Green = Gratitude

As 2009 draws to a close and I look back at the most recent year that will too soon become a distant memory, a feeling of reflection is sweeping over me.

2009 was a year unlike any I can remember in my life. As an environmentalist, whatever that means, it's incredible how much negativity enters my life. Polar bears facing extinction. Pollution not being mitigated. Atrocities to the land and the living creatures across the globe are rampant. An unthinkable plastic vortex in the ocean. Houses constantly re-sided with vinyl, a known toxic material. Oceans rising. Poor people on distant islands suffering at the expense of wealthy nations that for all intents and purposes seem they could care less about. Barack Obama won the presidency in convincing fashion and brought with him a renewed sense of Hope. Then Sarah Palin released a book and was suddenly in the media spotlight again. (Editor's note: Recall that she is in favor of shooting wolves from helicopters and drilling for oil in one of the world's last pristine landscapes). How? No, seriously. I thought her 15 minutes were over.

This is a lot to swallow for an optimist. "Environmentalists" tend to be optimists. We have to be because, well, we care about something other than ourselves. And that "thing" we care about leads us on a Sisyphusian struggle. Actually, I seem to be using the nomenclature—Environmentalist—hesitantly here at the end of the year. I'm not sure why but by the end of this post hope to have clarity.

People care about all kinds of things. The history of humankind has been nothing if not unimagineable. I don't practice any form of standardized religion. I'm not an atheist though. I fear death and find beauty in every single detail of my daily life. That may seem unreasonable but as an aspiring photographer, noticing details is in the fabric of who I am. I believe there is some sort of explanation out there for why the hell we exist on this intricate planet and can't even comprehend how we humans have discovered as much as we have about the universe.

That said, we live on this planet. This is our home. This is our only home.

Try to imagine what your house would look like if you burned toxic chemicals in each of your rooms all day every day. What if when you went to work, your neighbor brought over a giant bottle of bleach and dumped it on your flower beds? Or if he drilled holes in your roof? What if you decided to plant a vegetable garden and down the street, a small factory constantly dumped toxic sludge into the ground, eventually contaminating your own dirt and ruining your vegetables?

Grim. Thought I said I was an optimist...?

The trouble I am having here at the end of the year is not that President Obama hasn't fixed the economy or paid off the national debt or cured cancer or finished my upstairs bathroom. The problem I am having as an optimist is that the groundswell of support for the green movement seems to have plateaued.

My mother still has her reusable shopping bags from the 1970s. She and my dad once owned a Honda Civic that got 40+ miles to the gallon. In the 1980's.

Why do we go through these phases? Are we really so shallow that we care about the polar bears and our carbon footprints only when gas is over $3.00 per gallon? Why? Why does the price of the fuel our cars burn have ANYTHING to do with caring about living responsibly? See, this is where I have gotten lost this year. The green movement started as people really caring, I think, and then after the presidential inauguration, health care became the only thing we talked about. Michael Jackson, the king of pop, died. That's a big deal. Is it big enough for CNN to turn into E! and report on nothing other than 24/7 coverage of MJ? Until the balloon boy story captured our national attention for what seemed like an eternity. Seriously, is this what we care about?

I don't want to call myself an environmentalist anymore. We shouldn't have to. Caring about issues that matter should not require a movement. Or a label. I feel like the quality of life in our country is not getting better. Sure we txt, tweet and have Mafia Wars to get us through the day. But are we also spending time outside? Breathing fresh air?

According to the movie Food, Inc. (Editor's note: This movie should be required viewing for all Americans), 1 in 3 Americans born after the year 2000 will develop early onset diabetes. 1 in 2 for African American babies.

What are we doing? Changing our light bulbs and using fewer plastic bags is not enough. These are great things to do but in the grand scheme of things we as a people need to fundamentally change our definition of the American Dream. If we keep up with this pace of buying McMansions with toxic drywall from China and eating food that is making us sick, what are we really dreaming of?

I had the good fortune of meeting artist David Brown yesterday. He lives in a straw bale house with no electricity and no running water in Old Saybrook, CT. My wife recently helped him adopt a stray cat that needed a home. This was one of the most gentle and kind souls I had ever met. He is so grateful for the simplest things in life.

Hence, the title of this post. People call people who speak up about caring about natural things "Environmentalists" and we people supposedly are part of the Green Movement. But if you boil away capitalism and Americanism and corruption and everything else, all we people really want is for it to be mainstream to live natural lives and to be grateful and appreciative of what we were born into.

I don't mean we all should live like David. I don't think I could. As a society, there are some luxuries I don't think we could do away with and still have a functional society. But there are so many things we could live without and expectations of those things that could away, revealing a less stressful and more enjoyable way of life.

We as a country have completely lost our connection with the land on which we live. We don't farm. We don't need the sun to tell time. We heat and have air conditioning so the seasons don't really matter. Fruits and vegetables are made to look ripe through unnatural processes throughout the year.

Here at the end of the year, and decade, I want more than anything for us to stop and really think about what is real. And what we actually need in our lives in order to be happy.

Aiki Farms and Ed Begley Jr.

My wife and I had the pleasure of meeting one of our heroes yesterday, Ed Begley, Jr.

Ed has been friends with Robert Burns (pictured below demonstrating good composting techniques), of Aiki Farms for years. Robert is an organic farmer in Ledyard, CT and had a small event at the farm to teach some of the practices of organic farming and to get people to come out learn about the challenges small farmers face.

Begley was the star of the event and most participants had seen his show, Living With Ed. He has been an actor since the '60s and has been an environmental activist since 1970.

His show, Living With Ed, is a glance inside the life of he and his tolerant wife, Rachelle. He walks, rides his bike to make toast, she drives a Prius, he cooks in a solar oven, collects rainwater to water the garden, has solar panels, etc.

