More Americans suffering from Hunger than in China. Did I read that right?

I came across this article in yahoo news and found it quite sobering.
http://yhoo.it/nLVF2I

This article is talking about statistics that show that more and more Americans are falling in to poverty and can’t afford to put food on the table. They also can not afford to go get basic medical care. If you watch the mainstream news everything seems to be stable or getting better. It’s almost as if the mainstream media are saying “Move along, there’s nothing to see here.” trying to shuffle us back to our lives hoping that most of us won’t see the alarming treads that are showing that our country is in a serious world of hurt.

Tomato from my garden

We have to begin working on feeding ourselves. Back in my Great grandfathers day, everyone had a little garden of food. Up until the day he died he had a little patch of land that he grew various veggies in. My favorite was Rhubarb because from that Rhubarb came my favorite pie Rhubarb pie. (Now I know that there was a ton of sugar that went into that pie to give it the lovely sweet and sour taste.) But there was something about the fact that out of my Great Grandpa’s garden came something that was processed into a food I loved as a kid.

He is long gone, and the land he grew that food on belongs to another family (lost due to economic issues in my Grandpa’s life) but the memory still remains.

What would happen if 1 in 6 families started growing a little garden and producing there own food? Wouldn’t it be nice to create your own garden that was EASY to maintain yet only took a few hours to manage and cultivate and gleen food from? What if you had an entire meal that you took the time to grow, harvest and prepare? I personally think that being able to feed myself with out the need of a grocery store is an awesome accomplishment.

No I am not boycotting any stores or saying we need to go back to the 1800′s. I am saying how many people know how to grow their own food anymore? What happens if we have a financial crisis personal, local, statewide, or national that messes up the food supply chain? We may have many families that are having trouble eating now, but what is going to happen when our food supply chain is broken. Looking at the signs of the times due to financial problems in the world, weather related, and natural disasters all around, our food supply chain is severly threatened. Inflation on many food items is already occurring. Just ask the person in your family who does all the buying of food? Ask them about the price of X and has it gone up. You will find a startling response.

These are just some of the things I am thinking about these days. This article stumped me enough I thought I would share and see if I can more people to start thinking about their personal situation.

Some parting thoughts:

• How long could you survive if your access to the grocery store was cut off? (This could be caused by many things. Major Earthquake, Strikes, Riots, Disruption in the electric, gas or any other energy supply, or even things overseas that disrupt the food chain.)
• What would you do if you couldn’t get food from the grocery store for 1 week, 2 weeks, 3 weeks?
• Do you have a pantry full of supplies that can hold you over for a day, 3 days, a week, 2 weeks?

Some things to think about.

Until the next time,

Thirteen