Author: jennynazak

“Bad blogger! Bad blogger!” is what I’m saying to myself right now. Not in too stern a voice, because overall in my world I am feeling kissed by grace and have much to be thankful for. So I can’t manage to get as annoyed with myself as I usually do over my electronic “scrap habit.” Still, I am a bit irked with myself.

Back in the 80s, I was one of legions of young women who carried a giant purse. (It went well with my tall, puffy, DIY-frosted hairdo and my hot-pink leopard-print headbands and such.) The mega-purse would get filled up with a tangle of various papers and receipts and jewelry and junk, and periodically I’d have to disgorge the purse’s contents onto a table or something to sort things out. Well, friends, I haven’t changed all that much; I just do it with smaller purses (or mini hip packs) now. Therefore nowadays there are natural physical limitations on how far-gone I can let myself get!

Unfortunately, though, I also do an electronic version of that dysfunctional scrap-tangle habit. And the electronic version is a lot less self-correcting, let me tell you! Not only do I have multiple places to store stuff (my favorites are the iphone Note Pad app, Drafts section of this blog, and texts I send myself), but there is pretty much infinite space to store it! Unlike my purse, which (even those gargantuan purses from the 80s) has limitations on space, forcing me to clean them out eventually!

Well, in the spirit of one of my favorite permaculture design principles, I’m going to turn a problem into an asset. Make lemonade from the lemon of my organizational foibles, as it were.

Lemonade part 1: First, I’m sharing this foible openly with you, which I hope will help you feel comfortable with any glitches you have in your own organizational style and creative process. Thus (I hope) helping you in your work.

And lemonade part 2: I’m going to be giving you an unvarnished glimpse of my post-building process itself. This post, expressing my thoughts on tourism, may take awhile, as I try to either find the links from memory, or locate the electronic “scrap box” where I have been saving up all the links for you. You know, the links for the “Further Exploration” section, which I provide with posts on big topics when I feel compelled to share with you more voices than just mine. This sharing of my post-in-progress is also in hopes of helping you feel more comfortable with your own organizational quirks (if you have them), so you can get your creative activities flowing.

Right now, I’m starting from zero-ish. The file “scrap box” for my post “Thoughts On Tourism” is not in the Drafts area of this blog where I thought I had left it. If it’s not in either of my other two favored locations, I will attempt to cobble together the links from memory.

Human memory is a wonderful thing. Sometimes it works better than we expect.

Because, for various reasons, travel and tourism are a very emotional subject for me (a big part of why I let my “blog post gestation period” drag on for so long!), I may start the post by building the Further Exploration section first, and letting that lead me into writing my actual thoughts.

I’ve been “pregnant” with this post now for weeks-turning-into-months! Yikes! It feels great to make this “confessional” post though, and to get started (re)creating the actual post.

I hope you have found this preamble post helpful. We all (well, most of us) procrastinate from time to time, and we all (most of us anyway) misplace our “file folders” from time to time. And probably most of us feel blocked in our self-expression from time to time. I’m happy to be expanding my “bag of tricks” for navigating through those self-created rocky shoals. And I wish you the best in your own navigation, and am here to help you in any way I can.

And I thank you for blessing me with your presence, Dear Reader!

Over the past few years I’ve noticed that some people are so anxious about preserving their home’s resale value, that they never do anything to personalize their houses! Some people won’t even paint a wall the color they want, for fear it’ll affect the resale value.

I say why go to all the trouble of owning a home if you’re not going to allow yourself to enjoy the pleasure of making it yours? (And actually, even as a renter for most of my adult life, I always seemed to have landlords who were OK with me painting walls of my apartments, and planting fruit trees and other plants in the yard and such. Maybe I was just lucky.)

The water-heater discussion referred to in my previous post led to a tangent about home resale values; one commenter cautioned that choosing too small a water heater could harm a home’s resale value because typical buyers would want a larger one.

Of course, resale value is a key consideration for folks who plan on selling their homes someday. I’m lucky, my home is my forever paradise palace (unless climate change makes our area unlivable and the residents have to evacuate forever, in which case no new buyer would be buying my place anyway). Those of us who don’t ever plan on moving don’t have to worry about resale value, and get to enjoy much more leeway with our choices. (Just one more reason to choose a place to call home — “declare yourself native to a place” as Wendell Berry phrases it — and put down roots.)

