28 June 2012

Greener Me

When I was a kid I was an environmentalist.  I wanted to save the rainforest and the whales.  And be like my big sister who wrapped our Christmas presents in newspaper.   In high school my friends called me a hippie.  I ended up going to college in Santa Cruz - thinking I'd find others like me!  Well, I did and I didn't.  What happened was I found out ABOUT ME and how much of a certain type of environmentalist I really am not.

I don't like it when people will take their dogs to an acupuncturist but feel uncomfortable talking to a black person on the bus.  Or when someone will insist on an organic, gluten free, raw food, ayurvedic diet but smoke weed everyday.

Ok, I know, I know, there is hypocrisy everywhere, we are all guilty of it - duh, we are human.  What I didn't like was that there was this arrogance, or attitude around "I'm better than you because I care about the environment and show this by what I eat, where I shop and what I buy."  There is something wholly wrong with this attitude.

When I was in college I met a girl who considered herself a "freegan" instead of a "vegan"... She would eat vegan when she could, and then if something was going to waste (example: oops the restaurant forgot to leave the bacon off my salad) she wouldn't throw it out or freak out, but would eat it, because otherwise it would go in the trash.  If someone wasn't going to finish their burger, she'd take it home for dinner later.  She was against waste, not fanaticism.  I totally appreciated this perspective.

The crazy-over-the-top organic obsessed privileged rich white hippies in [__insert town name here__]/Santa Cruz totally jaded me. And I didn't want to be like them.  I stopped thinking of myself as an environmentalist.  Even though I still recycled, I didn't freak out if someone threw a can in the trash.  I never bragged about buying a natural, organic or eco product.  I decided that it's up to everyone to decide how they want to live and it's not up to me to preach about what I do or tell others how to be.

Just recently I have started blogging about natural living for a blog called KeenForGreen.com and have been doing quite a bit of research.  I realized that the green movement still has the nutsos out there (Gotta love Portlandia for making fun of these people!)



Now that I've been doing a lot of research on the chemicals in cosmetics, food, household cleaners and all the other unhealthy aspects of mass produced items - I'm getting back into the greener way of things.  And really enjoying it!  I take everything with a grain of salt- I prefer the laid back approach.  Do the best I can when I can, dont fret too much about it otherwise.  It's better to chose the lesser of two evils than obsess about perfection.  If others are interested in this information - they will ask or find it on their own.  No preaching necessary. 

I still think the yuppy-hippies in Santa Cruz are obnoxious.  Some things will never change :)

Check out what I've been writing on:

A Packing List for the Ecotourist and stay tuned for more!





1 comment:

  1. Congrats! As you know, in Cancun it's next to impossible to live green. Still, we do our best to recycle plastic bottles, re-use plastic bags, not waste water, etc etc. Little things :)

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