get powerful results from easy Earth Day ideas

What do many of us need each and every day? What enables us to function? Food and water? Plenty of zzz’s? A stiff drink?

The answer is right on most of our noses: eyeglasses. Apparently, a good majority of us would be lost without our glasses or contacts: 75% of adults use some form of vision correction (Vision Council of America). Can you imagine if we all woke up one morning and couldn’t find our glasses? Chaos, despair, certain doom…

My friend, Victor Reinoso, was awesome enough to be tapped to become an Aspen Institute Fellow. Fellows are anonymously nominated to participate in a leadership program designed for folks in government and for- and non-profit sectors who are tackling “the foremost societal challenges of our times.” He told me about another Fellow who identified a critical need – eyeglasses for people who can’t afford them – and figured out a way to meet it, sustainably, via micro-franchising. “Vision Entrepreneurs” in poor communities across the globe are taught how to educate people about vision and market $4 eyeglasses. The company, VisionSpring, is a multi-year winner of the Fast Company Social Capitalist Award.

A hell of a lot of adults begin to need eyeglasses at around 40, but in the developing world, many can’t afford them. The result: they lose income or drop out of the workforce, pushing them deeper into poverty. A simple pair of glasses can generate a 27X return for an individual! (And what about kids? I suspect access to education doesn’t mean as much if you can’t see very well…)

The juxtaposition of gaping need versus simple solution (e.g., donating your old glasses or giving money to outfits like VisionSpring) is striking.

That brings to mind another organization that does the obvious: take a valuable thing that is no longer wanted by its owner, and put it in the hands of another person who could never afford one. First Time Computers (for whom I serve as a board member) takes unwanted computers off your hands, diverts them from landfills, gives job-training to at-risk youth to refurbish them, then provides high-performing computers to low-income kids. A beautifully simple way to bridge the digital divide and do something good for the earth.

The chief concern about the digital divide is that the underclass of info-poor may become further marginalized in societies where basic computer skills are becoming essential for economic success…, entry to good career and educational opportunities, full access to social networks, and opportunities for civic engagement. (Norris, Pippa. Digital Divide. 2001.)

I know you all have computers that will one day (too soon!) become obsolete. I also know many of you have eyeglasses (or will soon!). So step up. Donating your old computer and eyeglasses is an EASY way to continue celebrating Earth Day.

Where to donate eyeglasses:

- Any Lenscrafters, Pearle Vision, Sears Optical or Target Optical location

- Lions Club International

- New Eyes for the Needy

If your glasses are beyond repair:

- Pop the lenses out and recycle the components – plastic, glass, metal.

How to donate computers and other electronics:

- U.S. EPA e-cycling info

- First Time Computers (if you’re near Washington DC)

If you’re in DC on May 4^th, help First Time Computers celebrate our 5000^th computer at a festive cocktail party! Email firsttimecmptrs@aol.com for more info.

green enough

“Give ‘em an apple!”

That’s what one panelist sniped to another a couple days ago at a discussion I attended on green marketing. She was referring to what she thought another panelist should offer her kids instead of organic gummy worms – a product she railed against as a prime example of greenwashing. The co-panelist who she was addressing had said that she’d consider buying the organic candy for her kids.

I’m totally with her. I mean, really? Was the first panelist saying that kids should never have candy? That’s fine for her, but I wouldn’t presume to tell anyone that they should ban candy from Childhood (or Adulthood, for that matter). As with everything, I believe in balance. A balance between good and evil, pleasure and discipline.

Now that our society is fully steeped in the concepts of all things green and sustainable, we find various factions pointing fingers at others for not being green enough. Such is the way of a cultural shift in the making.

On that note, I venture here into reviewing some products I wanted to try out on my quest to be healthy – for myself, others and the environment. By the way, you should know that it’s been only a handful of years since I myself switched from No regard for the environment and Very Little regard for health, to greater amounts of both. I was a non-veggie-eating, non-organic-buying, occasional smoker who thought the three R’s stood only for reading, writing and arithmetic.

A new glass water bottle has hit the market. To my knowledge, it’s the only glass bottle vying for position among others that don’t rely on plastic. Glass Lifefactory bottles ($22 for 22 oz bottle) have more utility than the standard aluminum Sigg bottles ($22 for a 20 oz bottle) because they are completely dishwasher-safe, can be used with hot liquids, and you don’t have to worry about how long fruit juice has been sitting in them. Drawbacks: breakable; heavier. (Note: it was shipped in a tight-fitting, regular strength cardboard box with no internal packing material, and arrived intact; later, my husband dropped it on the pavement and it survived beautifully.)

