All photos by Corbyn Hightower.
Earth Day has always been my favorite holiday as a parent. I am known for my Scrooge-like tendencies in regards to the big Hallmark-card occasions, and only attempt to quell that predisposition for the sake of my children.
Well, the younger ones don't care anyway, and I'm probably responding to guilty feelings based on grandparent expectations. I resist those. I resist the sense of obligation to get gifts and most of all to buy the decorations, trinkets, and crappy treats. Earth Day suits me because all that garbage is an anathema to the spirit of the holiday itself.
Earth Day is a time when my kids can feel proud of our family for the lifestyle that we've recently chosen. We went to a festival the other day (arriving on bikes after a four-mile ride) and the kids got an opportunity to say, "We don't drive a car at all, anymore."
And people exclaim, smile, share kindnesses, and it feels good. Not just like our fortunes have taken a turn for the worse. I look at what our days lately entail, and it's nice that we can go a really long time without any money changing hands. It's gardening season, and even my four-year-old is turning the soil and doing real work.
We are trying to keep ourselves strictly budgeted, even after the cash influx from the car sale. We need to stretch as far as we can, until we can get the younger ones into childcare, or otherwise free me up to contribute to the family finances. I have been thinking of putting together an environmentally-friendly housecleaning business, something I can do on the weekends, perhaps. I picture lugging my vacuum, assorted essential oils, baking soda, lemons and vinegar in my bike trailer, and I like that vision.
Recently, my husband has been fixing our appliances rather than chucking them when they break. We have this cool old fan that we bought at a garage sale for a dollar--heavy as an anvil and covered in grease and dust. We rebuilt it piece-by-piece, and buffed it to a shine and now it hums like a Cadillac. That's it, pictured left.
Now when you buy a fan, an iron, a toaster, they're made of lightweight plastic and meant to be thrown away when they stop working. But here's my husband fixing an iron. Imagine that, fixing it instead of just tossing it in the garbage:
Our needs are modest, our overhead has been lowered, and life has become about simple, sustainable pleasures. Also about the work required in a life without the little luxuries. I don't have to step out of the rat race; the only rats I deal with are in our basement, and it seems the neighborhood cats have taken care of those.
It's been a beautiful spring, and we are learning how to do this. Today I pedaled up a steep hill with my babies in the trailer, and I could feel my strong legs carrying the load.
Comments
Kirsten wrote on 04.22.10, 2:51pm:
Great article! Looking forward to more installments and inspiration!
DP wrote on 04.23.10, 4:37am:
Earth Day, an understanding which in simple way lay in Indian Life. Here majority clothes donated, furniture reused or passed on almost 100% newspaper recycled. The culture has had it since generations. The houses in villages are self built and dropped wood sticks used for cooking. All is coming back now. For the cities it is time to learn from villages and for the world from Indian culture. I am not a fanatic but compare the consumption patterns and you will find it all true. I am not sure if higher GDP means higher wastage but looks like it is so in the western hemisphere. It is time we learn from such occasion to retrospect.
Anjana wrote on 04.23.10, 6:43am:
That is wonderful, Corbyn! Thanks for sharing this story and letting us in on your efforts! It is commendable and we are with you! You feel like you are doing this for lack of money (or recession), but in reality this is how it should be. We should be closer to earth at all times, we should not get carried away with the technology around us. We must stay firmly rooted in the ground :) (literally and figuratively)
We owe so much to our Mother Earth, we are celebrating her just this one day, but yu guys are celebrating her everyday when you repair that fan, when you bike down with your kids, when you think of ways to reuse and reduce, when you want to use less and grow your own food. It is a beautiful thought you put out there about really re-using the clunkers, which no one gives a hoot about when a 20 $ appliance is available in wal-mart.
Thank you so much for sharing this, and keep it coming. I forward it to a lot of my friends who are surprised it is coming from an American :)
4 year old wrote on 04.23.10, 9:27am:
Earth Day fer me is all about like...the envirunment..and trees.. and..and..and..saving the palnet...becuz its going to die and i don't want mother earth do be ded. :-)
Karen wrote on 05.02.10, 12:35pm:
We live in such a throw away society. Why does the end of the cell phone contract mean we must buy a new set of phones? Why does a manuel can opener have to be replaced with an electric model? Do we really need to purchase plastic solo cups when our mismatched ceramic cups and glasses do the same trick?
Sometimes I feel that I am surrounded by people who can't or won't accept that things are changing economically. The days of rampant consumerism without consequence are over. I say this as a participant in that culture, despite the fact that I could plainly see the train wreck coming.
Tatoruso wrote on 06.28.10, 12:15pm:
The story you tell is so beautiful you fill me with empathy and hope. I´m a father of two, struggling, with help from my wife, to make ends meet each month, so i relate strongly with your story. We have been simplifying our tastes and urges gradually but nonstop, and we have learned to be proud of living life full of real pleasures (those of family, food, sharing life and love) and started to really not care about the "needs" mainstream culture and media pushes on us constantly.
Soldier on, you´re brave and beautiful
Cheers from Venezuela
Tatoruso.
Tome, Earth day is all about simplicity, and ease and the obvious. You don't have to buy a tree to plant, or buy more reusable bags (I'm so guilty of having too many of them, when I donate to Good Will, I use them to carry my items in, and donate the bag too) to carry your groceries home.
You can pick up the trash in your neighborhood or public park--lay down in the grass in your own back yard and breathe the air. You can challenge yourself to recycle a wider array of things than you already are. Hint...The box from your sticks of butter. The toilet paper roll. And one of my Favorites: the paper pouches from your morning oatmeal. A better bet still would be to buy things with less packaging all together--which are generally cheaper than individually packaged things. Remember the big Old Tub of Quaker Oats? They are just as good as they ever were. Instead of using a coffee stir stick when you buy coffee away from home, which of course you drink from your reusable tumbler, pour the milk in first, if you use it, and then the coffee. You have now reduced your need for a stir stick. The action of pouring the coffee on top of the milk thoroughly mixes the milk.
It's Easy and cost you less in the long run! just use less. See what you can do with out. You would be surprised at the difference between want and need. The distance is so great between these two foes, they can hardly see one another.
Of course there's always the If it's yellow, let it mellow rule.
So do your part in whatever simple costless way you choose.
Mother Earth Wins
and so do you.
Here is my silly little video I made about recycling, and how Easy it is to make a few Simple Changes. I had fun making it.
It's my Earth Day card to you http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AOYwbI6KIA and it didn't cost me a cent!