No Impact Woman... -ish

I'm pretty sure that I wrote a quick post one day after I watched No Impact Man, but here's a recap. There is a writer in New York who decided that he'd try to live "no impact" for one year. The rules for all of this were pretty complex, and a lot of what he was able to do was largely because he lived in a large city like New York, but I thought it was compelling. They used bikes for transportation, bought nothing new, turned off their power (6 months in), were only allowed food grow within a certain radius, used cloth diapers, did their clothes washing in the bathtub... you get the idea!

My wonderful husband also watched it later and we "compared notes" afterwards. The one thing that we both thought we'd like to try was not using power after dark (namely lights, cause we do live in the desert and I personally don't know of anyone that sleeps well while they're sweating :-D). Anyway! Something I read yesterday sparked some interest in my mind to revisit this interest of ours. I'm fairly certain that I was reading over at http://beingamotherwhoknows.blogspot.com/ because there's something very satisfying about reading my thoughts come out of someone else's head (if you haven't been over to her site, go, now, don't wait! She is able to form complete sentences unlike moi at the moment, it's worth your time!) Okay, again, anyway, I was reminded of the notion that we have so many more waking hours then our predecessors, often doing a whole lot of nothing if we're really honest with ourselves... sorry catching up on tv and pop culture is considered nothing in my book.... so in that regard electricity isn't so much a blessing. ***However, making bread in my oven for a set period of time at a set heat in the middle of the day with the a/c on is totally okay in my book!***

In trying to find a proper balance between the old and the new I'm going to take the plunge and try to keep lights off after dark. We're thankfully blessed with some large skylights in the living room where we normally are, so that helps during the day, but at night I'm going candle powered (well, probably save Thursday's when colloquium meets here). I bought some taper candles for the dinner table and have a large candle making set that my mom bought me for my birthday last year that I haven't been able to play with yet... something about being ridiculously nauseous and moving, I don't know! So, despite the fact that it would be way more fun to do with the hubby, I'm making a point to make a few candles next week! In the meantime I have a bunch of tea lights in our storage stuff that I'm sure would love some love!

I also purchased some drying racks today for my laundry. I had a wonderful clothesline when we lived in TX, but am not quite so lucky here in NM. While I can run my line across the pillars for my patio, the sun doesn't hit that area at all, so "bleaching" diapers is out. I suppose it'd be good for other things, like darks, but that's a project in and of itself. In the meantime I'm trying to give my dryer a break (as well as my power bill and the wear and tear put on our clothes), and I'm hoping that I have enough energy to keep it going!

So, I'll be reading tonight by the candle light and hoping to calm myself to sleep in good old fashioned Little House on the Prairie style! (With the option of lights in case of emergency). Oh, and to be fair, I picked up some small night lights that stay on and cool for 24hrs that will go in hallways/bathrooms while using minimal power "pennies a year." I figured that'd probably be the best compromise seeing as how I have a bunch of little kids at my house who probably shouldn't be playing with fire or having to light a candle for a nighttime run to the bathroom.

In other "no impact ish-ness," we still cloth diaper, make our own laundry soap, have a garden, have chickens, support organic farms whenever possible, and try to keep driving to a minimum. I would ABSOLUTELY ride a bike everywhere if I could, or a horse, or walk, or... Yah, still dreaming of not having to rely so heavily on "stuff." I don't like the feeling of knowing that "I have to" go get something in order to function. At least my children know where the food comes from and have an understanding of the earth to a certain degree. I think the further we are from nature the less able we are to understand how our specific actions impacts those around us. It's almost like our ability to empathize gets diminished. More on that later!