Local challenges provide creative alternatives

After having been in Grand Coulee for almost two years now, one of the biggest changes that I am still trying to adapt to is an unexpected one.  It’s not the distance to the nearest big box store or mall, nor is it the weather or the size of the community. 

Somewhat surprisingly, it’s the fact that I cannot put out my recycling with the trash.

For much of my youth, many might have labeled me an environmentalist.  When I was in high school I organized a grass roots campaign, if it could even be called that, to ask the lunch ladies not to give out the paper bowls with the chicken sandwiches.  They already came wrapped in aluminum foil.  Why did we also need the paper bowl?  I thought it a waste and tried, before the term was coined, to Reduce Our Use.

“Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” is now the accepted slogan for waste reduction.  It’s so popular, Jack Johnson has even written a catchy song about it.  And for many, this is an edict that ingrains itself into everyday life. 

When we moved here and I found out there was no easy way to recycle, I was a little horrified.  The young environmentalist in me protested. 

The practical side of me understands that the nearest recycling center is too far away to make the business—and that is what recycling is, however noble the cause might be—profitable. 

I also understand that space is not a limiting factor like it is in other parts of the country where I have lived.  In other parts, burgeoning landfills require citizens to be very conscientious about not only recycling but also the other two sides of it: reducing our use of new products and reusing what we already have. 

With every environmentalist cell in me protesting when I throw clearly recyclable material in the trash, I have tried to be creative as to minimizing my footstep in whatever way I can.  I even know some in our community who store up their recyclables and haul them to a convenient recycling center in nearby towns.  Admirable, and worth the effort, if time and space affords such a system.  If not, there are a few alternatives around town worth checking out.

Although my pantry is filled with a plethora of canvas bags, I must confess I use them far less than I ever thought I would and instead opt for the convenience of the grocery store plastic bags.  Plastic bags that find their way to the landfill usually also find their way to harming the environment, killing more than 1 million birds each year, to name just one negative impact.  Luckily, these plastic bags are easily recycled and are made into excellent re-used products.  Our local Safeway has a plastic bag recycle box just inside it’s front door by the flowers.  In my house, the plastic bags build up in my garage to an embarrassing quantity and a few times a year you will find me carting a gigantic armful of plastic bags to the bin in Safeway.  It may take me some time to get there, but my bags get recycled nonetheless, and that’s what matters. 

Also at our Safeway, there is a bin for recycling aluminum cans to raise money for the Senior Center.  This isn’t quite as simple as throwing them in the green bin and dragging it out to my curb, but at the same time, I like it almost even better.  In this case, the money for recycling those cans goes to a local group. 

I don’t generally use a lot of plastic or glass bottles, but when I do, I try to find another use for them or change brands if possible.  Milk for my daughter comes in compostable cartons and glass jars become excellent alternatives to plastic Tupperware. 

In the midst of the waste-producing holiday season, I challenge all of us to find ways to be kinder to the land that nurtures us and to be cognizant of what we throw in our trashcans.  Sometimes, a little creativity is all it takes.

Previously published in "The Star," Grand Coulee, Washington. November 28, 2012

Traditions for every day

As we’ve settled into the school year, our house, like houses across America, has settled into a routine.  Certain days call for certain activities, and many hours of each day fall into expected patterns.  One of the first things that my daughter will ask in the mornings is, “Mommy, what are we doing today?”  She’s always happiest when it is a day that she knows what to expect.  

Children take their cues on how to live out their days from their parents.  But it is not just our job to demonstrate how to get to school on time or what to tick off on the to-do list, it is also up to us, as parents, to demonstrate what we value in our days and in our lives.

With the advent of the holiday season, I think it is important to remember that it is not just the daily routines and traditions that are important to pass along to our children, but the seasonal one’s as well.  

So much of what drives the seasonal fluctuations in our lives are our traditions: what we eat, where we go, who we visit, even what to expect.  

For me, the holidays are about so much more than just one day.  It is about a thousand tiny daily rituals that add up to an entire season full of extra sparkle.  It is about smoking a turkey and making my mother’s stuffing.  It is about sitting around a laughing table with loved ones and sharing a thankful meal.  It is about finding the perfect tree and placing colorful lights upon it.  It is about setting up the train set and baking cookies, wrapping presents and finding the right gift for every person on my list.  

