I posted a version of this on a discussion board related to green careers for young adults. A green professional in city government asked: “what kind work would be of interest to young people?” The responses from students stirred up a provocative question for me: why would anyone do anything that doesn’t lead to personal gain?

That’s the kind of thinking that got us into the kinds of environmental challenges we were talking about on the discussion board in the first place. It makes me wonder what young adults are learning and having modeled for them about altruism – the idea that we take actions that benefit the “greater good,” that have implications beyond ourselves. Why do elderly people volunteer in their community? Because they’re bored and have nothing better to do? Most of the ones I speak with do so because it enhances their sense of belonging, creates better circumstances in their community, and is connected to a sense of being involved in something greater than one’s self. If what’s being modeled to young adults instead is that you have to get yours, fight hard for it, compete, and “get something,” then I opine we’re headed in the wrong direction and away from solving the challenges.

I’m not much of a fan of perpetuating the “start at the bottom cleaning toilets and work your way up” model of work, particularly for bright, A+ students, particularly a model that dictates young people have to do menial work before they can come to meaningful work. I didn’t follow that model, for the most part. I started by working in a computer store at 14, selling IBMs and Apple products, doing a little programming, learning how to repair systems, and answering the telephone. And I also sweeped, mopped, changed the toilet paper, and got my boss’ coffee. Sure, I got paid, a whopping $4.75 an hour. I wasn’t there for the money; I was there to learn, to meet people who also liked computers, to help customers solve their computer problems. In a way, I wanted to “strut my stuff,” to impress someone, to show people what I knew… in the hopes that I would connect with even better jobs later, to build a resume toward college, and see what this whole adult “work” thing was about.

Jobs and internships don’t drop out of the sky on a silver platter. Everyone has a starting point, and goes through a process of building experience. “You gotta work!!”  If money is a motivator, that’s great, but especially in environmental jobs, not all internships translate into money. I know college graduates who volunteer for internships to gain exposure, network, build resume, and learn about the technical and program issues. One student related his experience that his “grunt” work while volunteering in a social service agency didn’t lead to those insights and opportunities – it didn’t take him close to program work which was his actual interest. Good to get clear and move on from those situations and invite ones from which you can learn about a career field.

We’ve talked in our youth green jobs program about the idea of a “journey” through learning about green careers, but I’m not sure that the process really registered; everyone seemed focus on the end result – a job, money, an employer contacting them about a position. What the process will reveal is the need to actively engage employers and green career professsionals; they’re not spending their day actively looking for you. Not arrogant, just real.
The value to an internship – paid or not, grunt work or high-brow intellectual – is more about networking, learning, and yes even resume building. As a volunteer in Portland’s Master Recycler program, I had to be “arms and legs” staffing booths, schlepping displays, and spending time away from my paid consulting. I did it because I enjoyed it. It helped people in my community understand how to deal with waste, recycling, and compost. The idea that I would do this for my own learning, for the benefit of community service, for achieving some greater goal than just drawing a paycheck seems to be largely lost on a culture that values the $financial$ bottom line. Is altruism a dying value?

I posted this memoriam to Ray’s memorial blog.

I first met Ray at Emory University in early 1996, not even a full 2 years after his reading of “The Ecology of Commerce,” and his eloquence then about the sustainability challenge of climbing such a tall mountain was just as poignant and inspiring to me as his last interviews and talks. I approached this gentle and engaging man afterward and expressed my discomfort about my work in environmental communities that I always felt like I was “preaching the choir” and not making much of a difference. Ray did not miss a beat, grabbed me squarely by the shoulders, and said, in his soothing Georgia accent, “My friend, the choir is growing!!” That moment still gives me chills, brings tears to my eyes, and was quite a pivotal moment for me in my thinking and, really, in my worldview.

I met Ray the following year, 1997, as an intern in Georgia Tech’s (our mutual alma mater, something Ray would remember about me in our future meetings) Center for Sustainable Technologies conference. As keynote speaker, Ray had refined his message even more, had goals to talk about for Interface, and introduced us to the concept of Mount Sustainability. I was privileged to sit at Ray’s table for awhile during lunch and get to know a bit more about the man who would become a professional role model and a sustainability hero.

I work at eschewing regrets in my life, though one that arises from time to time is that I did not get to know Ray more personally while I had the chance when I still lived in Atlanta. Ray invited me out to their offices, though I graduated and moved before I could find a time that worked. Nevertheless, I met Ray again at UC Berkeley where I was completing my Masters, and he remembered me right away with a firm handshake, a smile, and “Good to see you, John!” in that familiar Georgia accent. How this amazing being could meet so many thousands of leaders, scholars, presidents — important people! — and still remember my name and our conversation from two years prior was beyond me.

There are very few people we meet along the road that we can say steered our lives in one significant direction or other. Many teachers and mentors inspire us, encourage us to express our fullest potential, but few can change our core values and shape our very foundations. Ray had this keen and unique influence on me, and I will remain immensely grateful to him. While his temporary form has changed, what he brought to this world is timeless and immortal, a tremendous gift.