When I expressed this idea that people who plan on living in their houses for life don’t need to worry about resale value, another person pointed out that if my family were to need to sell my home later, it helps if it’s sale-ready.

My take on this: True, but I wouldn’t want to live my whole life with an expensive appliance I don’t want, just so my family can sell my house more easily if I die before I’d planned to.

Same goes for creative things I choose to do such as painting flowers or lines of poetry on my walls. Or getting rid of the large airconditioner exhaust thingee I never use — because I don’t use a/c — to free up space in my yard for a birdbath. What do they call that giant, noise-emitting box that sits outside the house as part of a central A/C system? Air compressor? Condenser? (Note to self: google this.) I’m so glad I don’t need one; it took up a lot of space and I much prefer the birdbath; it causes no noise pollution and it attracts birds!

As it happens, my siblings are well-off enough so they would not need to worry about a few thousand dollars’ difference that my unconventional after-market touches might make in the proceeds from selling my house. But even if they were not well-off, I’d just sign up for life insurance right now, or some other thing that would help them out with some cash in the event of my death.

Much better than not being able to live the way I want to in the house I own. I figure why own a house if I can’t have the fun of modifying it to my wishes?

This is one of the USAmerican cultural norms around homeownership that I always find depressing: Some people are so focused on resale value, that they never fully LIVE in their houses while they are living there! Carpe Diem, homeowners!

Speaking of creative painting on the walls of houses one owns, an interesting story: My cousin, Jim Kay, was an artist (he died a couple years back, in his late 80s). In 2009, when I went up to visit him in his hometown (our ancestral hometown) of Fall River, Massachusetts, Jim took me to see the house where he had grown up.

We knocked on the door, and after we introduced ourselves and explained why we were there, the current owner very graciously let us in.

We were able to see, still on their livingroom wall, a tree mural Jim had painted in his teens — back in the 1940s! I was touched that the house’s subsequent owners had chosen to keep Jim’s mural.

Growing up in a military family, we moved every couple of years. Still, we always bought rather than rented. Even though they always knew we’d be moving, Mom and Dad never seemed to hesitate to paint a wall or do a bit of an unconventional renovation in a bathroom. Or put in some pretty wild wallpaper on at least one occasion I can recall! Wild, metallic, gold-and-orange pattern. (Hey, it was the 1970s.) Right smack-dab in the front hall. It was pretty darn cool actually. As was the large bold multicolored arrow that my Mom painted on the stairs that led down to the family room/”rec room.” I was so proud of that arrow, and of my parents’ taste and creativity in general.

By the way, my cousin Jim Kay didn’t just make art. He also taught the joys of art and performance to underprivileged kids, and to veterans. That was a huge part of his life, especially in his later years. Every year he guided his groups of young people in putting together a float and making masks for the local Earth Day parade. Jim was a strong believer in the power of art. To heal; to energize; to unite.

One of Jim’s favorite sayings was, “Everyone has a song to sing. And unless you sing your song, you won’t ever be truly happy in life.”

I think the little choices we make in our daily lives, including how we personalize our living spaces, are a big part of “singing our song.” I believe that if we allowed ourselves to express our natural creativity more fully, we wouldn’t feel such a need for outside-sourced “entertainment” and “escape.” (I’m talking mainly to my fellow United Statesians here.) That’d go a long way toward reducing our footprint, while also adding back into our lives a layer of richness that’s waned in recent decades.

To embolden you to get creative and enjoy altering your home to meet your needs and desires, I did a search on “homeowners obsessed with resale value.” Here you go!

Further Exploration:

Forget About Resale Value (finehomebuilding.com): Good read; practical advice from James Krengel, a kitchen and bath designer. No matter what you do, or don’t do, to your house, some buyers will like it and some will hate it. “If you listen to all the experts telling you to do this and don’t do that because it will affect resale value, you’ll essentially turn your home into the equivalent of a motel room. It’s your home; do what you want.”

Discussion thread on city-data.com: Lots of good sensible comments here, will fortify you to take up that hammer or paintbrush!

A super-green/permie friend posted in an online forum* seeking advice about the most eco-friendly water-heater option. (Her water-heater is electric and she says it will need to be replaced soon.)

My response, edited slightly for this blog post:

As you may know, I made the transition to totally water-heater-free a couple years back.

Even in winter, I can still bear to take a cold sponge-bath (or cold outdoor “Peace Corps shower” with a small dipper/pot) because I first make sure to get my body very heated up from doing yardwork, walking errands, etc.

