“I do care about global warming, but I’m too busy to (fill in the blank)”. I hear this cry often in one form or another. The blank can be many things: buying local produce, changing light bulbs to compact fluorescents, using public transit, using a clothesline instead of the dryer.
Feeling too busy to do things we know in our guts are the right things to do is like
Tags: climate change·environment·global warming·Inconvenient Truth·lifestyle·time management
U.S. culture is finally getting that global warming is both a fact and serious trouble. Good, great, excellent.
The problem now is that most people think somebody else had better do something about it — in effect so that business can continue as usual.
I embrace the opposite of that attitude: that all of us can do something about it, and that ‘business as usual’ is at the core of the problem
Tags: climate change·environment·global warming·smart growth·sustainability
One time in my life, years ago, I went inside a WalMart store and purchased one item. It was a full-length mirror for $10. I felt grateful I could afford it because I was a self-employed artist at the time (read: poor).
I never went back to WalMart because I learned about the high cost of their low prices. For instance, many who receive relief food from the Oregon Food
Tags: climate change·culture·environment·global warming·sustainability·WalMart
Maybe you’re like me in this respect: when I see problems, I want to find solutions.
No.
I don’t just want to find solutions, I want to live them out. I feel more alive that way, more connected. Lots of problems are both personal and public, both micro and macro. Ditto their solutions.
Here we have a national epidemic of obesity and a global climate problem of overusing fossil fuels. It doesn’t take
Tags: culture·environment·exercise·global warming·life·problem-solving·sustainability
This morning I submerged a jasmine tea bag into the hot water inside my lovely little blue mug that I bought from a local potter years ago. I’ve done this most mornings for years, but today I suddenly thought to put a little saucer across the top of the mug while the tea steeps.
Why? Because I’ve learned that heat is so costly to the earth. Even here in Portland Oregon
Tags: carbon footprint·energy·environment·simplicity·sustainability
