I've posted this video before, but it still rings as true today as when I first heard it, maybe even truer. Along the way I kind of forgot what this blog was about. It became such a chore to think of things regularly and then to think of witty phrases to include in the blogs. So here's the deal. I always knew that there really wasn't any chance of me completing 365 things in 365 days but it was about the dream and also a little bit of symbolism, of doing something small every day rather than waiting for the big things to come around.
So here are my small things:
1. Change 4 Change. This is an idea the mastermind behind the Shine Project came up with, which I actually mentioned way back in January in my It Just Makes Cents blog post and then again in the....... wait for it, "Shine On" post. Back then I donated a couple dollars-worth of change to a box benefiting the local humane society. This time I'm aiming a little bit higher. I plan on collecting change until it fills up an entire Bubbies pickle jar and then donating all of the money to something. The Change 4 Change movement donates all of the money to scholarships that send intercity high schoolers to college. That's definitely one option, after all I'm quite a fan of school, going off to graduate school as I am. Other ideas I had was to set the money aside to support some kind of local person or group. Maybe I'll use the change I save to pay for some farmer's market shopping I do later on or write a check to a nearby farm animal sanctuary, like SASHA Farm here in Michigan. Who knows, but at least I have quite some time to decide.
2. Conserving water. I'm always looking for new ways to be environmentally friendlier. I do all of the normal things, like unplug things I'm not using and using reusable grocery bags. I try to walk as often as I can and eat as much local food as I can. But I want to do some of the not so well-known things. First year of college I was part of a group called Meatless Mondays that researched the environmental benefits of going vegan. Fun fact, the EPA estimates that the 100 million cattle in the US produce 5.5 metric tones of methane each year, which is 20% of the US's yearly methane production. Earlier this year I talked about 10 minute showers. What about skipping the shower all together? Instead of showering seven times a week, how about just four? Your hair will thank you. Seriously. Shampoo strips natural oils from your head because we are a society that fears oily-looking hair. The problem is, if you strip the oils from your hair, your hair retaliates with an extra dose of oil. So of course you have to respond with another shower. Cue the never-ending, always-accelerating cycle until we are helplessly dependent on shampoo. For a while now I've regularly alternated, showering one day but not the next. Sometimes my hair plays along, not looking oily at all the second day. Other days it's cranky and just looks plain gross. To battle the gross days I've used baby powder. I haven't quite perfected this method, sometimes I dump way too much on my head while other times no amount would have been enough, my hair just wants to look greasy that day. Another problem with this method is the potential side effects of breathing in baby powder. While I scowl at anyone who argues that this, that, or the other thing causes cancer (news flash: nearly everything increases your cancer risk from sun to cell phones to the air we breathe) I do recognize that breathing in baby powder too much can be bad for me (aka I acknowledge that too much of anything is bad), so I've been researching alternatives for your benefit and mine: try cornstarch or a water bottle shower, complete with a couple spoonfuls of baking soda. There's plenty of easy-peasy "recipes" online, as long as you don't mind their being accompanied by 101 opinions from everyone who thinks they know best.
4. When you're lacking in motivation make a bucket list. By including some activities like volunteering for an organization like Cross-Cultural Solutions (maybe in Thailand!) or Global Vision International, I'm making sure that my small world does not have only a population of 1. Among my bucket list items: live in London, ride an elephant (again), and write a book.
5. Join a coop. A moodling blog post cannot be complete without some mention of food. But can you really expect anything less of me? It's summertime! Every time I go to the farmer's market there's fresh fruit and homemade bread and wonderfully colorful arrays of veggies. My parents own a share of a local co-op, which means every Saturday our kitchen is overflowing with all sorts of random veggies and fruits that we either have to eat in the next week or somehow store for the winter. It's downright rustic! We've already got 40 pounds of blueberries frozen in our heavy duty freezer downstairs and last weekend my mom and I canned a bunch of beets we'd been collecting over the past few weeks from our share box (by which I mean, my mom was doing all of the work and I kept getting in her way, taking pictures of the whole process). We've even started making our own jam, and for a girl who loves her jam (see the aptly named "Are you a fan of strawberry jam" post), this is downright heavenly.
6. Donate donate donate: I'm moving out to the Boston area in two weeks and that means packing, packing, packing. But it also means donating, donating, donating. There's so much STUFF. By now I could have built a fort strong enough to withstand Michigan wind with all of the paper that has been dumped on the recycle pile. And the books. Let me tell you, I could start my own library right about now. But I've only got my one trusty green car to fill up with the things I'll need for what's sure to be a whirlwind twelve months in Grafton, MA, so I've packed some of my things (yes, including 5 boxes, count 'em- five, of books) to be kept safe for me for when I have an actual, more long-term place of my own. But that still leaves bags of clothes, piles of books, and boxes of nicknacks. All of this stuff will be donated, one armload at a time, to the local Goodwill, Salvation Army, library, and- get this- a garage sale run by the students in a university class about hoarding and the local Hoarders' Task force (you didn't know we had a hoarding task force in the area, now did you?). That sparked some very witty jokes at the dinner table the other day.
