Miss Scarlett and a little foot-stamping.

In response to my frustration at not knowing how to eat local and organic, my sister-in-law told me about a little store called Brown Box Organics. Yesterday while Boy 3 was at his gymnastics class, Girl 1 and I did a little local market reconnaissance. It is a beautiful shop and the staff is really friendly and helpful. They have local, organic, non-GMO foods, and I learned a lot just roaming the aisles. I ended up buying a leek and a bag of Chippery BBQ chips. 

What I'm learning is, I picked the wrong time of year to try and go local and organic. It's funny how what a late-onset realization this is. It's winter, and I'm out looking for fresh, local, organic produce. I am so detached from the growing cycle, and from where my food comes from. I have no idea what grows well in Idaho. I have no clue what is in season and what isn't. I think that's probably true of a lot of people. So now I have some catching up to do. I keep having flashbacks to the days when I used to read Jean M. Auel and her Ayla adventures. I thought that longing for greens was a cave person only problem. Turns out there's like, this whole natural cycle. Duh.

Looking back over my No Impact Week posts, I realize that I spend a lot of time being frustrated. I want to live this perfect green lifestyle NOW. I get so frustrated by what I don't know, what doesn't work, or what we can't afford. And the more I research the more I realize just how very expensive the food part of the green lifestyle can get. I am not saying it isn't worth it, I'm just saying there's no way we can go whole hog right off the bat. We just can't afford it.

Doing things in baby steps means not every aspect of our lives are green all the time. I worry about hypocrisy a lot, the need to be consistent is part of my identity, and I don't want to be accused of lying, cheating, or not living up to my values. I want to do things right, and I'm tempted to give up when I can't do it perfectly. There was a good article about this today on TreeHugger: In Defense of Hypocrisy- In Search of the Sustainable Double Standard

So, here are some truths and then I'm just going to move on and stop judging myself so harshly:

• We have a ton of plastic bags in the basement. The things are like herpes, easy to get, impossible to get rid of. I can't throw them out, but I often fail to remember to bring my reusables. 
• I bought Kraft Macaroni & Cheese this week, along with a slew of other non-organic processed foods. When one lunch of mac & cheese requires 4 boxes to feed the fam, I can't afford Annie's all the time. I buy what I can, when I can, but I can't do it all at once.
• We use disposable baby wipes. Not going to quit that, it's too cumbersome and gross. Sometimes we use disposable diapers. 
• The laundry room is disgusting again. 
• My compost heap is frozen. I am failing on that one.
• I love my gadgets, my iPod and laptop and such. I use them a lot.

I'm sure there are a million more failures, but the thing is, every day I try to improve something. I'm not giving up, and I'm probably going to crap out more often than I succeed, but every day I try. If I'm inconsistent? Oh. Well. Tomorrow is another day. Fiddle dee dee? Maybe. But at least I give a damn enough to try.