Make your dollars holler for a green future.

I recently discovered a wonderful, pure, fresh carrot juice at my supermarket. To top off the fabulousness factor, it is organic. I should back up and say that I do about 99.99999% of my food shopping at an excellent local health food store (Rollin' Oats, yay!) in my city and, until recently, I only used to go to the regular supermarket for certain things, mostly non-food items, such as pine cat litter and toilet paper, to name two. However, that may be about to change.

Publix, the supermarket chain I go to, recently tore down my regular and closest store, because it was the smallest, oldest one in the city, and they are rebuilding a shiny new one on the same spot. Meanwhile, those of us who shopped at that location have been sent packing (or, more accurately, shopping) to another Publix store, which turns out to be a fantastic one with a much greater selection of organics and “near organics”, if you will. Publix has a whole line of products (everything from meats to produce to the aforementioned pine cat litter to toilet paper) called their “Greenwise” line, and even though much of it is not certified organic, which would be my ideal for all the food items, it is all at least in some way(s) striving to be sustainably and/or humanely produced and healthier for us to consume. I appreciate a lot of things about Publix as a company (no, they are not paying me to write that, nor are they or any company in any way affiliated with my little bit of cyberspace here, a.k.a., this little blog of mine--I'm gonna let it shine!), and the Greenwise line is just one of them. I thought my old Publix had a good selection of Greenwise items, but the Publix that I now am going to while my regular one is being rebuilt has a MUCH expanded, better variety of Greenwise choices and I’ve been completely dazzled and wowed the two times I’ve been shopping there thus far.  My bedazzlement mainly stems from the fact that they have a FAR greater selection of fresh meats and produce, both of which are vitally important in my diet.

I also found this fresh carrot juice at that Publix, Odwalla brand, to be exact, and it is a good example of the type of thing that thrills me to find in a grocery store versus a health food store. In fact, my wonderful local health food store does not sell fresh carrot juice in the store itself (unless I’ve somehow missed seeing it, which doesn’t seem possible, since I practically live there and am intimately familiar with every aisle. When your diet consists primarily of fresh, chi-laden, perishable food, you shop often for groceries, although, God bless the invention of the freezer, or I’d be in there every DAY). They do have a cafe in which you can order fantastic, freshly-juiced carrot juice, but it is very expensive (understandably—it takes a lot of organic carrots to make a little carrot juice, plus it is kind of labor-intensive). The Odwalla juice at my Publix, by contrast, was only $6.99, which may sound like a lot, but that is for a fairly large, 64 fluid ounce (two quart) container. That’s a lot of carrot juice, although I personally could drink the entire thing in one fell swoop, if challenged to do so. The container says it has 8 servings. I happen to love carrot juice, so for me it is realistically more like 3 or 4 servings, as I like me a long, tall drink of carrot juice. Still, even if you only get three HUGE servings out of it, that is $2.33 per serving, which to me is very reasonable, considering the nutrition factor, the refreshing factor, and the deliciousness factor (and no, Odwalla is not paying me to write this blog, either—I just call ‘em like I see ‘em) of this juice, and considering that I’m on a healthy diet, and carrot juice is like a “treat” item to me, yet good for me, I think it is a far better and more economical treat than, say, folks running out to Starbucks and spending goodness knows what on a sugary, caffeine-laden, fat-laden, liquid dessert called some sort of “coffee” but which is more like “coffee-flavored addictive dessert in a cup”. Carrot juice has tons of Vitamin A and is bursting with chi (life energy).

I’d much rather have a big cuppa fresh carrot juice for "dessert" than a slice of wheat-laden, corn-syrupy, God-knows-what-laden cake with faux whipped cream on it. I don’t even have a taste for stuff like the latter, thank God. To me, it is faux food. Even homemade cake doesn’t tempt me, and not only because I know how bad wheat is for my particular blood type (O). I’ve never been a cake person. SALTY junk food, now there’s where I hang my addiction hat. But when I’m eating right for my type (I follow the The GenoType Diet), I’m in balance and not craving anything. And items like fresh carrot juice, which I haven’t had in years until rediscovering it at this Publix this week, are what make my diet so joyful and sustainable and keep me in fine fettle.