Now, you can go into an investigation as to how sustainably each bottle is produced and recycled, but I’ll leave that for an expert on such cradle-to-grave matters.

wrapped around 2 rolled-up tortillas

Next, my 7-year-old has been testing the Abeego food wrapper ($20) for the past month. Abeego graciously agreed to send me a free sample for this test. I wrap his sandwich every day in a hemp/cotton cloth infused with beeswax and plant extracts. He unwinds the string to unwrap and enjoy lunch handily. I’ve tried other cloth wrappers, but they all rely on a plastic component (that comes in direct contact with the food). Drawbacks: must hand wash; not sure how long it will last.

a tiffin (apparently invented in India)

I also like tiffins – stainless steel food containers. They’re good for messy food or food requiring a fork. Drawbacks: bulky; can’t be molded around food; has more than one part.

So, like everything else, these products have pros and cons that run the gamut of considerations including price, efficacy and health and environmental impact. I suspect, in the long run, that being supportive of each other’s efforts to make purchasing and lifestyle decisions will work better than sniping.

Where do you think green ends and greenwashing begins?

into the woods

“Why are the days shorter here than at home?”

That’s what my soon-to-be 7-year-old asked, in all eartnestness, the morning of our third day at the cabin in the woods. We rarely have the opportunity to be alone in nature, or anywhere outside the developed world, for more than a couple of hours at a time. We don’t have to scrape the mud off our shoes, check each other for ticks, or collapse into a chair as soon as we walk in the door, either.

mucking about the stream's edge

My son’s question is particularly ironic when you see that his days are pretty full between school, homework, piano practice, extracurriculars, Wii and the occasional play date. You’d think the days would fly by in comparison to our days of absolutely “nothing to do” in the woods at Old Rag mountain, part of the Blue Ridge mountain range in Virginia. Beyond eating and cleaning up after ourselves, our days consisted of hikes, imaginary play, books and a couple of board games.

My goal in retreating from the city was to make my kids bored. I wanted them to get to the point of having to be creative and entertain themselves outside – with no boxed games, no electronics, no markers and… no adult supervision.

For my own moments of boredom, I brought a copy of Last Child in the Woods — Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder. According to author Richard Louv, kids who spend time in nature do better in school, and lack of contact with nature is linked to attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). And we all know that hanging out in nature reduces stress.

It turns out that our trip to the country is in vogue: last Sunday’s New York Times Style Magazine says agritourism is trending right now. Apparently, people are in search of a “simpler life.”

the kids' "magic crystal rocks"

Of course, it took some haranguing to get the kids to come outside for no concrete purpose. They whined that taking a walk was “Boring!” But once my 4-year-old hit the trail, she proved to be quite the naturalist, crouching over a 4” x 4” patch of ground in which she could view and manipulate components of a sylvan universe. We didn’t get much trail covered as she was difficult to budge from her frequent and prolonged stops to study the world underfoot. One morning, she added lichen, fern and bloodroot to her growing store of knowledge.

I like to think as author Gretel Erhlich does: that we “stumble on divinity” when we study nature.

What are your remedies for nature-deficit disorder?

This post is dedicated to Diane and Lowell, without whose generosity (and cabin in the woods) my kids would not have come to know the wonder of watching a spider spin his web, or the joy of falling off a log suspended four feet off the ground. And to Mary and Barney who helped open wider the doors to nature.

frugalista

the beauty of this word is that it’s somewhat obvious what it means. William Safire says frugalista is defined as “a person who lives a frugal lifestyle but stays fashionable and healthy by swapping clothes, buying secondhand, growing own produce, etc.”

being the fashionable person that i am, i went to a clothing swap last sunday. i can’t tell you how excited i get by these parties. and parties is what they is. lots of drinking, lots of stripping, lots of pointing and laughing. honestly, what could be better? my comrades and i made off with some awesome loot. the next day, i saw a friend in my old (but cool) wool jacket and silver earrings.

the girl sporting clothes swap & consignment store finery

that same day, i happened to be wearing – yes, really – a large kid’s jacket that I had recently found on eBay. the identical, off-white, spring jacket by the same designer is loads more expensive in adult sizes. (i know: you can only use this tip if you happen to be small…) then, i saved more money on top of that from the fact that the thing was used. it’s in perfect condition, and i’ve received numerous compliments on it.

my friend Jess in New York City lives the frugal life as a member of a CSA (community supported agriculture). you join and pay in advance for a share of a local farmer’s produce for the season. then, you meet the farmer every week or so in town to pick up a crate full of assorted produce. for Jess, it “works out to about $20 a week to more than feed two people veggies from june through november. saves time at the grocery store, the gas to get there, and the fossil fuels required to transport tomatoes from california or cucumbers from mexico or whatever. plus, there’s the perk of buying locally, sustainably and investing in the community.”

i’ve long wanted to join a CSA, but couldn’t muster the commitment required to buy an assortment of produce over which i have little say. that’s a particularly high hurdle to clear when you’ve got munchkins at home whose universe of acceptable fruits and veggies is rather restrictive. i’m happy to report that another friend just turned me onto a CSA that offers a “buying club” option in which you can order things à la carte whenever you like.

