As the year of greatly reduced buy sputtered out of existence with the advent of 2008, I have mused a bit about what I learned by undertaking this experiment. First and foremost, it is hard not to buy anything, whatsoever. It requires more foresight, planning, impulse-control, and awkwardness with friends than I expected or possessed. We live in a country built on the notion that you can buy your way to happiness, peace, power, and security. Our government is poised to give people money specifically so that they can spend it on random trinkets. What kind of message does that send to children? Consumption is a civic a duty? There are so many ways to participate in our government, and our society more broadly, but it seems that buying things is the easiest route. Consumption appears to take the least amount of time and emotional involvement and thus defines our collective societal terrain. (Although as someone who shopped the post-Christmas Old Navy sale/insanity for colored jeans, I would point out that I emerged from that store hours later and mentally and emotionally drained). So lesson one of the year is that it takes considerable effort to stay involved with mainstream American society if you don't buy.
The second thing that struck me about this year is the difference between being anti-consumer and pro-environment. At the outset, these ideologies might seem perfectly aligned, but I found that I could live quite frugally in environmentally harmful ways. When Owen and I were still in Baltimore, we often grocery shopped at Save-a-lot, a store remarkable for its rock bottom prices on everything. But, many of the products were trucked or shipped long distances, the tuna was not dolphin-safe, the produce was drenched in pesticides, and the coffee was probably traded in the most unfair way possible. If I was paying bottom dollar, then somewhere else in the world, another person or animal was being shafted. Two ideas spoke to me on this issue. The first is Michael Pollan's argument (from his book, the Omnivore's Dilemma) that we should eat locally and recognize where our food came from and the impact of growing or raising it. Second, reading NY Times articles about the environmental and human abuses at factories in China following the lead paint on toys scandal impressed upon me again that cheap things carry high costs elsewhere. I want to start buying more toys and clothes made domestically and with an eye towards quality. Both Pollan and the Times coverage made me think that environmental protection, human rights, and support of local business are things worth paying premiums for.
The third thought I have looking back is that it can be FUN to participate in the economy. Owen and I joined a crazy beater of a gym down the street from us called the Sweat Shop. We love going to exercise classes and working out there. The monthly fee is worth those experiences and benefits to our bodies.
Perhaps I will have more thoughts about this experience soon. I'm reading Alan Wiseman's "The World Without Us" and have been salivating over a world with no human influence where nature can reclaim its space and dominion. How could we create that world now, with us still here?
