In the past several weeks, for selfish and no-so-selfish reasons, my family and I have started to change our lifestyle. Don't get me wrong, we have always recycled, turned the lights off in the room after we left, and tried to eat organic. However, we also own an almost-paid-off gas guzzler and use a lot of paper products for our toddler twins. With this diary I intended to give one account of transition from a "normal" life towards a more sustainable one.
After reading "The Omnivore's Dilemma" by Michael Pollan and the recent diaries here on the issues with melamine and other toxins possibly getting into the human food supply, my wife and I decided to start making some changes to our diet.
In addition, I've started taking our local light-rail into work 2+ days a week. My current employer supplies employees with an "ECO Pass" for the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority which gives me a free ride on any local light rail or bus.
More below the fold...
Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) Food
We joined a local CSA farm that we found by searching online here. For $28 a week we receive a weekly share of seasonal fruits and vegetables. A representative share from this past week includes:
Basil
Beets
Broccolini
Chard
Cucumbers
Kale
Lettuce
Mei qing choi
Onions
Potatoes
Summer squash
Mystery item
Strawberries (2 baskets)
The farm’s website has a large recipe database for those items that we are not used to preparing.
We have found this change surprisingly easy. Meal planning and preparation takes a little more time and work, but our meals have been turning out almost restaurant quality. We have also found ourselves going out to eat much less. Our biggest challenge is getting through the entire share before the week is up.
This change results in a healthier diet, greater knowledge of the source of our food, and a significantly smaller energy footprint in delivering our food to the table.
Riding the Light Rail
I have considered mass transit often throughout the ten years we have been living here in Silicon Valley, but just never made the time or effort. With gas prices topping $3.30/gallon a couple of weeks ago, I finally decided it was time to give it a try. With prices at those levels that translates to about $10 per day savings when I take the bus or rail. The recent completion of a new rail line into the vicinity of our neighborhood in the past couple of years gives me 2-3 stations within 3 miles of my house.
Since my employer provides essentially a free pass on local mass transit to encourage us employees to use the local systems, I had nothing to lose except some time out of my day. Riding the light rail takes about 15-25 minutes longer than my commute in the morning and about 30-45 minutes longer in the afternoon. I need to get out of bed about 45 minutes earlier usual to catch the train I want, but if I miss it, the next one comes along in 15 minutes.
The most surprising revelation has been even though my commute takes longer, I arrive at work and at home much more relaxed than if I took my car. The opportunity to spend 45 minutes to an hour either reading a book or working on my laptop or listening to music actually makes the time seem to pass more quickly than it really does. I still currently drive to the park-and-ride station nearby, but I am expecting to start riding my bike once I shake the cobwebs off of it and figure out how to carry everything in my backpack.
Wrap-Up
Just making these two changes to my families life has made some initial steps towards a more sustainable lifestyle. Is it enough? No...but it was what I could now. My wife and I are starting to discuss what next steps we can take in the near future.
I think the most important thing to I have learned from this is to start doing something, change something, because the first step is the hardest. Each step after that is just an incremental improvement, and when you start to add up the steps...that is where we can change the world.