(Not so) First world problems

Darling Husband and I, being of a certain age, take a handful of supplements every morning and evening. The sorting of a dozen pill bottles into individual doses in boxes marked with the days of the week is a sweet reminder that we are growing old together, and some of the bottles are shared. But the romantic aspect ends there.

Every week we open one or two new bottles, and the process is the same: remove the outer seal (sometimes a thin film around the neck of the bottle, other times a heavy plastic pull tab—both are good tests of fingernail health), peel off the seal from the mouth of the bottle (sometimes with a tiny fiddly tab on the edge, other times with an unpredictable cellophane pull tab that covers half the opening), and then remove the wad of cotton (or more likely polyester) so we can get to the vitamin in question. A handful of waste gets chucked into the bathroom wastebasket, and I can’t help but wonder how zero-waste people manage this invasion.

Our kids laugh at us, and verbally hashtag it as #firstworldproblems. But is it? In addition to the seals and cotton whenever we open a new bottle, we have the old one to discard as well. The glass ones are easily recycled, but at this point, the vast majority of the bottles are plastic, and the lids a different type of plastic that is not recyclable in our municipality. The vitamin shop will accept most plastic bottles for recycling (but not the lids)—and desiccant is not recyclable at all. It takes us only a few months to fill a brown grocery bag with empties, almost all of them in absolutely pristine condition.

And this is where our first world problem becomes a whole world problem: the most responsible thing we can do is recycle the bottles. They go away—from us. But where do they go? We have no idea, and it is likely that only a portion of them are ever actually recycled. I expect most people just chuck them in the bin, meaning the vast majority of them end up in landfills and eventually the ocean, where they break down into microscopic pieces and join one of the several gyres.

In a final insult, Darling Husband has a supplement that used to come in bottles of 60; now the same sized plastic bottle holds only 30 (with a correspondingly larger wad of fluff at the top). He has discovered that four bottles can be decanted into one. We note that the manufacturer is local, so maybe it is time for us to use our consumer voice (a sort of privilege) and ask them for more sensible packaging. How about a glass bottle that holds 120 tablets? Dare we dream of a sealed paper envelope to refill our bottles? We are interested in not only our own health, but that of our fellow inhabitants and our planet as well.

The rest of us

In a culture where few seasonal items remain, February has a seasonal food of sorts: Girl Scout cookies. I have long been a fan of thin mints, much to the detriment of my hips, but lately it has been the rest of my system that complains when I feed it wheat or gluten. There was only one thing left to do: develop my own GF thin mint. Don't worry, I still buy the green boxes to support the fledglings in our neighborhood, but this recipe supports me and a legion of similarly deprived girlfriends.

GF Mint Cookies

1 3/4 cups GF flour mix (I like Namaste, but any mix will do)
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (preferably Dutch-process)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup sugar
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 large egg or egg replacer
1/2 teaspoon mint extract

6 oz. semi-sweet chocolate

Whisk flour, cocoa, and salt in medium bowl to blend. Cream sugar and butter in large bowl until well blended. Add mint extract, beat in egg. Add dry ingredients; beat until blended. Divide dough in half: Shape half of dough into a log 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Repeat for second half of dough. Wrap in wax paper and refrigerate 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Unwrap cookie dough, and cut into 1/4-inch slices. Place on prepared cookie sheets. Bake until cookies no longer look wet and small indentation appears when tops of cookies are lightly touched with fingers, about 11 minutes (do not overbake or cookies will become too crisp). Cool on sheet 5 minutes. Transfer chocolate cookies to racks and cool completely.

Drizzle or dip with tempered melted chocolate. Try to wait until set before you start dunking them in hot cocoa or devouring them.

The EV compromise

With National Drive Electric week nearly upon us, and with three years of EV ownership under my belt, I'm still thinking about the impact of my choices and actions. There is a fair amount of anti-EV sentiment making headlines, some of it politically driven, some of it remarkably level-headed, and asking smart questions about whether EVs are the answer. I come back again to my conviction that it is not what you have or buy, but behavioral choices that make the difference.

