"The Soilmakers of Bend"
A RCN New Myth
In the high desert winds of Bend, Oregon, where lawns once shimmered green with foreign thirst, there stood a village restless for renewal. Jake and his friends felt the hum beneath their feet — a whisper from the earth asking to be tended, not tamed. Each morning, they gathered at the Commons, a circle of bare soil and grass still clinging to its suburb past. They called themselves The Soilmakers.
Their elders spoke of the Resilient Communities Network, a web of kindred villages forming a constellation across the land — places learning again how to live with the earth instead of upon it. So Jake’s band took the old lawns as their dragon to slay. Their adventure began with spades and shovels, not swords.
At first, there was doubt. The lawns resisted, the soil was thin and tired, rich only in memories of pesticides. Yet they planted hope — organic seeds gathered from neighbors — and built compost heaps like shrines. Worm by worm, they made new soil. Water flowed from new swales, and the first sprigs of kale rose like green phoenixes.
The crisis came one summer when the heat grew fierce and the sprouts shriveled. The village nearly lost faith. Then, together, they remembered the permaculture principle of observation. They slowed down, shaded the beds, gathered mulch from the forest, and sang to the soil. The garden breathed again.
By autumn, the lawns had vanished, replaced by food forests buzzing with bees and laughter. The Commons was reborn — a permanent place of sharing, where no one bought vegetables; they exchanged stories instead. Jake and his friends were no longer just gardeners — they were stewards of a living myth.
Now, each spring, when newcomers arrive to learn, the elders tell the tale of how the Soilmakers turned grass into grain and separation into community. The myth lives on, spreading through the Resilient Communities Network — a reminder that regeneration always begins with the courage to plant something new.
Resilient Communities Network
https://resilientcommunities.network/ 
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