James has his spring break from school this week, and seeing as we have no spare time or money for a real vacation, we are having what trendy people refer to as a "stay-cation" which, if I understand correctly, is a stupid name for staying home and doing special things on a small scale. In the spirit of staycation, I have made my children pancakes on a weekday morning (unheard of!), I let them stay up late watching nature shows, and we took a visit to the children's museum.
I've posted bits and pieces about our children's museum before, but it really is an amazing place. We spent almost six hours there yesterday and Evan did not have a single tantrum, or even any whining, that's how magical it is. No whining! I wish that could have lasted forever.
The last time we were there, winter break, the place was insanely crowded and I nearly lost each of the children at least once in those fast-paced, waist-high crowds. It was completely overwhelming, for me anyway. The kids still loved it. This time I prepared myself for the worst, and gave the kids a strict lecture in the car on the way there about the importance of staying close together and never leaving my sight unless they want to live in their bedroom until college. All of which was totally unnecessary, because for no reason I can think of, the place was practically empty. I think the kids were even more well-behaved with fewer other children there. I still can't get over how good they were.
Some of yesterday's highlights include the carousel:
Evan is scared of the carousel horses that actually move, so he rode a miniature stationary horse who he named Fluffy.
There's a pretend TV studio at the museum, where James gave us the world news:
And then Evan filmed James' new cooking show:
And of course, the Lego table, where the boys spent at least an hour constructing various things, because they obviously don't spend enough time doing that at home.
In honor of Earth Day, the museum had some Earth-related events going on. We watched a play called Basura (Spanish for garbage) starring a woman whose overacting reminded me of Shirley Temple, and a puppet made out of trash. Together they taught us all about recycling, and even sang a recycling song to the tune of John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt, leaving us with that charming melody embedded in our brains for the rest of the day.
After the show we were invited to make our very own trash projects. And this is where I lost my patience. I'm fine with plays and songs, even those that indoctrinate my children (if the indoctrination is of a type I agree with, of course), as long as my kids are enjoying themselves. And I am a big advocate of recycling and reusing anything and everything we can. But I can not get behind the idea of reusing old materials to create extra junk that's going to sit around my house. That's not reusing anything, that's just reconfiguring the garbage and moving it from the recycling bins into my kids' bedroom.
Naturally my kids were on board with the plan to use someone else's garbage to clutter up our house, and I do have to admit that they came up with some pretty interesting little creatures, as much as I dislike the whole concept of the thing.
James made Big Mouth:
And Evan made Froglet:
Very creative, and almost cute, for something made out of garbage, but honestly I'm just wondering how soon I can smuggle these creatures into the actual trash and recycling bins.
Still, despite that little quibble, the museum was a really fun way to spend a day of vacation -- so fun I wish we had time to go again this week -- and I'm hoping the rest of the week will be as easy as yesterday was.
22 April 2009
spring break
22 April 2008
happy earth day!
Being green is so in these days, so in honor of Mother Earth and Earth day, I'm going to post some interesting links on a variety of environmental topics. Enjoy!
Which Candidate is Greenest? -- An article in Vanity Fair discusses which presidential candidate will be best on environmental issues. Yes, we all know it's not McCain, but check out this piece and the other articles it links to for more details.
Find Earth Day Events in Your Area -- I know it's getting a little late in the day for this, but Mother Earth News offers some resources for finding out what's happening in your area today.
10 for the Earth -- Heifer International (an all-around excellent organization) lists ten simple, everyday things you can do to lower your impact on the environment. They may sound familiar -- none of them were new to me -- but it never hurts to be reminded.
Why Bother? -- Michael Pollan addresses the seeming hopelessness of those little individual acts of environmentalism, and makes a compelling case that we should persist in our individual efforts. (Thanks for the link, Kim!)
Greener Pastures -- Speaking of individual acts of environmentalism, Bill Nye (the Science Guy) puts the rest of us to shame. Some of his ideas are simple, others are prohibitively expensive for most of us, but all of them make me wish I were eating his scones and watching hummingbirds with him.
Earth Day Tips -- Another list, this one from National Geographic's Green Guide, of things you can do to make your life more green.