Why is he one of our heroes? Because he lives among peers who care about big houses, lavish lifestyles, ritz, glamour, and fancy cars. And he has been riding his bike around LA for almost 40 years. I respect that. He is a down to Earth guy who was comfortable chatting with us, answering our questions, and eating fresh vegetables from the farm.

All in all a very memorable, and inspiring Sunday afternoon, if I do say so myself.

Battery-powered lawnmower

I mowed my lawn today.

Historically, this has not been something worth writing about. But today was different. Today was the first time in my life that I cut the grass and could hear myself think. The first time I could smell the fresh-cut grass as it was being shortened without breathing noxious fumes. The first time I didn't spill gas all over the place while filling my carbon dioxide spewing machine.

Enter my new Neuton CE 6 battery-powered lawnmower. It's quiet, maneuverable, and fun-looking. Is it a super powerful manly man beast of a machine? Of course not. I could care less about all that. Then again I am the kind of man that is not impressed by a Hemi, Hummer, or hog.

However, as I mowed under the solar panels that had charged the batteries running this new clean cutting machine, I did have a growing sense of getting somewhere. Lawnmowers are far worse than cars when it comes to polluting, and I am happy to have eliminated that portion of pollution that had been coming out of my yard.

I am so looking forward to the next generation of automobiles that are 100% electric and are charged at peoples' homes, where photovoltaic cells and small wind turbines are commonplace and no longer the exception. It seems that with the right people making the right decisions, that future doesn't have to be too far away.

Norwich, CT...Plastic recycling pioneers

I have not posted anything in a very long time. Several topics are in the queue but a job change and time constraints have prevented time for writing. With that said, it was going to take something big to break this funk.

And big indeed... Norwich, CT, in conjunction with recycling hauler F.E. Crandall Disposal Services Inc. have a new contract under which starting July 6, town residents will be able to recycle all plastics #1-7 in their blue bins.

From The Day, 6/21/09 by Claire Bessette

With the new program, residents will be able to add small metal items, aluminum pots and pans and even aerosol cans to the blue buckets.

All plastics numbered 1 to 7 can be recycled, including plant pots and those plastic garden-plant crates or “flats,” yogurt containers, plastic eating utensils and plates, plastic CD cases and DVDs. Styrofoam and foam plastics still are out, but clear plastic vegetable and egg containers are in, along with medicine bottles and hard plastic caps.

Newspapers, advertising fliers, magazines, catalogs, phone books, hardcover and paperback books, paper of all colors and envelopes with plastic windows and shredded paper in paper bags will go into the blue buckets starting July 6.

This is truly great news. My wife and I have been trying to get this done in Waterford, CT on and off for the past six years. Since Willimantic Wastepaper Co, is involved, perhaps we will soon be able to take part since our recyclables go to the same facility.

"We can increase tonnage for recycling. We get paid (for materials) and we don't pay $60 a ton to send it to the incinerator," Public Works Director Joseph Loyacano told the City Council last week.

Exactly!

June 28, 2009 Update...My letter to the editor was published in The Day today.

The Greening of Southie

This looks like it will be great:


Trailer - The Greening of Southie from Wicked Delicate Films on Vimeo.

Quick Tip for a clogged drain

Instead of spending a small fortune on a bottle of harsh chemicals that translate into basically dumping your money in toxic form down the drain in the form of Liquid Drano (or even a less harsh organic equivalent that is probably even more costly), instead try a small plunger that you can probably buy at the dollar store. Just be sure to plug up the overflow holes in your sink or bathtub. I have found plunging a stubborn drain to be much more effective than the Drano method.

Roofing materials given a second life

We've been working on a project that included removing part of our roof, and with it two layers of shingles and several roof decking boards (tongue and groove). You know, just a little weekend project ;-) So anyway, like all our projects we wanted to figure out a way to make this one as green as possible. Unfortunately, rather than putting on a metal roof or a green roof, we went with 50-year asphalt shingles. I say 'unfortunately,' because those options would definitely make us feel better about ourselves. But the rest of the roof is asphalt and this section needed to tie into the rest of the roof.

Anyone who has ever re-roofed a house knows what an incredible mess it makes. Most people hire other people to do this terrible job, there is usually a dumpster involved, and a big pile of asphalt, wood, aluminum and nails heads off to the landfill. In fact, I would be lying if I said that's not what happened when we had the front out our house re-roofed last year. But we all learn from our mistakes, and this time we did the work ourselves, and therefore took care of the aftermath ourselves as well.

The first step was to separate out the old demolished gutters and drip edge. Those we took, along with some other metal we had laying around, to Calamari Recycling in Essex, CT. We have brought several loads of metal to them in the past, and they give you a decent price for your scrap metal which they sell to companies that melt it down for re-use.

The second step was to separate the shingles from the roof boards. We didn't just scrape all the shingles off and then remove decking, instead we cut off chunks of wood and shingles. So we separated the two materials into piles, removing and collecting most of the nails along the way as well (those will head to Calamari in a subsequent trip).


Once we had the shingles separated from the wood, we drove the shingles up to a place in Bloomfield that Nicole found online. This company, Incorporated Industries, LLC, happens to be the only company in Connecticut that recycles asphalt shingles. They grind them up, separate out the nails (we were nice enough to do this for them), and sell the ground up material to companies that mix it in with regular asphalt for paving roads, driveways, etc.

The big pile of wood, which also contains scraps from the framing lumber, will be chipped up in a rented wood chipper and used for mulch.

All of these steps, in addition to re-using the bricks from the chimney we removed as a walkway for the garden, have taken what would otherwise be several loads of landfill material and turned it all into reused material.