Composting: a new way of healing
We’re finally getting back into composting. We’ve had a pile behind the garage since we moved in. For a couple of years I collected vegetable scraps and had them in a chicken-wire bin, but that went by the wayside, too.
We still put leaves and yard trimmings back there, but have otherwise neglected it.
I’d forgotten how much I love the smell of decomposing organic matter. It’s like a forest after the rain.
Sorting through what compost we do have from our pile & screening it through hardware cloth made me happy today. I felt more connected to my vegetable garden than I have in a long time. Something was missing.
The last 2 or 3 years I planted a garden but didn’t really tend to it well. Often I let the harvest go by without reaping much of it. Sure, I’ve had young kids every year since 2005. But I wonder if it’s been more than that.
My first real garden was in North Carolina at my mountain wilderness home. The first year went well – I built lots of beds & planted tons of strawberries and asparagus. Maybe a rhubarb plant, too. Every garden should have one.
Then the next year, right after I got the spring crops in, my husband & I separated. He stayed on the property and I moved out.
I never got to enjoy the harvest from that garden. It’s a sadness I still feel. Perhaps this year I can fill that sense of loss with a deeper connection to a garden I won’t be leaving. Besides, the asparagus are finally coming up this year.
Clean water and stuff
I admit I get most of my national news from The Daily Show, The Colbert Report and what Kevin shares with me from our local newspaper, the Democrat & Chronicle. (He reads the paper, tells me what he apparently thinks I need to know, then recycles it.)
But I’m still aware of things going on in the world. Like our need for clean water in many countries. Hell, we need clean water coming from our own tap!
The D&C had a story recently about water becoming contaminated with pharmaceutical drugs — from people throwing them out and from unmetabolized drugs in our urine. (Here’s a link to CNN.com’s version of the story as the D&C thinks I’m going to pay for access to their archives.)
So when Dean Kamen was on the Colbert Report with his water distillation/purification device that he wants to put in place in third world countiees to eradicate disease, it blew me away.
I think it’s a tremendous idea. But also one that we need in this country. If there’s a way to get out all the crap that’s getting into our drinking water, why aren’t we incorporating it?
On a similar vein, I did get Diet for a Poisoned Planet from Amazon.com. I started reading it. (I’m also vainly, if valiantly, trying to keep reading A New Earth.) Good God, what are we doing to our food supply, to the very things that sustain our lives? How did profit ever become a bigger motive than life?
Trying to be green AND clean
Why does being green have to be so damn difficult and expensive? It seems every other person is “going green” yet it still costs more to do things that are healthy for your family and the planet.
I fell in love with the Swiffer WetJet a few months ago. I got a “green” recipe for floor cleaner (white vinegar, natural soap, grapefruit seed oil and hot water), jimmied open the cap on the cleaner container and poured out the horribly smelly stuff it came with and mopped away. Even Duncan loves mopping now.
I could be extra-green and use washable pads, but they make it a lot harder to mop and our baby sitter doesn’t like them. And, let’s be honest, she does most of the mopping.
I thought I had a good thing going. My green cleaner costs next to nothing and the floors were getting mopped several times a week.
Then, tonight, I decided to haul out the big old mop and Murphy’s Oil Soap as between 2 kids, a cat, us and several winters, the floors are getting banged up. They’re never shiny any more.
I was saddened and horrified to find out the floors are filthy. The mop water was black. Ugh. No wonder those white pants Berry wore the other day were totally dirty down the front. I thought our floors were cleaner than that.
So is it the Swiffer mop (which now has a leak in it – possibly due to bottle cap tampering)? Is it my floor cleaning juice? Is it just the difference between cleaning something with a wet wipe and with a nice, wet washcloth in the bathtub? I know my kids come out cleaner from the bathtub/washcloth application than a baby wipe.
Whatever the reason, it sucks. I’m not a huge fan of cleaning. It doesn’t last long enough. But to clean and not really get things clean? How disheartening.
Food, “glorious” food
A decade ago (or more) I got interested in pesticides in food. I read Diet for a Poisoned Planet: How to Choose Safe Foods for You and Your Family
One of the things that struck me was reading about how children can be harmed by pesticide residues in fruits and vegetables–and that the harm outweighed the benefits of eating them. That blew me away.
Now I have 2 children. I think about these things even more.
I was looking to see if there was an updated version, and there is. I haven’t bought it yet, though. Why? 2 reasons:
I don’t have much time to read.
I’m scared to find out what it says.
When Duncan was a baby, he got only organic food. It’s easy to feed kids organic baby food. But as he started eating what we eat…well, we don’t eat organic all of the time. It’s the same with Berry. And it troubles me.
The Environmental Working Group has info about what fruits and veggies are best and worst when it comes to pesticide residues. But what I loved about the Diet for a Poisoned Planet book is that it also talked about the effect of canning and freezing on food. In some cases, it helped remove pesticides (for example, from the peel of pears), making them OK.
So it’s on my wish list. Maybe I’ll get it for myself once I’ve finished A New Earth.
It’s a plastic, plastic world
I’ve always been a bit suspicious of plastics that touch my food. Especially hot food. Whether it’s plastic cling wrap or leftovers being heated in the microwave, something never felt right.
For a while, I used glass Pyrex dishes to reheat my lunch. But then the lids cracked, or stopped sealing tightly and someone gave me a bunch of food in Gladware that I just kept reusing.
But now I have little people to take care of. And the recent controversy about cancer-causing BPA in baby bottles leaching into milk has reawakened my awareness and desire for plastic-free eating.
Kids use a lot of plastic. From the Avent bottles to Gerber dishes and whatever-brand-they-are spoons and forks. Plus the sippy cups. And baby food processor. And everything.
It’s a confusing world out there in Plastic Land. Which are OK, which are possibly harmful? And why don’t all of my plastic containers have numbers on them? If they don’t want to tell me what it is…what does that mean?
Here’s what I’ve learned: #s 1, 2, 4 and 5 are OK. #s 3, 6 and 7 are bad.
Why does Gerber sell their organic baby food in #7 containers? I’m making the effort and expense to buy organic food for my child. I didn’t order it with a side of cancer, thank you.
Also, polypropelene = good, polycarbonate= bad. At least I think that’s right. Let me check the notes I wrote on the fridge.
Thanks to Z Recommends for that info.
I haven’t yet figured out if all of the various plastic items we use are OK or not. Berry’s Avent bottles are going, to be replaced with some of the Born Free
The Nuby’s? I’m not sure. Duncan used to drink warm milk out of those — heated up in the microwave — and I was planning on using them for Berry when she gets to that point. At least I have 5 months to do my research.
It may seem like overkill. But we eat as much organic food as possible — especially the kids — to reduce our exposure to pesticides, antibiotics and other things we don’t want in our bodies. Yeah, we have a thousand plastic toys (hopefully not painted with lead paint) and live in an old house (I’m signed up for a lead abatement workshop this week). But I believe that the little things we do make a difference. And you have to start somewhere.