One thing I have noticed since my mother moved in with me is the increased amount of waste that comes out of the house now. I never bought paper towels. I think they are kind of pointless. (Although it would be hypocritical of me not to admit that they are lately a huge convenience with a pup in the house. It makes me cringe to realize. And say. And do.) My mother on the other hand, will use at least one every morning in preparing her breakfast and or lunch. There is always one pulled off the roll sitting on the counter with a few smears of food, as if she puts one there just in case she needs it. My toilet paper is now the extra soft double rolls. My energy bill is almost triple that of what it was before there was another adult living in the house. All just small little changes, but they kind of bother me, because they add up, to more money and more resources. It also makes me realize how conditioned we all are to a lifestyle of convenience and that will be our nemesis to change in the end. In taking care of the clothes that are particular about how they are washed, we do twice the amount of laundry with loads sometimes that are just three or four articles of clothing (this is my pet peeve, I will admit. I have never been one to buy clothes that require special care instructions because I am impatient and I think it's a pain in ass, I am much more suited to half assedly sort my clothes and do laundry once there is a full load). In insisting that we smell good, have soft hair, and colorful eyelids and dark luscious eyelashes we use chemicals that aren't good for us, the environment, and make animals suffer to test them, and then wrap it all in plastic packaging that will be around much longer than we will. In order to only spend ten minutes cooking dinner for our families and feeding them (an act that should come out of love) we buy boxed noodles wrapped in plastic, made in China or India, sauce that has ingredients that have seen more of the world than we ever will, and vegetables that have taken more money and put out more emissions than I do in an entire year in bussing to school and back. But who really needs to cook when we can drive thru somewhere that has a meal ready in five minutes? Sure it clogs up our arteries and uses meat that is low-grade and is barely able to be deemed suitable for human consumption. Oy, see, food is my hot spot. Now that I brought that up...
Even when we think we are doing the better thing in buying organic, our values of variety over quality lead to us buying food that normally wouldn't grow here in whatever current season it happens to be, so we buy fruit from South America, or Asia. What is worse, buying local food that may not be organic? Or fruit grown on borderline slave labor conditions in another country that is starving to give us our organic pineapple in January? And then shipping it, flying it, somehow taking it thousands of miles from where it originated from. At least when we buy local, the impact we have is on our own communities, and not those of people living in conditions most of us wouldn't even dream of getting close to. Or the meat, that used to be an animal raised in something smaller than our home with hundreds of other animals, so tightly packed that they are covered in each other's feces, and there is no room to move. Not to mention the environmental impact of those kinds of farms (2,500 gallons of water per pound of beef we consume is just the tip of the iceberg). *it is at this point in my rant that I must be honest and also admit that I am an omnivore, and I eat meat. In my recent efforts to have less of an impact and put more thought to what I am really putting into my body I have discovered some wonderful local farms that have meat CSA's, where I can meet my dinner and actually explore the way they were raised. Yes, it is still consuming meat, which I have issues with, but I also have health issues that conflict with my moral issues sometimes, but that is a blog for another time...end honesty moment*
I guess, I am looking for simplicity. And looking reduce the impact my lifestyle has on other people. And I notice more and more all the time how serious it all really is...
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