Imagine

Vege garden from It's Complicated. Swoon! (Seriously. I'm so lame. I watched this movie three times to perve on the garden and interior design.)

OK, confession time. When I do the ironing, I like to geek it up and listen to podcasts on my iPhone. It makes a fairly boring task enjoyable, and I get to catch up on gardening podcasts, as well as listen to some awesome lectures.

The other day I was listening to some of last years' TED talks and came across one by Rachel Botsman. It was all about the idea of sharing and how she believed the way of the future was in shared knowledge and shared belongings as opposed to hyper-consumerism (her words, paraphrased poorly, I'm afraid).

How cool would it be if everyone in your suburban block grew one type of produce (herbs, tomatoes, apples, lettuce, leeks, whatever) in addition to anything else they may wish or have time to grow. Then, every couple of weeks you have a produce swap. You take some herbs and some eggs, some leeks and some kale and swap them for bundles of juicy tomatoes, or cucumbers, zucchinis, whatever.

If I let my imaginative and entrepreneurial brain run away from me I see a co-op, rows of homegrown produce, huge tubs of bulk staples and a program for renting out your underused domestic items.

Did you know that on average, a domestic power drill is used less than an hour its entire life? To quote Rachel again:

"You need the hole, not the drill!"

What if co-op members stored their drills, saws and other bits and pieces at the co-op and rented them to other members for a small fee? Make a little bit of cash from the things you own but use really infrequently. Cool.

Pardon my idealistic ramblings here. I've just had this idea rattling around in my brain for a while and thought it might do some good to get a little air on it.

Plus, I got doubly excited about it again when my sister told me about this local business called Healthy Harvest who are starting a shared farming program in the Blue Mountains. I think it's in testing phase this year and looking to go bigger next autumn.

I love that people are finding solutions to problems by looking outward, finding other people who feel similarly to them. Gives me the warm and fuzzies!