More thoughts...

I've spoken before about how the concepts of sacrifice and change towards healthier practices seem quite parallel through religion and numerous dietary protocols. I just read the following and was struck again by the similarity in how one thinks about sacrifice and change.

"I think as vegans, often we think that we have already given up SO much just by going vegan. And it is true, we have given up a lot. But at the same time, I don’t think we should see being vegan as a sacrifice, but more as something that set us free from a horrible industry. Giving up junk food should be seen in the same light. It is not a sacrifice, it is not a punishment, rather, something that sets us free from some pretty awful industries." from-http://veganhope.com/2011/02/08/say-goodbye-to-vegan-junk-food/

Being a conscious and vocal consumer

I recall that when I was younger I thought it ridiculous that people would write letters to companies to voice their thoughts. I thought it was an antiquated notion to believe that a giant company would care about the tiny voice of the little old lady who sat down with her stationary and a shaky hand to tell them that she thought their old recipe tasted better, or that she didn't like the new spout on their bottle, or some such minor concern, and that at most they'd send the lady a $1 Off coupon and call it a day. It seemed to me that you either buy a product or you don't, and that companies will make their decisions based on market research and tracking actual sales.

So perhaps it is simply a sign that I am turning into a little old lady, but recently I have begun writing to companies about things that I feel it important to voice. I may be a tiny voice but that doesn't mean that I shouldn't speak, and in this age of Twitter and Blogs and Social Networks I feel that companies are finally starting to see the consumer's voice as another avenue of market research and one that they should listen to. But beyond that I find that with so many choices to be made every day in our consumer-driven lives it is more and more difficult to find a decision I am truly happy with and that I can fully support. If I boycott a product because of over packaging, use of Styrofoam, or factory-farmed eggs how does the company know the reason for my boycott? How can they know that if they make the changes I desire I will return as a customer? And if I'm no longer their customer why should they care about my opinion?

So sometimes once a month, sometimes more, I see or use some product or service which I feel could benefit from simple changes. Would I go to Dunkin' Donuts more if they offered me a non-Styrofoam cup? Would more people use the "House Mugs" or bring in their own if Starbucks made those options more visible? Will I ever get to attend a party without cringing over the number of non-recyclable plastic cups scattered about the room? Does Lucern realize that putting their Cage-Free eggs in plastic instead of cardboard cartons makes me buy their competitors eggs for $1 more per dozen? A quick look on their website in most cases will provide a comment form that will save me from any stationary-depleting, shaky-hand syndrome while letting me voice my concerns. Yes, I know that my letter is probably read by some intern who has the option of sending me a $1 Off coupon, a form letter, or a cease and desist form, and that I may be wasting my time, but somehow to do nothing would seem an even greater waste.

If you've ever seen me ask the host of a party for a glass, or bring my own, you'll understand why I wrote the following letter to Solo today. (Who, by the way, has a new line called "Bare" with more recycled content and renewable resources that will be available at most Target and Meijer stores.) And I hope that you'll consider joining my Old Lady Brigade when you see products in need of change.

"I am writing to you today as a concerned consumer. The Solo red and blue cups, in my experience, are the most popular and widely-used cups for parties, outdoor events, and networking events in need of single-use products. From your website I can see that you are aware of and concerned about the environmental image and impact of your product. This is of great concern to me as well and I try, whenever possible, to use products that are either re-usable or recyclable; this is made difficult at social events where I am uncertain what products will be available and whether there will be recycling disposal for items on-site. I would like to suggest that in major metropolitan areas like Chicago it would be useful to include recycling information either on the package or, when possible, as part of the sales display. A simple "Chicago Blue Bin Recyclable" could go a long way towards thousands of cups finding their way out of the trash and into a recycling bin. A small amount of education could go a long way. And I for one know that a simple statement like that would make my purchasing decision for me.

Thank you for your consideration,
Valerie Brown"

Shopping Spree.

I'm looking to find a new job. So I looked through my wardrobe to figure out what I would wear on an interview and found it terribly lacking. Now the reason for my job search is that the past two years at my current job my pay has been woefully inadequate (as well as having expensive but useless health insurance) so I don't have a lot of money to spend for the old "you gotta spend $ to make $". So after a orientation for a volunteer position yesterday I hit the thrift stores.

