Discuss: Altar Call for True Believers

This is a wonderful article that captures my feelings exactly. I work part time in a heath food store and one of my big frustrations is all the plastic. Plastic bags that we repack all those organic goodies (candies, dried fruits, etc.) everyone loves, plastic gloves we must wear to make a deli sandwich. Plastic garbage bags. Plastic bubble wrap supplements and other breakables come in. Styrofoam peanuts – those things should be outlawed. It really irks me when books and other nonbreakables come way overpackaged in plastic and styrofoam. At home I have more control over plastic. But I still use some, though much less than even a year ago.
  I may be wrong, but I believe my biggest personal contribution to climate change is my car, a 1996 Honda that gets about 32 MPG but is old and so therefore has dirtier emissions, or so I’ve been told. But I can’t afford a new car and don’t know when I’ll be able to. I live seven miles from town, fourteen miles from my job, and there’s no small store nearby to pick up even a paper. I’ve lived in a rural area all my life and don’t like cities. Ideal would be a house in a small town so we could walk at least for some things. (Problems with legs and back make bike riding not a great idea for me at this point in my life, nor would it work for my disabled sister, though she can walk just fine.) We are thinking of selling and moving to just such a location but the housing market right now isn’t great here and places in town cost way more than we can afford. Contradictions are crazy-making especially when so much is at stake. But I do garden, do buy as much local food as possible, the store where I work is a great, community-centered place (plastic notwithstanding), and there are days when I don’t have to drive anywhere. They are the best! And thanks to the rising cost of fuel and everything else, we buy much less ‘stuff’ than ever before, and don’t miss it at all. I love flea markets, antique stores, and yard sales. I have learned over the years not to judge because because it feels bad and changes nothing. And since I’m far from perfect, I figure if I don’t judge you, then hopefully you won’t judge me.

I have taken to asking customers at the store if they “need” a bag (and I always use paper unless they specifically request plastic or, better yet, have their own) rather than if they’d “like” a bag, and I think that small word change does make a difference.

Since I had posted, gruffly, comment number two, it really does seem my role must be that of the ‘Grinch That Stole Christmas’.

Ms. Ray’s monologue is soooo predictable. She does us a service, maybe, in that I know too many earnest folk who monopolize every conversation as if they had Ms. Ray’s article soldered into their brains, as script! Nice to have it all right out here, to parse a little further…..

Two realms stand out to this writer, and are illustrated by points in Ms. Ray’s article and in some of the responses in other comments.

Recall from the article, and from several comment posts, where the writers have chosen actually to live. Lifestyle choices matter: a poignant subtext here might go ‘but…I like my country life…’ Fine, but don’t you think before you join the choir that you might examine the costs your preference imposes on the rest of us? If you simply must drive a car to get to town because of where you like to rest your head, and thus you ‘can’t afford’ a less-impactful model, why shouldn’t you consider how you are burdening us all with the consequences of your free choice?

These are unpleasant hints of a sort that seethe over the heads of every choir and one reason I dread sermons, whether on the transmitting or the receiving end.

And, ah yes, the turkey paradox.

Ms. Ray, in a hurry for the sake of her own convenience, badgers the farmer, at the peak of HER most frantic season, to extend the further service of delivery. And at the same price, one wonders…

Where in Ms. Ray’s article, nay, in her mind, was an inspiration to network among her neighbors and friends, to organize a turkey pickup, or for next year, a turkey relay into town, adding value and subtracting impact at one swoop? Goodness. The pickup crew could even stop off at some other farms along the way—pumpkins, squash, a bit of fall color for the mantle. Idle chit-chat with locals maybe.

Oh—but THAT takes time and energy. It’s dreary, making those calls, hoofing it around town—not to speak of getting into town in the first place, o lucky country-dwellers, we!

We may pat ourselves on the back for right-thinking but the buck does stop when we get up and act. OR were those nods to ‘walking’ and ‘talking’ mere ornamentation? Vote. Badger mercilessly your elected reps. Form coops. Move to town.

So sorry about that last. Here’s one man’s vision of a low-carbon utopia: live where informal working alliances for practical ends (i.e. getting turkeys delivered) are as hard to start as stepping out the door and chatting with the two nearest neighbors. Groceries? Should be available within a 5 minute walk, preferably a 1 minute walk, where one carries in one’s empty bag, fills it, and comes home. Minimal waste, maximal use of time, a bit of exercise thrown in painlessly.

And the optical boutique, when new glasses are in order for screen-squinting? Right around the corner, the other side of the shoe store, the jewelry shop, the hardware boutique, and the post office…but be careful if you are headed out into the next block. You’ll pass through the bi-weekly street market, a minefield of every gadget and article of clothing known to humankind, plus garden-fresh vegetables, flowers, artisan cheeses, meats…oh, the horror of it. The humanity.