But let's be clear: driving an electric car is a compromise: if I were "green" beyond reproach, I would be living in a high-density urban area in a net zero building, within walking distance of my workplace. Cycling (and cycling distance from the workplace) is a close second to this. Omitting anachronistic modes of transport such as horse and buggy, and things like skateboarding, means that public transit comes next, and then ride and car sharing. Driving in a personal car is really at the far end of the sustainability spectrum; but it's not the car that needs to change, it's the way we arrange our cities and lives.

The biggest change is where we choose to live: when someone tells me they couldn't make an EV work because they commute so far from work, I have to wonder why they live so far away. Yes, homes closer in to urban or suburban employment centers are more expensive, but the cost of commuting over the years is even more so. And that "hidden" cost keeps many artificially poor.

Even a rough back-of-the-envelope calculation, with readily available numbers (the IRS mileage rate, the value of your time at minimum wage) gives staggering results: those miles and days really add up, and compounded over the spam of years that most people work, it's clear that the expensive house close to work is actually much cheaper in the long run. A typical 30-mile round trip commute? It adds up to well over $450,000 (double that if both spouses are commuting) over 20 years, and that's not even considering the impact in terms of extracting and burning fuel (over 100,000 tons of CO2, in case you were wondering), and the social and environmental impact of traffic congestion and new road construction when everyone starts thinking that a 30-mile commute is normal.

Now those numbers are based on commuting with a gas car. If I run the same commute with my EV numbers, I'm a bit better off: $130,000 over that same 20-year span. (I can't compute the CO2 emissions for everyone--the guy with his own solar panels is doing much better than the guy plugging into 100% coal-generated electricity.). But the social cost of my time and the impact of roadways remains.

For the record, I work at home, and Darling Husband takes his bike or walks to his office under 2 miles away: the car is for ferrying kids and running errands. My husband's bike commute is a clear example of choices playing out: $700 for the bike (it's a nice one, bought used), and about $50 each year for a tune-up. Over 20 years, it's paid for the whole house two times over. Even if he had to replace the whole bike every year, we're still way ahead, and he doesn't need to take time out of his day (and away from family) to go to the gym. Because in the end, it's not what you have, but what you do.

Souls

Frustrated by escalating market prices for decent bread, and inspired by our new neighbor (who makes an incredible crusty rye bread in his dutch oven). Darling Husband has taken to baking bread. The Internet gave him a basic recipe for Seelen, and after a few weeks of practice runs, we have been enjoying spectacular golden Seelen on Sunday.

After posting pictures on Facebook, many friends asked about what they are. Seelen, literally "souls" are the bread found in the pocket of Swabia where my Darling Husband originates; the same place he rushed to, to gather with his family and share salty tears and Seelen with his family. For while he was baking Seelen here, his father was slipping towards the other side, and passed the threshold in the wee hours of our morning, shortly after his son arrived in the Vaterland.

Seelen were originally the small loaves placed on graves for All Soul's Day. But they're so good with fresh butter, it would be a waste to not share it with the living, and make it daily.

This is where I admonish you to hold your family tight, and perhaps share a crusty loaf with those you love. Because all too soon, we must say goodbye.

Thoroughly Modern Millie

I went to the bank yesterday. In my line of business, contracts are irregular but not infrequent, which means that checks need to be run to the bank irregularly and fairly frequently. In the interest of saving time, I often let client checks pile up for a week or so before running deposits--the joke is that the way to make a pending check arrive is to deposit the others.

While I was handing checks to the teller for deposit, she asked if I was aware that they had added a shiny new feature to the mobile banking app--I could now deposit checks from my home office--she thought I might be really interested, since I seem to be in so often.

Sure enough, after that bank visit and picking up Little One from school, and getting some more ice cream (Jr. Firefighter is home from college for the summer, and this wreaks havoc on frozen inventory), I swing by the mailbox on the way up the drive, and there it is, another check.

Oddly enough, I find myself torn: Yes, it is a good idea to reduce trips, with all those pesky carbon emissions, traffic congestion, and such. Yes, it is an ease of burden for the busy to be able to take care of errands in a few seconds. Yes, reducing the amount of paper reduces cost, both environmental and administrative.

