A short video to make you think about stuff. You know, like things.
http://storyofstuff.com/
The nice thing about doing The Compact (see sidebar) as we have been now for about 7 months (I can almost count on one hand the total amount of things we have purchased new this past year) is that your desire to consume just grows less and less. This also goes hand in hand with decluttering. You realize how much time you spend cleaning and otherwise managing the chaos of items in your house--you lose the desire to bring more items into your life.
I really have no desire to shop for anything. I haven't set foot in a mall or big box store for about 2 years. I just don't see the need. There are some items that i've bought new this year, such as underwear and things of that nature, but the level of frivoulous spending for items that aren't absolutely necessary is down to almost nothing. It also helps that we're broke.
Here is a simple-living pledge that I think it would be pretty easy for our family to follow this year, since we already do most of this stuff:
In order to keep our lives simple in 2008 we are going to do the following:
*restrict purchases to needs (exceptions for birthday/anniversary/holiday gifts - everyone needs a toy now and again)
*buy used when possible and practical (exceptions for personal care, undergarments/socks, safety equipment, shoes, and medical needs)
*recognize limits of our day, and do what we can, let the other stuff go, and start new each day
*work on organizing life, home and work so that we can fully enjoy our time, rather than spending it on digging through chaos
*make wise choices about purchasing new goods
*be conscious of the impact we have on the earth and try to minimize our footprint
*spend more time outside
*eat well
*move more
*stop and play with our children every day
*tell each other we love one another every day
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
karma
Jay and I have been complaining a lot lately that our karma has failed us. We used to brag that we had great karma. Since he lost his job, then lost his new job, a lot of other little side events have happened to us. We have just had a lot of stress since this summer.
One of those is that last week our dog, Barry, jumped over our fence and bit our mailman. I know, it sounds kind of funny when you first hear it, like what dog wouldn't want to do that? Unfortunately, it's not really all that funny, because many Bad Things are happening now because of it. One of them is that the post office may or may not sue us. We may have to go to court.
Barry has never bit someone and he is not an aggressive dog. He's never gotten over our fence before, either. But for some reason, he really has it in for the mailman. He just goes crazy when that guy comes. Its like that guy really did something to tick him off. Anybody can walk by and barry might bark, but if the mailman walks by its like he's a pitbull on crack. This is all very traumatizing for us because we are renters and we can't change the fact that the property has a 4' chainlink fence. We have looked at all of our options and have decided that re-homing Barry is the best option. We can't keep him inside 100% of the time. We can't change the fence. Training him would be very, very time consuming and we can't guarantee that it would be 100% effective. Ever since the kids were born, the dogs just haven't gotten the attention and exercise they need. Maybe this will give him a chance to have a better life. Maybe I'm just trying to make myself feel better, but I really believe that. I just can't see another way to work it. It is going to be sad and traumatic for our family to do this, but if he had the right set-up, the mailman issue wouldn't be an issue. I don't think he deserves to die because he is aggressive only towards the mailman.
So we were looking at our renter's insurance and realized they would cover it if our dog bit someone. It would also cover a lawyer if we got sued. The amazing thing about this was that we were in the process of canceling our renters insurance because we thought we were moving. We thought it expired. Then we realized it covered us through the end of this month. I wanted to make sure they wouldn't make an issue, so i went in and reinstated it and payed it through March. We came very close to having a lapsed policy through all of this.
This past weekend we all had the stomach flu. jay had it the worst and was in HORRIBLE pain and vomiting really horribly for hours. I called the doctor and they said he needed to go in RIGHT away to the ER. So he went. It was so bad they thought it was his pancreas or something. It was just the flu affecting him really badly, but you can't mess around when you have severe abdominal pain for 5 hours. And this is just FOUR DAYS before our health insurance from my temporary teaching job expires!
Here's another thing that happened: i was randomly flipping through the paper and came across a classified ad that said 'need health insurance?' i thought 'yeah.' so i called it (brilliant, huh?). This guy called me back and we set up an appointment. He's an insurance agent. Normally I would just apply for health insurance myself over the internet and wouldn't use an agent, but for some reason i just thought it was all too overwhelming and decided to do it. Well, though this random encounter a number of really, really good things happened. First of all, he told us that we should not report on our application the prescription drugs we take because they would deny us. He basically told us that insurance companies are evil and you can't tell them that you have ever had any kind of problem or they will just deny you. It never would have occurred to me that this was possible. I would have just put it down and then been shocked when we got denied.