BUT in the colder months I do sometimes heat up 1-2 liters of water a day in an electric kettle and store it in an old Stanley thermos. Stays very warm, even hot, for 24 hours, mildly warm for several hours longer. Perfect for a warm spongebath or a warm version of that beautiful al fresco “Peace Corps shower.” (One of my favorite things is a shower under the stars. Great option in an urban environment, especially if you don’t have a seamless privacy fence, tall dense hedge etc. Or just make yourself a little outdoor shower stall; those are popular. Of course you can just shower indoors but I love outdoors.)

If I were to end up with family members living with me longterm, I would probably accommodate them with a small water heater, for shower only. Say 10-20 gal.

My problem with a tankless heater is that it removes the feedback loop of limited quantity. People get accustomed to infinite availability of hot water– not a good thing for planet or wallet.

Huge bonus: I love having one less appliance that can leak, break down, etc. Such a load off one’s mind! My approach may sound extreme, but it’s hard to beat the peace of mind of just not having to think about this at all.

You could also just experiment by turning your water heater off for a day or two at a time, or only turn it on when you have guests. That’s what I did for a while. (IMPORTANT: In cold climates, where the temperature gets below freezing on a regular basis, just turning off your water heater might not be a good idea; your water might end up freezing, breaking pipes, etc. I would not try this in a cold climate without doing a lot more research. At the very least I would drain the water heater, not just let the water sit in it with the heater off.)

*The “online forum” mentioned above is the “Socially Conscious FIRE” group on Facebook. I highly recommend it. Once you join, you can find the water-heater discussion I’m referring to by doing a search for November 28, 2020; or “I’m likely going to have to replace my (electric) water heater.” Laura’s post elicited lots of good alternative suggestions, including heat-pump and gas-powered water heaters.

And, the “super-green/permie friend” who initiated this discussion is Laura Oldanie of the Rich & Resilient Living blog, one of my top go-to resources about finance, thrift, and abundant simple living. Laura’s blog is delightful and packed with high-quality information.

Dear Readers,

I love you all so much! And thank each of you for being you. Your emails and other communications are filled with adventure, surprises, deep wisdom, practical know-how, rich emotion. By your generous sharing of life-slices, you transport me to distant countries and hidden worlds; you allow me to live alternate lives simultaneously. I am honored to share your joys and your burdens.

Through your stories, I dwell in a palace of a thousand rooms, and each room has within it a thousand doors leading to a thousand more rooms.

Even if you have never actually communicated with me; even if you are a “read-only member”; even if you just got here today — I still feel the wealth of our connectedness, and will always seek to keep that wealth circulating; to give more than I get. Which is a very tall order, considering how much you all have given and continue to give me!

Thank you especially for everything you are doing to take care of yourselves. Please keep doing those things, so we can share many more years together, and maximize the good we do in the world.

Did I mention I love you?!

Consider yourself hugged.

The dreaded “TP Shortages” are back! And shortages of some other everyday household supplies too. Once again, “the most sought-after items at grocery and department stores this pandemic-impacted holiday season is — again — cleaning supplies, paper towels, and yes, toilet paper.” (Article in Daytona Beach News-Journal.)

But you don’t have to be affected! Here is my DEEP GREEN take on those shortages:

Once again, we have shortages. … And once again, all three items are STILL things a person can do without!

• Cleaning supplies –> Instead use water, elbow-grease, bit of baking soda & vinegar, drop of essential oil for scent if you like.

• Paper towels –> Never buy em again!! cloth rags are free, reusable, and far superior in terms of absorbency. Tear up old worn-out clothes & towels, and voilà! Endless supply of multipurpose household cloths.

• TP –> many North Americans are “discovering” a great thing that folks in other parts of the world have known about all along: bidets, or bidet-bottles! (I have posted about the latter, as have many others — look up “bidet bottle” or, as they are called in some countries/cultures, “Lota”). For wiping remaining water off the skin afterward, many people use washable “toilet cloth,” which is far easier on the skin than paper TP. Easier on trees too! Toilet cloth can be made by cutting up old sheets, old cloth napkins, etc.

To me, this “second wave” of shortages serves as a reminder of how liberating it is to have so many categories of stuff that we simply don’t need to buy! #FreedomFromPanicBuying

I have blogged about all these topics, and you can type keywords into the search field of my blog. If you don’t find what you’re looking for, or if you have questions after reading, give me a shout! I’m here for you!

