The Local

Local is a word that can be used several ways. Geographically, mostly positive, when describing a character, often derogative. You can be local and be a local. In my opinion, the word itself sounds like an insult at first impression. And yet being local and viewed as a local is such a well-dusted chip on the shoulder of so many people. A map-point of pride. Shop local. Eat local. Local honey. Local eggs. The power of the word comes from being so directly tangential to home. I think for some local extends no further than a property line, and I think you’ll find these people often garden, keep chickens, and produce food within their definition of local. Others, usually educated through academia or vocational experience, local is an entire community, a town, a city, a county, a state, a country. Their home is nestled within it like an egg within a nest and they know, they have learned, their neighbor’s creeks are their creeks. All locals join together in that great cosmic realization that universally speaking, what are we to the earth? The fog lifts on the final view of local, which is, seemingly paradoxically, global. 

To see it clearly, what can’t be seen in the least, that the word local actually means roots. And even though they’re not physical and heavy like the ones beneath a tree, we are all physically tethered to major resources to maintain life. We’re held hostage to these needs, in a way, because we exist in bodies that will consume themselves if they are not fed, and survive in environments with weather conditions that require us to seek shelter. Local refers to our concept of the community of life around us that answers these needs, allowing us to maintain the healthy function of life going beyond survival into wholesome fulfillment. The setting that backdrops the drama of living is described as local. 

From the surface of the planet, there are endless locals, every town and city with a story all its own, but from the surface of any other planet, none of that is known. We are all locals and local and by definition, belong to the Earth. When we move, we drag our roots, we transplant ourselves and our lives, but none of us exist in a vacuum, and without this planet and its resources and its seasons and specific level of gravity, there is no such thing as life. Without having a vision or an idea, a lot of work is required simply to be. And you’re not a local because of the amount of time you’ve spent in a place, you’re a local because you’re drinking the water there every day, eating food grown in the miles surrounding your home.

Local is a word very rarely if ever used in past tense. Have you ever heard someone say I used to be a local, I was a local there for a while. It’s odd to write and more so to read. You are or aren’t local, seldom were and are no longer, products are not previously local because they were shipped across an ocean. Local is active, and present in our minds, referring to the physical roots that sustain daily life, the resources of family and happiness. Food, water, shelter. All the way to medicine, education, friendly neighbors, and entertainment. 

Next time you hear the word local used, consider the context: is it food, is it a product, does it represent a person or describe a personality? It is a word with power and some ambivalence, because no matter its use, local hits close to home. That’s what the word local means. The concept of home is as changing as there are minds to conceive. Local is its frame, its nest, its context. It is a word with power, because of its connotation to home.