I am so happy to vote with my hard-earned green for green. When I choose to shop greenly, I’m voting for sustainability, for organics, for purity, for humane farming practices, for whole foods, for quality, for products produced in ways and by companies that respect nature and work in harmony with it, thus preserving and protecting it and ourselves.

Buying organic and/or as close as you can get, as with the Publix Greenwise line, may seem like a small thing that you are mainly doing for your own health and that of your family. But make no mistake about it: when you CHOOSE to spend your dollars on certified organic food or on products by companies that are trying to at least come close to that, like the Greenwise line at Publix, you are doing something very powerful to change the world, no less. Here in the USA, our right to vote with ballots is precious and powerful. Yet understand, voting with our dollars is profoundly powerful, too, because this is a capitalist society. Very few things speak louder here than MONEY and how consumers CHOOSE to spend it. By “voting” with our dollars for certified organic whenever possible, we are saying we not only want pure, junk-free, whole, high-quality, nutritious foods for our own health, but we also demand food that is humanely and sustainably raised. Humane agriculture is sustainable agriculture is healthy agriculture is a big piece of the puzzle in how we support the health of ourselves and our environment

Please note that it is very important to choose “certified organic” and not greenwashed, i.e., green lite, items that just say “natural” or something equally meaningless on them. And no, that doesn’t contradict my support above for the Publix Greenwise line, even though some of their food is not certified organic and thus does have room for improvement by really becoming certified organic. I feel the Greenwise line of meats and produce (some of which IS organic mind you, but in the meat department, some isn’t) is still worth choosing over their regular offerings, as again, back to my point, that way we are voting with our dollars and letting them know that we like the green direction and please take it even further, offer more certified organic items, we will buy them.

Like I said, items are simply “greenwashed” and not truly green if they just have meaningless marketing phrases on them like “natural”, but with companies like Publix that are really trying and really producing quality, purer (not purest, but purer) meats, for example, I think that is worth supporting and is certainly better for my own health and that of my family (read: pets...feeding them is yet another blog topic...so many blog topics, so little computer access). If a Greenwise meat item is not certified organic, for example, it has features about it that are specific and meaningful to me as a green consumer, such as: “Our chickens are completely free of antibiotics and added growth hormones”, etc. That is why I say such an item is truly worth supporting and choosing and is not simply greenwashed.  In my city, we don’t have a big, national health food store chain such as Whole Foods and, like I said, the selection of meats, particularly fresh meats, at my local health food store, is very limited. Therefore, by supporting grocery stores who are moving in that direction, even if they aren’t totally organic yet, we can send a powerful message.

Besides voting with our dollars, we can provide feedback to stores and companies on what we appreciate and what we would like to see. I told the Publix “Customer Service Team Leader” how much I appreciate their Greenwise line and how greatly expanded it is at that particular store than at the smaller store that is being rebuilt. I said I try to buy organic whenever I can, and I normally shop at the health food store, but Publix has so much more variety of meat, particularly fresh meat, that I am going to start buying more of their Greenwise stuff. I said I love how many varieties of bagged salads they have. I get SPECIFIC. I finished by singing the praises of fresh carrot juice, and then I was off, but not before she called after me “I’m glad you like what we’re doing—come back again!” and I shouted back “Oh, I will!”

THEN (today), I continued my personal green consumer revolution by writing the following email to the Odwalla company regarding their carrot juice:

“Just a quick note of appreciation to tell you how much I appreciate your fresh carrot juice, which I recently purchased at the Publix Supermarket on 4th Street North and 37th Ave North in St. Petersburg, FL. It is reasonably priced for such a high-quality, nutritious, pure, fresh item and what I really love is what you DON'T put in it: all it is, is pure, fresh carrot juice! Wu HUUUUUUUUUUUUU!

