Cross Country Veggies

Here are today’s Wonderful Words:

Transporting a single calorie of a perishable fresh fruit from California to New York takes about 87 calories worth of fuel. That’s as efficient as driving from Philadelphia to Annapolis, and back, in order to walk three miles on a treadmill in a Maryland gym.

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, Barbara Kingsolver, page 68

Background

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle tells the story of a family that moves to a farm in Virginia and spends the year eating only local food, most of which they grew or raised. These sentences come from the chapter explaining some of the best reasons to eat in-season, local food.

What makes it wonderful?

This one isn’t wonderful in the traditional sense.

It doesn’t make us marvel at the beauty of the English language, like Steinbeck does here.

It doesn’t paint a vivid picture of an old, grizzled tiger hunter, like Vaillant does here.

And it doesn’t hook us like the cliffhanger of a Netflix finale, like Kalanithi does here.

But it does do something else that’s pretty important at this point in Kingsolver’s story. It emphasizes one of the major points of her book—the value of eating local.

Learning that the produce we eat in New York comes from California? Sure, maybe it’s a bit surprising.

Learning that the energy to transport the food is 87 times the energy we gain from eating it? Yeah, that’s actually rather shocking.

But learning that this would be the same as driving from the Eagles stadium to the campus of the Naval academy—236 miles round trip—simply to walk a 5k on a treadmill? C’mon, you’d have to be a god damn nutcase to do that.

And there you have her point…

You wouldn’t drive to another state to exercise when you have a gym in your hometown. So why would you buy groceries that took a cross-country road trip on a gas-guzzling 18-wheeler when you could take a trip to the local farmer’s market?

Let's get technical

Kingsolver used a pretty great analogy here. According to the Masterclass website, “An analogy is something that shows how two things are alike, but with the ultimate goal of making a point about this comparison. The purpose of an analogy is not merely to show, but also to explain.”

I don’t know about you, but I’d say she made a point. Her point was strong enough to make me take action, which is a lot more than most authors do. After reading this book, I started buying much more of my food from local farms.

If that’s not some powerful writing, I don’t know what is.

You can have the most convincing stat in the world, but sometimes readers need to see it through a different frame. And that’s where the analogy comes in. It’s actually pretty easy. Put down your pencil and brainstorm examples that are totally unrelated but equally as impactful. Then sit back and smile as you watch your readers take action based solely on your words.

Happy writing,

Joe