But the REALLY fortuitous thing was we were talking about our life insurance application we put in a few months ago and we mentioned that it was taking forever to process. He was like "huh, that's weird" and then we mentioned some of the things we'd put on THAT application. He was like "WHOA! you told them THAT?!?!" needless to say, there are some things you just should not tell a life insurance company. it is a need-to-know basis, and they do not need to know. But we're so naive. man, we are SOOOOOOOOOOoo naive. It turns out that there is this health database and anything you tell them goes on there...for 7 years. You'll never get life or health insurance or anything if you tell them that you've smoked like 1 cigarette in the past year. So anyway, he tells us to call them and withdraw our application before it goes in this database. man! i'm so glad we were able to do that.
So things i'm thankful for (THANK YOU, UNIVERSE!! KARMA, WE WILL PAY YOU BACK!)
1. That i was able to get a reasonable paying job right after jay got fired (i shudder to think what we would have done if i hadn't gotten my teaching degree yet.)
2. that jay and i both worked for a short time enabling us to get some savings to weather this month where we would have had a deficit
3. that the one and ONLY time that anyone in our family has gone to the ER it was while we still had kick-ass public employee health insurance that we have to pay nothing out of pocket for (4 days under the wire...)
4. that we may have just saved ourselves from being branded uninsurable for 7 years and not being able to get health insurance due to a random encounter with a really cool, really nice insurance agent
5. that our renters insurance is still in effect and covers barry biting the mailman (dammit, barry, why?!? why?!!?)
6. that we are all in good health
7. that we have wonderful families who support us and were even willing to let us move in with them, if it came to that.
so even though our family has been through a LOT of, dare i say, shit, in the past 6 months--way more than our fair share in my opinion--there have been a lot of silver linings, too, that have really saved our butts.
One of those is that last week our dog, Barry, jumped over our fence and bit our mailman. I know, it sounds kind of funny when you first hear it, like what dog wouldn't want to do that? Unfortunately, it's not really all that funny, because many Bad Things are happening now because of it. One of them is that the post office may or may not sue us. We may have to go to court.
Barry has never bit someone and he is not an aggressive dog. He's never gotten over our fence before, either. But for some reason, he really has it in for the mailman. He just goes crazy when that guy comes. Its like that guy really did something to tick him off. Anybody can walk by and barry might bark, but if the mailman walks by its like he's a pitbull on crack. This is all very traumatizing for us because we are renters and we can't change the fact that the property has a 4' chainlink fence. We have looked at all of our options and have decided that re-homing Barry is the best option. We can't keep him inside 100% of the time. We can't change the fence. Training him would be very, very time consuming and we can't guarantee that it would be 100% effective. Ever since the kids were born, the dogs just haven't gotten the attention and exercise they need. Maybe this will give him a chance to have a better life. Maybe I'm just trying to make myself feel better, but I really believe that. I just can't see another way to work it. It is going to be sad and traumatic for our family to do this, but if he had the right set-up, the mailman issue wouldn't be an issue. I don't think he deserves to die because he is aggressive only towards the mailman.
So we were looking at our renter's insurance and realized they would cover it if our dog bit someone. It would also cover a lawyer if we got sued. The amazing thing about this was that we were in the process of canceling our renters insurance because we thought we were moving. We thought it expired. Then we realized it covered us through the end of this month. I wanted to make sure they wouldn't make an issue, so i went in and reinstated it and payed it through March. We came very close to having a lapsed policy through all of this.
This past weekend we all had the stomach flu. jay had it the worst and was in HORRIBLE pain and vomiting really horribly for hours. I called the doctor and they said he needed to go in RIGHT away to the ER. So he went. It was so bad they thought it was his pancreas or something. It was just the flu affecting him really badly, but you can't mess around when you have severe abdominal pain for 5 hours. And this is just FOUR DAYS before our health insurance from my temporary teaching job expires!
Here's another thing that happened: i was randomly flipping through the paper and came across a classified ad that said 'need health insurance?' i thought 'yeah.' so i called it (brilliant, huh?). This guy called me back and we set up an appointment. He's an insurance agent. Normally I would just apply for health insurance myself over the internet and wouldn't use an agent, but for some reason i just thought it was all too overwhelming and decided to do it. Well, though this random encounter a number of really, really good things happened. First of all, he told us that we should not report on our application the prescription drugs we take because they would deny us. He basically told us that insurance companies are evil and you can't tell them that you have ever had any kind of problem or they will just deny you. It never would have occurred to me that this was possible. I would have just put it down and then been shocked when we got denied.