Many blessings to Ray, Mrs. Anderson, and his living and loving family.

If suddenly my community stopped receiving Federal and State monies, if it failed to meet its operating budget to the point where it shuddered the police department, the fire department, open the jail because it couldn’t keep the lights on, what would happen? Utter chaos? Would people stand around and scratch their heads like monkeys wondering how to function without its non-functional government? Not a chance. I believe ingenuity and creativity would dominate, and a culture of service would emerge where the community would essentially be forced to shift its priorities and its resources toward maintaining a certain quality of life. Physicians would provide care, neighborhoods would fight fires and see after each other, and structures would emerge in self-organization to feed people.

Is that utterly Pollyanna? Yes, probably. Would there be some chaos, violence, and discord? Absolutely – some people would freak out as the natural course of the ego being stripped of its security blanket – the structures that it knows and relies on for safety and survival. The game has changed; the wise find ways to adapt, the unwise resist what is actually happening. There will be fearful expressions of competition for scarce resources – food and water being the first.

Yet in the midst of this ego-shock, I imagine the light of the human spirit prevails and orients us toward community, sharing, and collective innovation. We come to realize that reliance on unsustainable structures, such as an economy that provides us with money and goods from a far distance, has produced a very limited sense of community – and of ourselves – and then realize what powerful beings we are. All our attention and energy that has gone into frivolous efforts, diversion, pain-numbing, and distraction is now called to participate in building community, providing for ourselves, our families, and our community in new ways.

I went back to the pantry and realized that my craving for halvah, which I found on the label had been made in Israel, didn’t quite fit my model above! I opted for a locally grown apple instead.

On the walk home, I mused on behavioral change and the adoption of environmental values. Especially as I prepare myself to work more with youth in environmental programs and build “green job” skills and training, I am interested in the process by which we make the kinds of decisions I had to face with the “intelligent” plastic bag. Indeed, the intelligence doesn’t belong to objects; it belongs to the humans who make, consume, and eventually dispose of them. Every step of product stewardship is a choice. Our ancestors certainly build their homes, cities, and whole civilizations without plastic. The notion that we “need” material goods is competely debatable, yet I still hear children telling their parents they “need” a particular toy or good that doesn’t contribute directly to the “hierarchy of needs” – food, water, shelter, clothing, nurture, support. Why, then, are children absorbing the “other” kind of viral program early on, the one that eventually, among many other actions, allows the plastic bag to be produced in the first place, and then end up in the storm drain?

I’m not a psychologist, an expert in human behavior, a sociologist, anthropologist, or any such “learned scholar” that hones his/her skills around answering these kinds of questions. I do care about how we use and waste energy and resources at an alarming rate, and demonstrate to our children that it’s perfectly fine, no harm no foul, to live out of balance. Far be it from me to project my value system onto the rest of the world, but evidence of the outcome of turning a blind eye is so striking and so commonly publicized these days that they almost don’t bear mention.

What’s our children’s place in this situation? I believe it’s to generate the solutions and demand a different way from their parents. If the problem can’t be solved in the same level that created it, then parents running about inventing tradable carbon credits seems hardly compelling. At a time when kids are dropping out of high school at ever increasing rates and falling into apathy, it hardly seems fair to project our “solutions” into arcane corners of the intellect that require a Ph.D. to unpack, understand, and meaningfully apply to the real world. I had to pause for a moment listen to Crosby, Stills and Nash on the matter:

Teach your children well,
Their father’s hell did slowly go by,
And feed them on your dreams
The one they picked, the one you’ll know by.

What’s our job? Encourage them and show them our dreams. Kindle their interest in nature, the outdoors, animals, plants. As they grow older, teach them about stewardship, care, community, and gardening. Explain the importance of reducing consumption, reusing items and finding durable alternatives, and recycling and composting what’s left. Leave the question open why we make things that must be disposed of “permanently” for their own inquiry. I see how that song’s lyrics change around:

Teach your parents well,
Their children’s hell will slowly go by,
And feed them on your dreams
The one they picked, the one you’ll know by.

Our children are the ones who are most likely to rise to the occasion and make our dreams real and manifest.

There are many resources online about plastic bags, factoids, and ways to reduce consumption. Here’s one from Worldwatch Institute.

Here’s a video my friend Geoff and I made on plastic bags (please excuse the harp).

I also kicked this thread off awhile ago in a post about the role of mentoring in sustainability.

Far West Fibers has seven depots located throughout the metro area that accept a wide range of materials, from plastic lids (which don’t go in your curbside rollcarts or bins, only the body of the container) to plastic take-out clamshells (clean only, and apparently they’re a pain to deal with).

Eye-opening factoid: Portland metro residents throw away about 20 tons of material per day in curbside recycling that doesn’t belong there, and has to be removed and landfilled. Some of that material can be recycled at depots, though it never ends up in the right stream.

Click here to watch The Story of Stuff, and please leave a comment with your thoughts and impressions.

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world. There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We are born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us, it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”    – Marianne Williamson

She’ll be speaking in San Francisco tonight, Tuesday, September 22nd, at EcoTuesday (http://www.ecotuesday.com), on the connection between sustainability and spirituality.