Thanks for producing this healthy, delicious, fabulous product!”

I should have said I appreciate very much that is it certified organic, but I am ashamed to note that I honestly didn’t even notice that until today. And I call myself an organic consumer! In my defense, I was so bedazzled by everything around me in that section of the produce area that, when I quickly read the ingredients label, I just noticed that the sole ingredient was carrot juice not that it also said “organic”. Once I saw that carrot juice was the only ingredient, that container was in my cart faster than I could sing out “OMG, fresh, pure carrot juice!”, and I was back to looking all around me in wide-eyed wonder at all the colorful, chi-laden produce. Hosanna, I’ve hit the mother lode!

My point, after much rambling, is to remind my dear and hopefully green-leaning readers that the mundane act of shopping wields a LOT of power in this society. America is all about the consumer. We actually RULE, folks, so whether one likes or despises the fact that this is a consumer-driven culture, it is a fact. So why not make your dollars count towards what you believe in? As Gandhi said, “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.” If you wish to see sustainable agriculture, humane treatment of animals and an end to factory farms and all the violence they do to animals and the environment, a healthier population, more whole, chi-laden food on your grocery store shelves, ethical companies thriving, and just generally a greener world, you have to CHOOSE that every day, in every way. And one important way is when you are filling your cart at the grocery store. Think about what you are “voting for” with every item you put in your cart. Cast your votes wisely!

Hippie Day

Well, it’s “Hippie Day” here at Cubicle Central, a.k.a., my workplace. You see, this is “Employee Appreciation Week” and each day has a different theme (can you feel the excitement...NOT). Monday was Dress Like Your Favorite Sports Team Day, Tuesday was Tropical Day, Wednesday was Western Day, today is Hippie Day and Friday is Patriotic Day. It’s a fascinating sociological study to observe how excited my co-workers get about the littlest things during this week, such as the daily bingo drawing (you could win a gift card at the end of the week to a corn syrup, wheat, and factory-farmed meat dispensary, a.k.a., a fast food restaurant—be still my heart again—NOT), and how all out they go with the various costume opportunities. I have never really understood it, I mean, how into “Western Day” can one be? It’s like how into it they get over every little potluck or birthday party that involves food, much like the office culture depicted in the classic “Seinfeld” episode that featured the 4:00 o’clock cake parties at Elaine’s office. I can never usually understand how cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs my co-workers go over such things, any more than Elaine could understand her co-workers crazed excitement for the 4:00 o'clock cake parties (until she herself got sugar-addicted from them *tee HEE*), but today, for the first time in the 11 years I’ve worked here, I am finally passionately INTO one of these theme days. Because today, for the first time in 11 years, I get to be MYSELF at work! While some who are festooned in hippie garb today were not even born in the sixties, and most others just look at it as a fun opportunity to “dress up” (or down, as the case may be) in a sort of exaggerated costume, for me, this is not a costume. This is a rare chance to let the real me out at work! Flowerchild ALERT!

True, I was just a child in the late 60’s, so in that sense, I wasn’t one of the original hippies. Yet the Baby Boom was a loooooooooooooooooong generation (including all those born from 1946 through 1964), and the thinking now among scholars who study such things is that there were two distinct “cohorts” within the Boom, Cohort 1 being the early Boomers and Cohort 2 being us “Late Boomers” such as myself, but any way you slice it, I’m still a Boomer, for better or worse, and I can’t stand when some other camps who study such things try to summarily extricate me from my generation and stick me in a separate generation (“Generation Jones”). No, I’m a Boomer, baby, even though I’m certainly not ready for all the ads for adult diapers and anti-graying hair dye and retirement funds that they are clearly directed at Boomers these days. Don’t rush me, I am not there yet and neither is over half of our generation! But I digress (I could talk all day about the fascinating intricacies of the Baby Boomer generation, but maybe in a future blog). My point is that I am, in fact, a card-carrying, authentic Boomer, even though I arrived at the tail end of the Boom, and my “cohort” had our issues and protests, too, and I want to talk about “Hippie Day”, and about how, as I was prepping my garb last night in ridonkulously excited anticipation, decking out one of my many tie-dyed shirts with political buttons I’ve been saving since “back in the day” (which for my Late Boomer “Cohort 2” was actually the ‘70’s and the ‘80’s) the following blog-inspiring fact was brought home to me: Wow, most of these buttons reflect issues that are still relevant, controversial, and “hot button” (no pun intended) today. Nothing has changed! We haven’t moved off a dime on “The Big One” to me, namely: going green. That is DEPRESSING.

