Local is the new black.
It goes with everything.
Or does it?
Here at Not Dabbling in Normal we want to know how far we can push this local thing. What can you buy locally and what can you really not? How local can you get? Your yard? Your block? Your neighborhood, your state? Can you tell if what you’ve purchased is local?
This month, we’re going to get “real” at Not Dabbling again. Emily B, Emily S, Suzy, Ryan, Xan, Miranda and DeeDee are going to buy local and only local. We’re talking food, transportation, underwear, cat food, clothes, you name it. We’re going to find out what can we buy that’s locally produced, and what we can’t. If it isn’t produced locally, we’re going to try to find locally-owned shops. And if we can’t do that, we’ll find out what can we live without, and what we have to have.
***
This challenge is perfectly timed for me, Miranda. I have been feeling utterly disconnected from my food lately, and recently had an epiphany of sorts. You can read more about my recent re-connection with seasonal food at Pocket Pause, and i’m looking forward to sharing my new found inspiration here at Not Dabbling.
***
Food is easy. It’s the other stuff. I need curtains, which I can make, but if there is a fabric mill or curtain rod factory within 2,000 miles of Chicago I’ll eat my hat. On the other hand, many communities have shops like this one– a locally owned, owner-managed True Value Hardware.
***
How close to home do you think you can get? Join the Challenge! Let us know in the comments; leave us a link to your blog and we’ll create a participants blog roll.
What a fun and thought provoking challenge!
I am just plain lucky to live where I live (Northeast PA). As much as I complain about the big box stores going in around here, I feel like I can stay away from them easily–and I’m not sacrificing a thing. I’m lucky to have a relationship with the small businesses owners that I buy from. I can understand living in the middle of nowhere, though, and you really do have to drive over 50 miles to get to the nearest store, and unfortunately, it’s usually a Walmart, Target, or Shop Rite. They are the businesses that can afford to be there, at least at first, where the population is few and far between. We adapt to our environment–I like to think that’s what I’m doing here, and if I lived in the absolute boonies, I would try to adapt there, too.
For centuries small local owners did just fine. It isn’t that no one but the big boxes can “afford” to be in rural communities. It’s that they actively worked to destroy local economies, through rapacious business practices, collusion with local officials to corrupt or circumvent the tax code, eminent domain abuses and more, in the name of short term profits for their absentee owners.