Environmental Cleaning Solutions -- Lots of resources about using environmentally-friendly cleaning products, such as vinegar and baking soda and lemon juice. Keep your home clean using fewer chemicals and pollutants, and save a few bucks too.
The Rainforest Site -- Just one click of your mouse and money is donated to rainforest preservation and habitat protection. (Click to donate to the other worthy causes while you're there, too.)
Thoreau's Laundry -- Interesting post at Shakesville about the intersection of gender issues with environmentalism -- thoughts I've had from time to time, but I don't think I could ever have put it down so coherently. As usual at Shakesville, the comments section is nearly as good as the original post.
Monsanto's Harvest of Fear -- Okay, this is not exactly an Earth Day link, but it's about the evil being done to the earth, to farmers, and to agriculture in general by one of the leading bioengineering companies in the world. Monsanto is responsible for the majority of genetically modified foods out there, as well as a marketer of bovine growth hormones, and they are frighteningly aggressive in both political lobbying and bullying small farmers.
Okay, that's all from me. Go out and do something nice for the Earth today!
31 January 2008
what do global warming, childhood obesity, and torture have in common?
The meat industry.
Since mentioning our move towards vegetarianism in my last post, I've come across several articles that have only reinforced my belief that this is the right decision (for my family, at least) to make right now. You should read them, you should really, really read them, especially if you're considering reducing meat consumption. Or maybe especially if you're not considering such a thing. What Americans don't know about where our food comes from is an astonishing amount.
In comments, Kim pointed me to this article from the NY Times, which is all about the environmental effects of factory farming, and it is very surprising. To keep things brief, I'll quote the bit that surprised me most: "...if Americans were to reduce meat consumption by just 20 percent it would be as if we all switched from a standard sedan — a Camry, say — to the ultra-efficient Prius." I already knew that factory farming contributed to oil dependency and global warming, but I didn't really know the scope of it before reading this article.
Next: I actually bookmarked this article a few months ago, intending to read it when I had the time, and then promptly forgetting about it. I finally read it a couple of days ago, and was surprised once again at how much we as consumers do not know about our food. The article, written by Michael Pollan of The Omnivore's Dilemma fame, is all about the government's farm subsidies, which doesn't sound that interesting, but is really eye-opening. It tells us why the cheapest foods are those which are unhealthiest, and why these foods make it into kids' school lunches. It also talks about the global effect of these outdated policies. It's a copmlicated web of issues, but Pollan does an admirable job of weaving them all together.
Last: I came across this article this morning, about the sickening forms of abuse and even torture that go on in slaughterhouses. Horrifying things were captured on video by an undercover animal welfare investigator. I didn't even try to watch the video; just reading the descriptions was enough to turn my stomach.
So vegetarianism has moved beyond a simple animal welfare issue to one that encompasses all kinds of moral and ethical concerns. And even if I weren't moved by those concerns, the animal abuse practices along with the photos from the first article I linked to make me pretty certain that I don't want to eat meat that's been lying around in its own excrement, confined in close quarters that seem ideal for the spread of bacteria and disease. It's atrocious.
To quote once more from the first NYT article:
Animal welfare may not yet be a major concern, but as the horrors of raising meat in confinement become known, more animal lovers may start to react. And would the world not be a better place were some of the grain we use to grow meat directed instead to feed our fellow human beings?
...
If price spikes don’t change eating habits, perhaps the combination of deforestation, pollution, climate change, starvation, heart disease and animal cruelty will gradually encourage the simple daily act of eating more plants and fewer animals.
04 December 2006
ethical compromises
As I mentioned yesterday, sometimes when you're on a budget you have to make compromises that you wish you didn't have to. This is something I've struggled with for a while, and I know my sister has written about this before as well, though I couldn't find the post I was looking for after browsing her archives this afternoon.
