Suddenly over the past couple of years "Green Living" has become hipster-chic and there is lots of excitement over reducing your carbon footprint. Electric cars are making a comeback and more and more cities are outlawing plastic bags and turning junk filled vacant lots into community gardens.
For this old Hippie, it's like deja vue all over again. Here's a room-by-room summary of all of the ways the "green living" to me is just living.
Kitchen
I have been taking my own bags to the grocery store since the 70's. Yup. The check out clerks used to exclaim over this and I even got a 5 cent per bag credit at many stores. Now seems like everyone does it. But I also get plastic bags some times and use them to line my wastebaskets and corral scooped cat poop. Most of my bags are canvas and yes, I do wash them from time to time. Those "microfiber" cheapies you get nowadays pretty much fall apart in the washer.
A big red plastic Folger's Coffee can corrals all the coffee grounds, egg shells, avocado pits, onion peeling and food from the fridge that has turned to green slime. This gets emptied into the compost bins along with the dirty straw from cleaning out the chicken coop, dead flowers, and grass clippings. Since I am a lazy composter, one bin has a trap door on the bottom where I can dig out the rich stuff for my garden as it changes into compost.
Stale or moldy bread, outer brown lettuce leaves, mushy fruit and tomatoes -- chicken ambrosia!!!!
Leftovers get recycled too. Example: A tri tip I grilled on Tuesday has also become steak fajitas, a southwest salad, and if the little wedge left gets funky, it will become cat food. Last night we ate out at Black Angus, and there is always too much food. This morning I turned two partially eaten baked potatoes into breakfast by chopping them up, adding a little red and green pepper, and pouring four beaten eggs over the top in a skillet ---- yum!!!!!
When I do dishes (rarely since that is Rod's job), I fill up a big bowl or pot with soapy water and wash from that. Everything gets piled in the drainer and then rinsed off.
Every can, bottle, and container is put into the recycling bin. Most of the "garbage" in my garbage can is non-recyclable packaging. As a matter of fact, the blue recycling bins we put by the curb are filled up more than 3 times that of the garbage can (which holds mostly bags of kitty poop, packaging, and the one 10-gallon bag from our kitchen each week).
The plastic jars that hold nuts, candy, and biscotti that we buy at Costco also get reused to hold dry beans, raisins, croutons, and other foods that stay fresher in a covered jar than they do in their original (often flimsy) packaging. Some of those jars also hold dry kitty kibble that we keep upstairs, on the front porch, and in the chicken yard to feed all of the critters.
And last but not least, many of my favorite kitchen things were purchased second hand -- cookie jars, serving bowls, sturdy metal utensils -- and my 1949 Wedgewood stove!!!!!!!!
Living Room and Dining Room
Again, much second hand furniture including a mission rocker I got for $10 in pieces, stripped, stained and made a new upholstered seat. And the oak heart chair I got from Alice for trading a set of golf clubs. And the 1890's American Oak secretary I have had since 1972.
We keep a tyvek bag in the corner for paper and all of the newspapers, junk mail, and other paper go into it, along with an occasional aluminum soda can. Then it gets emptied into the recycling.
My "best" china came from an antique store in Portland. The dining set, buffet, and library table are all old. When my cut flowers (from my garden mostly) die, the water in the vase goes into my plants.
When we turned the floors into oak hardwood, Rod took all of the pulled-out carpeting to use in the outdoor areas of the shop to protect the mechanics from wet, muddy, and dusty ground.
I have books!!!!!! But I also recycle books. First to my mother in law who is the only person I know who is as avid a reader as I am, and then they go to the bookstore in Sonoma where I turn them in for credit for MORE books!!!! I also pick up books at yard sales and the Friends of the Library sales. And I do have a Kindle -- used mostly for travelling so I can have more BOOKS!!!! When I have books that are too beat up to exchange, they go into the many bins around town that collect them or sometimes I put them on Freecycle. Freecycle.org is also a wonderful way to get rid of things that are still useful but not to me!!!! It is an on-line community-based trading post where people can list what they have to offer as well as what they need, and are then matched up online.
Bathrooms Toilet paper empty rolls go into the recycling. Shampoo and lotion bottles (after turning them upside down to get every drop out) are recycled. Worn out towels go to the Humane society for the kitties. The clawfoot tub in our downstairs hall bathroom was found on Craigslist. The tile in the master bath was found at a tile outlet for seconds and discontinued items.
An old habit from the 70's means that I never run the water while brushing my teeth. And while waiting for the water in the shower to heat up, I capture the cold water in a bucket which I then use to water the plants on my upstairs balcony.
But one drought habit from the 70's that I do NOT keep -- I DO flush after every use!!!! (I'm not THAT green!!!!).
Bedrooms
I will have to confess that after having the same (mostly antique) bedroom furniture for 20 years, I broke down a couple of years ago and got all new furniture from IKEA for the master bedroom. And I do NOT regret it!!!!! However I still have the walls decorated with all of my needlework cottage scenes from the 20's and 30's. We also keep a recycling bag upstairs for paper and Morgan-food cans. Most everything in my adjoining office is old -- the desk, desk chair, mission bench, lawyer's book case and revolving bookcase -- are second hand. What magazines I do not keep get taken down to the Kaiser clinic for the waiting rooms.
The guest rooms are also furnished with antique and yardsale furniture, with one bedroom sporting a duvet cover I made for an old comforter with a matching window valance and a repainted yard sale headboard and side tables. The other bedroom has my grandmother's spool bed set and one of Uncle George's worn but beautiful oriental rugs and a patchwork quilt from the 30's.
Other stuff
I drive a hybrid Nissan Altima. I love my car (named Kermit). I grow my own herbs in pots on the porch -- and a rosemary bush in the chicken yard. All of my porch furniture is second hand -- wicker love seat, two rockers, coffee table and two side tables, plus a painted wrought iron table and chairs, and two cabinets which hold cat food & supplies and gardening stuff.
I have chickens and vegetable garden -- three really cool raised beds made of indestructible cement block lines with old metal roof panels to keep out the gophers. This year I am growing strawberries, eggplant, green and red bell peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini and artichokes.
The chickens give us more eggs than we can eat not to mention the best soil conditioner ever!!!
I have several fruit trees -- peach (three peach trees), apple, plum and almond, plus an olive tree. I wish I could figure out how to cure olives without using lye. Last year I got a dehydrator (thanks Mary) so I can dry the apples and tomatoes that I don't eat right out of the garden or cook with.
I give old clothing to the Church Women United, who operate a free store for people referred to them from social services or church groups.
I almost always "trip chain" so that when I get in the car, it is to do several errands at the same time -- bank, post office, pick up/drop off dry cleaning, grocery shopping, buying chicken food, etc.
None of these things take huge amounts of effort, although some take a little bit of pre planning. I am basically a lazy old hippie who would rather sit on the porch with a crossword puzzle and a cat than pretty much anything else