But the REALLY fortuitous thing was we were talking about our life insurance application we put in a few months ago and we mentioned that it was taking forever to process. He was like "huh, that's weird" and then we mentioned some of the things we'd put on THAT application. He was like "WHOA! you told them THAT?!?!" needless to say, there are some things you just should not tell a life insurance company. it is a need-to-know basis, and they do not need to know. But we're so naive. man, we are SOOOOOOOOOOoo naive. It turns out that there is this health database and anything you tell them goes on there...for 7 years. You'll never get life or health insurance or anything if you tell them that you've smoked like 1 cigarette in the past year. So anyway, he tells us to call them and withdraw our application before it goes in this database. man! i'm so glad we were able to do that.
So things i'm thankful for (THANK YOU, UNIVERSE!! KARMA, WE WILL PAY YOU BACK!)
1. That i was able to get a reasonable paying job right after jay got fired (i shudder to think what we would have done if i hadn't gotten my teaching degree yet.)
2. that jay and i both worked for a short time enabling us to get some savings to weather this month where we would have had a deficit
3. that the one and ONLY time that anyone in our family has gone to the ER it was while we still had kick-ass public employee health insurance that we have to pay nothing out of pocket for (4 days under the wire...)
4. that we may have just saved ourselves from being branded uninsurable for 7 years and not being able to get health insurance due to a random encounter with a really cool, really nice insurance agent
5. that our renters insurance is still in effect and covers barry biting the mailman (dammit, barry, why?!? why?!!?)
6. that we are all in good health
7. that we have wonderful families who support us and were even willing to let us move in with them, if it came to that.
so even though our family has been through a LOT of, dare i say, shit, in the past 6 months--way more than our fair share in my opinion--there have been a lot of silver linings, too, that have really saved our butts.
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
2008 goals and resolutions
Now that i'm substitute teaching full time, we have time to do projects around the house again and actually live mindfully again, instead of stumbling through each day like a sleep-deprived zombie. Our big project at the moment is organizing/decluttering our whole house. It sounds like a chore, but really it's not too bad. One of the side benefits of moving all the time is that you don't get a chance to accumulate too much stuff. We are just going through everything drawer-by-drawer and area-by-area and getting rid of stuff that we don't love/need/use. i'm really thinning out the kids' toys. Our house is so much easier to keep clean when there aren't 100000 little pieces of plastic laying around everywhere. My goal is to have all the counter space free of stuff that isn't used daily, as well as not having a junk drawer in every room. I want to reorganize our garage, too. Its scary in there. Since we will be moving sometime in the next 6 months, I want to only move things that we really need or want. Especially since the place will be smaller. Its nice to go back to basics, in a lot of ways, and be forced to do that by moving into a smaller space. It makes you consider each item and if its really valuable.
I've been reading several blogs about living without plastics. One of them is Living Plastic Free Although I don't think we could live TOTALLY plastic-free, i think we could cut it back by A LOT. Things like a loaf of bread, which now costs $4.39 (!?!) are bagged in TWO layers of plastic. Now that jay has the stay-at-home dad thing down, I am hoping we can get back into making our own bread. Its pretty easy, and its fun to do with kids. I think with just a few changes, we can get back to making less garbage. We've been somewhat reliant on disposable items such as diapers and food from Trader Joe's lately. But we shouldn't be at this point. The amount of garbage we've started to produce is just sad. Considering that we were down to like 1 bag of garbage a month. We make that amount each week now : ( So I would like our second goal of the New Year to be cutting back on all plastic, and especially cutting way back on stuff that can't be recycled.
Last weekend I took our worm bin and pulled some worms out and started a second worm bin. They are a little sluggish--i'm assuming because its cold out--and aren't eating a lot. But if we do move, its likely that we wont be able to have an outdoor compost bin. So i want to have two worm bins to take care of the kitchen scraps at least.
I've been reading several blogs about living without plastics. One of them is Living Plastic Free Although I don't think we could live TOTALLY plastic-free, i think we could cut it back by A LOT. Things like a loaf of bread, which now costs $4.39 (!?!) are bagged in TWO layers of plastic. Now that jay has the stay-at-home dad thing down, I am hoping we can get back into making our own bread. Its pretty easy, and its fun to do with kids. I think with just a few changes, we can get back to making less garbage. We've been somewhat reliant on disposable items such as diapers and food from Trader Joe's lately. But we shouldn't be at this point. The amount of garbage we've started to produce is just sad. Considering that we were down to like 1 bag of garbage a month. We make that amount each week now : ( So I would like our second goal of the New Year to be cutting back on all plastic, and especially cutting way back on stuff that can't be recycled.
