Time for Change

Last Tuesday, like so many of us in Massachusetts, I Voted For Change. It is the second time I have done The Change Thing recently; last month my 1996 Geo Tracker that I had been driving around town for 12 years got replaced by a little red Smart Car. After chairing Sustainable Milton for 2 years, I am finally walking the walk when I drive.

This Smart is justly named. It rated at 40+ mpg (almost as good as a Prius) compared to the Tracker which got 22 mpg; the Smart can turn on a dime and park anywhere; the seating area is quite roomy (my 6 ft. 1 in. husband fits in with ease), and it received the top rating for front and side crash protection from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (the engineers of the Smart [at Mercedes] did their homework and designed a high level of safety into a very small package).

Plus it is really very cool! The little round Smart looks like a giant acorn sliding down the street. As I proceed through an intersection, heads turn. Drivers stare, they point, they smile, they wave; like automotive paparazzi. I definitely cannot go out driving in my sweats anymore, and I must get some of those big shades, like Brittany and Angelina wear, because in this car I feel like a movie star!

But a funny thing happened on the way to Hollywood. A few weekends ago I drove the Smart out the Mass Pike to a conference in Amherst. The Smart is classified as a micro-car; it is 1/3 the length of some SUVs so I was not about to compete with the Suburbans in the fast lane. So I built in an extra 15 minutes to drive out to UMass doing 55.

Surprisingly, it was pleasant driving slower! People still stared, smiled, and gave the thumbs up, so I did not need to drive fast to feed my ego. I found it far more relaxing just driving along at 55 than weaving in and out of the 2 faster lanes, passing other cars, switching the cruise on and off, and cursing other drivers. But what really surprised me was the feeling of contentment that eased over me as the miles passed by, a feeling that that I was doing the right thing going slower, taking 15 minutes longer, not being first. Despite a lifetime of a competitive, tenacious, American can-do attitude, this little car was changing decades of my behavior. A gnawing question began to surface: if I could change my attitude towards driving, could I change other attitudes as well?

This is the challenge facing us all: to change our attitudes about practically everything, and fast. Consumption is the category du jour; we need to consume less, understand why, and feel good about it. The biggest house is no longer the best; how much fossil fuel is being used to heat that McMansion?, what is its carbon footprint, in tons per day?, could less square footage be OK? More cheap plastic stuff is not better; in landfills plastic does not biodegrade, it just photodegrades, breaking apart into smaller and smaller toxic bits that can then be confused for food by animals and birds, filling their stomachs so they cannot take in adequate amounts of real nutrition.

Our culture has raised us to believe amassing more is good, but it is not. Just because we can afford it no longer makes it our right to blindly consume, heedless of the impact on the rest of the natural world. Over-consumption is so last century.

We are highly educated, thinking adults. We can anticipate and comprehend the long-term effects of our choices. Awareness is the first step towards changing attitude: before each purchase, each errand, ask, do I really need to do this? right now? at all? When we can answer No, then our attitude is changing, we can feel good that we can do with less - not because we have to, but because we want to.

Changing our thinking and behavior will not be easy, but many of us took the first step last Tuesday. Now we know we can do it, so keep the momentum going.

Visit http://www.sustainablemilton.org/ for ideas on sustainable living.