day 37: getting real

One of the things we promised ourselves we would do when we moved here is to live more sustainably. In a lot of ways you can't help it - we buy mostly local and compost a lot. But in other ways I am still full of shit.

We had to go to the City yesterday to deal w/ J's stones (he's much better today thank you for your good thoughts) and on the way back we stopped at a Real Grocery Store (ok, not real as in US, but realer than some of the whacked out versions locally) and I went a bit nuts. SWISS CHEESE, CREAMER, TURKEY BACON, BROWNIE MIX) and bought a bunch of stuff. After we left J started telling me how wrong he thought this was, that we are given an opportunity here and when we take the easy way out and buy imported big brand things we are cheating ourselves and the planet. Great. Nothing says guilt like tossing the PLANET into the conversation.

At first I resisted, it's just a treat, we've been living very simply, why can't you just leave me alone but the more I thought about it the more I realized that I only buy these things for momentary pleasure, for comfort, for ease. I am not buying it because it's the right thing to do or because we need any of this stuff. I am doing it because I am conditioned to do it, and because I am conditioned to rationalize that I deserve a treat in some way. That my consumption doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of a dying planet. But at what cost?

So today I made a decision to focus on how to make things instead of buying them, like baking my own bread, making hummus, (they don't have that here anyways so it's not like I'm killing Nebraska in order to have it but what the hell, I found dried garbanzos), making my own refried beans, pasta, growing and then drying my own herbs (anyone know how to dry herbs in a way that they can be preserved?) basically to stop being lazy and to wake up in terms of the opportunity and the reality, that even here we can continue to be blind consumers and if I am going to do that I might as well do it with more hot water and less bugs. And a much more reasonable kitchen.

What do you think? It's certainly harder and not as much fun. It takes longer and makes me work harder. It requires more effort. But this is my chance to get my act together, to put into practice something I feel. The problem is I am lazy. I am lazy and can do the wrong thing because of it.

Having all this time in the jungle makes a girl think harder than sometimes she wishes she had to. I'm not giving up beer though. It's local and they recycle the bottles. I'm drawing the line at beer.