But. When I walked into the bank, the manager looked up from his desk, and greeted me by name. I still remember when he came to this branch as a teller, long before Little One was born. I think of the times a trip to the bank counted as human contact, during those years as the tired mother of two young boys. I think of the time that same bank manager flagged a transaction because he knew I wasn’t in Texas (having a spa day and buying a flat screen TV) because he had seen me just an hour ago (and he knew I wasn't a Red Door kind of girl). I think of the phone call from my mother's bank when something didn't seem quite right with her, and I wonder if my bank will still be around to provide that same human connection and safety net. Can the mobile app call my kids when I'm 84?

I could get on my high horse and justify a drive to the bank since the carbon emissions don't apply to me in my electric car (and it's true), and discount my contribution to congestion since I try to combine trips. But it's still a car on the road, and an electric car is at best a compromise (maybe I should get a bicycle). So I take the newly arrived check, endorse it "for mobile deposit," snap pictures of it, and send it off through cyberspace. And fight the urge to email the bank manager just to say hi.

Brambles and sweet

There is a moment near the end of summer, when you can smell the blackberries on the dry wind that musses your hair as you drive past with the car windows open. It's the time of year when you try to make sure there is some sort of container in the trunk in case you have a few extra minutes to stop and pick a pint.

My childhood is punctuated with memories of snatching those drupes from the thorny vines. There was the time that Mom let us stand on the hood of the car and pick blackberries from the brambles peeking over the fence at the back of the parking lot while she went into the bank, and there were countless weekends of puttering on hot dusty back roads with my father, when we would fill hats and frisbees and baggies and cups with the dark berries, and stick out our purple tongues at each other.

It should be no surprise then, that I did the same with my kids, at first passing berries to their toddler selves, and then enlisting them to pick the lower branches.

In the final months of my father's decline, he was unable to leave the house easily, and so I stopped at the side of the road and picked a handful of sun-drenched berries for him. He relished them as only a dying man can. It was one of the last times I saw him.

The weeks and months before leaving to college are full of partings as well: goodbyes to teachers and classmates, goodbye to the explorer post, goodbye to the cello teacher. When Jr. Firefighter first started playing the instrument, Little One and I would sometimes play in the park across the street, where brambles weave their way up the madrona trees. Many of those berries made it into mouths and under ice cream--if they made it home at all.

And so it was that on his return from his final cello lesson, Number One came home with a baggie of blackberries picked from the same park, a parting gift, and a request for one last cobbler before setting off on his next adventure, where I play only a sidelined role.

A handful of blackberries. A parting. Pain and joy. Brambles and sweet.

Double delicious

I am stuffed. Full of smiles that make your cheeks ache, and endless hugs--the solid kind that last long enough to synchronize breathing--of laughter, of touches, of love. And then there was the potluck table, groaning under the weight of multiple and tasty savories and sweets, all washed down with wine produced by one of ourown, followed by s'mores at the fire pit late into the evening, and a hearty brunch the next day.

It was a reunion, of family of a sort: 30-some odd years ago, we were young theatre students, so sure of ourselves and so incredibly unsure of ourselves, trying on new personas and discovering who we might turn out to be. Some still work in the industry, many do not, but all agree that they use their degree (or near degree) every day of their life. And all have turned into lovely people I am just tickled to be able to count as friends.

With all the missteps and misunderstandings of our youth behind us, we could truly appreciate and enjoy each other, and we did so joyfully as we devoured the food and each others' tales. And so I offer you these special cookies from a very special  place--my heart.

Giant Toffee Chocolate Cookies

makes about 18

1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 lb. bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, chopped
1/4 cup butter

1 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
4 large eggs
1 tbl vanilla extract
8 oz. chocolate-covered toffee, coarsely chopped
1 cup walnuts, toasted, chopped

Combine flour, baking powder and salt in a small bowl; whisk to blend. Melt chocolate and butter together in a double boiler set over simmering water until smooth. Remove from water and cool mixture to lukewarm.

Using an electric mixer or food processor, beat sugar and eggs together until thick. Beat in chocolate mixture and vanilla. Stir in flour mixture, then toffee and nuts. Chill batter until firm, about 45 minutes.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper or a silicone mat. Drop batter by 1/4 cupfuls onto sheets, spacing 2 1/2 inches apart. Bake just until tops are dry and cracked but cookies are still soft to the touch, about 15 minutes. If baked cookies are misshapen from escaping toffee, use a spatula to coax the still-hot cookies back into shape. Cool on baking sheets. Share with friends.

