A Careful Christmas

I suppose I mean a more careful Christmas. There are certain indulgences I am not ready to give up, even for the cause of sustainability.

Does that make me a hypocrite, or am I just human and doing the best I can? My studies, as director of Together Yes, lead me to believe we have to reign in our consumerism, and now! But it’s Christmas!

I admit that there is a bit of unease tickling the back of my mind as I search the dollar store for stocking stuffers. Many of them are made of plastic (beginning with petrochemical resources) and/or have traveled internationally to reach my hands (thus polluting and wasting precious energy resources, as well as having been made by nearly slave labor in other countries while taking jobs from Americans).

And so I compromise. I will put roasted nuts, oranges, and apples in the stockings. A couple of foolish, plastic gimmicky toys that will be fun for about one day (seems to be a Christmas tradition). Perhaps some raucously fun items such as new toothbrushes, hair ties, and designer soaps. If any people in my extended family don’t already have a decorator Christmas stocking, I won’t buy them one. As a child, I put out an ordinary sock (one of my father’s was bigger, so I raided his sock drawer for the occasion). The juxtaposition of that ordinary sock and the wonders bulging out of it on Christmas morning leant mystery to Santa, whatever he had left for me.

I will take my pies to dinner, without using disposable pie pans. I’ll go to the trouble to bake them in my own pans, and pack them very carefully for travel (then wish I'd remembered to bring them back). I’ll cautiously pack my home-canned cranberry chutney, and then use fossil fuels to drive to Vermont for the holiday weekend, sloughing pollution into the atmosphere the whole way.

Rather than buying and mailing the usual 30-50 holiday cards, I will send e-cards. My elderly Aunt Mary and a few other people on my list do not participate in email, and I will continue sending them regular cards. I’ve promised myself that I will hand make those cards of recycled card stock rather than throw my money to Hallmark. But, constraints on my time being as they are, I will probably be seen in CVS this weekend, purchasing cards after all.

As Kermit sings, “It ain’t easy being green.” It seems impossible to be impeccably “green.” Next year, I will do better, and that’s going into my letter to Santa!