Normally, wearing political buttons is strictly verboten in my workplace, so I was a little (okay, more than a little) nervous about sporting them today, even though “Hippie Day” came down from on high (a.k.a., our Human Resources Department and/or upper management) and they told us, in writing, that “Hippie Day - the 60's will be alive again: bell bottoms, tie dye shirts, etc.” Well, to me, “etc.” clearly includes POLITICAL BUTTONS because, I have news for them: being a hippie was not just about tie-dyed shirts and long hair, it was very much a political thing, marching in the streets, “ETC.” So I take the “etc.” to mean: “Peppermint Twist, this is your one chance in the 11 years you’ve worked here to EXPRESS YOURSELF”. Mind you, I left some of the more militant and/or more specific political buttons safely tucked away at home. I didn’t want to give some of the radcons around here a heart attack. But even the buttons I have chosen to sport, I was a little nervous about, in terms of: will wearing these get me fired, even on employer-sanctioned “Hippie Day”?

Why did I worry about that? Precisely because the buttons are still so topical and so threatening to people, even though they are all just really about peace, living in harmony with nature, and all that good jazz. So far, though, everyone has really seemed to “dig” my outfit (maybe they don’t realize this isn’t a fun costume for me, this is really who I am, and since they think I’m just “dressing up”, they don’t feel threatened by it), even one person who is on the extreme right. He did mention that he could kill me and no one would ever find the body, but I chose to take that in the best possible light! Seriously, he was a good sport about it, and I know it is hard for him to suffer through “Hippie Day”. It would be like me suffering through “Tea Party Day” (unless it was a real tea party, now THAT I could get into, as I’m all about tea...but again I digress), if they had such a thing, which mercifully they don’t. Then again, every day around here is like Tea Party Day, but let’s not go there.

It just blows my mind, to use a phrase from back in the day, how relevant all these buttons still are. I mean, okay, not the one that says “US/USSR Nuclear Weapons Freeze” and the other ones about the arms race/cold war specifically, but all the ones about going green are still so avant-garde today, yet they shouldn’t be! It upsets me to no end that I can pull out these dusty old buttons from THIRTY YEARS AGO that say things like “Rescue the Rain Forests” and “Solar Employs, Nuclear Destroys” and realize that we are still fighting to get people to understand and implement these things. I should be able to pull out these old buttons and think with a smile, “Wow, remember when we had to fight to get people to understand how important the rain forests are and that nuclear power is NOT “safe and clean”? Remember waaaaaay back before we went to solar and wind power? The fossil fuel era seems so primitive and long ago now! If I didn’t have these buttons, I would never believe I actually lived through it.”

But instead: here we STILL are, thirty years later, deeply entrenched in the fossil fuel era, oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico as we speak from a “safe and clean” new oil rig, a president advocating for more “safe and clean” new nuclear plants. Oh, and he’s a big proponent of “clean coal”, too. How, in 2010, can anyone’s idea of going green be to build more nuclear plants and work on the mythical “clean coal” technology? What we really need is to go to TRULY clean, safe, renewable, sustainable energy, such as and specifically SOLAR AND WIND. We should have done this THIRTY YEARS AGO! Why are my dusty old political buttons still relevant today? Why are they still so controversial that I have to have even a fleeting worry about getting fired for sporting them? This is madness! I want them to be archaic, not relevant! I want them to be a sweet, poignant, gratitude-inducing reminder of lessons learned, of how the human race was waaaaaaaaay back BEFORE we turned away from our earth-destroying ways and turned towards respect for our planet. Instead, they are still as “hot button” and avant-garde as ever. I could have stood up when President Obama recently advocated “clean coal” and new nuclear power plants and shouted “Solar employs, nuclear destroys!”, and it would be just as relevant, almost as radical, and certainly even MORE urgent, than it was THIRTY YEARS AGO. Bummer, maaaaaaaaaan.