Connections to the past

A package arrive yesterday from my home state. "Fragile" was written on it side in an unfamiliar yet oddly familiar hand. Inside, buried under Styrofoam peanuts and bubble wrap and a single layer of tissue, was an oil painting. The painting is not signed on the front, but primitive lettering on the frame reveals the maiden name of my grandmother. The painting was suffering in the dry heat of my mother's attic, rescued by my visiting cousin, beautifully restored by a friend in Berkeley, and tucked into a used Eileen Fisher box for its trek here. The brush strokes of that young girl took me right back to the golden sunlight of my childhood; I can almost feel the dry grass against my ankles, and smell the dusty warmth. I want to go find cool shade in the white house. The image and the feeling connect me, however briefly to the bent old woman I knew, who shared her love of music and chocolate bars with me.

The farm is in full swing, sunny and dusty on the roads--there is just enough water for the fields. There are sunflowers and squash and basil and beans, which means tomatoes and corn aren't far behind. The zucchini are no longer the delicate shy little fruit of the early season, but are putting on weight faster than the crew can pick them. Those baseball bats of summer have one role: to be made into zucchini muffins, some to eat now, some to freeze for a chilly morning in the fall. The markings are long worn off my old Pyrex measuring cup (good thing I am not a slave to level cups), the muffin tins are blackened with use (bakes lighter), and the kitchen timer's chipped paint only offers hints to its former art deco glory. These items, and a yellowed recipe, connect me to the women before me as well, who may also have padded around in their nighties while others slept, filling the house with aromas of summer and sleepy mornings.

Slow

As I slowly turn the spoon in the pot, I let out a long sigh. Finally, the breakneck pace of last-minute school events and end-of-year projects has ended. The berries in the pot took no notice of our hectic high-mileage days in May, instead slowly setting fruit and turning the berries an irresistible red that I feel compelled to capture.

As I sweat from the steam in my sultry kitchen, I revel in that fact that the days have finally turned long and sunny, soaking the berries with warmth and sweetness. It is time to slow down, to indulge in nibbly-type suppers in the cool of the back garden, to sip icy drinks to counteract the steamy heat.

As the jam bubbles, I think about when we will eat it; in the winter, on crunchy toast or English muffins or waffles. Perhaps a jar will find its way into a Christmas gift. The mornings will be chilly and the light pale, and we will bundle up and see our breath. But we will venture out into the chill with summer in our tummies.

As each jar sounds its happy plonk! I relax into summer. It is time, finally, for hammocks, for ice cream, for books and beaches, for sunburns and mosquito bites. Time to capture the warmth in our bones, in our hearts, and in jars.

Mailbox weeds

They are as unwelcome as dandelions and crabgrass, and fill my curbside toter as much as blackberries and buttercups. Years ago, I went on a systematic campaign to rid myself of these postal weeds, setting aside coupon mailers and other junk mail as they came in, and then working my way through the myriad of opt-out scenarios.

Most could be tidied up with a quick online form, with the requisite four weeks to process; some forced me to resort to phoning a call center wage-slave to have them remove me from their list (after a four week wait…). But one was a persistent as bindweed; the RedPlum flyer. You likely know what I’m talking about—it’s like the advertising section inserted into the Sunday paper, the first thing you pull out and recycle. But this one comes straight to the mailbox of every single address in the country.

This particular one stood out from all the others, because not only did it take up half my mailbox several times a week, no opt-out website or phone number could be found on the flyer itself. Sleuthing online I finally found a website that provided a physical mail address. Maybe most people won’t bother. But I’m not most people: I eradicated bindweed from my raspberry patch, and I send off an opt out notification in a letter in an envelope bearing a stamp. After a few weeks of wait and a note taped inside my mailbox alerting the habit-driven postal carrier that no RedPlum flyers should be delivered, I was able to downsize my recycle bin.

The relative calm has endured, punctuated by the occasional flare-up of a catalog in the wake of an online purchase. These blights are quickly dispatched, chucked into the bin after a quick visit to the website or a expeditious call to the 800 number on the back.