Salvation Army at Fullerton and Clybourne... my salvation for all things sweater-y.

Purchased fro $30 + tax:
-One Beautiful Purplish/Majenta Wool sweater with a couple of small holes (repaired in 10 minutes) and one purple long sleeved shirt to wear underneath
-Two Cream colored light cashmere sweaters and one cream long sleeve shirt to wear underneath. One sweater perfect, the other with holes near sleeve cuff--I will convert to 3/4 length sleeves.
-One A-Line knee-length black and white floral skirt with sequins
-One long length very unique black skirt
-Two Business Suit Jackets
-One sweater that I hate the style of but absolutely Love the yarn and will salvage the yarn for knitting

Family Thrift at 2160 N Milwaukee (My FAVORITE thrift store! They are clean, well organized and have FITTING ROOMS!!!)

Purchased for $14 + tax:
-3 pair of jeans! (This is a miracle and is entirely due to the fitting rooms. I have a difficult time finding pants that fit so I usually would not buy where I can't try on. And I usually try on 50+ pair of jeans for every pair I buy-- somehow paying less than $4/pair makes me less picky than when they are $40-$90 and I was lucky to find some that fit fairly well)
-1 pair of awesome pallazo pant dress slacks.
-1 Silk dress shirt
-1 pair of dress shoes

I estimate the MSRP of all of these items new at somewhere over $700. My cost= under $50

Although honestly I'd never pay MSRP for all of those items I'd also say that realistically I'd still feel happy paying $50 for even a single pair of nice pants that fit well and there were probably 3 or 4 items in my purchase that I would have gladly paid $50 retail for had I the money.

Summary: SCORE!!!

Panera

In my transition into becoming one of those old ladies who writes letters when they're not happy about something I wrote to Panera Bread--one of my favorite restaurants for a quick soup and salad. I told them how disappointed I was that although so many of their procedures are earth-friendly (reusable dishes and flatware & paper lined trays instead of disposable items) I was a little put-off when I realized my choices for drinks were between a plastic water cup and a styrofoam cup. They were good enough to write back:

Dear Valerie,

Thank you for taking the time to contact Panera Bread. We are actively
seeking ways our company can support the environment, from the materials
we use, to how we recycle and what kinds of products we serve in our
menu items. Although we do not currently have a company-wide standard
recycling program, our bakery-cafes do recycle on a regular basis. We
are also increasing our use of products made from recycled materials
including: our Via Panera catering boxes are made from a certified
renewable resource; we are replacing our cups with certified sustainable
paper; and, we are in the process of replacing our soup containers with
paper containers. Several of our menu items also feature organic
ingredients.

Thank you again for contacting us. We appreciate your business and value
your comments.

Sincerely,

Isabella
Customer Comment Coordinator

Good to hear Panera...I'll see you soon!

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Shopping Guide

So....having survived the scourge of dust and junk laid upon me by my old roommate and having successfully passed up on taking various items that I "kinda, sorta, maybe might like to have" and instead sending the lot on to Goodwill, I am now in the midst of transporting my belongings from one room to another and am trying to find things to lose along the way.

Along those lines I bring you a handy guide to help you reduce your clutter from its very source:

Some time ago Natural Home magazine featured a guide for how to see through “greenwashing” that asks all the right questions to help us buy less in general and buy greener when we do buy. These are best answered in terms of the product and its packaging:

1. How was it made? Are the materials sustainable? Did it take a lot of energy to make?
2. Is it locally made or did it require a huge amount of energy to get to your local store?
3. Is it built to last for generations and would you want to see it around for generations?
4. Is it recyclable or biodegradable?
5. Is it made of recycled materials?
6. Is it natural and nontoxic?

If after answering these questions, you still want to make the purchase, try one more test. Wait 24 hours and see if you’re still thinking about it. If you aren’t, skip it.

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My money= My ballot, continued...

So where was I? Right...I was feeling guilt over my consumerism, my consumption, my needless purchasing of things that I thought little to nothing of and of which I had never even stopped to consider all the "real" costs.