One of my favorite traditions is sitting down with my family and making tamales, a tradition passed down from a great-grandmother who immigrated from Mexico.  One hundred years later, her descendents still sit around a large table together every holiday season and carefully make these delicious delicacies.  As with many holiday traditions, it is more than the lure of a delicious meal that draws us to return to this tradition.  It is about being with family and continuing a long and cherished tradition.  It is about making new memories and sharing old ones, retelling tales we hear almost every year, yet still make us laugh or cry.

As my daughter gets older, I delight in passing down these traditions, sharing in these seasonal rituals, and adding to them.  I know each year we add to our own traditions to remember for future years sitting around a table and laughing at a memory.  

At the start of every holiday season, I know that in a blink of an eye it will be over.  I also know that the week after the holiday’s are over, I will experience a simultaneous sigh of relief that it is back to business as usual and a sigh of regret that it all passed so quickly.  Next week, before we are bombarded by the sparkly excess of December, I hope to take a moment for a day of appreciation, a word that takes on new meaning with each passing year.  What we experience and expect each holiday season may be tied up in small, daily rituals, but it is the larger seasonal traditions that drive us and in the end, tie us together.  

Previously published in "The Star," Grand Coulee, Washington. November 14, 2012

Who we really are

My three-year-old daughter recently declared that she had a favorite song.  The use of the term “favorite” made me sit up and listen.  Although she had been displaying preferences since birth, this was her first declaration of a “favorite” anything.  I find the idea fun, even if I have to listen to the “Wheels on the Bus” every time I get in the car.  

As I watch my daughter jump headfirst into defining what she likes and dislikes into favorites and aversions, I know that she is, at the core, defining a preference.  She is at the beginning of a lifelong road of finding and defining the things that she prefers, and ultimately loves or hates.  In the end, I know that it is these specific definitions, our preferences, which make us who we are.  
At this early stage, my daughter has yet to learn that a preference is a one-sided opinion.  What is pleasant to one person may be entirely unpleasant to another.  These differences make us all unique.  It is when we begin to define our preferences that our differences are revealed.
Next week the nation will express our preferences as we go to the election polls.  Elections, after all, are nothing if not about defining our preferences and our differences.  
Now that my daughter is in preschool, these defining preferences are becoming a theme in her interactions with her peers.  We, as parents, love to watch our children find things that they love.  My kid loves the sandbox, and yours loves the monkey bars.  Isn’t that fascinating?  So wonderful!  Watching the beginning of finding a passion in our children is thrilling to witness.
But I have to wonder as I watch these children define their favorites.  Such a simple distinction like the sandbox and monkey bars are innocuous now, but over time, will it grow to an unreachable divide?  By the time these kids reach middle school, after playing apart in their favorite activities for so long, will they have anything in common?
Is a common ground even necessary to form a friendship?  Just because one prefers the sandbox and another prefers the monkey bars, does that mean they won’t be friends?  Or, can’t be friends?  As adults, is it necessary to have something in common with another to be friends, or for that matter, friendly?
As I watch the election coverage, it makes me wonder what sort of example we are setting.  Any child watching would suspect that a common ground is absolutely essential for grown ups to be friends, or even to respect each other.  

How do we teach our children to respect each other’s preferences, when one is constantly saying that the monkey bars are better than the sandbox and neither will budge?
Perhaps it’s a far-reaching analogy.  But as we catapult into this election, our preferences and likes and dislikes blazing, I can’t help but think about where that came from.  Somewhere, sometime, a mother like me sat on the side of the playground and cheered as her child displayed an unabashed love for a new favorite thing.  

As adults, have our definition of preferences and favorites taken us so far?  When did we determine that it was okay to disrespect someone else’s preferences?  These are things that make us who we really are.  And just because we prefer two distinct things, does that really make us so different from one another?  As a parent, I know that it is my job to teach that a difference in preference does not mean an end of a friendship.
My daughter is too young to make this election any sort of teachable moment for her.  But it may be a good one for me.  Regardless of the elections outcome, it might do us all good to remember that it is our choices that make the world an interesting place.  After all, just because you like the sandbox and I like the monkey bars, doesn’t mean we still can’t play in the same playground.

Previously published in "The Star," Grand Coulee, Washington.  October 31, 2012

If we are what we eat...

Like many children who grew up in the suburbs of America, I had a typical, and rather uninvolved relationship with the food I ate.  I was an athlete and had healthy parents, so tried to be thoughtful, but I spent very little time wondering where the food we bought in the grocery store came from and what, if anything other than satisfying my hunger, my food was doing to my body.