A few merchants have figured out that if I order online I might not want a paper catalog, and they make it possible to opt out at the time of purchase, though the default is still to pop a paper catalog in the shipping box. But there’s a huge difference between a mailing received because of an existing relationship and “Every Door Direct Mail (EEDM)” blanketing entire zip codes. These mass mailings are actively encouraged by the USPS, as they represent a steady revenue stream to the struggling behemoth.

To my great dismay, I opened up my mailbox this Tuesday, and pulled out a RedPlum flyer. I was thinking it must have been an unthinking substitute mail carrier, one who didn’t know my foibles. But no, there in the address field was our address, and the addressee was “Resident.” Sure enough, after five years, RedPlum opts you back in. At least this time, they have an online form for opting out. Though I note it now takes them six weeks to process the request.

For Anna, Carrie and Lorelei

I have made this dish many times; certainly for the legendary couscous party well-known to our friends. It has attended two Bat Miztvah celebrations, and numerous school potlucks. There's always some in my freezer. It is, not surprisingly, the most requested recipe from my repertoire (other than jam!).

********

 Chicken Tagine

INGREDIENTS:

12 oz. Apricot sauce (puréed apricots or peaches)

¼ c up Creamy peanut or cashew butter
1/3 c Orange juice
1/3 c Dry sherry
2 T Balsamic vinegar
2 T Lime juice
4 garlic cloves, minced
2 t salt
2 t Curry powder
½ t Cinnamon
½ t Cardamom
½ t Ground cumin
1 lb. Chicken

INSTRUCTIONS:

In a large ovenproof dish, combine preserves, peanut butter, orange juice, sherry, vinegar, lime juice, garlic, salt, and seasonings. Cut the chicken in large bite-sized pieces. Add the chicken pieces to the marinade and coat well. Cover and refrigerate for 3 to 4 hours.

Preheat oven to 350F degrees and bake the chicken and marinade uncovered for 20 to 30 minutes. Serve over the prepared couscous. Share with friends. 

Of lettuces and elections

November brings two things around these parts: elections and the end of our CSA season. September and October have been a flurry of roadside campaign signs and roadside stands hawking local corn and cherries, growing piles of election fliers and a growing pile of colorful organic squash to get us through the winter.

And then came November, and the airwaves and the CSA went quiet. I put three long-overdue spring weddings on my calendar and washed my last head of Claire's lettuce. But despite the joyful weddings to come, the news wasn't all good, and it wasn't all local. California's Proposition 37, a mandate to label GMOs, was defeated. Even though the vast majority of people say they want to see labeling, Big Money from Big Corporations saturated the airways and billboards with confounding messages, and we all lost.

With that last head of CSA lettuce gone, I headed to the co-op to buy vegetables. The heads of red leaf were tiny and trucked from California. Organic, yes, but not bursting with the energy of the farmer I know. It might have come from a small-scale farmer, or it might have come from a mega-farm irrigated by water from huge canals. I don't know, and it's not obvious.

Like the anonymous lettuce, it isn't obvious who provided the Big Money against Prop 37. We expect it to be limited to big corporations that sell only pseudo-foods, neon-colored and laden with unpronounceable ingredients. But it's far more complex than that. Many of those mega-corporations (exercising their right to free speech by supporting anti-labeling rhetoric) actually own some of the more popular organic brands. There's a nifty infographic from the Cornucopia Institute that shows who is really who.

The anonymity of the supermarket is like a huge online chat board--you can't tell if you're talking to a gorgeous blond or a pedophile stalker. Infographics can help, but there has to be a better way for the person who wants to eat real food and do the Right Thing.

If complexity hides the truth, then simplicity exposes it. Just as my magic trick this summer, we have a simple tool. Get as close to the source of your food as possible. It's helped by social media, to be sure: it's the old-fashioned analog conversation. A chat with the produce manager, a regular date with your year-round farmer's market sellers, a buyer's club, a cold frame in your garden. Small money, simple, and the Right Thing.

Vegetable alchemy

"Wow, mom, you did magic!" exclaimed Little One as we left the farmers market this afternoon. And I did feel a bit like a medieval alchemist, transforming juicy fruit into root vegetables.

