I am currently living the “greenest” life I have in a long time. The apartment I recently moved to does not have air conditioning or a dishwasher, I am more careful than ever of turning off lights and appliances to try to reduce my electric bill, and a few days ago my trusty steed (which also goes by the name very old clunker car) broke down.
There is some hope of it being repaired, but in the mean time I have been reliving the car free days I once had as a student. I live farther away from town than I used to, but I have been enjoying walking in to do errands like go to the bank or return library books. Today, I happened to notice this little addition to an already rather anthropomorphic tree.
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The interesting thing here is that I used to drive by this tree almost every day, and I have never noticed it before! To be honest, usually at this part of the road I am worried about passing people before it goes down to one lane. It’s amazing the difference it can make to slow down and move at a normal human pace, rather than elbowing with other people from the inside of a wheeled metal beetle case. Who knows what surprises–both natural and shall we say.. enhanced–are waiting just outside the car window! If you aren’t willing to get out at least roll it down!
There is an Isaac Asimov story (if anyone knows the title please e-mail me!) about a future where teleportation is common and no one goes outside anymore. One young student is forced to walk to school when his family’s device goes down, and he continues to after it is fixed. Everyone thinks he is crazy and they send a psychiatrist to find what is wrong with him. The student takes the psychiatrist on a walk and shows them what he has discovered–beauty, nature, flowers, butterflies, everything wonderful–and the psychiatrist begins to walk too. I don’t know if teleportation will ever be invented, but cars may have accomplished something similar! Hopefully my car will be fixed soon, but this time away from it has reminded me that I don’t always need to drive to get things done, and that walking somewhere makes the whole rest of my day seem better and more accomplished. There are lots of places where you simply can’t walk to get around, but if you are able to I highly recommend it! Who knows, maybe there is a surprise like this waiting for you too!
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