While most plants grow from the tip of the growing shoot, grasses adapted to grow from the bottom-up this is why they can be trampled, grazed, or burned and still thrive. Grasses are found on every continent, including Antarctica, and do important things like nourish wildlife and prevent erosion. Grasses are the most economically important plant family and account for almost one-quarter of the earth’s vegetation. Yet it is the Poacea (sometimes called Gramineae) family that comprises over half of all dietary energy consumed in the world, mostly through grasses like wheat, rice, oats, barley, and corn. Among the plant kingdom, with its colorful flowers, towering trees, and incredible diversity, the humble grasses hardly seem notable. It is a kind of spiritual alchemy by which ordinary, often overlooked things are transformed into something more than the sum of their parts.įunny enough, the “grass” in “grassroots” is a study in this idea. In other words, the origins or essence from which something meaningful blooms for example, curiosity as the grassroots essence of learning, or love as the grassroots origin of brotherhood. Yet what “grassroots” really means is the most fundamental or essential level of a thing. Perhaps for others it connotes efforts a lack professionalization, centralization, or polish. What does the term “grassroots” bring up for you?įor many it hearkens to street protests and the counterculture revolution of the 1960s. “A blade of grass is the journeywork of the stars.” -Walt Whitman
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