Ever since permaculture came to my attention last year, I have watched every video, flipped through book after book, and surfed the web for forums, looking for whatever information I could find. All well and good, of course, but I'm frustrated by the fact that it's all academic and no practice. I'm itching to get my hands on some dirt.

This time of learning will be good for me to spend more time thinking about the defining characteristics and ethics that are an integral part of the development of permaculture. My focus has been on the how-to. Taking a piece of land that has been so overworked and drought-ridden that it is completely devoid of life, and turning it into a food forest that can support a family or a community, seems like the kind of challenge we will be needing to do more and more in the coming days.