I Will Help You

 Infrastructure is the base that we all stand on, connected together.  We are all dependent upon this.

Do people tend towards selfishness, or giving?  Is selfishness an innate survival technique or is working together and cooperating how we survive?

I seem to be running across people here in our Midwest that are now fed so much fear, hate, and repression that they themselves, fear, hate, and are repressed.

My most recent baffling conversation started out with a woman, chatting together about organic foods.  We talked about how we are inundated with pesticides in our water and food. How do we negotiate this? How do we protect ourselves in a state where pesticides have been found in 100% of the ground water and permeate every inch of soil?
We talked about how to help ourselves as much as possible by finding organic food sources in the local farmer's markets.

We talked about how, in the country, one can grow their own food, but in cities and suburbs we are dependent upon the structures that exist.  I feel that's how most people's lives are in this country, dependent upon infrastructure.

Our conversation then took an odd and dark turn. She began talking about, "when the grid breaks down."
This is how I feel.   I don't believe those are her own words. She has been fed that thought.

She went on to say we better protect ourselves against those who will "take the middle country's food stores"  and "take what's ours."  That we better have guns, and "lots of 'em" to protect ourselves and our family.

I said, "Well, it takes 2 hours by car to get here from Minneapolis and gas stations wouldn't be pumping.  There would be no food or water. I'd be on foot.  I'd never make it. Hahaha."

She replied, rather vehemently that people could go for weeks without food, all they need is water.  They could get here.

She had this whole scenario thought out, of  millions of people  pouring out of New York City and raging across our country because they would know, of course, that food would be on farms.

This mass, apocalyptic breakdown of society... this fantasy.  I think that those who feel in the least in control of their lives and economic circumstances believe this.  The more that lives are controlled by lack of decent jobs and any social support network, the more these sort of fantasies are embraced.  People need to feel in control in some way and this future zombie apocalypse is a fantasy of distraction.

I have guns.  I can protect what's mine against you.

Hobos ("and lots of 'em") use to knock on my great-grandmother's back door asking for food.  I grew up being told the stories that,  even though so many had so little, she would always have some soup, or bread, or whatever she could spare to help others.

Here, I will help you. If you need help, I will help you.