Will It Really Kill Us?

As our country "goes green," I ask myself, "What happened to good old-fashioned thriftiness?" When I was a young college student, my husband and I were older than our counterparts and we put each other through school with two preschoolers. We were so glad to have something on the table to feed our children; I became very adept at stretching bologna, macaroni and cheese, hamburger, or whatever else was on hand into multiple meals.

Sometimes, horror of horrors, my husband and I didn't eat so we could feed our kids. We were living in a married, second-floor student housing apartment that had no air, no appliances, no dishwasher, no microwave, no clothes-washing facilities, and we didn't use food stamps or government assistance even though we certainly qualified.

We had a small TV with an antenna that sometimes worked, sometimes didn't. We were so busy studying and working, it didn't matter. Since we didn't have a washing machine and couldn't afford disposable diapers, I hand washed our kid's cloth diapers and strung them up on ropes all over the bathroom (something I detested). Sometimes our schedules were so close we handed our children off to each other between classes. When neither one of us could afford the next semester, we were booted out of the apartment. Consequently, we lived in six different rentals. When we could, we put in a backyard garden to help us eat. We did all of this on grants, loans, and work-study jobs plus outside work. It took us seven years. I already had my two-year degree.

I thought it was going to kill me; it didn't. We learned to get by with very little. We made do with what we had. I used a bar of soap and washrag to clean my dishes, our clothes, the kitchen, the bathroom and whatever else needed to be cleaned. Rags, unlike paper towels, can be washed and used over and over thereby saving enormous amounts of paper. Clorox can sterilize anything. Zip-lock bags can be washed and reused. I used a shopping list that I had carefully gone over before I went to the store and only went once a week. If we ran out, we ran out. Information can be gotten from a library and books. Have you noticed that even though we have hundreds of channels on TV, there still isn't anything to watch? Go outside; get your exercise. Kids can learn to play on their own and create ways to occupy themselves. They don't have to be in every organized sport, camp or lesson known to man.

When we were newly married, the gas shortage of 1973 began, and people had to plan their whole day around waiting in long lines at the gas station. You learned to be very careful with your gas. We should have worked on becoming self-sufficient as a nation then, but 35 years later we are in the same situation. Let's work on permanent ways to do that now. We can get by on less if we have to. We've done it before; we can do it again.