When I moved to a small college town in Oregon for graduate school, I got in the habit of going down to the farmer’s market on the weekend.  On bright summer mornings, there wasn’t a better way to spend an hour or two than walking by the river, sipping coffee and contemplating the splendid array of fresh, incredibly bright and tantalizing fruits and vegetables.  After a time, I even started buying some.  Immediately, I was impressed by the taste and incredible affordability of the food.  For less than I spent on that coffee I was sipping, I could buy a bag or two of locally grown, picked-just-this-morning fruits and vegetables.

I was hooked.

When I moved into my own house, I started a vegetable garden and have depended on a small but steady supply of fresh vegetables every summer since.  Like many others who have small vegetable plots, I still buy the majority of my food from a grocery store.  But, I am far from alone in delighting in eating what I grow, and each year the local food movement grows stronger.

Next week, on October 24th, the nation will celebrate its 2nd annual Food Day.  Organized by the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), Food Day is “a movement for healthy, affordable, and sustainable food.”  With a strong focus on health, the day is also meant to highlight hunger, agricultural policy, and animal and farm worker welfare.

For all the greeting card inspired holidays that fill our calendar, I find this new national celebration day to be worthy of some involvement and attention.  According to their website, foodday.org, 50 million Americans are near hunger and those who are near the poverty line are lured into buying cheap, overly-processed foods, contributing only to increasing waistlines and declining health.  In fact, it is because of this diet that one-third of children born after the year 2000 will likely develop diabetes.  And it is this downward spiral that perpetuates the current estimation that this generation of children will, for the first time in history, have a shorter lifespan than that of their parents.

While the local food movement is growing, and many people nationwide are becoming aware of just how far their food has traveled to get to their table, so far it isn’t enough to change either the food system or our health.  The USDA estimates that only 1.6% of food sales is direct farm-to-table, including farmer’s markets, CSA’s and school gardens.  

There is much that divides us, nationally, internationally, and even within our own towns.  But food is not only something that all of us need, it is also something all of us want.  Who doesn’t want food that is affordable, delicious, and good for us too?  

According to the Food Day website, there are four events taking place in Spokane and over 1,600 events taking place in all 50 states on October 24th.  We don’t have to drive to Spokane to recognize this day, and in fact, it doesn’t even have to be something we do on just one day.  Whatever our situation, eating healthy and thoughtfully is a goal to be achieved by all.


Previously published in "The Star," Grand Coulee, Washington. October 17, 2012

From "free-range" to "helicopter" parenting

A couple of weeks ago, a rather notorious mother in New York, Lenore Skenazy, started an after-school program for children.  This is the same mother who, a few years ago, let her then nine-year-old son ride the New York City subway on his own, with nothing but a map and fare money.  Her new after-school program is an 8-week course costing $350 per child.  All that is on the schedule?  Free play in a playground in Central Park with the promise of absolutely no adult supervision.  In fact, Skenazy herself will be around the corner in a Starbucks.

Skenazy’s movement, labeled as “free range parenting” is considered by many to be radical, but I wonder instead if it is simply at the opposite end of the spectrum of the more popular, and even more socially acceptable, helicopter parenting.  Is her parenting style just a knee-jerk reaction to a movement she finds overbearing and unsuccessful?  Is it a throwback attempt, when childhood was, presumably, slower paced?

In either case, the arrival of free-range parenting is a spark for the always-conversational topic about parenting styles.  In many areas of the country, the way you parent your children has become a bit competitive.  Whose child has the highest grades?  Whose child has the fastest time, got into the best college?

This pervasive competitive spirit among some parents has me wondering.  What does it mean to be a successful parent?  A child that makes it out of adolescence without bodily harm to themselves or others?  Entrance into an Ivy-League school?  A well-rounded, happy adult? Is success as a parent even something we can measure, much less compare to others?

In a poll conducted by Vanity Fair last month, a whooping 95% of us think we rate either the same as or better than our own parents at parenting.  What could possibly make us think so highly of something that is difficult at best to measure?  Are we that self-assured that we are forming the next generation of super-adults?

In actuality, despite the fact that more and more of America’s children are achieving a higher education, kids are taking longer to be independent.  This has even sparked the new phrase “Adultescence” to describe the extended period of financial and emotional support provided by parents before children make the final leap into adulthood.  This phenomenon might instead suggest something larger in our society, whether it is the propensity of helicopter parents, over scheduling of kids, or the long list of other factors that make “childhood” almost unrecognizable to the generations that came before this one.

Free-range parenting leader Skenazy insists that total supervision of children is not only unnecessary, but harmful.  When parents hover and interact with children on a minute-by-minute basis, we neglect to let them experience such things as frustration, disappointment, and even anger.  She insists that left alone, they will work out any social transgressions and physical limitations on their own.

