quote for today

This comes from the Plough, a daily email publication put out by the Bruederhoeff. "We are involved now in a profound failure of imagination. Most of us cannot imagine the wheat beyond the bread, or the farmer beyond the wheat, or the farm beyond the farmer, or the history beyond the farm. Most people cannot imagine the forest and the forest economy that produced their houses and furniture and paper; or the landscapes, the streams and the weather that fill their pitchers and bathtubs and swimming pools with water. Most people appear to assume that when they have paid their money for these things they have entirely met their obligations." --Wendell Berry, "Thoughts in the Presence of Fear", Orion Magazine. I'm not sure exactly where this quote fits in, but I think it is profound: "The richer a society, the more impossible it becomes to do worthwhile things without immediate payoff."