I plead guilty. I am utterly inconsistent when it comes to doing the right thing: reducing my carbon foot print.

I was thinking about this this morning when doing my weekly drive to one of my favorite places around Portland to walk the dog: 1000 acres in the Sandy River Delta. It is a 23 miles (37 km) drive mostly on the Highway, to a large natural area with meadows, forests, ponds and rivers. Dogs are allowed to roam there unleashed, and my 2 year-old German Shorthair Pointer goes crazy just by hearing the name of the park, much less during our arrival there at the parking lot.

 

I have a set route there which takes a good hour during the summer and twice as long during the rest of the year because I waddle in my rubber boots through the puddles and try not to slip on the mud that covers the paths. The parts of the parks closest to the parking lot see a good amount of foot traffic, but soon those unafraid of mud baths have all of nature to themselves. As a regular visitor you can observe the change in seasons, and as a dog owner you can rejoice at the pure joy emanating from the creature when he charges through the meadows in the everlasting, never fulfilled hopes of catching the swallows and the meadow larks.

 

 

So I compromise by making up for that insane Schlepp by taking the bus at least once a week for other errands, and try to walk as much as I can instead of using the car in the neighborhood.

Other contemplations of foot print reduction are guilt-inducing as well:

(the whole lot is listed here: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jan/19/how-to-reduce-carbon-footprint)

1.Biggest culprit: air travel. Guilty as charged.

2.Eating meat: Yes, our household is trying to reduce meat quite a bit, but man, I can’t give up the Leberwurst.

3. Home Heating – here we are several steps ahead. House got insulated, and daytime temps are 66, nighttime 58.

4. Boilers – by default, yes – we needed a new one and now have a responsible model.

4. LED lights – yes, installed. Grudgingly.

5. Home appliances: using laundry line inside and out, most of the time. Check. No extra freezer, either, don’t blow-dry hair.

6. Buy less – working on it, I swear. Without too much success. You know me and clothes…. But we still have furniture from 30 years ago, so that’s a start.

7. Buy local – increasingly so. Not enough, though.

 

 

Well, we leave it at that.  Inconsistency, unresolved.

Today’s book recommendation is a fitting look at the godfather of environmentalism, Alexander von Humboldt.

https://www.csmonitor.com/Books/Book-Reviews/2016/0115/The-Invention-of-Nature-positions-Alexander-von-Humboldt-as-the-godfather-of-environmentalism

I think I wrote about it here shortly after it came out, but I strongly recommend it to all interested in nature, South America and a portrait of a man who became a staunch abolitionist, but still could not quite jump over his Euro-centric shadow. An enlightening read.