Earth Day, Patagonia, and the World's Diverse Passions

Happy Earth Day, everyone! I completely forgot the holiday, but it's a happy coincidence that I bought a new Electra quick-release wire basket for my bike last weekend and a Patagonia messenger bag this week. Both I plan on using for environmentally friendly offices. I'm going to use the wire basket for conveying groceries from my local farmers' market and books from my library. It looks cute on my bike and is soooo fun to use!

The Patagonia bag is extra-special to me. I've wanted one since college. Patagonia makes high-quality camping, hiking, and bicycling products in an extremely earth-friendly way: they fund a lot of great causes, and pretty much everything they sell is either completely recycled or completely organic. They're a fantastic company, and I can't wait to tote my work computer around in their bag! I'm calling it a Happy New Job present to myself.  :) 

Finally getting a Patagonia bag is a big deal for me; their stuff is expensive (in part because it's meant to be used for decades without falling apart), so it's exciting to finally be able to afford one and to placate a consumerist fetish that I've been nursing for a long time!

Buying my bag got me thinking about people's unique proclivities and passions. Patagonia is an old one for me, and it's a passion that is unique to my geographic location, my class, my social situation, my values, and my temperament. It comes from being a former Enrivons member and a KU graduate and a Lawrence resident during the early 2000s. It's symptomatic of who I am and where I come from, just like my passion for bookstores and literature and education and vintage clothes and granola and pickles and who knows what else! Our loves and desires are created by more than just ourselves--they're organic outgrowths of our unique personal contexts, as well.

This has been on my mind as I learn about the students I'm involved with as an advisor. The personality types common to each of my academic programs are so distinctive from each other and often quite different from my own. Each day contrasts my values and understandings--those values and understandings unique to my background in the study of literature, writing, and the creative process--with those of my new co-workers and advisees.

I suspect that my job will be a great one for studying human nature and the variety of human passions. Whether it's service, professionalism, creativity, or knowledge that my students seek, I find it refreshing and fascinating to experience, at least for a few minutes at a time, how these lovely people perceive the world, themselves, and their career paths.

Food, Inc.

On Wednesday night, I finally got the chance to watch Food, Inc. on PBS. It's a documentary about the American food industry, more specifically the meat, corn, and soybean industries.

Now I've seen the PETA video about the horrors of slaughterhouses, chicken houses, and feedlots (Warning: Do NOT click on the previous link unless you have a strong stomach!), and I was expecting more of the same: excruciating scenes of sick and dying animals, fetid killing floors, and desolate swaths of polluted ponds and fields.

Instead, I was surprised to find that the documentary focused on the human costs of industrialized farming and food processing. The film covered a wide range of abuses, many of which I had never heard of before, including

• food corporations' gross exploitation of immigrant worker communities,
• the coercion of American farmers by giant seed and meat corporations,
• the rising diabetes epidemic as an unintended consequence of government subsidized corn products,
• and the prevalence of e. coli and salmonella contaminations in slaughterhouses across the country (which the USDA is largely unable to regulate).

I know that these bullet points seem unbelievable--you may be thinking, what a bunch of hippie, anti-capitalist babble!--but the documentary does an excellent job of talking directly to the persons involved and explaining these issues clearly. So I highly recommend that you check it out for yourselves and form your own opinions.

One of my favorite things about the documentary was its concluding message: each of us has the power to change our food by "voting" with our money. By buying conscientiously, with an eye toward human costs as well as the more obvious monetary costs, we can change the way food in America is grown and raised. So buy locally, choose sustainably raised and organic foods when possible, and go to your local farmers' market this weekend!

How to Make Your Own Wrapping Paper

Seven wrapped packages.

Ta daaaa!

I've been wanting to make my own wrapping paper for years, but this is the first year that I've found the time to do so. I was very pleased with the results: I was able to wrap six small-ish packages for less than two dollars, and I created no new waste in the process!

Here's how to do it: First, cut a brown paper bag along two of the longest seams (see below). This will give you one large rectangular piece of paper and one small rectangular piece.

If you have a cat, let her inspect your work frequently to keep you on the right track.

Next, cut off the bottom of the bag, which is too thick to wrap with. Smooth out the remaining sheets as well as you can and trim off the rough edges until you have the desired paper size. You should be able to wrap two small packages with each bag.

Then, draw your chosen pattern on the blank side of the paper using a silver Sharpie. Any other metallic marker will work, as well, but Sharpies are the cheapest and easiest to find (I got a double pack at Wal-Mart for $1.50).

 

My beloved silver Sharpie.

I used three different patterns. Each pattern took only a few minutes to draw on and, luckily, required not a jot of artistic talent:

Swirlies.

Stars.

Spirals.

The resulting wrapping paper has its benefits and its drawbacks. Obviously, it's very strong, so you don't have to worry about it tearing during wrapping or under the tree (unlike Hallmark wrapping paper, for example, which is terribly cute and about as flimsy as tracing paper).