Last weekend I took our worm bin and pulled some worms out and started a second worm bin. They are a little sluggish--i'm assuming because its cold out--and aren't eating a lot. But if we do move, its likely that we wont be able to have an outdoor compost bin. So i want to have two worm bins to take care of the kitchen scraps at least.
Monday, January 21, 2008
hayyy laaaadies!
just a short post to let all the women out there know about the best thing ever. why this is such a big secret, i'm not sure. but if you are interested in reducing/preventing waste AND not having...um...leaking issues during your period, you must go buy a diva cup or moon cup. it took me a while to get used to it, but now that i am, i LOVE it. it's expensive at first, but consider that you can use it for years.
http://www.divacup.com/
or
http://www.mooncup.co.uk/
just get one. i've heard that the mooncup can be more comfortable. i already got the diva though, so i'm committed to making it work. its just one more way to not buy disposable products. and i HATE wearing pads, cloth or disposable, so this is the only non-disposable alternative to that.
http://www.divacup.com/
or
http://www.mooncup.co.uk/
just get one. i've heard that the mooncup can be more comfortable. i already got the diva though, so i'm committed to making it work. its just one more way to not buy disposable products. and i HATE wearing pads, cloth or disposable, so this is the only non-disposable alternative to that.
Saturday, January 5, 2008
merry post-holiday greeting
happy new year everyone...
This post will serve as the substitute for the more traditional letter-in-a-christmas-card that informs everyone about what they have been doing. we have not gotten our act together to do anything for the holidays in terms of cards, baking, gifts, etc. I had big plans to bake stuff to mail to the far-away relatives, and never did get a chance to. We did give a few books this year, and i bought people some things in ireland (more on that in a moment).
we were really pretty pleased/impressed with how restrained our families were this holiday season. most presents were hand-me-downs or used, which was awesome. there was a minimum of wrapping paper, most of which was recycled, and the stuff for us adults was very small. still, it can be a bit overwhelming to consider that this (photo below) is what counts for trying for a very minimalist christmas. our entire couch was covered in presents for the kids.
we continue to be pretty non-committal about any gift-giving. we just aren't into it, and kind of refuse to feel like we should buy things for people and get all stressed about it. when the kids are older, i suspect that we will make some things, but right now that idea seems kind of ludicrous since we don't even get time to do dishes.
as for how things are going, the kids are doing well. as you can see, emmett is huge and has become an official toddler. he's 13 months old now. he runs around after elsie now and we've seen brief moments (of up to 10 minutes!) of them playing together and entertaining each other, whilst leaving us alone. hopefully it's a taste of things to come in the future. he also loves to eat everything and does a lot of babbling and playing with all sorts of objects. he understands what we say now and can follow simple commands such as 'hand me that ball'. he is much more eager to please, sensitive and compliant than elsie ever was. he will cry if we tell him 'no', whereas elsie never cared if we told her not to do something (and still doesn't!) elsie is growing bigger by the minute, and will be four in 2 months. she has started sounding out words, and can write her name and several other words. she loves to read still, and proudly announces that she now reads "chapter books" which she requests constantly. her vocabulary amazes us on a daily basis, saying things like "i have this memorized" and "is this a sand-hill crane, mama?" (today, she brought me a picture she found of a crane. where she heard about sand hill cranes, i have no idea). we've kept to our TV free lifestyle but do allow her to watch movies which we get from the library or video store. emmett hasn't watched any movies or tv.
elsie loves spending time down at her grandparents' house and we send her down there as often as we can. her behavior has gotten easier recently, and we've noticed that we aren't feeling like ripping our hair out quite as many times per day. the terrible threes are hopefully coming to a close.
my job as a teacher ended just before christmas, which is at once a relief, something sad, and something stressful. i really felt like i came into my own as a teacher toward the end, and i was sad to have to leave the job after hitting my stride. i was really enjoying my students. they were really sweet on my last day, many of them getting me christmas presents, cards, and flowers telling me that they will miss me and that they wanted me to stay. there were a few tears shed and i had a couple of students tell me wonderful things such as i was the best teacher they ever had (sniff). it was sad to realize i wasn't going to see them any more. it feels good to know that i really picked the right career and i learned a lot during these past months. i am excited to get a 'real' teaching job for next year or the year after.
