Nestled here in our quiet mountain coves it can often seem that the problems of the world are far away, barely affecting our daily lives, activities and concerns. For many of us, there is a special peace brought on by this place of clear, cool streams and verdant hills that effectively camouflages many of the wrongs on the planet, especially if one can avoid seeing a television or picking up a newspaper.

All that changes once we come down off the hill and travel far enough to cross a few state lines. It’s tough to ignore what you see through your windshield and hear in conversations direct from America’s backyards. On a recent road trip to visit family I was reawakened from my idyllic Appalachian slumber and found that with a little travel you can find plenty of big problems just about everywhere you go. The nation appears to have lost the application of logic in it’s decision-making and nationwide we as Americans are floundering.

Even a trip to Asheville can shock the senses with the sheer number of cars and trucks out there sucking up $2-per-gallon gasoline. Sure, we see traffic counts increase locally as the tourists return with the leaves each summer, but pack six lanes of asphalt for miles with cars and trucks and the incredible volume of glass and steel alone will get your attention. As we crossed state lines the scene was repeated, differing only by the color of the license plates going in all directions.

Logic would tell you that we drive around too much. We cannot continue to add ever more cars to already crowded roads, nor expect fuel prices not to rise when we’re slurping up more petroleum everyday, but few are listening and even fewer it seems are responding. An accident has occurred; effective marketing has run over our logic. Someone needs to call 911.

Along the road we saw great scars across the landscape, one after another of slashed earth making way for another mall, subdivision or chain store. Pastures, meadows and crop lands are being rapidly converted to raising buildings, not produce. While innocent enough an idea to most investors, this conversion drives food production and local jobs farther from consumers requiring more shipping traffic, fuel use, supply vulnerability and limiting food’s freshness. This trend reduces the earth’s plant cover with it’s oxygen producing transpiration, and the resulting water runoff from these areas is laden with silt and petrochemicals which wind up defiling the streams we rely on for drinking and recreation. Each time I saw another bad example repeated I had to ask myself, “How many more thousands of these do we really need? Where is the logic?”

Much of the country seems to be caught up in the pro-consumption attitudes encouraged by slick advertising and the newly rich media and sports stars with their flagrant buying habits, monster mansions and insatiable desire to acquire expensive things. Too many Americans are following that bad example by consuming more and more while striving to work and produce less and less.

Concerted marketing efforts have convinced many that lavish living, giant SUVs and huge homes filled with too much stuff are worth the obesity, heart attacks, prescription drug dependence and mountains of garbage we generate to get it. The emphasis on “bling-bling” and the glorification of those who work little and make millions has clouded many people’s eyes to their role as world citizens and the most basic logic of sustainability.

Too many people it seems are hell bent on over-consuming simply because it’s the way of the rich and famous, and we’ve been convinced that we need the same. Way too few are making great efforts to reduce their impact and react only when their egos or wallets are threatened. Now that the economy continues to dive for many industries and localities, whole communities are grasping at straws for the promise of jobs and prosperity from prisons, landfills, mass extraction of natural resources, or quick sale of whatever anyone will buy. They’re raiding the cookie jar that belongs to the future; short-term thinking that’s short on logic.

Sixteen hundred miles later, I returned to my quiet cove and fields not with a crystal ball filled with answers but a clearer picture of how screwed up things have become in America. I came to realize that what the nation truly needs is a reassignment of the “margins of reasonable behavior.” Logic could again become a key component in decision-making, rather than a way-too-late afterthought. Imagine if each person, corporation or entity considered the impact of their actions on other people and the planet and always cleaned up their own mess. If we can move the attitude margins such that gas-guzzling vehicles and mass consumption are viewed as stupid and unfavorable for everyone, those things will fall from favor. If the margins can be shifted so that smaller, energy-efficient homes and healthy, productive lifestyles are what everyone needs and deserves, we can cut our energy use and health care costs and begin working toward a more sustainable future. We can start to promote good living patterns by rejecting the lousy, illogical ones. These margins cannot be instantly or completely reassigned by legislation or executive order. It will take many factors working together, most importantly a widespread attitude shift on the part of the American people. Logic and long-term thinking should be applied at every decision, from personal habits to international affairs, concepts our country has somehow forgotten in the past couple of centuries.

We all use resources and create wastes. We could all be doing a better job of reducing both. My guess is that only a crisis can or will undo our deeply-rooted, false and piggish precepts that America has the right to be the most consumptive and polluting nation on Earth, and reassign those margins to reasonable, logical limits that promote global human and environmental welfare. Fortunately, from what I saw on the road I don’t think we’ll have to wait much longer. Thank goodness for logic and hope, and the efforts of those trying to redirect our mis-guided nation.

(John Beckman is a builder, organic farmer and logician living in Jackson County. He can be reached at info@unahwi-ridge.com.)