By Erik Pfantz
I come from a place often intentionally forgotten. It is not uncommon to meet people from a rural area but it is common that they express shame or resentment about their places of origin. Popular media often tells stories of people making it out of their small hometowns and young people are often told success, fulfilling lifestyles and meaningful relationships can only be found in places with higher population densities. This may be true to some degree, and it's furthered by the self-fulfilling nature of the belief. However, statistics and experience tell us that a move to a city is not the magic way to fulfill all of our aspirations.
To make a long story short, I returned to my hometown for a few years in between two stints at UW-Madison. Within a month of my return, I got a job with my cousins' small construction company and set about becoming an active citizen in the community: attending meetings, joining groups, walking the streets, exploring the parks and more. Blindfold me and drop me anywhere in Merrill, and I'll know exactly where I'm at once it's removed. I put the effort in to truthfully say I know the city like the back of my hand.
Show up to enough things in a small town and you get to know people quickly. In a city of 10,000 or so, there's about a hundred people you regularly see at most events. It doesn't take long to identify significant figures and the different factions at work and the various interests which sometimes come into pointless conflict with each other. One figure in particular introduced me to what I refer to as the rural perspective: a friend of mine named Paul Gilk.
Paul is in his seventies and has been a prolific author for decades. He lives in a log cabin that he built with his father in the woods on his family's farm land. The cabin has no electricity or running water and it is filled with books, candles and a variety of chairs for his guests. Paul also served on the county board for several terms, owns a car and his wife owns a house in the city. He doesn't totally reject modernity but he is passionate about living a rural lifestyle.
The central question to Paul's essays is “why are small farms dying?” He's been researching answers to this question since the 70s when he spent time living in St. Louis but found himself longing for a return to the rural lifestyle he had left behind. The content of his books range between autobiographical notes, philosophical and religious musings and political ponderings. The answer to his question exists elusively between the words of his numerous essays.
Amongst several of his favorite phrases, the one, to me, that most clearly describes the “ethic” of the rural perspective is “radical servanthood and radical stewardship.” These mean servanthood to neighbors or all people and stewardship of the land, creatures and plants that we call nature. These ideas are radical because they imply actions which are incongruous to the current state of society and, in some ways, unimaginable or impossible to describe in precise detail.
A phrase I often dwell on in relation to this idea is “they would give the shirt off their back to help someone.” The phrase is slightly but could also be true in the right circumstance. Another idea to describe a rural perspective is the basic humanity of inviting someone in from the cold. Free warmth (or air conditioning) is a radical idea when scaled to a societal level. The outdated cliches of lending a neighbor a cup of sugar, helping someone wrangle an escaped animal or a community collaborating on raising a barn are all actions spurred by these radical ethics.
Besides deep care, love, passion and pleasure between humans, the rural perspective also radically considers nature and the environment in its pursuits. Nature provides bountiful resources if humans would only let it or even thoughtfully encourage it. In recent centuries, humans have sought to master nature and even exploit certain aspects to an ultimate detriment. As part of nature themselves, some level of intervention between human, plant and animal is expected but a rural perspective would encourage mutually beneficial and sustainable practices.
By definition, these are radical ideals to strive for and to build a perspective around. The rural perspective exists in opposition to many values of civilization that are taken for granted such as clean floors or right angles. I began this post by talking about rural being intentionally forgotten. Rural peasants were (or still are) oppositional to civilized royalty. Civilization has tried its best in the last two thousand years or so to remove itself from the dirty peasant lifestyle and extract and exploit the abundance of nature as provided by the peasants it left behind.
The rural perspective is aware of this exploitation but is willing to forgive and continue to give its natural wealth until the civilized understand what it means to live within the practical means and wealth of our shared environments. As humanity moves through time, awareness of our impacts on nature, our environments and on each other keeps increasing. Social movements are increasingly advocating for more groups and having broader impacts faster than ever before. Humanity is slowly evolving to regain its rural perspective. My work is to help move us there sooner.
