What Are We Voting For?

What’s on my mind today?

Voting.

Not the political kind.

The kind we do every day with our money, our time, our attention, and our habits.

My family has an ongoing conversation about our local McDonald’s.

My kids love it. They want the fries. They want the nuggets. They want the experience to be what they hope it will be.

But the service is terrible and inconsistent enough that even my kids notice it. They have brought it up more than once. My response to them has been pretty simple:

Until we stop giving them our money, they have no reason to change.

If we keep buying it, we are voting for it.

We may complain about the service. We may talk about how bad the experience was. We may say we are disappointed.

But when we pull back into the drive-through and hand them our money again, we are telling them something else.

We are saying, “This is still good enough for us to buy.”

My kids understand that.

They also still want the fries.

I get it.

I still want the fries too.

That is the part I can’t stop thinking about.

Because a few days later, I was standing in Lowe’s looking at shelf after shelf of weed killer. A lot of shelf space. The kind of shelf space a store does not dedicate to something unless people are buying it.

And I felt confused.

Not angry exactly. Not even judgmental, although I’m sure there was some judgment in me if I’m being honest.

Mostly confused.

I found myself thinking, “Doesn’t everyone know?”

Doesn’t everyone know we should at least be asking harder questions about the chemicals we spray where our kids play, where our pets walk, where our gardens grow, and where water eventually runs?

Would I drink it?

Would I put it on my skin?

Would I want my kids playing sports on a field treated with it?

Would I feel good eating food that was treated with it shortly before harvest?

I know those questions are not full scientific arguments. I know they do not replace toxicology studies, label instructions, or real risk assessment. I am not a scientist, and I am not pretending to be one.

But I am a dad.

I am a homeowner.

I am someone trying to pay attention.

And I am someone who gets confused when something many of us seem uncomfortable with still takes up that much space on the shelf.

The product exists because people buy it.

The shelf space exists because people buy it.

The company keeps making it because people buy it.

That is how the system works.

And that is where it gets uncomfortable for me.

Because this is not just about weed killer.

It is really easy to talk about what other people should change. Farmers should change. Companies should change. Stores should change. Neighbors should change. Someone else should stop doing the thing we think they should stop doing.

Maybe they should.

But what am I doing?

What am I still buying?

What am I still funding?

What am I still choosing because it is easy, familiar, convenient, or comfortable?

I spent more than ten years reading every book I could find about human health, longevity, nutrition, and the gut microbiome. I changed a lot because of what I learned. I probably follow 80% of it.

But there is still that other 20%.

There are still things I eat, buy, or do on a daily basis that I know would probably be better if I changed.

So why don’t I change them?

If I understood that, I wouldn’t be writing this.

That might be the real question.

Why doesn’t knowing better automatically lead to doing better?

Why do we keep voting for things with our money, our time, our attention, and our habits that we also say we want to change?

Maybe because convenience is powerful.

Maybe because habits are powerful.

Maybe because marketing works.

Maybe because change is uncomfortable.

Maybe because the thing we know is not best still gives us something we want in the moment.

The fries still taste good.

The weeds still disappear.

The old habit still comforts us.

The easy choice still works well enough today, even if some part of us wonders what it costs tomorrow.

I recently tested a more natural weed-control product for a customer who was looking for an organic option. It was made with clove oil, lemon oil, and soybean oil. I mixed a small amount into a gallon of water and sprayed a small patch of weeds.

It did not magically solve the problem.

It did not fully kill the weeds.

But it burned the leaves badly. In some places, they were almost burned to the ground.

That small test did not prove anything. It was one product, one application, one small patch, and one observation. I would need to test more, adjust the method, watch for regrowth, and compare results before saying anything with confidence.

But it did make me think.

What if alternatives exist, but they require more patience?

What if better options are not always easier options?

What if some of the older, simpler, more natural approaches never disappeared because they failed, but because they were harder to sell, harder to patent, harder to package, or less convenient for the world we built?

I don’t know the answer.

That is the honest truth.

I don’t know.

I don’t know how to perfectly balance freedom, responsibility, health, convenience, cost, effectiveness, and personal choice.

I don’t know how to live in a world with endless information and still know what is best.

I don’t know how to make perfect decisions.

I still buy things I probably don’t need.

I still choose convenience.

I still do things I know may not be the best thing for my own physical body.

So this is not me standing above anyone else with all the answers.

This is me standing in the aisle, looking at the shelf, looking at myself, and feeling confused.

I don’t understand why we accept some things as normal.

I don’t understand why we can learn something may not be good for us and then not immediately drop it and move on.

I don’t understand why things persist for so long after we start openly questioning them.

And I really don’t understand why I do the same thing in my own life.

Before I judge someone else’s shelf, field, cart, or plate, I need to look at my own.

What am I voting for?

What am I funding?

What am I asking to continue because I keep choosing it?

I’ve said something for years to my insurance customers when they sit across from me in my office.

“Thank you. You spend your money with my business, and every dollar is a vote for me. I appreciate that and value it. You get to choose, and you chose me. That means a lot.”

Maybe I need to say that more often to Iowa Worm Farm customers too.

Because it’s true.

When someone buys worm castings from me, they are voting for something.

They are voting for food waste becoming soil instead of landfill.

They are voting for a different way of thinking about lawns, gardens, and plant health.

They are voting for a small local business trying to figure out a better way, one imperfect step at a time.

And I don’t take that lightly.

Maybe that is where this whole thing lands for me today.

Every purchase is a vote.

Not a perfect vote.

Not always a fully informed vote.

Not always a vote we even realize we are casting.

But a vote all the same.

So maybe the question is not just, “What should they change?”

Maybe the better question is:

What am I voting for?