We live in a fast-paced, consumer-driven society.
But is it a happy one?
Author Cecile Andrews will address that question and more in a keynote speech on Oct. 6 at the Sustainable Energy Fair and Solar Tour 2007 in Everett.
Andrews, who founded the Phinney EcoVillage in north Seattle, hopes to shed new light on living sustainably – not just in terms of sustaining the planet, but as a means of creating happy, healthy human beings.
“Our goal is simpler, slower and smaller,” Andrews said. “It’s local food as well.”
Andrews opens her latest book, “Slow is Beautiful: New Visions of Community, Leisure, and Joie de Vivre,” with an anecdote about a woman driving an SUV, who, while waiting for an elderly woman to parallel park, became so impatient that she drove up next to the elderly woman, rolled down her window, cursed loudly and threw chocolate-covered raisins at her.
“How bizarre,” Andrews wrote about the incident, which happened in her former hometown of Palo Alto, Calif. “When you’re in too much of a hurry to let someone park in front of you, when laying on the horn seems a better strategy than simply backing up a few feet, and when anger consumes you to the degree that you pick up anything handy to throw at someone, you’re probably a candidate for a ‘slow’ transfusion.”
But what, exactly, is “slow”?
First came Slow Food, founded more than 15 years ago in Italy to combat the growing culture of fast food. Since then, Slow Food philosophy has blossomed with new groups emerging across the globe to honor local-food traditions.
Now, thanks to activists such as Andrews, eating and simply living slowly has become a bona-fide movement in Snohomish County.
Marilene Richardson, 41, and her family, who live in rural Snohomish, have been trying to live a slow life for many years.
For her, right now that means living in a basic 400-square-foot house on a 3-acre wooded lot with her husband, Brian, 46, an electrician, and their children, Sofia, 10, and Simon, 6.
On the surface, it’s a balancing act that seems nearly impossible to sustain.
But it’s cost effective. Richardson can work part-time from home, grow produce, raise animals, home-school her kids and be totally immersed in nature, all while building a new eco-friendly home of 1,500 square feet with her husband.
“We’re taking our time,” said Richardson, adding that they wanted to live on the land for a while before building to get a feeling for the property. “Our idea is to slow down and watch and make choices based on information rather than the need to just get it done.”
When the Richardsons were first talking to builders, most of them insisted they would need at least 3,000 square feet.
“There was a really huge challenge for us in building a small home,” Richardson said. “All the pre-made plans were designed for vacation homes.”
But the Richardsons wanted the home for living, not visiting. Now they’re crafting their new home mostly on their own with super-insulated walls and, in a rebellious move, no furnace.
Though they’ll build radiant-heat tubing into their concrete floor, Richardson said they are going to try to live for two years in the home before deciding whether to hook it up.
Without a furnace, they’ll have to rely on passive solar heat, sweaters and their wood stove, just like they do now. They already chop their own wood from fallen trees.
“When we get good and cold, we really appreciate that fire,” Richardson said, adding that her kids get involved too. “They stack wood. They start fires.
“These are things people used to be very connected to and aware of. We don’t want to be so disconnected from where our things come from that we just take it for granted and just use it.”
It’s a philosophy that goes beyond home heating.
When the kids get a new toy, they often have to give one up.
“They would figure out: ‘What do you want to gift to someone else?’” Richardson said. “You’re aware of every single thing you bring into the space.”
Richardson works as an outreach coordinator for the Portland-based Northwest Earth Institute. She left Dancing Women Home Style Meals in Lynnwood, a successful catering company she helped found, after Simon was born.
“They’re growing so fast,” Richardson said, adding that her kids sleep until the “crack of 10.” “I think it’s sad that our society is so fast that kids are shoved out of bed, and brought here and brought there.”
Though sustainability for the Richardsons is also about creating community.
What does that mean?
In the Richardsons’ tiny but temporary home, there’s a large poster with the words “How to Create Community,” that takes the concept from a nebulous ideal to a clear daily mission of more than 40 suggestions, including: “Turn off your TV. Leave your house. Look up when you are walking. Greet people. Sit on your stoop. Use your library. Bake extra and share. Ask for help when you need it. Open your shades.”
Community is about working together with neighbors and friends to support each other by sharing talents, knowledge and cultures, too, said Richardson, who helped found the annual Multicultural Family Fair in Lynnwood as well as the Snohomish-based Foundation for Sustainable Community.
When Andrews speaks on Oct. 6, she’ll talk about how to have quick chats with people instead of rushing off to your next appointment.
“If you have community, it goes a long way to combating our culture of fear,” Andrews said. “There’s something about just talking in a friendly fashion. You feel like you belong to the human race.”
Green Everett
Learn more about the organization at 4 p.m. on the third Sunday of every month at Zippy’s Java Lounge, 1804 Hewitt Ave., Everett; 425-258-4940; GreenEverett.WikiSpaces.com; MySpace.com/ZippysJava.
Topics include mass transit, bike lanes, conservation, and community gardens.
A sustainable book club meets at 6 p.m. second Wednesdays at Zippy’s.
Reporter Sarah Jackson: 425-339-3037 or sjackson@heraldnet.com
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