Here in the coulee, we aren’t presented with some of the difficulties raising children in other places are.  There could hardly be a safer place to let your kids go outside and play unsupervised, and over scheduling is not necessarily something we have to worry about either.  But nationally, all these things are a daily presence for many kids in America and it is something interesting to think about.  Would you let your children play in a city park unsupervised?

In my short three and a half years as a parent, I’ve found that, like politics, you can almost always find credible information to support your beliefs as a parent.  And, like politics, extremism as a parent ends up making everyone around you crazy.  Perhaps, for those of us in the middle on the helicopter vs. free-range debate, it is simply another exercise in finding the right balance as a parent.  After all, parenting is, if nothing else, about finding a balance.

Previously published in "The Star," Grand Coulee, Washington.  October 3, 2012

Something to count on

There is, perhaps, nothing so steady, predictable, and at times frightening in life as the continuity of the calendar.  No matter what is happening in your life or the world tomorrow will bring a new day.  And every year, it will bring with it another birthday.  

Around this time every year, without fail, I celebrate a birthday.   A worthy cause for celebration, birthdays are an important ritual.  It is a yearly acknowledgment to yourself and the people in your life that this day is a good one, a day when the unique person that is you entered the world.  

Growing up, birthdays were joyous occasions filled with balloons and bright colors, chaotic present openings and copious amounts of cake and ice cream.  Somewhere just past the first flush of adulthood, birthdays begin to be less of something to celebrate and more of something to endure.  Older still, they become something that many start to dread.

Every year that passes I begin to understand this sentiment a little more.  As a child, birthdays are a sign that you are growing up, gaining experience and independence.  But once you pass that imaginary hump, birthdays instead slip over into the fine distinction of marking the basic fact that your earthly body is ageing.

Certainly, this is still something to celebrate.  Without doubt, I would prefer to grow older than the alternative, and I’m sure most would agree with me.

As I grow older, I also understand that ageing is simply a matter of perspective.  I am fully aware that I am in the prime of my life and am nothing but thrilled to be the age that I am.  I an also clearly remember what it was like to view a 30-plus-year-old as someone who was simply old.

The summer I was 20 I shared an office space with a 30-year-old.  He frequently made references to the need for “us young people to stick together.”  This always garnered a behind-the-back eye roll and snicker amongst those in our office who actually were “young.” At 30, this poor guy was anything but young.

Now that I have come up to and rocketed past his age, I have far more sympathy for what he was feeling.  Now when I come across college-aged kids, I am embarrassed to admit that I fully believe that we are still contemporaries, when, clearly, they wouldn’t agree with me.  When I see a younger person now their youth simply mirrors what I still see when I imagine myself.

Every year that I age, I have more appreciation for people older than myself.  As they say, growing older is not for the faint of heart.  It is difficult to accept that you are no longer young, that you may be too old to be in a certain place or wear certain clothes.  That your body may not always perform like you think it should.  I’m beginning to understand why older people shy away from a camera or a mirror.  What you see in the mirror rarely corresponds with how you see yourself.   It’s easier now to see that life is not a circle, but instead an uphill battle with gravity.

Somehow, though it happens to everyone, when you are young you never actually think that getting older will happen to you.  Youth seems to stretch before you.  Now, as I’m on the cusp of, well, something older than “young,” I understand that in fact it’s the opposite.  You are old far longer than you are young.

With each passing birthday I find that I’m happy with this phenomenon.  Youth carries with it so many uncertainties that fall away with the simple march of time, replaced by confidence and a contentment with ageing that is hard to imagine when you are young.  As for the relentless dependability of the calendar, I suppose it is just another lesson to learn as you grow up and grow older.  Rituals and predictability are, after all, comforting.

Previously published in "The Star," Grand Coulee, Washington.  September 19, 2012

New beginnings

Every year as the calendar flips over into September, I feel a little thrill of anticipation. As an adult, I attribute this to the approaching autumn, my favorite season. But deep down I know that this feeling is a relic of my childhood, a remembrance of what September always brought: the first day of school.

Like many children, I adored the first day of school. I remember looking forward to the coming school year with such eagerness. An entire year stretched out before me with a trove of exciting days, undiscovered promises and perhaps, even some learning. My brother was a year ahead of me in school, so every year I had a peep into what was awaiting me. This made the start of the school year that much more exciting for me as I finally got to discover the secrets that he already knew.