It's a conflict that's hard to resolve at this point. Ideally, according to my values, I would like to support local businesses, support businesses which are socially and environmentally responsible, support environmentally friendly and sustainable agricultural practices, and avoid giving my money to those businesses or organization that espouse values contrary to my own. With that in mind, I went on Saturday to check out a local craft fair: Metro Justice's Alternative Fair, which was offering "fair trade, earth-friendly and/or locally produced goods that support a just and sustainable world." I was hoping to find some holiday gifts for the people still left on my shopping list.
And at first I was enchanted -- it was a progressive's ideal alternative to the mall. There were lots of booths for progressive organizations -- the ACLU, the Sierra Club, CodePink -- and other booths full of handcrafted gift items, as well as homemade treats to eat. But as I wandered around, I began to get more and more discouraged. Sure, I would love to buy organic fair-trade Peruvian coffee beans, but on our graduate-student budget, it's more practical to buy beans of questionable origin for half the price from the local coffee chain. There were some gorgeous hand-knit scarves, but I could knit something almost as nice myself, for less money. Everywhere I turned I saw things I would love to buy in support of the principles I believe in, but it seems you have to be a wealthy progressive to do so.
I got so frustrated that I left after only twenty minutes or so, and nearly cried on the way home. It's frustrating that the default products in this country are mass-produced by workers who are either exploited or underpaid, and support corporations that use every loophole on the books to evade social responsibility. Ethical business practices are not the norm. Caring for other human beings and for our earth are not priorities for the business world -- the bottom line is money. And when you don't have much money, you have very few options about who you're giving yours to. This is why we bought our Christmas tree from the Boy Scouts, and why I shop at the Salvation Army -- both organizations discrimate against homosexuals, a position I'm not keen to support with my business, but their prices are hard to beat, and on our budget, that's really the deciding factor.
All of this is on top of beginning to read The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan, which, like Fast Food Nation and other books of that genre, has me desperately wishing we could afford to buy produce and meat from sources other than corporate farms and agribusinesses. It's depressing that the morally and ethically responsible choices are not available to everyone, but only those with enough dough. And sure, within a year, once Greg gets a job, we'll have enough money to start buying grass-fed, free-range beef or sweatshop-free apparel, but the fact that my circumstances will change doesn't do anything to address the problems that require one to pay more to be an ethical consumer.
I don't know whether there's a real solution to this problem. Our country has long been promoting quantity over quality: consumerism is vital to our culture and economy, and more and bigger and cheaper are always better. It's a culture that focuses more on money than on people or the earth, and I worry that we're too far along this path to make any meaningful changes any time soon.
02 May 2006
on bird watching and conservation
I've never really been a fan of birds. Never found them very interesting, and in fact, I've always thought they were a little creepy. Those beady black eyes... My distaste for birds only grew when I dated a boy in high school whose family owned a cockatiel (I think it was a cockatiel; big white bird anyway) that alternately screeched and mumbled demonically, and two bitey African greys (though they were very good at mimicry, which was pretty neat). The eyes, the talons, the skittishness, all contributed to my opinion that birds were best avoided.
But I've come to realize, over the last few years, that birds are actually pretty cool. Even amazing. I mean, dude, there's a bird that can moonwalk! How many other animals can claim that? And March of the Penguins showed the world just how awesome penguins are. But what really interests me is watching the birds in my own neighborhood. The diversity just in this small area is kind of astounding to me. Birds I've seen in our backyard include robins, crows, sparrows, chickadees, cardinals, starlings, woodpeckers, blue jays, and morning doves, off the top of my head. There is a pair of geese who have taken up residence in the neighborhood (this morning one of them stood on the roof of one of the buildings and honked incessantly for at least ten minutes, while the other stood below on the ground, beating his wings and strutting around). There are also hawks in the area, though not in our immediate neighborhood, and there's the occasional seagull flying through. That's a dozen that we've seen, right here in one little corner of the world. I still wouldn't want to own one -- I don't like the way they look at me -- but to watch them in the wild is pretty interesting.
