Intro(post)
Probably a lot of would-be writers are inspired by Julie and Julia. Julie is a would-be writer, who decides to cook all 524 recipes in Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child, Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle. These recipes are not normal; Boeuf Bourguignon, Aspics, Charlotte Basque. They take time and true mastering through practice and making mistakes. Julie cooks every one of the 524 recipes in 365 days, including deboning a duck. And through this effort she becomes a Julia Child aficionado, a professional writer, and has a movie made about it, her character is played by Amy Adams and Julia Child is played by Meryl Streep.
Throughout the movie there are flashbacks on Julia Child’s life while she searches for meaning, something to do with herself, and finally plunges into writing Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Her husband keeps saying, “You are going to publish this book, and it is going to change the world.” It seems a funny thing for a guy to say to a woman in the 1950’s about a cookbook. But he was right. Because of Julia Child we have Ina Garten aka the Barefoot Contessas, Iron Chef, Alton Brown, the Food Network. Before her there really was no such thing as a cooking show.
The world could do with a change right now. It’s a long list; war in Ukraine for one, inflation, an ongoing pandemic, political polarization, environmental disaster.
Just before the pandemic started we went to visit my son at college. In the library the book, Zero Waste Home by Bea Johnson, was on a display shelf. Like Julia Child, Bea Johnson was a woman looking for purpose. She had embraced the American dream of accumulation, big house, big cars, piles of beauty care products. But she realized she, her husband and her kids were not especially happy. They decided to move into a smaller house closer to the things they wanted to do. And so began her project to downsize, and then to examine their way of life.
Bea Johnson became aware that the accumulation that was hurting her family was also hurting the planet. This has become such a common phrase, ‘hurting the planet’, so it’s worth unpacking.
She realized by her purchases she could vote against child labor, destruction of the RainForest, toxic chemical spills, and cruelty to animals. She could vote for stronger local economies, biodiversity in farming practices, renewal of artisanal trades, clean water, clean air, and even a reversal of climate change.
I was so inspired by her book that I went home and converted my kitchen into a Zero Waste zone. Because of course I’m against slave labor in my chocolate. But, you know, life took over. Plastics crept back in along with processed foods and other nefarious products.
Watching Julie and Julia tonight I realized I need accountability. In the form of a blog.
There are actually a lot of things about Zero Waste out there on the internet, yet I rarely meet anyone who is practicing it. In fact, I’ve only met 2 people. It’s so disappointing, really, because if we all did it we could change the world. We actually could.
So… I just need to do it. In Julie and Julia fashion I think I had better put a timeline on it. There are 12 sections in Zero Waste Home, including the Introduction. I propose to do a section a month. This will include reading it and putting the principles from it into practice, whatever that means.
In one year, by February 26th, 2024 I will no longer be voting for bad stuff with my purchases, frustrated with the amount of stuff (and cleaning of said stuff) that we own, wishing I could do something about climate change but not knowing what to do. Instead I hope to be strengthening my local community, living on less, living in a way that is good for myself, my family, community and planet. That’s my pledge.