“I’d hate to think it was all just fashion.”
- A great line from the film “The Big Chill”. -

Choice: Oil Spills or New Collective Will?

It is hard to grasp for words to describe the feelings spreading throughout every nook and cranny of my being, saturating and suffocating me, just as the oil and chemical dispersant is insidiously infusing the Gulf of Mexico and suffocating the wildlife. When I see the oil-soaked birds, I want to cry out. I'm not sure exactly what I want to utter, but I want to make all of humanity hear it. It’s not just BP that did this and continues to do it, and it isn’t just Big Oil. It’s us, all of us, humankind. And for that, I feel such shame and sorrow. As Melissa Etheridge sang in the great song she wrote for Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth”: we need to wake up! Actually, she said “I” need to wake up, and that is indeed the only place to start. All of us “I”s that make up humankind need to wake up, so that the waking up becomes a collective reality of the “we”.

Will we ever learn that whatever we do to the earth, to nature, we do to ourselves? If we disregard and disrespect it, we disregard and disrespect ourselves. If we destroy it, we destroy ourselves. If we choose to make a different choice, to RESPECT nature, then we choose to respect ourselves.

Every day, we make choices. Should I drive a Hummer or a Yaris? Should I drink out of the styrofoam cups freely provided by my employer, or should I go to the trouble of finding and buying a cup with the requisite lid and bringing it in? My city doesn’t have curbside recycling, should I throw out my recyclables or put in the effort to save and sort them, periodically load them into the car, schleppe them to the closest recycling collection site, and unload them in the hot Florida sun? And if I find that doing that becomes too much of a pain in the patootie and that my house is being taken over by two-liter seltzer water bottles, do I man up and say, okay, if I’m not willing or able to take these to the recycling site often enough to keep myself from being buried in plastic bottles, then I need to TAKE RESPONSIBILITY for my waste creation from a different tack, and not buy the seltzer water (*GASP!*) in the first place. I need to give up my precious sparkly water and switch to TAP WATER. Because my choices matter. And my choices on the seltzer water front, as I see them, are either to: 1.) recycle my plastic bottles, or 2.) don’t buy plastic bottles. If I want to be a respectful citizen of this earth, those are my choices on the seltzer water front. So, since I recently concluded that I cannot get myself to the recycling site often enough to preclude having ten tons of plastic bottles in my house (which my puppy takes out of the area I try to corral them in and drags to his futon on the floor of the den, where he likes to collect them and teethe on them, resulting in about 20 seltzer water bottles on that futon alone every day when I get home from work), I have now switched to tap water. Too bad, so sad. As Kermit the Frog pointed out long ago, “It’s not easy being green.” But it is very important to me, and part of “the greening of me” process has been to realize that it is, indeed, a process and none of us are perfect, and no matter how committed we are and passionate we are about respecting the earth and taking responsibility for our actions, we are never going to be “perfectly green”.  But we have to keep trying.