It started back in early spring, when we had a glorious stretch of sunny and warm. I looked out at the mass of bees and blossoms on the plum tree and thought to myself, "it's going to be a good year for plums (and apples)." As it turns out, I was right.

But it was also a good year for strawberries and raspberries, and somehow the finite resources of empty jars and shelf space dwindled long before we got to plum jam season. In our house, it's the last hurrah of summer when we pick the late-ripening plums and add foraged blackberries, a sort of bookmark on the jam shelf: once you get to the plum-based jams, you know that season has come to a close.

So what to do with the excess plums this year? It turns out the answer was staring us in the face, as we have joined an informal online group that arranges shared buys of various local produce. I put out an offer, and a few people responded. It's a perfect match: we still had plenty of fruit to use up every last jam jar, and the excess was magically transformed into a handful of bills.

Yes, the bills were the intermediary that I traded for the spuds, but it somehow felt direct, taking the same worn three bills that had been pressed into my hand only a few hours prior and pressing them into the hands of the farmer, so, yes, I agreed with Little One that it was indeed magic, transforming purple plums from the front yard into purple potatoes on the supper table.

____

The post script to this, is of course, that money is a kind of magic, based on mutual trust in a system. In a time when we hear terms like mortgage-backed derivatives and bankrupt brokerage firms bantered about, it's a good reminder, seeing how those leathery slips of paper can represent real value. It's pretty easy to follow the trajectory of those dollar bills, but how much of our economy is that firmly based in the real and tangible? Yet another compelling reason to keep it local.

Single shot

It crept up on me slowly, a mere dash of instant coffee from a leftover packet of instant for a bit of a lift one brisk autumn morning. And before I knew it, my morning cocoa had morphed into full-on mocha. Rich and creamy with coconut or soy milk, tasty syrups adding a little kick. Mint and eggnog prevailed over the holidays, and caramel, vanilla, and salted caramel flavored my summer.

At first, I didn't pay any mind to the syrup, just checked the label to make sure that the mysterious concoction was made of sugar rather than the evil corn syrup. But after a while, it seemed I was seeing a lot more of the fellows at the Cash and Carry, and lugging increasing numbers of bottles out the door. Not to mention chucking a couple of empties into the recycling bin every month.

And then, bent over the u-pick herbs at our CSA farm few weeks ago, Little One called out, "Mom, can I pick some mint?" Sure, I say, even though I have no idea what to do with it. But while I'm making my mocha the next morning, Darling Husband sidles up and starts making cocoa for the aforementioned boy, spiking it with mint syrup.

I look at the label on the green concoction. The main ingredient is sugar, which I have plenty of. I am after all, a jammer and a ten-pound bag sitting on the counter from making blackberry-plum jam last night is staring me in the face. I race to Google; sure enough, those fancy coffee syrups, the ones that cost about $3 a bottle? Simple syrup.

Simple syrup is about the easiest thing to make in the world. It's just sugar and water, heated until it dissolves. So I do, boiling it with a handful of mint for a few minutes. Voilà, homemade mint syrup, and it isn't bright green. If I caramelize it a bit first, I have caramel syrup (predictably, if I add salt, it becomes salted caramel syrup). A drop of vanilla extract is all it takes to make it into vanilla syrup.

So there it is, easy-peasy, homemade coffee syrup. Icing on the cake, it only costs about 86 cents to fill the bottle that gets reused now instead of thrown away.

String of pearls

I am dunking a lovely flaky pain au chocolat in my mocha this morning, thinking about how lucky I am, not just for the pastry and chocolate, but for my life in general. I’m enjoying what many would call success: the bounty of my years of professional experience, an amazing spouse (who brought me said pastry), a healthy and mostly joyful family (except perhaps for those testosterone bursts that happen in the back seat when someone gets grumpy); life is good.

In my professional persona, I read glossy (well, what would be glossy if I read the print edition) business journals. One article recentlyconsumed noted that the one trait common to all successful people is gratitude. Yup, that positive outlook that makes you truly grateful for all others have given you. And when you express that sincerely, it makes folks like you and want to do things for you. Voilà, success!

