Dreaming of the Ogallala :: The Third Day

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This content was posted on 13 Jul 24 by Joe Brewer on Medium

On our third day, I began to dream of a $100 million dollar fund to #RegenerateTheOgallala…

In the morning we drove across 8000 acres of sand dunes covered in grass. This natural geologic feature absorbs 100% of the rain that falls onto it to recharge the aquifer that is below the two hundred feet of sandy soil on this part of the land.

I could feel how people on the Great Plains need to understand how important this groundwater supply is. The feeling became more clear as we walked barefoot in the Canadian River that is more sand than water. And as we pulled invasive bushes to repair the banks of this important waterway.

Later, we smoked tobacco and sought guidance from our ancestors at a sacred site of the Comanche People (and many other tribes who came before them). It was there — at sunset — that I began to see the shape of the moraine that creates this massive aquifer as it spread beyond the horizon to the north.

It was also there that a clear vision for raising the first $100 million dollars arose in my heart. I could feel an impact fund being designed that secures the first 60,000 acres of land at the southern end of the Ogallala that could become part of a patchwork quilt all the way up to Wyoming and Nebraska.

Do I have any idea how this fund might come into being? No. Yet do I sense that it is urgent and timely that it manifest into the world? Absolutely. It is this sense of dreaming at the scales our times require that shaped my thoughts throughout the night.

Onward, fellow humans.

Joe Brewer is co-founder of the Design School for Regnerating Earth as well as a co-founder of Barichara Regenerativa. You can follow him on Twitter, LinkedIn, or Instagram and support his work directly on Patreon.

Tagged with :

design, finance, ogallala, regeneration, water

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