January 1, 2050,
Fear.
I remember that being the overwhelming emotion that pulsed through my veins when the love of my life, whom I had just married hours before, squeezed my hand and said, “I can’t wait to start a family with you.” Of course, I wanted children. We had talked about it for years–even before he proposed during that magical sunrise on the lookout of Rocky Butte in Portland, Oregon. But now that we were married, now that the possibility of bringing a child into the world seemed so close, I was paralyzed with an overwhelming sense of dread.
How was I supposed to bring a child into a doomed world? What reason could I fathom nurturing a soul in a civilization I had lost all faith in? Would my child get to have the quality of life I’d always dreamed for them on an Earth whose climate was on the brink of collapse?
That was February of 2024.
It’s hard to believe what our reality was back then, seeing where we are now. I remember, when I first started dreaming of the world we have today, I didn’t actually believe it could ever come true. We were surrounded by so much pain. Horrible wars were tearing apart families, countries, and faith in humanity. In the United States, we were facing an election year that would become one of the most divisive the country had ever seen. People were polarized, hateful, and selfish. Our society wanted more, more, MORE things to fill our existence with. Everyone’s heads were down, buried deep in their phones, scrolling through the lives of anyone else and forgetting to live their own.
There were two things I was desperate for: time and connection. I wanted more time and space to truly live–to breathe in the fresh coastal air, smell the dahlias that bloomed behind my apartment building, and watch the leaves turn into their autumnal gradient as the weather began to cool. I desired to share a plate of freshly baked cookies with my neighbors during book club and help one of them renovate their kitchen out of the goodness of our hearts, not expecting anything in return but their gratitude. I wanted this for my hypothetical child. I wanted this for me and my new husband. I wanted this for our world. So, maybe, I thought, other people might want this too.
The journey started with finding investors in my immediate community. People who could help fund and participate in my grand plan of creating a sustainable micro-community. With much convincing, I had gathered fifty households in my neighborhood in Koreatown who felt similarly as I did and came on board with my plan to create a micro-community that would function symbiotically by reducing our waste footprint, living off of sustainable food practices, and providing mutual services that would minimize consumerism for each household. That didn’t mean we couldn’t be consumers outside of our micro-community, it just meant we could come to our community members first before seeking resources outside of it.
Then we made a proposal to the Los Angeles City Council. The council was skeptical that this could function in an urban setting. I argued, “Maybe it will all be for nothing, but don’t we owe it to ourselves, our children, and this planet to at least try? If we can succeed here, in Los Angeles, don’t you think we could do it anywhere?” The council approved our permits to turn an abandoned lot into a community garden and allowed us to transform our water and waste practices with the city’s departments (it was a lot of paperwork, but I won’t bore you with the details).
We had one year to prove the micro-community’s efficacy without it seeming like it was just another “hippie urban commune” (a councilman’s words, not mine). It was not all rainbows and butterflies from the start. Our self-serving, mega-consumeristic tendencies were hard to break. We liked our comforts–food that came packaged, clothes with a sales tag, and twenty-minute-long showers. There was a big adjustment period, and some people dropped out of the community because it was all too much.
We quickly learned that we didn’t have access to things we needed, like milk for example. With much difficulty due to their scarcity, we eventually found a local sustainable farm that used the mixed-farming method growing crops on rotation and raising livestock that lived in harmony with the land. We made a contract with the farmer to have a farm share, but in time, much of our produce came from our own garden which easily supplied our fifty households and even gave us some to sell or give away to those who needed it. And we didn’t have to give up everything we loved! I still gave in to my cravings for Hot Cheetos from the grocery store every once in a while, but we felt less need to buy excess or prepackaged food. Miraculously, we managed to reduce our food waste by 83%.
Our members would use their hobbies and talents to benefit the group, and we would gather together to participate in unity. Several members of our group were avid sewers. Instead of throwing old fabrics away, we repurposed them into new clothes, bags, towels, rags…you name it! Some members were chemistry-oriented and interested in making soaps and sustainable housecleaning products–anything that could eliminate single-use plastics from our lives we tried to find an alternative (it didn’t always work). As I said, we didn’t eliminate all outside consumerism. That wasn’t the point of this micro-community, but over time we gained more members with new talents and naturally, we all consumed less–67% less plastics, 71% less fabrics, and 55% less other non-reusable materials.
We were saving money and, best of all, we were spending more time with good people in such positive ways. We were all so much more content with our lives. Time seemed to pass slower. Our connections with our neighbors were deeper. We had created a safer, more reliable network of households. Again, we had our struggles. We didn’t get along all the time, certain logistics in scheduling members for services were a nightmare, and some people chose to leave, but that was the beauty of this system. You had the choice to contribute to the system and receive its benefits, or you could not participate and we wouldn’t judge or shun those who made that choice. By the end of that year, our community grew to 83 households.
Well, long story short, word got out about our successful sustainable urban micro-community. More neighborhoods started their own micro-communities. The city of Los Angeles repurposed abandoned buildings and lots across the county for community gardens, lawns, mini-parks, and trade centers for people to deliver and redistribute goods. The micro-communities continued to succeed and even collaborated, all while staying within the breadth of the government regulations. More towns and cities across the state and the country began adopting these methods. It was all optional, but so many people were thirsty for meaningful change.
By the fourth year, large consumer corporations were losing money drastically because there was lower demand for their supplies. They needed to adapt how they sold their products, but also what kind of products they sold. The reality was that many of these corporations (Coca-Cola, Johnson and Johnson, and Kellogg, to name a few) had to reduce their production by nearly half at the time. Jobs were lost, which caused quite a stir, but very rapidly jobs in sustainable sectors were created and positions were filled.
More consumer-driven countries incorporated versions of sustainable micro-communities into their way of living after seeing how much the U.S. had transformed. Some even came up with new systems that we’ve now adopted in the U.S. It’s important to note that consumerism fluctuated during these times, just as it’s still fluctuating now. The wealthy still consume more than the average citizen, but the definition of wealth has greatly changed over the past fifteen years. The best part is we started to see the positive effects our decrease in consumption had on nature. We have quite literally added decades to our planet’s life already, and at the rate we’re going, it will soon be centuries.
As for humanity? We are more connected than we ever were on social media. Social media is still around, but people are much less buried in their devices than they were in 2024. We are enjoying living our own lives in the moment. It feels good to be helping our neighbors and healing our planet without expecting a reward in return. The real reward is our time and our connection. We still have a long way to go, in my opinion, but today I will celebrate that we’ve saved my children’s, and all our children’s, future.
Today is my eldest daughter’s wedding day. The first day of the year 2050. Soon she will have her own child for whom she will hold hopes and dreams as numerous as the stars. I’m honored I was able to be a part of reinvigorating her future on this earth–the future of my hypothetical grandchildren. And the overwhelming emotion that is pumping through my veins now?
Bliss.