Also, this is a good way to get a second use out of your old paper bags. The resulting wrapping paper is completely recyclable, as well, unlike commercial wrapping papers, which many cities won't accept for recycling. By making your own paper out of reused materials and then recycling it, you can avoid contributing to the four million tons of wrapping paper waste that ends up in landfills each year.

And, most importantly, it looks quite pretty, understated, and chic once the wrapping is done.

A few small packages with swirl and star designs.

A bag with the star design and a box with the spiral design.

The drawbacks are that that paper is quite thick and doesn't always want to stay folded around its intended package. I solved this by creasing the paper as much as I could before wrapping the package, and then by crimping the edges of each wrapped package so that the paper kept its shape. Most importantly, though, I used the strongest tape I could find, and plenty of it!

In keeping with the earth-friendly theme, I reused an plain old gift bag (see above) and tissue that I had received with a gift earlier this year. Drawing on the bag made it look quite new again, and tissue paper is always so crumpled that it's impossible to tell that it's been reused!

If you've done your job properly, your kitty will show her approval by blinking sleepily.

I'm baking most of my other presents this year, and I'm trying to figure out equally environmentally friendly ways of wrapping delicious baked goods. This, I fear, will prove a much harder challenge: not only does my paper need to be food safe (which prohibits most recycled paper), but I'll probably need to use cellophane to keep the food fresh. But I'll do my best, and if I get any bright ideas, I'll be sure to post updates here!

Clotheslines

Today, I came across an article about how residents in many areas are prohibited from using outdoor clotheslines. Sometimes they're prohibited by housing associations and sometimes by hostile neighborhood opinion, but the lines are always forbidden because of "aesthetics": neighbors think that the lines look "trashy" (read: they make the neighborhood look poor).

It seems incredible to me that people could be against clotheslines. Sure, if your neighbor has a clothesline, you have to look at his t-shirts and pajama pants, but I think it's kind of homey to see neighbors' clothing; it reminds me that other people live on my street, whether I see them in person or not!  Besides, using a clothesline lets the sun dry your clothes for free, reducing your electric bills and your carbon footprint. Saving money, helping the environment, a more colorful neighborhood--what's not to love?

I couldn't hang clothes outside during college or grad school. (Usually, even if an apartment complex gives you a tiny patch of land or a deck, you're still not allowed to actually do anything with the space.) But my parents still have a clothesline that I convinced them to install when I was in high school. I'm a big fan of it.

But it wasn't until I read the article that I remembered that we had a line at all. Ours is a retractable model: you pull the line out of its case when you need it, attach the end of the line to a hook screw, and then let the line whip back up into its case when you're all done.

 

I didn't use the line all summer, and when I went out to check on it this afternoon, I realized why: the retractable line was all knotted up inside the plastic case, and the case itself was about to fall off the shed wall. I couldn't yank the line out, so I resorted to "fixing it" (translation: I broke the brittle case off the shed wall, whacked it with a hammer, popped the case in half, dodged the sharp metal spring that whipped past my head, and then reattached the freed line to the shed via an old nail). As you can see, the fix worked quite nicely.  ;)

I started hanging clothes outside for environmental reasons, but I also like the process because it reminds me of Mrs. Gretencord, my second grade teacher. She lived down the street from me when I was growing up. She had four clothes lines in her back yard that ran between two thick metal T-shaped poles.Whenever I walked past her house, I would see her clothes danging in the wind beside her husband's pants and, occasionally, his underpants. Being a seven-year-old, I always giggled to see them, but I also shivered at the thought of pulling on a pair of boxers that had been hanging outside on a windy January day!

Mrs. Gretencord also had a clothesline hung in her busy little classroom at Central Elementary School. She used the clothesline during our reading units. We'd read a book together as a class, and when we were all done, Mrs. Gretencord would hang a copy of the book's cover on the line with a little clothespin. The books would hang in the classroom for the rest of the quarter to remind us what we had accomplished. I remember staring at the covers everyday: Mr. Popper's Penguins, The Chalk Box Kid, and The Mouse and the Motorcycle. Mrs. Gretencord is probably why I love book covers so much.

I count Mrs. Gretencord as one of my favorite teachers; she never stopped encouraging me and caring about me, even when I was all grown up. Even in high school, I still stopped by her house to chat and to tell her how school was going.

She finally retired a few years ago and moved out of her old house, but I hear that she still volunteers at Central Elementary because she misses being around the kids. I bet she still hangs her laundry outside, too, retired or not, and regardless of whether it's July or December.

Mother Earth News and Un-Smart Choices

I recently discovered that Mother Earth News, the nation's largest magazine focusing on sustainable, DIY, green living, is published here in Kansas. I take this as further proof that Kansans are the most awesome people ever. Even though the premise of the magazine is environmental, its focus is positive and practical. Mother Earth's articles are about what people can do in their homes to reduce their impact on the environment, improve their lifestyles, and become reinvested in the land they live upon. The magazine is half hippie and half traditional farmer, a mixture that appeals strongly to my Midwestern dislike of wastefulness.

