Shopping For Mother Earth

Some say there is never a reason to shop at Wal-Mart. EVER. Clothes should be recycled. Buy used from garage and rummage sales. Buy home improvement items and household essentials from small independent hardware stores. And why buy furniture? You can make it from old newspaper and glue. Who would of thunk?

I work at being a good guest while staying on this big blue watered down orb, called Earth. I do shop at Wal-Mart on occasion. I needed a fishing license and it was the only store open. Forgive me if I didn't want to pay a $250 fine. I confess buying non-union worms from Canada there too.

They are usually the same people who say all families can eat an organic diet cheaply if they make everything from scratch. If you think your teen is being stubborn for not cleaning her room, wait until she hears, "Ashley, time to grind wheat and churn the butter!"

My wife and I shop at a Trader Joe like place. The majority of the food is organic. Our food bill has gone up $20 since shopping there-- over $1,000 a year to eat hormone free meat and organic products. However, my wife and I can afford it. If we had children at home, and we are comfortably middle-class, we couldn't do it.

We also belong to an organic farm co-op which we enjoy. Again, expensive.

Those folks say drive a hybrid car. Can't afford the 22,000 price tag (excluding tax, interest, fees, delivery?) Well, put on your recycled 1994 sneakers on and get walking! Too far to walk and you live in a cold climate? Take a bus or train. Ignore the gangs and the creepy old man sitting next to you fiddling with something under his coat.

I love our van. Most guys hate vans but I love mine. I can get a lot of plywood sheets in it, haul stuff from garage sales, car pool lots of folks and so on. It only gets about 20 mpg but it is utilitarian. And I don't know how many times friends with very fuel efficient cars have asked me to pick up something for them because they couldn't fit it in their tiny cars.

Sure, someday we'll have one but until my van dies, I can't abandon her because she isn't popular anymore. Now that would be wasteful!

And they are usually the folks that don't watch TV either. You mention "Seinfeld" and get blank stares. Who needs TV when one can dance in the grass, read a book (the one you got when you walked to the library), play music with your armpit?

I tried the hippy dippy stuff in college years ago. I took my "principles" very seriously. Yes, I planned on buying 10 acres and only eating what I grew. I looked forward to starvation for a cause. Thankfully, my wife talked me out of that.

I got tired of self-deprivation in the 1990s. Why should Bill Clinton have all the fun? I wanted dumb TV, a kick ass entertainment system and Playstation 2. Recently, there was a lecture about living "simply." Ha! I could write the definitive book on living like a stingy miserly bastard and then say, "I'm not cheap, I'm saving the planet!" I never lived selfishly high on the hog yet. I don't know what that would be like. Maybe that is the problem. Until I live only for my comfort (screw the planet) will I know the joys of living on the Earth carefully not leaving any footprints.