Transition Abingdon considers worst-case scenarios

ABINGDON, Va. – They aren’t growing organic mushrooms on a commune in California or stockpiling guns on a ranch in Idaho. But they are working to plan for a future whose circumstances could be less than bright.

About 50 members of Transition Abingdon met Sunday afternoon to talk about how to make Abingdon and Washington County more resilient – whether its future challenges are caused by climate change, an oil shortage or just a tough economy.

“A lot of people think the lifestyle we’ve lived for the last 50 years is just the way it is,” said Rod Edins, a member of the new community organization’s initiating group. But, he said, “Change can happen very quickly.”

Transition is a global movement that started in Europe in 2007 over concerns about climate change and the oil supply; it came to the United States a year ago, and Abingdon is among communities around the nation that have jumped on the bandwagon.

But in Southwest Virginia – a region still relatively connected to the land – it’s taken on its own flavor.

Edins likens the movement to learning how to swim: If you know how to swim, you’re prepared when a bully pushes you into the deep end of the pool.

“I think we need to start thinking about backup plans,” said Cassa Von Kundra, Edins’ wife. She said people across the political spectrum can find common ground on this issue and that the recession, and the enormity of federal spending to combat it, has a lot of people thinking about such issues these days.

“The bottom line is the consumer culture is unsustainable,” said Von Kundra, “so what transition is about is finding a sustainable way of life.”

For Dan Manweiler, another member of the group, Transition is about a world that’s running out of resources, a world in peril as it ebbs ever closer to an environmental tipping point with drastic consequences for the population.

“I’m just worried for them,” he said, referring to his children, who joined him at Sunday’s event. “I want to make sure that they have a good life.”

For Rachel Richardson, it’s about personal responsibility. She doesn’t believe in climate change, she said, but people shouldn’t need a big, scary excuse for choosing to live a better life.

She also thinks society is on the verge of collapse – not because of an environmental crisis but because everyone is asking for a handout: free health care, a welfare check, a federal subsidy for growing corn.

“Government has gotten so big and taxes have gotten so high because people aren’t taking responsibility in all their little groups,” she said.

If people would simply compost their garbage – and not litter along the roads – it would save taxpayers millions of dollars, she said.

“At its heart, it’s going to bring people together that haven’t been able to come together on much of anything,” said Roger Golden.

He said it involves a thought process called “forecasting and back-casting” that draws from the past to help build a sustainable future.

Among the specific ideas discussed Sunday were things like community gardens, energy efficiency and ride-sharing for transportation. Even Abingdon Mayor Ed Morgan turned out, expressing support for the project in conjunction with the town’s efforts to go green.

They all seem to recognize something important about living in Southwest Virginia: It’s a relatively good place to prepare for tough times.

Dene Peterson, born in the middle of the Great Depression, has firsthand memories of the victory gardens and bomb shelters of the World War II era, and was thankful to be in rural Kentucky at the time.

“My parents always said we’re lucky we live on a farm because we always have enough food,” she said. “That was both during the Depression and the war.”

The nation changed immensely after the war, she said, as men who’d seen the world went on to college and never returned to the farm. A federal subsidy program begun at the same time allowed industrial agriculture to flourish at the expense of the family farm, accelerating the trend.

Still, she said, her generation has never forgotten the frugality that was instilled as common wisdom when they were children. And even with so many changes, the idea that one can go back to the land when times are tough has remained a part of the American psyche.

For Richardson, it’s the news of two grandchildren on the way that pushed her toward pursuit of “the good life” that she observed on her grandparents’ farm when she was a child.

“I have two grandkids on the way, and I look forward to being able to provide them with an environment that’s more wholesome, to be able to come to grandma’s farm,” she said, amidst the process of learning to grow a garden and preserve food.

“I liked what I saw my grandparents doing,” she said. “My grandparents grew their own food, they canned vegetables, they had animals, and they had space.”

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