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Okay, I Can Do That
Andrew Postman
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
All the light bulbs in my house are not energy-super-efficient CFLs. I have eaten veal piccata within the last 36 months. Afterwards, I felt no remorse. The car I drive is not a hybrid (though when our 6-year-old Honda Odyssey minivan finally conks out, the next vehicle will be). If I owned a jetpack, I'd sometimes fly even when I could bike instead. Sorry.
I'm a father, husband, American, New Yorker, writer. I'm over 40 and under 100. I have little patience for grand statements of beliefs - either you live the life or you don't - but here, in the first of what I hope will be many blog posts from my perspective, on a single (if massive) subject, let me dispense: I believe the environmental health of this country and this planet are seriously wanting, that we must do what we can to stem the rising toxic tide, that we must reverse things. I want this first and last because I have three young children, and because there are many more young children now and to come (the world's, not mine, that is). Now that I've gotten all Hallmarky on you, let me tell you what I do about this problem - and, just as important, what I don't do. (Yet.)
Though my wife and I put care and thought into decisions that impact our family's health, we do only so much. Could we do more? Absolutely. Would some of it require spending money we don't have? Yes. Time we don't have? Yes. Energy and commitment we're not ready to give? Yes. Look, I have a fairly large flat screen TV (not obscenely large - 38"), and I've been known to walk out of the bathroom after turning on the shower to retrieve a towel in the bedroom. I will not win the award for Most Environmentally Conscientious Earthling or Father or American. I can do better.
But here's the thing: Change happens incrementally. Maybe even incre-incrementally. With me, you, the world at large. Much as we'd love certain rotten things just to be gone in a flash (crumbling bridges, a horribly screwed-up banking system, the Electoral College, etc.), replaced by transcendently superior, gleaming, perfect structures and institutions, that's not how things usually (or maybe ever) work. Meaningful, positive change almost always happens slowly because it needs to. The human organism doesn't take kindly to radical changes - Uma Thurman's character in Pulp Fiction may have needed that hypodermic stab of adrenaline to the heart to live, but generally that doesn't seem like a great strategy - and the world is just a very large organism. Sure, I want to change for the better but I can't make all the changes I'm told to make, and anyway, sometimes it's just better to take it in small steps, so I can see how reasonable it is to change my life. Show me the man who resolved to get into shape by doing a thousand pushups a day and I'll show you a man who broke his promise on the third day. And who's still out of shape.
You will get no browbeating here. I would have no standing to do so: I'm no saint myself. But I've tried to make small changes over the last several years and now I realize, as if suddenly, that my wife and I have actually accomplished a bunch of measures that, taken together, seem meaningful: no more Teflon pans, always take cloth bags to the supermarket (it happened a bag at a time), an awareness of which lice treatments never to use, some CFL bulbs in our house, never drinking from plastic water bottles that were sitting in the hot car, buying far fewer plastic water bottles period, etc.
Each installment of this blog will be a brief discussion of one change I've been willing to make - one small, doable change, and only one. Something we routinely buy, think, or react to. To the radicals who think the world is in such a dire state that baby steps are preposterous, pointless, indulgent, window dressing: Sorry. I - and so many others - can only do the best we can do.
In the last few years I've written a bit about environmental issues, often from this very perspective: the well-meaning citizen trying to learn steps to become a slightly better citizen. I contributed to Christopher Gavigan's book Healthy Child Healthy World: Creating a Cleaner, Greener, Safer Home (Plume, 2009), a detailed guide of information, ideas and lessons for parents trying to figure out how to keep their homes and environments as healthy, non-toxic, organic and sustainable as possible for their families. I contributed to The Live Earth Global Warming Survival Handbook (Melcher), the book companion to 7-7-7 Earth Day and Al Gore's initiative sparked by An Inconvenient Truth. I wrote "The Energy Diet" for The New York Times, my attempt to show (without browbeating) that one could easily reduce one's carbon footprint. It was one of their most blogged/referenced home stories of 2006.
Good. That's out of the way. I hope you'll come to this blog to learn what I've learned, and which may help you and yours live an increasingly (if incrementally) healthier life.
Andrew Postman has written nine books on a variety of subjects, some of which have to do with health and the environment, some of which absolutely do not. He lives with his wife and children in New York.
This blog was originally posted on our Creating a Healthy Home Blog on WebMD.com.
Healthy Child Healthy World recommends Robi Comb® as an excellent way for parents to help reduce their children’s exposure to potentially harmful chemicals.
Posted by Jenni at My Web of Life on 02/25 at 09:31 AM
What you described in this post absolutely mirrors our life! My husband and I consider ourselves green. We are currently creating an online green company. We try to do our best. But we are also humans that have a tendency to resist change. And there is the reality of daily life as well. We hold onto the belief that seemingly small decisions made daily can add up to a big impact (both positive or negative). Thank you for validating that we do not need to be ‘perfect’ treehuggers and that we are not being judged (at least by you). We are doing the best we can.
Thanks for a great post. I will make sure to share it with others!
Posted by Susan Gowan on 03/01 at 02:38 PM
Thanks for sharing your feelings about the little things adding up to a lot, Andrew. It is true that so many of us are trying to jump on bandwagons but the people who make a concerted effort to change one thing in their lifestyles per week are the ones most likeliest to effect change that counts!I am in the middle of a spring cleaning scourge & will devote most of this month towards recycling & re-using.
Posted by Meghan on 03/04 at 01:33 PM
Good article- thanks. I do think, however, that the our environment is changing radically, therefore we need to make some radical changes in the way we live. If we all keep forgiving ourselves for our environmental “sins” then positive change will come slowly- perhaps too late.
We are such a wasteful, disposable society that needs a complete paradigm shift! Thank goodness there are conversations such as this one going on right now…we need more of them. We need to bring these issues to the forefront of our consciousness before it’s too late and all of our other problems pale in comparison to this one.
Posted by Beth @ Smart Family Tips on 02/25 at 08:26 AM
Great post, Andrew. Sometimes little steps are all we can take, but I do believe that all the little steps from all the people who take them, add up.