Dear Mother Earth,

I have always associated your preservation with a certain level of misery.  I was raised in a household where your name was often mentioned when my childhood pleasures were being restricted.  Growing up without Lunchables, a well-packaged treat that is apparently an “ecological disaster,” is not a hardship I’m ready to forgive you for.  Let’s just say I have always liked you WAY less than my other parent, Father Christmas.

As I got older, I began to understand the importance of respecting you, but caring for you became no less miserable.  My feelings toward you now also included guilt.  Every time I did something that I knew hurt you – like driving my own car to work when both of my roommates worked in the same building – I felt myself having to defend myself to you for my bad behavior.

“Sorry, but we all have slightly different sleep patterns!  I recycle, what more do you want from me?!”

I wanted to make you happy, but what I was doing was never enough.

Well Mother E., after years of resentment and guilt, I’m writing to tell you that I’ve recently had a revelation: being a good daughter to you actually requires way less effort than I thought!

It all started when we made a compost bin.  First of all, drilling holes into a plastic container and cutting out its bottom with a utility knife is the most enjoyable thing I have ever done on your behalf.  Second, it turns out that composting is not that nasty or hard!  I thought saving you would smell like an alley in Ocean Beach and take up a lot of my precious crossword time.  Actually, I walk a shorter distance to our compost bin than I do to the trash can and it just smells sorta earthy.  Third, did you know how much shit you can actually compost?  Coffee grounds, tea bags, paper towels; every time I turn around Kristy is showing me something else that I have incorrectly directed toward a landfill rather than back into your blessed loins.  I find that neat.

Go on, say it. "It's breathtaking".

As the contents of our compost bin grew, finding ways to reduce the load in our non-compostable trash became like a competition (rugby season was over and we needed the outlet).  We tried to identify our most common waste items and see if it was possible to cut them out.  For example, it turns out you don’t have to put your veggies into ten separate plastic bags before they go into your reusable grocery bag.  You can just toss all of them in there loose.  Who knew!?

“Why stop in the kitchen?” we thought, fully amped on our desire to win the saving-you game.

We cleaned with rags made from t-shirts my friends had been asking me to stop wearing for years.  (You’ll all be happy to hear that my Wizard tee shined my toilet just the other day!)  We bought shoddy Ikea furniture used instead of buying it new and shoddily building it ourselves.  Mother Earth, did you know that you can compost tissues?  We now have two separate trashes in the bathroom that we plan to obnoxiously label so our guests can also appropriately sort their refuse.  And you better believe we are letting the yellow mellow (when we remember).

Now Mother (and potential house guests), there are places we are still not willing to go for you.  When I say we are composting tissues, I mean the kind you wipe your nose with, not the kind you normally flush, even though those are compostable too apparently.  My brother could poo in a bucket in his outhouse and toss in some woodchips, but he lived in a yurt at a camp in Julian, not North Park.

We recently watched a documentary called No Impact Man about a dude that tries to go a year making a zero net  environmental impact.  In the movie, he actually gets a lot of criticism from environmentalists for depicting such extreme efforts to “go green” (for example, cleaning his laundry in the bathtub and giving up everything that couldn’t be locally obtained, like coffee…the horror).  I have to say I agree that making a film about the trials of being environmentally friendly isn’t exactly an effective way of convincing the average person to do his part.  I don’t think your children hate YOU so much Mother Earth, as they hate being told to inconvenience themselves whatsoever.  We see environmentalists as self-righteous hippies that have chosen to suffer and judge us for not suffering too.  The more defensive we become, the less likely we are to even make a small effort to do the right thing.

But the point Mother Earth, is NOT that I’ve grown to love you more than I did as a child and that I am therefore willing to sacrifice more.  The point is, I’ve realized I can help you and still remain as selfish as always!  None of the things I have described have required me to make a significant change to my lifestyle.  Furthermore, because I am doing more, I feel less guilty about the things I am still unwilling to change.  (“Marea” time during the morning commute remains firmly intact despite coworkers in the same neighborhood.)

Mother, as I get older, I am beginning to sense for the first time the true mortality of my parents (Father Christmas isn’t looking too hot either to be honest).  And I think it’s important for me to secure my share of the inheritance before it’s too late.  (Insert sappy sentence here about how our inheritance is your purple mountains majesty, etc.).

Love (and not just begrudging love based on a sense of duty!),

Marea

PS – When I first moved to San Diego I asked my apartment building manager where to put my recycling and he said, “Just throw it in the dumpster.  A Mexican named Jose comes and digs it out.”  We recently got the pamphlet below.  The city and/or Jose have really made some improvements!