Getting rid of the waste? Across the street on the curb, let’s see. Brown equals compost. Green, glass and cans. White, plastic, and gray, paper and cardboard. The rest of course goes in ‘undefined’—the mid-sized box. Once a month if there’s something bigger or odder, it can sit next to that bin and will be spirited away.

Used batteries, compact fluorescents, computer parts? Check the return slots at the market for that, too.

Ah. Utopia. Italy is no paradise, but all of what I’ve described is exactly what is in place, now, in every town and city. Where there’s a will there’s a way.

Grinch says: will you? When?

Turin

Hey Mr. Grinch,

I agree with everything you’ve said. And it is no secret, at least among progressives here in the U.S., that Europe is way ahead of us (even a model in some respects). Changing societal habits in the U.S. is happening - there is more momentum in the “no” direction than ever before. I think the greatest hurdles for American society is how to caste off our cultural habits and paradigms with regard to issues like private property and community.

Competition is so much a trained and ingrained trait in American culture, that it takes an event of critical tragedy before people actually experience what “community” really feels like. Currently, given a few exceptions,  Americans are more inclined to avoid contact even with immediate neighbors rather than to associate. I bring this up because, as important as individual action is, community is our real issue.

All the little acts we need to do for a healthier, greener world are obvious to many Americans, but those things are not yet “Common Sense” because we have very little example, training or experience in “sense of common-unity”. Americans are typically more inclined to assert (at almost any cost) their separateness. It is a kind of dysfunctional individualism that prohibits the formation of healthy local common sense.

There is an awful lot of bad common sense in our culture. We’re working on it. Building “local economies” is not a new idea, but it is hard to wean the kid off the teat.

Drew

I guess Mr Grinch and all his followers have it all figured out. But I am still behind asking questions. Is it really more energy efficient for everything to be delivered into the city than for me to grow everything I can in my country garden? I work only 3 days a week because my country life is so affordable. The rest of the time we spend on our land, gardening and walking and visiting neighbors and of course communicating on the net and by phone and even letter.
Is his city life really all that superior? Where does his sewage go compared to our composting toilet and use of grey water? There are many issues and I think more than one right answer. An attitude of arrogance and self smugness is what turns many people off to the environmental movement. Is that the best approach? Or could we begin to look at things with an eye for understanding and cooperation? We have young family members in Atlanta who dont even bother to recycle because they feel so overwhelmed with their life of full time work and parenting young children. I can feel very judgmental about their choices. But where does that get us? Or I can try to think of ways to make their life a bit easier or to model a happy life that does not depend on so much consumption. These are complicated questions that do not lend themselves to stock answers. At least that is how I see it.

Well! A Rose is a Rose! Let me ask Mr. Grinch to let you know if—- or when—- he gets it all figured out.

Figuring. About 30 people live in my apartment building. There mare about 28 or 30 such apartment buildings on this city block, so that makes maybe 700 or 800 people. How many composting toilets is that? May we move in next door to you? (And what does a two story composting toilet look like? Five stories? Eleven?)

No—- still not speaking for Mr. Grinch—- I don’t have it all figured out. Please remember the example which I addressed was merely the ‘one person one turkey’ problem. These are not simple equations—- AND the nascent MBA in me wants to know from Ms. Rose much more about the economics of her life in the country and above all how the math comes out that she need work just 3 days a week to get by. Salutary, given contemporary land cost and debt service realities, not to mention pay-back on the investment for a composting toilet. If it’s really so, may we bottle that solution and distribute it widely? Royalties to Ms. Rose, of course. Or is there more here than meets the eye, what my mother always remarked as NVMOS—- some kind of No Visible Means of Support—- at work? One is struck that in his writing Wally Stegner usually followed the word ‘hippy’ with the phrase, ‘on trust funds’.  Do forgive me for this, but I’ll bend with Ms. Rose’s ‘arrogance’ and ‘smugness’ (seems a trifle strong, that) if she’ll tolerate what she sees as mine. In an ‘it takes one to know one’ spirit, if that’s what it is.

But I hope not. I have ‘had-it-to-here’ with abuses of land and abuses of people, of us. That is what drives me. Sorry if anyone takes my rougher edges the wrong way, but kindly know that if this observer spots the grail, he will pounce and pass it back along, quicker than quick.

On with the search.

I was more than touched by the later passage from Ms. Rose, invoking her family who do struggle, energies at the limit, in classic contemporary career-task mode. Those are ‘realities’, many will testify. Manifestations of HABIT. I write not to judge, but to uncover, if I can, those traces of habit. I was disappointed in Ms. Ray’s article, (though not with her sense of the danger before us, which I share) and I’ve expressed that already. Earlier I responded to her example of the turkey from her article, and now to Ms. Rose’s comments.