In my last post I mentioned all the time I've spent NOT shopping. Although I was surprised at how much time that actually was I have since found out that I am far FAR below average. The average American apparently spends 6 hours a week shopping. I assume this is mostly browsing time, as I think we'd be even more insanely in debt on average if we actually purchased for each occurrence of shopping that totaled that 6 hours. I'm not sure that includes time spent doing online shopping. (I'll double check Big Green Purse where I read this statistic). Anyhow... I found myself with more time on my hands.

For anyone who doesn't know I work in a furniture store and have been there almost 5 years. Over the course of this time I have brought home box upon box of discontinued fabric swatches (about 13"x16" pieces of upholstery fabric used for custom ordering.) I could never bear to throw out this fabric and always figured I'd either use it myself, donate it to an artist or art group or I'd sell it on Ebay after leaving the job. With some extra time on my hands I started organizing these fabrics a bit and made a couple of simple bags. My simple bags were lovely. Beautiful fabrics made the bags gorgeous with little effort on my part, but I have a degree in art so that wasn't enough for me. I started making more complicated bags, using different combinations of solids and prints with contrasting lining. I started making them reversible bags...way cool. But I didn't get far before I realized that handles and closures would be a problem. I didn't have any supplies on hand for handles and most of the fabrics I used were far too bulky to make a nice handle out of. I went to the craft store and looked at handles. $7-$10 for a mass produced handle? for a unique bag made for free, and out of repurposed fabric? It seemed to me like a lot of money and waste, especially since I had no real intention to go into business selling them. And so I looked for alternatives for making handles. I went thrift store shopping, I thought perhaps I could scavenge some handles from other bags or perhaps find some other alternatives.

Most of my thrift store shopping in the past few years has been for one type of item--nice wool sweaters that have some problem or are just ugly, but can be unraveled, wound into a ball, and used again as a cheap, eco-friendly knitting yarn. So when I went shopping for handles I already had a good idea where my favorite thrift stores would be and where I might find good supplies. But when I went I was disappointed. Most of the handles on purses were either already worn, or attached to purses that were far too nice to be scavenged. I came home with nothing (except more sweaters).

So while I was still trying to figure out my handle dilemma a friend told me about her favorite thrift store. I went and was amazed. I found a lovely selection of beautiful, stylish clothing sorted neatly and priced cheaply. I came home with a new winter coat and about 7 shirts, blouses and sweaters, most of which were work appropriate and half of which were brand name items (Banana Republic, Kenneth Cole, Anne Taylor, etc.)I spent around $16.

I've been stingy my whole life. I admit it. I kept quarters my parents gave my brother and I for arcade games and said I was going to put mine in the bank rather than waste it on two minutes of forgettable fun. I ration things; once a box of pop is half empty I start slowing my consumption so it will last longer. I like getting a good bargain; if you compliment some jewelry or piece of clothing I'm likely to smile and tell you how little I paid for it. So it shouldn't really be a shocker that I like thrift stores and that I've shopped at them my whole life and continue to do so even though I can afford not to now. But then again, how does one define what they "can afford"? I may not have to count every penny and worry if my limit has been exceeded if I splurge on some clothes here and there, but student loans and credit card debt still eerily lurk in the background reminding me that whatever I spend is keeping me from being able to pay off debt and start my savings. I occasionally remind my ever-broke coworker that with her complete lack-of-debt she is far richer than I am.

So I find myself in thrift store bliss... Lovely, right? Buying pre-used clothes and other items guilt free? Ah, but there's a catch...my closet is already full and I already have way too much stuff...and did I mention my roommate is moving out and I'm faced with the possibility of either having to move all of stuff (a very hefty task) or finding a new roommate willing to live with all of my belongings?

So I stare into my closet and try to see space, try to see how perhaps I might find more room in the crowded and already overstuffed area...And I fail. I imagine giving away all of the clothes I hardly wear and all of the items around my room and around my house that I don't really NEED and I feel elated, freedom sweeping over me. I imagine how I could pick-up and move to another city, just one suitcase full of belongings to my name...ah, sweet bliss it would be to be relieved of the burden of my belongings.