Sometimes you find yourself using a styrofoam cup, or realizing that you just don’t have time in your life to get to the recycling site often enough, so you just have to be honest with yourself and admit that you can't keep up with it, jettison your seltzer water habit, and keep lobbying your elected municipal representatives for curbside recycling. But the point is to TRY, and if you realize one area where you aren’t respecting the earth, ask yourself, can I do better? If the answer is yes, then you have to make that different choice, even if it is hard. Yes, I’m admitting here on the worldwide web that I am just coming off a shamefully long spell of using the styrofoam cups at work, since my Thermos cracked and it took me this long (okay, months) until I FINALLY brought in a mug today, and in keeping with the truism “no good deed goes unpunished”, I’ve already been yelled at by a co-worker because it doesn’t have the requisite lid...so I won’t be walking past that person’s desk anymore with my tea. But I have finally jettisoned the styrofoam. And yes, I’m admitting here that it has become too much for me at this particular juncture in my life to schleppe my recyclables to the recycling site as often as I’d need to, in order to keep up with the plastic seltzer water bottles I was CHOOSING to buy, but okay: so now I am MAKING A DIFFERENT CHOICE, one that is still taking responsibility for the waste I create. No more of my beloved seltzer. Tap water with lemon is just fine for my staple beverage. And this way, I only have to go to the recycling site occasionally because I don’t have much glass or paper waste (and I can bring the paper waste in with me to work and dump it in the recycling bin here periodically, which is easier for me).

What I’m saying is, none of us are perfect. We don’t make perfectly green choices all the time, no matter how committed we are to it. I feel that there are very few folks on this orb more passionate about living green than myself, yet in the process of doing it, in the process of “going green”, you realize a lot of things about yourself, and you realize that it is a process and, just like gardening or community building, you are never “done”. You gotta keep weeding and seeding. You have to be honest and look at yourself and say, look, I can’t do this, but I can do that. I can’t go to the recycling site often enough to keep up with the seltzer water bottles, but I CAN give up the seltzer, much as I love it. I can’t seem to find a cup with a lid that I like but I CAN sneak around with my lawlessly lid-free mug at work, because I’d rather risk reprimand than continue to drink my peppermint-kukicha tea from styrofoam (and, God knows, I CANNOT give up my peppermint-kukicha tea at work—that’s just crazy talk!). Kermit was right, it ain’t easy being green, but it is a moral imperative that we TRY. Every day, in every choice we make, we need to infuse our decisions with respect for nature.

Going green is all about respect. Respect for all of nature. Living in harmony with nature instead of violating it. It sounds so simple, but it is very challenging in practice. We need to challenge ourselves daily and be honest with ourselves when our choices don’t jibe with our green ideals. We need to wake up, as Melissa sang. I like that she chose to say “I” instead of “We” because, like I said, it begins with “I”. It begins with each of us making little daily choices like me with the styrofoam and the seltzer water bottles. The big companies like BP will HAVE to change in response to US:  if we choose hybrids instead of Hummers, then they will really have to live up to their slogan and move “beyond petroleum”. We all need to move “beyond petroleum”! If we don't, then every time there is news of glacial melting, and every time there is a catastrophic example of our violent choices, such as the current Gulf oil spill, we will just have to sit and watch in horror as the oil spills, baby, spills, knowing that we didn’t do the best we could to change how our species treats the planet that sustains us, watching the oil we are addicted to smother and suffocate it...and, eventually, us.

That bird I saw this morning on the news, soaked in oil, is my fault. It’s your fault. It is the fault of all of us collectively as a consuming species. A species that can CHOOSE. And we MUST choose to change now. We must choose to move from violence to respect. Otherwise, we are all going to end up like the oil-soaked birds. Let some good come out of this horrific Gulf oil spill: let us finally, as the small yet powerful individuals we are, wake up and choose respect. Because when we do it, the corporations will have to follow. Tragically, it may be too late to save the Gulf of Mexico. But may this awful event serve as an awakening for us all, individuals and corporations, families and nations, all of us, all of humankind: let’s make different choices!

Instead of disregard and violence towards nature, let’s choose reverence and respect. From that choice, all good things will flow. If we keep behaving as we are, however, the toxic results of our violent choices will continue to flow and suffocate us all, as the oil is doing to the Gulf of Mexico. There is a beautiful and very profound line from a hymn (written by Jill Jackson in 1955) we used to sing often at the Unitarian-Universalist church I grew up in. The line is: “Let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with me.” I realize that I do know what I want to cry out, after all: Let there be respect for nature on earth, and let it begin with me!