But my weekly CSA provides me with the missing pearls to complete this necklace of wisdom, in the form of the single Xeroxed sheet tucked in my bags between zucchini and lettuce. This week, after letting us know how the tomatoes are doing (always a cliffhanger in the short growing season in the Pacific Northwest), our farmer cogitates on success, clearly spurred by the tone of much rhetoric being spewed this election year. I can’t say it better than her:

 “When encountering the philosophy that maybe we are all responsible for caring for, and about, our 'neighbors,' there are two extremes of thinking. One is 'I came from a poor background, I worked hard to get what I have, I’m not going to give any of it to anyone,' the other is 'I was helped when I really needed it most and I want to give as much back as I can.' … [But] have you ever wondered why you are living where you are, in the time you are, why not born somewhere else in a very different life style. Maybe in a country with very different opportunities? I think we all have wondered about those things—how certain circumstances of physicality or people who were part of our lives have had a huge part in determining our current living conditions.

“The more I ponder on this, and think through my life, I can’t find anything that I can actually say is something I can take credit for. Every single thing I do, how I react, everything I have done, good or bad, is mostly due to circumstances and genetics.

“So maybe that’s the key to humility? Must we grasp that concept in order to be truly free of what I call 'fear' of sharing, giving, responsibility for caring about all other humans?”

Thank you, Claire, for completing this string of pearls: gratefulness, gratitude, humility, freedom.

Sweet 16

I turn 50 this week, and some people are asking what I want for this noteworthy birthday. I really do have all I could ever want—family, friends, beauty. Well, almost. When I cogitated about what I could do to bring meaning to this milestone, I realized that my age now gives me permission to speak my mind. What can I say? So, gloves off, here’s what I really want for my birthday, from you and every one of you:

Number 1. I want you to think about stuff. The raw materials and “cheap” labor that go into making our electronics, clothing, and stuff have a huge impact on the planet and its inhabitants. We are buying, hoarding and discarding at an alarming rate, all in the name of stimulating the economy. It is an unsustainable and harmful model, shifting wealth from the many to the few and destroying our planet in the process. In the end, the content of your character is not defined by what you own.

• Ask yourself if you really need it. Wait a bit; you may find you don’t really need it, it was just a fleeting desire, inspired by clever marketing, or you were Jonesing. I’m pretty sure there’s a commandment about that.
• If you decide you really need it, do you need it all the time? Maybe borrowing or renting it could be the answer. Most people only use their power drills 16 minutes a year. Libraries have books and videos. Consider granges or sharing schemes, which range for everything from cars to tools to kids toys. Seriously, one lawn mower would do for five or six houses. We likely don’t need 3,000 square foot houses, three-car garages and storage lockers either, once we cut back on the stuff.
• If you really do need it, do you need it new? Chances are what you seek can be found on eBay, Craigslist, or in a thrift store or garage sale.
• Read/watch anything by Anne Leonard. (storyofstuff.org)

Number 2. I want you to think about your food. Factory animals, intensive chemical farming, GMOs, and trucking and flying food all over the world are bad for us and the planet and don’t make sense on any level. Did you know that tankers full of grapefruit rinds are shipped overseas to feed French pigs, while local food scraps head for landfill? The single act of changing how we eat may have the biggest impact on carbon footprint—and climate change—than anything else we do. Because it is so close to our selves and so immediate (we do eat frequently), this is not easy, but try these in small bites and grow it into a habit.

• Grow it. Organically. Rip out a bit lawn and put in a raised bed, then grow the one vegetable that you eat a lot of, one that you eat some of, one you’d like to try, and some flowers. We need beauty in our lives, and a small bouquet of flowers from your yard will put a smile on your face.
• Get to know a farmer. Go to farmer’s markets. Hire a farmer: CSAs are all over the place, and provide a direct connection between you and your food. You know those stands by the side of the road? Stop at them!
• Eat real food. Forget about things that come in boxes, cellophane or Mylar wrappers with bar codes. Eat in season. Put things by for winter—freeze it, dry it, can it. Open a jar of sunshine in February (otherwise known as jam).
• Don’t buy GMOs. They require huge amounts of chemical fertilizers by design, and line the pockets of companies that have no interest in leaving the planet a better place. Keep putting pressure on politicians to label them. Vote.
• Plant a tree. Plant lots of trees. They suck up carbon. Hug trees, fight for their lives when you see them threatened.
• Read anything by Michael Pollan. 