A joyful sight anywhere is a well-loved garden. I’d so like to believe in the dream of the self-sufficient garden economy. But here Ms. Rose herself notes that she must perform paid labor several days a week, along with tending her garden. So GARDENS help enormously. But I doubt that COUNTRY LIVING, if I may suggest a distinction between the two, will solve much on the national, let alone global, scale. Where would that crowd on my one city block live, really? Especially the many who would be lost without the social, economic, and cultural structure the urban fabric provides. Not everyone can be happy watering the garden and turning the compost dawn to dark. In fact it might be argued that only a small minority, things being equal, would choose the relative isolation Ms. Rose sketches over the densities of experience in the city.

In my dreamier, idealistic moments I imagine that here in Italy the very best solution might be to live in one of the smaller towns. The surrounding forests and croplands would be at hand, and quiet. A town is a social place above all, and in it one finds all those things one uses day to day, as I noted in my earlier post, in easy walking range. There’s sewage and gray water of course, but you can see where it goes and keep an eye on things being done right. You know the person who tends the valves and switches because you bump into her often enough in the bar or the post. But the large city, too, has a grace that fosters a good life, reflection, creativity, and a serenity of spirit. If we deny that, we’ll be tossing the baby with the (gray) water. As an aside, I’m regularly surprised at how many little vegetable gardens there are, stuffed in where any bit of unused land can be co-opted for a few tomato or melon vines. I suspect the water for some that I’ve seen is gray, to boot.

Changing habits calls for learning new new ones, AGAINST the flow of intuition. This counter-intuitive learning is the most difficult of all. If the whole picture of moving to the country and installing a composter is truly the answer (or even one of the really big ones) then the ‘reason’ for that isn’t obvious. It’s counter-intuitive. So, how would one—- how would I—- learn differently?

That’s the real question. I can speak to this in concrete terms in relation to bicycling, because so many people—- also here in Italy—- respond to the mere mention that I use a bicycle at all by repeating their pet anxieties about danger, sweat, discomfort, effort, traffic, and so on. I myself ‘know’ that these objections are not ‘valid’.  I also know that repeating the ‘truth’ I have discovered is futile. So there’s the question. How does one make that jump? My own search to answer that is ongoing.

And one thing more, though for country-dwellers who are perfectly content with life as it is, may stop reading here.

When I walk to La Scala to see Don Giovanni, or bike or take the bus or the metro or the train across town or out to Rivoli to see an exhibition at the Castello, or to teach my photo classes—- and so on, I’m glad for being in the crush of the city. When I want to add a really good prosciutto crudo, or artisanal cheese, or some variety in the peperoni I like, to my larder, it’s nice to know that the deli around the corner, or the street market a few blocks down will have lots of temptations. I’m not ‘against’ country life, but I’d not counsel valuing it above the city, for a whole host of human and cultural, as well as engineering and practical reasons. I hope the country dwellers can accept that, too. And do the math, the engineering analysis, honestly. I think they would be shocked in many cases at the true costs of their dream, and unnerved at the relative actual economies implicit in the city alternative.

Until someone can show us how all of my city-block neighbors and I, and ten-thousand more blocks like us, can share fields, pastures, and composting toilets gracefully, I’ll posit we still need cities, sewage, gray water, and all.

I’m sorry, but I have to say this - what Americans call environmentalism a large part of the world calls moderation, and, laying a guilt trip upon oneself isn’t going to help solve the problem.

A naturalized citizen from the U.K.

Mr Tyson, (no relation to the turkey factory, I assume)
Your remarks about “trust fund hippies” shows that you have put me in one of your standard categories appparently reserved for people who live in the country. I am a nurse and have been for over 25 years. In case you don’t know, it is pretty hard work most of the time. My mother cleaned houses for a living and saved enough to send me to college.  I wanted to point this out not to chastize you for this categorization but just to point out that all of us do this. What if we all did less of this and more of really listening to each other. Perhaps we could solve problems more easily.
I know that there are huge contradictions in my life style when it comes to the environment. I would love to see them clearly and weed them out as much as I can.
Your city life sounds really good for you. But it too has some contradictions. That is all I want to point out. Thank you and Janisse Ray for bringing it all up. Like Susan Meeker who sees the insanity in the use of so much plastic in her Natural Food job and Drew who cousels us to look to community for solutions, we are all adding a piece to this puzzle. I just wish the whole world was working on it. I really do thank you and all the others who live their lives with intention to walk lightly on this Earth.

This is Grinch, back having pulled a fast one on Mr. Tyson—who says he did feel properly chastised by Ms. Rose and knows he probably deserved it.

Both he and I wish our UK half who weighed in with a pithy reminder of how the other half lives would expand a bit on the thought. We agree with her that self-flagellation, guilt-tripping, don’t help.

Maybe the kicker is in the banner for this comment column: ‘It is time (Ms. Ray says)...to get serious about leading by example.’

Ms. Rose’s example is so appealing that it kills us to say it, but we imagine the conditions that made it possible for her to establish herself as she has are much harder to come by these days. We both tip our hats to her endeavor and her hard work, all the same.