Then I crash. The reality of my belonging to my belongings pull me down. I OWN this stuff. I am responsible for it--like a puppy: I have accepted ownership and agreed to take care of it for the rest of its days. If I give up on the old worn jeans and the slightly outdated dresses and the acrylic paints and the bottles of household cleaners and the old computer towers and the folding chairs and the hair products and all the other countless things crowding my house I will have to choose their fate--do they end up in a landfill or is there someone I can trust to put them to use? I've seen the dumpsters at the Salvation Army, I know that a large number of items are unsold and dumped, I can find no redemption there.

....big long pause...

...So now what?...Well, I'm not sure. I'm buying a bike and am trying to cut down on my driving. I'm trying to think of ways to re-purpose all my old clothes (rugs? quilts? sculptures?). I've found the recycling drop-off point where I can recycle all plastics #1-7 except 6. I've kept up with the composting. I'm sure I'll find new stumbling points as I go though, new obstacles to trying to live my green and footprint free life.


...I'm sure there will be more to come but most of this bit has been sitting waiting to be published for far too long, keeping me from posting anything more frivolous or not on-topic (and I like frivolous and love off-topic)

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Money, the root of evil or the biggest ballot you can cast?

So all my piracy has left me with a large gap in my life...no, it's not the lack of human contact, that was there already. The large gap was/is the time I'm spending NOT shopping.

Now you are probably thinking horrid thoughts about how much I must have BEEN shopping in order to now have so much time filled with non-shopping. All perfectly deserved, but even so, I was never as high an offender as most. I may have to rewind a bit to explain.

I don't know where I should start, with my overcrowded closet and the moment that I felt my heart soar as I contemplated what it would be like to just get rid of it ALL, or with the visit to the thrift store that made me realize I could NEVER buy a "new" outfit again and be completely and sufficiently clothed for the rest of my life by way of other people's cast-offs, or with the website The Story of Stuff that made me re-evaluate my contribution to environmental harm not just in terms of what I brought home, but by the effects and environmental expenditures production and transportation put into those items, or should I start with my first knitted shopping bag?

I knit my first shopping bag about a year ago. It was cotton and pretty and stretched really big to fit groceries in it. But I needed more bags for the amount of groceries I was buying. So I started bringing my knit bag inside of a tote bag...and then another bag, and then I got a thermal bag...and now I probably have about 7 or 8 "grocery bags". Baby steps. I loved not taking bags while I was at the store, and even more I loved not having huge bags of bags growing each week in my recycling pile.

Then I started doing "Eat to Live" during the summer. The diet is largely vegetarian/vegan and the staple foods are lots and lots of veggies and fruits. So as I began doing this diet I began visiting the grocery store once or twice a week instead of once or twice a month. But instead of increasing my garbage I was actually reducing it. I started a compost bin and would go out every week or two to bury the compost in the garden. I put all the plastic containers, tin cans, and cardboard boxes in with my recycling and reused the thin produce bags whenever I could. Very little excess packaging remained. My trash bin filled up once a month rather than once a week. It was inspiring. I started looking at what I was still throwing away and despising it. I began looking at styrofoam trays and plastic bags that had to be thrown out from the corner of my eye--they were personally offensive, they were making me look bad by creating an environmental footprint where I wanted there to be none.

I began noticing that when I went out to eat and was given plastic utensils, Styrofoam cups, plastic containers for salad dressing, cheese, sauce, etc. it was usually without my permission and forcing me into creating a footprint from one meal that might equal a normal week from my at home eating, or a month from people in other countries.

Then I watched The Story of Stuff. And honestly it made me snap out of a delusion I was in. I felt I was doing well. I thought "well look here, I'm conscientious, I reduce, I reuse, I recycle, I don't buy animal products as much, I'm shopping at places that are supporting local and organic farming. I'm way ahead of everyone I know, so surely that's enough, right?"

Oh.My.Gosh.