Thinking about the diversity of birds makes me think about the diversity of life in general on this planet. I like reading books about animals and extinction (two of the best I've read are Monster of God by David Quammen and The Ghost with Trembling Wings by Scott Weidensaul). I think the diversity of life on this planet is unspeakably amazing, and to learn about how different animals have evolved and learned to survive is fascinating. That's why I was so sad to read this article about a report from a Swiss-based conservation group that predicts the extinction of more than 16,000 species of plants and animals, thanks in large part to humans' destruction of natural habitats. It's a hard situation, though; I recently read Gorillas in the Mist by Dian Fossey, and that book really impressed on me the difficulties of conservation work when it comes into conflict with local people. It's easy to be a conservationist from the vantage point of a middle-class suburban American, but it's a different story in developing nations where people are struggling just to survive from day to day. If the only way to feed your family is to cut down trees and sell the wood, or to kill animals and sell their parts, what will your priority be? Who's going to starve their family to allow an animal to survive? When it's a choice between conservation and personal survival, I don't blame people for choosing their own lives.
But it is tremendously sad for me to think about the world my children are inheriting. The Yahoo article says that the most widely accepted estimate of the number of species on the planet is 15 million -- how many will be left when my sons are adults? The article says there are 65 species that exist only in captivity -- how much higher will that number be when my children are grown? I don't know whether there's even a way for humans and nature to coexist peacefully, to maintain a balance. Our track record so far shows that it's pretty near impossible on our part to live and let live. As our population increases at alarming rates, it will probably only get worse.
Sorry to get all depressing there. Consider this my late Earth Day post. Consider donating money to a conservation organization, or even visiting your local zoo, since zoos are often involved with conservation work too. We've got a totally amazing, wonderfully diverse planet, but it's disappearing. We've got to at least try, right?
26 April 2006
if i should die before i wake
Today in the mail, I got my first-ever pamphlet from a cemetery about burial options. Okay, so it's addressed to "Resident", but that applies to me. So I thought I'd write a slightly morbid blog post about what should happen to my body when I die.
I've never been into the idea of traditional burial -- it seems kind of meaningless to me. I've attended many a funeral, and visited many a burial site, without ever feeling a shred of emotion or attachment to the place, to that hole in the ground, nor have I ever needed that physical location to remember and honor my deceased loved ones. I always kind of thought I'd like to be cremated, and have my ashes scattered, this being for a long time the only alternative I knew of to burial. But it turns out that cremation releases harmful gasses into the air, and burial leaks harmful chemicals into soil and water. So what's an eco-friendly girl to do? Why should we have to pollute to dispose of our dead?
I didn't really think about this much, though, until I read Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach (recommended, if you're into that sort of subject matter -- I found it really interesting), which talks about the variety of things done to bodies once their occupants have died. The idea of donating my body to science appealed to me at first, until I found out that some donated bodies are used for practicing plastic surgery, among other things. Call me shallow, or superficial, but there will be no plastic surgery performed on my dead face.
And then I read a really attractive idea, which may sound kind of terrible if you haven't heard of it before: human composting, a method developed by a Swedish ecologist (read about the process here). Then, thanks to my random pamphlet, I was doing some internet searching on burial options, and found out about green burials. What better way to spend death than to become part of the earth and help new life to grow and flourish? I've always thought cemeteries were a tremendous waste of space that could be turned into public housing or something. I do enjoy cemeteries such as Rochester's own Mt. Hope Cemetery (the resting place of Susan B Anthony and Frederick Douglass), which was designed (in the Victorian Era) to be a park and picnic area as well as a burial place, complete with gardens, picnic tables, benches, fountains, and a gazebo -- it's a lovely and fascinating place to visit. But so many cemeteries are not like that -- they're empty, silent, lonely. I love the idea of the green cemeteries mentioned in the article linked above -- "nature preserve first, cemetery second".
So someday, should all go as planned, my body will be laid to rest in an ecologically-friendly way. Of course, I'm an organ donor, so that'll be taken care of first, but then a green burial, or composting, should it become available in the US by the time I die. I do feel a little odd for thinking about this in so much detail, and actually researching it a bit, when I'm only 24 and I hope to live at least, oh, let's say 70 more years, to be optimistic. But I do think it's interesting in a larger sense to think about the land use, the pollution, and the impracticality of the traditional burial procedure. And I suppose it never hurts to be prepared.
