Like many of you (maybe even most of you) I consider myself to be an environmentalist. I recycle, I take public transportation to work (60 miles round-trip), I use the new lightbulbs, and I keep my house at a reasonable temperature.
However, I also know that most of the time, I am an environmentalist only when it suits me, and that I could have the hypocrite card used against me quite often. I drive my car on short errands way too much, even though I have a bicycle. The new car I bought, while not a gas-guzzler, is not a hybrid, either.
So it was that I found myself in the lawn-equipment aisle at the Home Depot this afternoon.
I have a house with a decent-sized lawn. The whole lot is maybe a quarter-acre. I have planted a few trees (locust, dogwood, red maple, and crabapple) put in some flowers (day lilies and tulips, mostly) and removed a lot of junk, like the rusted-out swingset and the useless pile of deck-building materials that the previous owners kindly left in a corner of the yard.
The only thing I don't like about my yard is mowing it. My younger brother gave me a used mower when I bought the place, but it dies on me last fall. So I had to buy a new one. Despite my inherent laziness, I have too much self-respect to buy a riding or self-propelled mower. So that left me with three choices. Push mower (gas), push mower (electric), and the "classic" mower, colored green with the little blades that look like they were designed to decapitate bunnies.
I bought the classic. I have heard that a gas mower puts out more waste than a car, and I am sick of coming in with a massive headache from the noise and reeking of gas fumes. So about 30 times over the next seven months, you will be able to see me grunting and groaning and pushing that engine of death around my back yard. My conscience will feel better, even if my back does not.