Number 3. Think about your energy use. The petroleum industry is hugely powerful and subsidized by our money to the tune of billions of dollars. And it’s a great business model: they don’t have to pay anything to clean up the mess—think spills, fracking and the Arctic wilderness. They already have five times more oil reserves ready to tap than the planet can bear if we want to cap global warming to 2 degrees C—a level that already wipes some islands off the map. This is not theory, it is fact. At the rate we’re going, it’s only 16 years away. I will be 66, my kids will be in their 30s. This is important, and it’s something we all need to do together. Now.

• Don’t use it. Remember Jimmy Carter in his sweater? Turn down the thermostat. Sweat in summer, wear another layer in winter. Turn off lights. Insulate. Bake the whole meal in the oven or crockpot together. Go for efficient over flashy.
• Green it: If you have an expanse of roof, cover it with solar panels. They work even here, in the darkest corner of the country. If you live in the sunbelt, you have no excuse. If you have a lot of wind, put in a windmill. If you don’t have sun or wind, sign up for your utility’s green energy. Do it now, it’s easy, and will cost you less than the price of a latte every month.
• Think about your driving. Don’t do it: walk, bike, get on a bus. Work from home, move closer to work. Dump the low-mileage vehicle. You can always rent a pickup truck when you really need it, but look at your driving habits, and tailor the car you own to majority of your driving needs rather than 100%. I bet you’d be fine with an electric car or a hybrid (but ask yourself why you’re driving so much to begin with).
• Buy carbon offsets. They may seem like a scam, but they are the only mechanism we have to level the subsidized playing field. While you’re at it, write to your politician, and ask them to tax carbon emissions. And keep asking. Did I mention it’s important to vote?
• Read anything by Bill McKibben (350.org)

All of these things will save you money (some will take longer than others to do so), and all are good for you, but most of all, they are good for the planet—our planet. I want to have grandchildren someday, and I want to be able to spoil them with a beautiful, healthy planet. Call me selfish.
And there’s one more bit, and it’s hard: do these things as a gift to fellow inhabitants of the planet (not just humans). Lead by example, but don’t get too cocky—pride goes before the fall. The point is to make it look easy/fun/like it will save money so someone else might say to themselves, “hey, that’s a good idea, I’m going to try it.”

So there you have it, my birthday wish list. Feel free to share my wishes, pass them around, send me notes, but most of all act on them. Start with baby steps if you have to, but start. I don’t want to have to ask again when I’m 65.

Not having a cow

It seems like she has always been there, sometimes hiding just behind the front door, sometimes on the front porch waiting for kids to climb on her. Near the end she was too fragile even for that, and had to make due with kids posing next to her.

It was not her choice to perch on the roof, and indeed it subjected the artificial bovine to many indignities; besides the rain, there were the high school pranks, where she'd end up in someone's front yard or the middle of the football field.

But as fake as a fiberglass cow might seem, she was a piece of realness in a once-rural community where homogeneity has fast invaded. For nearly 70 years, she has watched as the McMansions and chain stores, strip malls and shopping centers slowly replace the fields of pastoral cows and corn. But still the dairy cow remained, even as a mega church moved in next door and the red-bearded owner passed away.

But last winter was different: for the first time in its history, Theno's Dairy closed for the winter. They promised to reopen in the spring, but the evidence is strong that this may not happen. Even as we turn the corner into sun-soaked days, the door (with the hand-lettered sign telling people to slide to open, since the automatic closer gave out five years ago) remains closed, the freezers (for gallons of vanilla and banana nut and mint chocolate chip to take home) are empty, and most telling, the cow is gone.

I stand at the closed door with my Little One, and we are both sad. There is simply nothing else like it out here in suburbia. Of course, there are the three national chains (you can probably name them with no difficulty), but this was the place we were going to buy two huge buckets for the end of year celebration at school. Without the cow, we are at a loss, for it seems impossible to treat the passel of happy kids to ice cream that comes from here, from milk from a fiberglass cow named Vivian.