Let me tell you a side story: When I was in Africa I stayed a number of places with a number of people and usually when first arriving offered some money or food to help facilitate my stay. I was never asked for this, but offered anyways. It was only after I had been in Malawi for 5 months or so that someone asked me how much I had given and I had said "as much as they would take". I was then told that I was supposed to have INSISTED on giving them more, and that most likely the people I stayed with in villages suffered hardship in trying to feed me for the amount of time I had stayed. My heart hurt. I was crushed. People already poor and already burdened suffered without telling me. How could I possibly make up for this? It was truly impossible.

It was a similar feeling, of being crushed by the notion that I was a burden, that I AM a burden, when I watched The Story of Stuff. It was all there. I was buying things...lots of things, here and there, random things, little things, cheap things, unimportant things...and those things were having social and environmental tolls that I could not see or possibly calculate. Every little piece of junk I had ever bought had some price that I had NOT paid. A price not necessarily in dollars, but in fuels burned, natural materials squandered, labor exploited, toxins released into the air and the water, and that those items still had within them more toxins and more material for the landfill unless I could keep them in use. And I have a house FULL of this stuff

Ouch.

...continued later

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Female Chauvinist Pigs and Thoroughly Rotten Morals

I'm reading "Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture" by Ariel Levy right now, and it's really hitting on a lot of the things that have been bothering me lately.

I know I posted recently about the "Identifying" t-shirts women are wearing that bother me, as girls identify themselves as sexual or as some type of gender stereotype. I've also posted about how it feels as if the choice for women today is to be sexual, or to be labeled as repressed. The "freedom" of sexual choice has become the freedom ONLY to be sexual.

The book I'm reading is in line with a lot of the things I've been reading, but it also touches on a few other aspects of this subject as well.


Business world still generally= the MAN's world, and in order to succeed women have had to act like men, and have taken it so far as to be attending strip clubs and buying into the T&A power play culture. “If you can’t beat them, join them,” and "If a guy is an idiot and I can use sexuality to my own advantage over him, why not?" seems to be the attitude.

The problem with these attitudes is that they continue a culture that places women as sexual objects, and heightened sexuality with worth, while simultaneously saying that a woman’s place is to be submissive and willing. The "Female Chauvinist Pigs (FPGs)" Levy talks about as accepting and buying into that culture and acting "like a man" generally don't identify themselves as part of that group (women) who use their bodies to get ahead, and will make fun of those women and try to portray a strong front "like a man" while seemingly completely oblivious that they are keeping the station of women below that of men and that no matter how well they “fit in” to a man’s culture, they will continue to be women.

--

Even young girls recognize that with promiscuity and sexual openness now comes advancement in popularity and even celebrity (note how Paris Hilton's "sex tape" came out just before her reality series aired, and how young girls are posting sexy pictures and even videos online for their classmates and the world to see and comment on). Women are being rewarded for these actions, and if they speak out against them are generally told they just “don’t get it,” or are “repressing” their sexual nature.

Why was it that the convergence of the Women's Liberation movement, and the Sexual Revolution led to women being not freed from their role as a sexual object, but instead embracing and enhancing their role as a sexual object and objectifying other women as well in a kind of sleazy one-upmanship?

Why do women NOT see themselves as a group working together, but would rather be "one of the guys" (who are, of course, as a group very united and very willing to assist each other advance) to get ahead?

"Women who've wanted to be perceived as powerful have long found it more efficient to identify with men than to try to elevate the entire female sex to their level." (Ariel Levy) Women wanting to get ahead in the business world have found loopholes and behaved in ways that they found effective and those ways have generally been by imitating and fitting in with the men. And at some point those highly successful women will be "complimented" by others who will applaud her with phrases like “Masculine-like independence” or with some version of the phase "like a man."


Why do we buy into the idea of the attribute of a woman being "quiet, weak, and submissive" and the attributes of a man being "outspoken, strong, and dominant"?

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Why has our culture SO strongly embraced the idea that to feel sexy and to be sexually desired is an important part of a woman's self-worth and self-confidence? If this were inherently necessary for a woman, would it not also be inherently necessary for a man? And do we see the media forcing young men to outdo each other with vulgar displays of sexuality? How many men are out there exposing themselves the way girls are, just to try to be considered "hot" and become the object of desire?