I love their website, so I decided to follow their Twitter account to get their updates more efficiently. Their most recent tweet took me to Jennifer LaRue Huget's column for The Washington Post. Huget writes on health and food for the Post, and today's column "Smart Grocery Shopping: Check! No, Wait . . ." is all about the flaws and foibles of the Smart Choices Program.

Smart Choices is trying to put check-marks on the front of all processed foods that they deem healthy. Like Froot Loops.

Yeah, those Froot Loops.

The Program is clearly faulted; not only are Froot Loops high on sugar and low on nutritional value, but Huget points out that only companies that buy into the program will be rated, which means that much more healthy foods won't be given a check mark, while less healthy foods from paying members will be.

Huget reports that Smart Choices is taking a break to regroup after the Froot Loops fiasco and will be working with the FDA to create better standards for its foods. But Huget suggests that the FDA drops Smart Choices and endorses something closer to her own favorite program Guiding Stars, which is a universal rating system (meaning it's not limited to paying companies) monitored by a panel of scientists.

Near the end of the article, Huget mentions in passing that "we could adopt something like the traffic-light system that's been in use in Europe for a few years (green for stuff you should eat lots of, red for foods to eat in moderation)." I love this idea. Not only is it incredibly simple and easy-to-understand, it's also keyed into a system that most of us already respond to instinctively; we all know that red stands for stop and green stands for go from the flash cards parents waved in front of us when we were three years old.

Because this labeling latches on to a symbolic system so deeply embedded in our culture, I think red/green labeling could have a dramatic impact on the way we eat. Think of how guilty you would be when you tore open a red-striped bag of Little Debbie cakes, and how self-satisfied a sack of green-banded Sun Chips would make you feel. Maybe the color red would start to repel you if you were on a diet: you would begin to associate guilt with seeing red, while green would become attached to your sense of responsibility and healthiness.

I'm not sure that we need a labeling system at all--I've never had a problem reading nutritional panels or understanding that Oreos will make me fatter than a bag of broccoli crowns--but if we choose to use one, it certainly needs to be clear, simple, and rigorously evaluated.

Just as long as no one is evaluating anything I bake. I'd weep if I saw my cinnamon rolls robed in a pall of red cellophane. 

Headlines: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly Truth

I've always been a big fan of The Kansas City Star, which I think of as my hometown newspaper and read regularly whenever I'm in KC. Here's a round-up of my favorite headlines from the past few days.

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Sunday, Matt Campbell reported that Kansas City is turning a portion of its biosolids (read: human poo) into fertilizer for trees and biofuel crops. According to Campbell's article, the city is currently turning 8,000 pounds of dry biosolids into fertilizer each year and plans on expanding the program in the future. The system helps the city save money by reducing the amount of waste the Water Department has to burn, by providing cheaper saplings for planting in public parks, and by contributing income to the city budget in the form of biofuel sales.

Not only is this process amazing, but it's especially impressive in Kansas City, a place that has, until recently, never seemed particularly interested in going green. But then again, large-scale composting has come to KC, so maybe we're not as environmentally backwards as we Midwesterners sometimes seem to be.

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More bad news: Today, Emily Van Zandt and Chad Day (who, ironically, are recent college grads employed as summer interns at the Star) revealed that college grads may have diplomas, but they're still missing their paychecks. Van Zandt and Day profile four local college graduates who can't find work, despite their degrees in civil engineering, music education, communications, and Latin American studies.

It's a good article, but not a terribly surprising one since I'm also struggling to find my first post-graduation job. This piece did make me wonder, though, why such articles get published and read at all. Each new issue of every paper in the country is running articles about the state of the economy and how high the unemployment rate has soared, yet nothing visibly changes day to day; there's nothing new to make this "news" exigent. So why are newspapers giving this space, and why do I find myself reading these pieces again and again?

Well, to be honest, they help me feel a little better when I don't get called back for an interview. So there.

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Mary McNamara's piece on the shrewish business woman type in American comedies first appeared in The Los Angeles Times but was reprinted in today's Star. McNamara uses Katherine Heigl's role in The Ugly Truth as an example of how most comedic movies depict independent women: as high-strung, neurotic, cold, and bitchy, at least until the manly co-star proves the woman vulnerable and persuades her into leave her career for love. McNamara argues that actresses like Heigl (and Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston) should avoid these Taming of the Shrew-style roles in movies and stick to the richer, more realistic, and less misogynistic roles found on television shows like In Treatment or The Closer.

While I don't watch enough TV to know whether or not I share McNamara's preference for women on the small screen, I do know that she's dead-on when it comes to romcoms like The Devil Wears Prada. Plots like these are why I want to hurl a copy of A Room of One's Own at my TV screen every time a Jennifer Aniston movie comes on late-night cable.