This year’s Radically Rural theme is Regenerate Rural. There are several definitions of regenerate that resonate with us, but my favorite is “to bring into renewed existence.” This year’s sessions will dive into the regeneration of whole systems that affect our social fabric, from transit to land access and beyond. While we find value in those big picture conversations, there are also small ways that we can bring our communities and our systems into renewed existence.

This year, we’re starting with t-shirts.

The last time Radically Rural purchased branded t-shirts was 2021. That is due to a conscious effort of ours to reduce waste and energy usage by only buying when we need to, and when we do need to, to buy sustainably and locally produced items as often as we can. While it’s true that we don’t need t-shirts, we like to give them to our staff and volunteers for a few reasons. The bright red color makes them easy to pick out. When you have a question, you can almost always spot a volunteer by their shirt. It’s nice to give something to our volunteers for their time. And like every other brand or movement out there, we’re seizing the opportunity for wearable marketing. For the last two years, we’ve been making do with a limited size range of leftover t-shirts and an arsenal of rubber bands. 

This year, we are truly running out of options, so we’re hosting a t-shirt drive. If you have a Radically Rural t-shirt that sits in the back of your drawer, send it to us. If you love your Radically Rural t-shirt and wear it proudly, keep it! Better yet, send us a picture of you flaunting your radically rural self. We’d love to share it. But if you, like so many of us, have a drawer full of free t-shirts that you are never going to wear again, send it back to us so we can bring it into a renewed existence.

The most environmentally friendly practice is not buying more (no matter how organic or recyclable they are), it is using and reusing what we have. So please consider donating your t-shirt to our drive OR getting more use out of it yourself. 

If every person that saw this told us they wear their Radically Rural t-shirt everyday and will never part with it, we would be ecstatic. But we know, that is likely not the case. If it is, seriously, send us a picture. In addition to that picture that you’re taking right now in your Radically Rural t-shirt, send us your favorite sustainable, made in the USA brands. We know that one day we will have to buy more shirts and we’d love to find a distributor that we can wholeheartedly support. 

If you are interested in participating in our t-shirt drive, please mail your shirt to:

Hannah Grimes Center

25 Roxbury Street

Keene, NH 03431

 

Written by Lillian Chase.