I surely don’t want to sound alarmist, because I’ve not done an ounce of scientific research on the vastly different areas of Portland to determine where’s good and where’s off limits. But after taking a sample from a garden bed I dug and amended – and even planted – last weekend, and finding it contained 900 parts per million lead, I sank into disappointment and a bit of concern for the rest of our yard. After all, didn’t that fresh spinach salad I had, dressed with balsamic and herbs from our garden, taste and feel so healthy?

Consider testing your soil especially if you’re gardening, or planning to, next to a building built before 1978. That’s the year lead-based paints were banned.

A recent New York Times article highlights the problem with urban gardening in areas where lead paints and pesticides once prevailed. A good read – I found it because I actually had a hard time researching so-called “safe” levels of lead in soil – that is, is there really a threshold at which I should stop worrying and start digging?

So far it seems that 1200 ppm is really the upper limit at which remediation needs to be done, despite a debacle in the W years of raising the threshold and loosening the standard. The so-called safe limit for soil around children’s play areas is 400 ppm. So at 900 ppm, our soil is suspect. Sure, I could have added lime to raise the pH and bind some of the lead, but the risk seems unacceptable. So I’ve abandoned that bed, and today take off new samples from other beds for testing.

I need to do more research on mitigating lead problems in urban gardening – depending on what I find, I may report back here, and I also appreciate your comments on this topic. Lead-laden soil tends to be acidic, and lime and other alkalinizing amendments not only raise the pH but help bind the lead so that it doesn’t get taken up in plants or human tissue. You can build raised beds and bring in fill dirt and compost to keep your veggies above ground level, although you really want to know where your dirt comes from. Gardening in pots is another option. It’s possible that some crops, like large leafy greens, will help remediate the soil and extract lead, but the crop not only can’t be eaten – it shouldn’t be thrown in the compost or perhaps even the trash, as it may contain high lead levels!

Fruiting plants like tomatoes and peppers tend to have much lower lead levels, whereas leafy greens and herbs draw up higher levels into their tissues. It’s important to wash dirt and dust from the plants, and cleaning of any lead-containing particles is more thorough with a very slightly soapy solution.

To find out who in your area conducts soil testing, contact a university extension office, or your city’s environmental services division. There are lots of private labs where you can mail samples, though they’re often more expensive. Gardeners in the Portland Metro area can check the resource list on Growing Garden’s web site for area testing centers. I used Wy’east Environmental Sciences, very reasonable at $20 per sample and very fast results.

I hesitate to post this entry, worrying that would-be gardeners excited about growing their own, local, healthy food will give up and get worried. My intent is only to raise awareness and say “Don’t give up; get smart!” Ask questions, be inquisitive, find answers, seek help and advice. I’m following my own advice with respect to my gardens, and each step of the way learn something new about growing better, healthier, more vibrant food.

Many metro areas have sophisticated recycling collection that accepts more than just soda bottles and yogurt containers. Many types of plastic films, bags, bubble wrap, shrink wrap, and hard plastic pieces can be recycled, though the results vary. Much of it is melted down to make plastic pellets that are sold to plastics molders who use the material to make new plastic goods. Flexible plastics such as PVC, however, contain chemicals that don’t melt down well and don’t have much of a useful afterlife.

The problem with plastic recycling is that most areas only take certain types of common plastics like soda bottles, milk jugs, and yogurt containers. The other “odd ball” plastics require you to go further afield, often delivering the goods to distant industrial parks and even paying someone to take it off your hands. The aftermarket for plastic junk is really on the decline – it’s just not worth much – and there’s too much of it.

The story is similar for Styrofoam, which is a catch-all (trademarked) term that probably originally applied to hardened polystyrene (but now is as commonplace as the word “Kleenex”) and now includes softer polyethylene (type 4) and polystyrene (type 5) foams. The stuff’s insidious, doesn’t break down in landfills, and has an even more challenging and sparse aftermarket than plastic.

If you live in the Portland metro area, here are a few good resources for you (click for company websites) for recycling of plastics, foams, batteries, lamps and lighting, electronic waste, and more:

Total Reclaim: (503) 281-1899

Denton Plastics:  (503) 257-9945

Pacific Land Clearing

Interstate Plastics:  (503) 251-0835

Quantum Resource Recovery

Far West Fibers

Of course, the best strategy is reduce the amount you or your business produces and consumes.  For situations where waste is hard to curb, explore the above resources (or find similar in your area). Happy recycling!!

The unlikely gardening tip: Starbucks. Some locations in the Portland area are now bagging their grounds in the vacuum bags they receive the coffee beans in, putting a cute and instructional label on them to seal the bag, and placing them by the door for people to take home for their gardens. And yes, free; selling them would be ridiculous. I went back yesterday afternoon to collect another bag, and was told I had competition; someone typically grabs them regularly at that location almost before they’re even bagged.

And I thought competition was fierce for used vegetable oil at Asian restaurants. Now we’re competing for soil amendments? Wow. I guess the local gardening movement is really taking off. Get your starts and seeds planted now!