at the same time, the job was taking a lot out of me, and it was very hard to keep up with.
jay has been doing some work here and there for his friend david, who just started a cultural resources company (david was the one who also got fired along with jay and 2 other people from AINW in august). in combination with substitute teaching for me, we are hopeful that we can make it through the next 6 months financially with both of us working very flexibly. it will be kind of nice to switch off working/staying at home on an as-needed basis. we have talked about moving to salem and renting a cheap apartment, while i sub there, but we are going to hold off in the hopes that jay will land a full time job in the next few months and then see if moving is necessary. the idea of moving is almost more than i can deal with. i'm just so sick of moving. but our place is kind of expensive and it would be nice to save some money. however, if jay does end up getting a job, it would be silly to move to salem and then to move back. we have some reason to hope that david will have a full time position for him in the next 6 months. i'm hoping that he can work and i can work part time, as i'd rather not jump into full time teaching next year unless i have to. i'd rather wait until emmett is 3 to tackle that. still, if jay doesn't have a job, we'll have no choice. subbing is OK money, but we might have problems when summer comes if jay doesn't have a job. we are trying not to stress about it too much. sometimes it just feels like we can't take any more changes and adjustments, though. nothing has been stable since August.
In other news, i just got back from an 7 day trip to ireland, which was absolutely amazing. My good friend roy got married to a wonderful irish woman, which was the reason for the trip. it was amazing and crazy to be by myself with no kids for so long, and offered me an unprecedented chance to think and take care of my own needs for a change. the kids and jay weathered it fairly well with lots of support from my family. i decided while over there that our family should not postpone happiness for some time in the future, when things might go a certain way; that we have each other, and in that regard we are very lucky and blessed. we are all working on focusing on the positive for now and realizing that everything is temporary. i felt very grateful and very, very fortunate to get to go on this trip and to be with my friends during this time.
the wedding feast in longford, ireland
roy and i at trinity college, dublin.
at some point i will post pictures of the kids and everything, but right now i don't think i can take any more elsie harassment about 'when will you be done?!?'
just one final thought: during these past few months it has become apparent to me that it is entirely impossible for people who are in a crisis to think about the environment, or anything beyond just their day-to-day survival. a lot of things fell by the wayside as we contemplated more important things, for example: are we were going to have to move in with my parents? how we were going to get health insurance? how we could afford to heat our house? etc. people all over the world, and in america, are in crisis and are just trying to survive. many, many millions of americans are only one paycheck or medical problem away from disaster. how can people think about their choices affecting the earth when they are just surviving? i know we didn't. we went back to whatever was cheapest/easiest, which always means less organics, more trash, less mindful consuming, etc. it's a pity, but its hard to imagine anything changing in a meaningful way while so many people are in poverty. its obvious that global poverty and environmental catastrophe are linked, and our family now understands the reasons for this first-hand.
here are a few pictures to appease the masses. thanks for reading this long ramble.
This post will serve as the substitute for the more traditional letter-in-a-christmas-card that informs everyone about what they have been doing. we have not gotten our act together to do anything for the holidays in terms of cards, baking, gifts, etc. I had big plans to bake stuff to mail to the far-away relatives, and never did get a chance to. We did give a few books this year, and i bought people some things in ireland (more on that in a moment).
we were really pretty pleased/impressed with how restrained our families were this holiday season. most presents were hand-me-downs or used, which was awesome. there was a minimum of wrapping paper, most of which was recycled, and the stuff for us adults was very small. still, it can be a bit overwhelming to consider that this (photo below) is what counts for trying for a very minimalist christmas. our entire couch was covered in presents for the kids.
we continue to be pretty non-committal about any gift-giving. we just aren't into it, and kind of refuse to feel like we should buy things for people and get all stressed about it. when the kids are older, i suspect that we will make some things, but right now that idea seems kind of ludicrous since we don't even get time to do dishes.