Remember, one of the best ways to be instantly wealthy is to learn ways to just not need as much, while still having abundance. I am always here to help!

Right now, lots of eco-minded folk are talking excitedly about a “Green New Deal,” where suddenly everyone is employed at clean green jobs and driving clean green cars. I’m all about shifting our economy and society to green, of course. And if the government actually manages to help us do that, I’ll be delighted and will support it to the fullest extent I am able.

Except. There are no pure magic “clean green cars.” Depending on your circumstances, the greenest option could be to drive (as infrequently as possible) the car you already have, til it wears out. And then buy a used one. Or better yet don’t replace it. Go car-free.

In my previous post “Rolling Again,” I talk about my lovely new (used) bicycle. I even share a link to a photo of the bicycle on my Deep Green Facebook page. And I talk about how my period of doing without a bicycle, getting around on foot only, turned into an experiment of sorts.

One thing remains the same: Bicycling and walking remain my absolute favorite forms of in-town transport. (For long distances, it’s bus and train.)

Electric cars and hybrid cars are probably being improved all the time (I don’t actively keep up with the details of new “green” technology developments, so I will need to dig up a resource for you if you’re interested in finding out). But they’re still cars. They keep us stuck in the same patterns of thinking it’s OK to live a car-dependent distance from our work, kids’ school, essential shopping, family.

It is not OK. Not if you’re the kind of person who cares about the environment enough to have found my blog and to have read this far. We want to stop paving the earth and killing wildlife. We want to stop the massive clearcutting of trees and stop replacing them with endless seas of parking lot and generic big-box store, turning our lovely unique bioregions into Anywhere USA.

If we stay stuck in car-dependent life, we can’t do that. Nor can we fix the many serious health problems associated with a sedentary lifestyle. Nor the deadly social problems associated with same.

In my book, I bring up the term “social capital.” I mentioned it in reference to choosing a bicycle over traveling behind car windows. Social capital is what you create when you meet people, interact with them, offer something of value. It’s a non-monetary form of wealth that we all build to a degree. It’s easier to build, the more out & about you are. It’s harder from behind a car window (especially since most car windows seem to be very darkly tinted and you can’t see who’s inside even if you stand next to them at a stop sign and squint and peer into their vehicle — which I don’t recommend!).

Not that building social capital from inside your car is impossible. Often friends/neighbors stop in front of my place (or stop next to me when they see me out walking), roll down their windows and shout hello, and often some further exchange takes place, like I tell them about the upcoming neighborhood meeting, or I offer them flower seeds or a lemon off my tree, or they tell me they have an apartment for rent and can I keep my ears open for a good person, and so on.

The value created through these exchanges is social capital. You build this form of wealth by giving. Note, it’s not something you do in a calculated manner. Like, “I’m going to offer something so this person will owe me.” That isn’t healthy; I know — I’ve done it that way too! Rather, this giving something you do out of a genuine wish to help and connect. And it feels wonderful. And it builds your social capital! It’s like a social savings account. Which, it turns out, is oftentimes a much more durable and flexible form of wealth than cash money.

While it’s possible to do this from inside your car, it’s not always safe or convenient to stop your car in the middle of the road. And it’s a lot easier to do on foot or by bicycle. And on foot or bicycle, the opportunities greatly multiply, since you end up using more varied routes and meeting/seeing more people on the way from point A to point B.

Another note about car ownership for my fellow greenies: The expense of owning a car requires you to work more hours to pay for it. If it’s a new car, you’ll probably have car payments and higher-priced insurance. If it’s an old car, you’ll have the expense of repairs (which is, furthermore, unpredictable — and that unpredictability leads to additional expenses such as taxis, needing to take time off work, etc.) That car-related work overhead, in itself, has a footprint in many forms.

For example, working more hours means you’re more likely to have a rushed lifestyle and feel the need to rely on packaged convenience foods, which have a higher footprint than, say, produce from the farmer’s market.

It also means you’re likely to be gone from home more of the time, which means you’re less likely to meet your neighbors and build that all-essential social capital.

If doing without a car just isn’t feasible for you right now, you could try just having one car for your whole household. With more people staying home these days, it might be do-able for you now where it wasn’t before.

A note about my car usage: Although I do not own a car, and hope never to need to again, I do on occasion (a handful of times a year) find it necessary or at least very helpful to have access to a motor vehicle. Needing to get to or from a mandatory meeting in hazardous weather is a prime example (though the age of Zoom meetings has largely relieved that burden for now). For such times, I take Uber/taxi, or pay a friend/neighbor to be my taxi. Or catch a ride with another attendee if they are on the way.

