economically viable and sustainable as individuals. A few people have spent alot of money to make sure things like victory gardens are lost in the annals of history. I, for one, do not want to see this idea die.

By blogging about my philosophy and the exact trial and error process of actually setting up a fully potted vegetable garden, I hope that others will be able to use my successes and failures as a back bone to try their own ideas. Not every vegetable will grow in a pot, and sometimes modifications to growing procedures need to be made in order to be successful. I hope that this will be both a resource for information and an inspiration towards actions. Lets grow some freakin food, man!