In one part of the book Levy discusses a school where all the middle school girls were coming to school in mini-skirts and tiny tank tops and a motion was put forth for a school dress code--so that the boys wouldn't be so distracted.
Levy comments:

It's interesting that the teachers were concerned about boys getting distracted. Teenage boys tend to find teenage girls distracting no matter what they are wearing. As David [one of the students interviewed] put it, "What girls don't understand is guys always want girls. If every girl dressed casually, you'd still like girls. It's like, you don't have to exhaust yourselves." The people who are really distracted by the competition to look and seem sexy are the girls themselves.

How can we continue to ignore the way our culture is screwing up the generation of women behind us, who is so bombarded with messages telling them it is important to be hot, and to have the “right” wardrobe and nails, and bikini wax that they no longer have a foundation of self-worth OUTSIDE of their physical attributes and desirousness?

Okay, on a lighter note, please listen to Ernie Cline's "Nerd Porn Auteur" for a refreshingly humorous "guy's perspective" on how current plastic hotness falls short.

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Provocative T-shirts

Interesting article on the T-shirts many of the young folk are wearing these days.
Here are a couple excerpts:

Call it rude, call it crude, call it the latest sign of civilization’s decline — there is no escaping message Ts.
Some are harmless. JCPenney sells T-shirts that say “Be happy” and “Looking for my prince.” Some are ironic: “You couldn’t afford my expensive taste” is the message on a $12.99 shirt at Charlotte Russe.

Then there are the baddies of the T-shirt world — the sexy girls smokin’ in the bathroom. “Stop staring, they don’t talk.” “Yes, but not with you.” “Are you a good boy?’’

In a society soaked with sexual imagery, such messages are being worn by girls barely old enough to drive, or in some cases, stay home without a sitter.

But when does playful cross the line to trashy? And how should educators deal with sexual messages in the classroom?

At International Plaza’s Abercrombie store, 16-year-old Rebekah Stellick of Clearwater purchased a shirt that read:

“I may not be perfect, but parts of me are pretty awesome.”

Ariel Levy , author of the book Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture, says provocative shirts are a symptom of a culture obsessed with sexual showmanship.

“Even if you have a dress code that says you can’t wear that to school, it doesn’t change the fact that the entire culture is set up in a way where that is appropriate,” Levy said. She said it trickles down to youngsters from women who confuse sexual explicitness with feminist liberation.

Personally I rarely wear anything that says something at all, if I do it is usually either humorous or advertising for something I believe in. I object to even the "Princess" and "Boy crazy" t-shirts I've seen young girls wearing today because I really feel that the labeling makes girls WANT to fit the words and become some stereotype more than they might already have become. ICK! Why are women creating an ever-heightening sexual atmosphere and hierarchy for OURSELVES? Why do we take over where men leave off and push it even further?

GRRRRRR!

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Trader Joe is my new crush

OMG!

Trader Joe's has apparently been tracking me for years and stocking up on everything I buy or am likely to buy...EVER!

I hit the first aisle and knew I was in trouble. Item after Item was something I wanted and I immediately found myself holding back in a way I usually reserve for tool stores, knitting stores and chocolate shops. I don't think I've ever had this kind of experience at a grocery store!

Perhaps I should explain that my normal grocery store experience entails searching every aisle for the few things in it that I will eat, and enjoy, and can afford, and then having to do a second round when, after I finish the first round, I realize I don't have enough food in my cart.

In a size less than 1/4 that of my normal grocery store was almost everything I ever buy. I was there just before close, so the produce was a little bit low, but that didn't phase me at all, especially when I got to the frozen food section and found vegetables galore, with mixes I've never even seen at my store.

They had the Tofutti Cuties Ice Cream sandwiches that my Dominick's quit carrying a couple of months ago, they had an awesome selection of nuts--roasted, raw, salted, unsalted, They had Indian ready meals for $1.99. They had Frozen Nan and Garlic Nan!
They had, be still my heart... GELATTO!!!! I love Trader Joe....no, really, where is he? Get him over here, I want at least a hug!

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