I also sometimes rent cars, though those times are few and far between, and it’s been a while. I rented a car to drive north for time-sensitive family business one time a couple years back. And I rented a small box truck to transport furniture, books, memorabilia, and other useful and wonderful items I chose from Mom’s house after she died, to my home here in Florida. (What a blessing to my home! I live in a space that’s uniquely mine, yet sprinkled with family memories.)

On the subject of social capital, there’s a lot more I can say, and I will. For now, I’ll just wish you a fruitful day of loving connection with the people in your world.

Check out my beautiful new bicycle! (New to me, that is! I purchased it “gently used” from a lady whose husband bought her too tall a bike. BTW the buy-sell area of the NextDoor app is wonderful for buying other people’s great used stuff, selling your used stuff you don’t need … and meeting your neighbors in the process!)

Until a few days ago, I had been without a bicycle for 2-3 months. During that period, I just pretty much went everywhere on foot. If I couldn’t get there on foot, I didn’t go.

My bicycle is my car! This was the longest I had gone without a bike in my life. I didn’t set out to go without wheels for so long. In fact, if you’d asked me “Could you do without a bicycle?” I’d have answered “No way!”

But somehow, inertia set in, and one day turned into months. I was having trouble deciding whether to get my existing bike fixed (it had broken down bigtime), buy a new one, or (my usual favorite option) buy a good used one. But none of the used ones I was seeing were grabbing me. So it was that a short-term circumstance ended up turning into an interesting longterm experiment — which ended up bringing many rich yields!

First, I walked more. Upped my mileage; got a bit more fit. Which is important because out-of-shape-ness has sort of crept up on me, and I want to keep my body fit and strong. I’m using it! For my own good, as well as for the good of people I’m trying to help, my body needs to be in shipshape working order, not be slow and heavy and creaky.

Also, I saw more details. Riding a bicycle, you see more detail than if you were speeding by in a car. And walking is even slower (4mph if I’m really booking it), so I see even more detail.

And, I ended up meeting more people.

And, I got more knowledge about which roads are seriously in need of shade trees.

And, I noticed that walking, while it’s more work than cycling, can also be less stressful because instead of being out there on the road dealing with cars, I’m a pokey pedestrian on the quiet backwater of the sidewalk.

My new bicycle is a sleek beauty. Single-speed like my previous one, but with skinny tires. A road bike rather than a commuter bike. Unlike my old bike, it only has one brake, a front brake. This makes the rear tire easier to remove, which is good for two reasons: 1) because back tires go flat more often, and not having a brake there makes it easier to take off the wheel and change the tube; and 2) because the back wheel can be flipped over to turn the bike from a freewheeling coaster into a “fixie.” This makes it safer to just have one brake. Riding in freewheel mode with just one brake felt a little sketchy to me.

Today after flipping it into fixie mode I started out doing an easy errand on flat terrain, then advanced to riding down the steep slope of the ISB bridge. (Which I refer to as one of the Daytona Alps.) I was gratified to find that I only needed to wuss out and use the hand-brake for a couple of seconds at one point on the downhill; otherwise I was completely able to moderate my speed just via that essential fixie skill of using the rear wheel to slow down.

A single-speed skinny-tire bike is super lightweight. Ah, I am finding it so refreshing!! I had become so dependent on having panniers and baskets to carry pounds and pounds of stuff. But I think I’ll do without for awhile, and just carry groceries and such on my back. I am loving it so far.

For heavy hauls and long-distance trips, I’m considering a Burley cargo trailer. They are very lightweight. Interestingly, the only solo multi-day bike trip I’ve ever taken, a six-day trip from Austin TX to Santa Fe NM, was on a road bike towing my stuff on a Burley. You wouldn’t think a road bike could be used for that but it was actually great.

Or I could be the wheeled version of my minimalist travel hero Ray Jardine, who routinely hiked the PCT for three weeks at a time, or more, with an 8-pound backpack!

Since long-distance public transport does not feel like a good idea right now, I’m exploring my options for traveling by bicycle to visit faraway loved ones. I would probably start with a trip across the state to the farm of some fellow permaculture folk.

Then who knows: By summer, I might even be fit enough to make the 759-mile trip to my family in Virginia. (I have already mapped it out on paper.)