The World Awaits You

Reader Contribution by Lee Bentley
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A little over a year ago I happened to get into a conversation with a bright young man who had just taken a class in wildcrafting at our local branch university. He was full of enthusiasm for what he had learned there and had made a batch of skin cream utilizing the aromatic mountain sage that grows everywhere here in Northern New Mexico. He proudly gave me a jar, and to my surprise it worked very well on my crusty old skin. The next time I saw him, I asked what he had done with his skin cream idea and he replied that he didn’t know what to do to make a product from it. Having spent about half my life as a teacher, this was like the fire alarm going off for a fire house dog. I suggested some possible sources of information and brought up the idea of looking into whatever regulations might be lurking. I also talked up it’s potential to become a little business he might nurture into a livelihood. At that time my young friend had no job and no serious responsibilities beyond his beloved old truck. In the interval between our next meeting, I looked into the pertinent regulations … the State of New Mexico wasn’t a problem and the scary FDA had much bigger fish to fry.

In a later conversation with my friend’s mother, I learned he had not made any more sage skin cream and had taken a job at the local movie theater.  Of course I was a little disappointed, but the teacher in me knew that I could only plant a seed, I couldn’t make it grow. But what had happened was I had planted the seed in my head too…and it had began to grow! If that was such a great idea for a home based business why don’t I do it? I had sold my sign business the year before (which, in part,  had sprung from an article I had read in The Mother Earth News back in the 70’s). I had lots of time and a small Social Security check. From that point things began to take on a life of their own…research on the internet led me to the beneficial qualities of animal fats for the skin. The biology is almost perfect – your skin wants and needs animal fats. However, my enthusiasm was seriously dampened by the reality of the treatment given to our domestic livestock (more on that in a coming blog). I wouldn’t smear the fat from those poor tormented beasts on my skin and certainly wouldn’t offer it to anyone else. So my great idea took a nose dive. What a shame, a good idea struck down by modern agribusiness.

Then the light bulb above my head turned back on! What large herbivorous animal could be a source of pure fat for the perfect skin care product? The answer was just across the road in front of my house. Buffalo! But my neighbor would no doubt object strenuously to my havesting his buffalo. So I then researched again, until I found a source for fat that was as pure as the fats that our ancestors used to protect against their harsh world.

  • Published on May 29, 2013
Tagged with: Reader Contributions
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