Anna, a friend in DC, is bartering her graphic design skills for career coaching with a woman in California. all it took was a few emails, and now Anna is designing her coach’s book, while Anna’s business benefits from professional coaching.

her story encouraged me to ask my son’s piano teacher, Sophia, if she’d mind coming every other week instead of weekly, while i stepped in on alternate weeks to teach. not exactly bartering, but related…

and let’s not forget the almighty Freecycle. in Freecycle i trust. Freecycle lets me get some serious spring cleaning done (at any time of year) through a listserve where i can post unwanted belongings –from used shipping supplies to my kids’ outgrown shoes – and someone will email back, get pick up details, and appear as if by magic to take it away and put it to good use. no waste, no landfills, no guilt. then, there’s the stuff you can get for free! among my treasures: a nice wood platform bed; a high quality kids’ art easel; clothes; toys, and more.

someone offered up a diamond ring last year. i wasn’t quick enough on the draw to nab that one

weigh in with more ideas!

let them have smiley faces!

“every problem has a solution.” that’s what my husband and i have been repeating to my six-year-old son over the past week or so, ever since he ran into a snafu at school. and whenever he displays perseverance in the face of great adversity – like stamping his foot and trying again, instead of screaming and throwing his shoe when he can’t tie his shoelace just right – we congratulate his restraint. we’ve been told by all the parenting books and seminars that modeling and positive reinforcement are key to success in making a lesson stick.

it struck me that children and adults are not that dissimilar when it comes to learning. a couple nights ago, i went to a Slate magazine event here in Washington DC. they gathered people for discussion – and a few cocktails – to find solutions to the problem of our profligate use of energy. a Slate project called The Efficient Life is seeking ideas to help people use less energy. at the end of the month, readers and expert judges will choose a winner from among the proposals submitted by readers.

i don’t see mention on the site about a prize, but i suspect the reward is understood to be that one is making a contribution to the greater good (not to mention some publicity and the possibility that the idea may hit pay dirt). perhaps that’s a main organizing principle behind The Efficient Life: to call on and inspire individuals to think about and enact change in their own lives, which in turn will spur and inspire their neighbors to follow suit. sounds like a good exercise in modeling.

in my own home, we’ve done a major, two-year retrofit of a 100+ year-old townhouse to make it as green and energy efficient as possible.  from spray foam insulation to radiant floor heating powered by solar thermal panels. but, i refuse to swap my halogen light bulbs with compact fluorescents that make me look like an extra from Night of the Living Dead. (yeah, compact fluorescents have come a long way, but nothing yet beats the light quality of halogens. believe me, we’ve tried.)

during the panel discussion, Lisa Hymas, senior editor at Grist (an influential environmental blog), spoke about an innovative product offered by OPOWER, an energy efficiency company. she said its success hinges on a very high-tech tool. then, she held up a picture of a large smiley face.

OPOWER sends energy customers usage reports that show how their energy consumption patterns compare with others’. at first, they found that those who were told that they had higher than average rates of usage subsequently lowered their rate of consumption. but they also found that those who had been told they had lower than average rates tended to then increase their usage. so, they tried giving low usage customers a smiley face on their report. once the power of the happy emoticon was unleashed, low consumption users tended to stick to their good habits.

now, if everyone gradually lessened their usage over time and/or stuck to low usage rates, the whole neighborhood would eventually become a model of good energy consumption behavior.

one event attendee had another great idea about how to make behavior change stick. Cliff Majersik, executive director of Institute for Market Transformation, promoting energy efficiency, green building and environmental protection, has an idea for a new Facebook widget. the widget would interface with utilities’ databases and draw gas and electricity consumption data for an individual’s home and display energy, cost and/or carbon data (whichever one chooses) for display on one’s Facebook page, with privacy options to make some or all of the data public, private or viewable only by certain friends.

“since i’ll know that everyone will see how much energy i’m using, this widget would increase the likelihood that i’ll save energy by doing things like turning off lights. and the widget will increase awareness about energy efficiency on the part of everyone viewing my Facebook homepage,” Majersik commented in an email.

Hymas reminded the cocktail party guests that behavior change is far more cost effective than all of the other green technologies – solar, wind, carbon capture, etc. – combined.

if you peek behind one of the cabinets in my kitchen, you’ll find two pieces of paper taped to the back with each of my kids’ names. underneath their name is a series of – you guessed it – smiley faces. they get one for each day during which they exhibit model behavior. once they get five emoticons, they can cash in for a mutually agreed upon reward. (our new Wii has become a powerful incentive around here.)

so how do we jumpstart behavior change and get ourselves and our neighbors to start Really saving energy? help bolster what behavioral scientists call “community reinforcement” (usually employed in treating substance-abusers, although i suppose, in this case, you could replace addiction to controlled substances with addiction to energy!) and post your ideas and comments here.