as for how things are going, the kids are doing well. as you can see, emmett is huge and has become an official toddler. he's 13 months old now. he runs around after elsie now and we've seen brief moments (of up to 10 minutes!) of them playing together and entertaining each other, whilst leaving us alone. hopefully it's a taste of things to come in the future. he also loves to eat everything and does a lot of babbling and playing with all sorts of objects. he understands what we say now and can follow simple commands such as 'hand me that ball'. he is much more eager to please, sensitive and compliant than elsie ever was. he will cry if we tell him 'no', whereas elsie never cared if we told her not to do something (and still doesn't!) elsie is growing bigger by the minute, and will be four in 2 months. she has started sounding out words, and can write her name and several other words. she loves to read still, and proudly announces that she now reads "chapter books" which she requests constantly. her vocabulary amazes us on a daily basis, saying things like "i have this memorized" and "is this a sand-hill crane, mama?" (today, she brought me a picture she found of a crane. where she heard about sand hill cranes, i have no idea). we've kept to our TV free lifestyle but do allow her to watch movies which we get from the library or video store. emmett hasn't watched any movies or tv.
elsie loves spending time down at her grandparents' house and we send her down there as often as we can. her behavior has gotten easier recently, and we've noticed that we aren't feeling like ripping our hair out quite as many times per day. the terrible threes are hopefully coming to a close.
my job as a teacher ended just before christmas, which is at once a relief, something sad, and something stressful. i really felt like i came into my own as a teacher toward the end, and i was sad to have to leave the job after hitting my stride. i was really enjoying my students. they were really sweet on my last day, many of them getting me christmas presents, cards, and flowers telling me that they will miss me and that they wanted me to stay. there were a few tears shed and i had a couple of students tell me wonderful things such as i was the best teacher they ever had (sniff). it was sad to realize i wasn't going to see them any more. it feels good to know that i really picked the right career and i learned a lot during these past months. i am excited to get a 'real' teaching job for next year or the year after.
at the same time, the job was taking a lot out of me, and it was very hard to keep up with.
jay has been doing some work here and there for his friend david, who just started a cultural resources company (david was the one who also got fired along with jay and 2 other people from AINW in august). in combination with substitute teaching for me, we are hopeful that we can make it through the next 6 months financially with both of us working very flexibly. it will be kind of nice to switch off working/staying at home on an as-needed basis. we have talked about moving to salem and renting a cheap apartment, while i sub there, but we are going to hold off in the hopes that jay will land a full time job in the next few months and then see if moving is necessary. the idea of moving is almost more than i can deal with. i'm just so sick of moving. but our place is kind of expensive and it would be nice to save some money. however, if jay does end up getting a job, it would be silly to move to salem and then to move back. we have some reason to hope that david will have a full time position for him in the next 6 months. i'm hoping that he can work and i can work part time, as i'd rather not jump into full time teaching next year unless i have to. i'd rather wait until emmett is 3 to tackle that. still, if jay doesn't have a job, we'll have no choice. subbing is OK money, but we might have problems when summer comes if jay doesn't have a job. we are trying not to stress about it too much. sometimes it just feels like we can't take any more changes and adjustments, though. nothing has been stable since August.
In other news, i just got back from an 7 day trip to ireland, which was absolutely amazing. My good friend roy got married to a wonderful irish woman, which was the reason for the trip. it was amazing and crazy to be by myself with no kids for so long, and offered me an unprecedented chance to think and take care of my own needs for a change. the kids and jay weathered it fairly well with lots of support from my family. i decided while over there that our family should not postpone happiness for some time in the future, when things might go a certain way; that we have each other, and in that regard we are very lucky and blessed. we are all working on focusing on the positive for now and realizing that everything is temporary. i felt very grateful and very, very fortunate to get to go on this trip and to be with my friends during this time.
the wedding feast in longford, ireland
roy and i at trinity college, dublin.
at some point i will post pictures of the kids and everything, but right now i don't think i can take any more elsie harassment about 'when will you be done?!?'
just one final thought: during these past few months it has become apparent to me that it is entirely impossible for people who are in a crisis to think about the environment, or anything beyond just their day-to-day survival. a lot of things fell by the wayside as we contemplated more important things, for example: are we were going to have to move in with my parents? how we were going to get health insurance? how we could afford to heat our house? etc. people all over the world, and in america, are in crisis and are just trying to survive. many, many millions of americans are only one paycheck or medical problem away from disaster. how can people think about their choices affecting the earth when they are just surviving? i know we didn't. we went back to whatever was cheapest/easiest, which always means less organics, more trash, less mindful consuming, etc. it's a pity, but its hard to imagine anything changing in a meaningful way while so many people are in poverty. its obvious that global poverty and environmental catastrophe are linked, and our family now understands the reasons for this first-hand.
here are a few pictures to appease the masses. thanks for reading this long ramble.
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