Drop That Paper; Hug A Tree
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During childhood visits to my grandmother’s house, she’d put me to sleep on the fold-out couch in the den. At some point early in the morning—it was always dark outside—I’d half-awaken to the sound of her puttering around in the kitchen and the smell of the mud she called coffee percolating on the counter. By the time I actually got out of bed a few hours later, the coffee would be gone and my grandmother would be happily working on whatever task she’d set for herself that day.
Note the use of the word, “happily.”
Consider, if you will, the contrast in my house. I roll out of bed to the sound of my tweens bickering over the remote control (my weekday television ban gets a moratorium in summer), which has woken up the Barnacle (read: baby), who is determined to get her daily dose of “Dora.” I stumble downstairs to put the kettle on, and am greeting with…
Not, “Hi, mommy. How did you sleep?” That would be far too civilized. Even a simple “good morning” seems to be too much for my children.
No, this is the first thing I hear in the morning (drumroll, please):
“Can you make me some breakfast?” Followed by, “Where’s my shirt/underwear/pants/shoes/socks/bag/purse/ipod/remote control/book/toothbrush/toothpaste/brush/barrette/hairband/ponytail holder/lunch/snack money…?”
“Happy” is not a word I would use to describe my morning.
So while I do love to lounge in my silky-soft organic cotton sheets, this morning I took a page from Grandma’s playbook. I set the alarm for 6 a.m. and actually got up when it went off. I took a shower, got dressed and checked my email while my kids were still in REMland. By the time they emerged from their rooms, I’d had my breakfast, drank my extra-super-large mug of tea (really it’s a teapot in cup’s clothing) and read the entire newspaper cover-to-cover.
“Happy, mommy?” Indeed.
Which brings me to the green part of this rambling and digressive post: Reading the paper. Because my complete and utter bliss at being able to spend an hour by myself is tainted by the nagging realization that the newspaper I’m reading while doing so is totally and completely unsustainable. Like the rest of the rapidly greening and technified world, I should be getting my news online.
According to Slate, “Manufacturing one ton of newsprint, which is enough to create approximately 280,000 pages, requires the contents of 12 mature trees.” Let’s put that in perspective: One local newspaper can be responsible for the destruction of more than 200,000 trees per year.
And I call myself a treehugger?
Plus, despite that fact that, on average, American newspapers utilize about 35% recycled paper (versus 80% in the U.K.) and that, off-line publishers argue, technology used to produce online news (servers, computers, etc.) is also responsible for carbon emissions, the brutal environmental impact of the simple paper production process is clear: “The Department of Energy estimates that the paper manufacturing industry is the nation’s fourth-largest emitter of carbon dioxide, trailing only the chemical, petroleum and coal, and primary metals industries,” Slate reports.
Apparently, my six-ounce morning paper is responsible for six ounces of carbon emissions. This may not sound like much until you realize that said paper has millions of subscribers and there are hundreds of thousands of local papers, in addition to the one read by yours truly.
My next step in the long road to green? Canceling the daily paper, getting news online and saving up our carbon credits to splurge on a weekend paper and a quiet hour of Sunday-morning bliss.
Now I just have to convince my husband.