This week, my daughter will have her first day of preschool. I realize that preschool is just a few hours a couple of days a week and will probably not compare to how I feel when she starts kindergarten. But to me, it feels like a significant milestone nonetheless.

As the calendar rolled over into September this year I felt an extra thrill of anticipation. School is starting, and I get to experience it all anew through the fresh eyes of a parent.

In the weeks leading up to this day I had a few surprises as a parent of an upcoming student. I received her school supply list, which was not, as my child mind remembered, a suggested list of supplies your child might need, like a pencil box or backpack, but instead a long list of the things each family needed to supply to the school. I had to fill out an extensive background check to be able to volunteer in her class. I was informed of the various fundraisers we will perform throughout the year, joining the ranks of other parents who are constantly pawning boxes of donuts or wrapping paper onto their friends and neighbors. And while I was somewhat surprised at the level of involvement required for preschool, I was excited at the same time. This is a new era, for our world and for our family. Certainly when I was in school, background checks were not required of parents. But I would far rather fill out some extra paperwork and ensure the safety of our children in this modern era than the alternative. Like children, we parents must adapt as well.

As I kissed my daughter goodbye, I was attentive of what I was sending her into. A world where every day her mind will expand, bending to absorb all the educational and social experiences school will give her. I am also aware that I send her out into a world that is no longer within my control. This is not the first time she has not been beneath my supervision, but as a stay-at-home-mom I am accustomed to having a level of management over her experiences. I am aware that this first day of school is not just a milestone for her, but one for me as well. If parenting is a gradual give and take between preparing your children for the world and then letting them go, then this is a start for me as well.

Since my daughter is only three, and this is only preschool, the importance of this day in her life is probably far over her head. For her, it’s an exciting day to meet new friends, sit in a circle on a colorful carpet, sing songs and play games. But for me, it’s also a new beginning, and maybe, a little bit of an end too.

Great American road trip says “See America First”

When America’s frontier was officially declared closed in 1890, the country scrambled for a new identity. For hundreds of years, we had been a nation with seemingly limitless borders. The stretch from the Atlantic to the Pacific felt endless and the people of our nation proudly embraced the idea of their pioneering character. But when the frontier closed, the nation stumbled to find a new backbone. Expansionism was over and the world wars that brought our modern nation into global dominance was still in the future.

Around this time, the elite and middle classes of the east coast were spending $500 million a year visiting Europe. In an effort to keep some of that money at home, the newly formed national parks and the great railways that depended on domestic travel joined hands and gave America a new identity. By insisting that true nationalists “See America First,” they impressed upon the nation a new identity that was tied to the terrain within our own country. Tourism in America was officially launched and a new national spirit inspired citizens.

When rail travel was replaced with the personal automobile, Americans clambered in and took to the highways. Rising gas prices notwithstanding, then, as now, the American road trip was within reach of all classes. This summer, my family and I, along with millions of others, continued this tradition. Like other families across America, we stuck to a reasonable distance and explored our neighboring states.

Leaving the highway system and the warp speed it requires, we took to the back roads and slowed down, marveling that the life we saw passing our windows existed in the same country that we did. The diversity in life and landscape was dramatic.

Traveling through three different national parks gave me some interesting perspective. I found that I was incredible proud, not just of the breathtaking landscape, but of the foresight and ingenuity required to set aside such spectacular places. It was hard to remember that when these lands were set aside, land in America was plenty and the need to preserve and protect all but absent.

As we traveled through the national parks I marveled at the diversity I saw in such remote places. License plates from almost every state, many languages, and a smorgasbord of nationalities were represented at every visitor’s center and scenic overlook. I also found it interesting to see that despite the stunning vistas, human weaknesses were just as rampant. Tailgaters, pushy camera-toting tourists, and outright rudeness were abundant. Yet in the midst of such thoughtlessness towards other humans, everyone was incredible considerate towards the landscape. Somehow being in such wildness seemed to create an air of responsibility around almost every tourist I saw. It was as if we were all united behind one pulse of thought: protect this wild place.

It is no secret that the wild places and wild things of the world are shrinking. In many places on our trip, set in the middle of some of the most rugged country in our nation, cell reception was perfect and a mobile GPS unit could find me no matter what road I traveled.

Upon creation, the National Park Service was charged with providing pleasure for the American people while also keeping them “unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.” Such a mission statement is challenging at best, but after spending my summer vacation “Seeing America First,” I have to say it is well worth the effort. The identity of future generations of Americans may depend on it.

Previously published in "The Star," Grand Coulee, Washington. August 22, 2012

More than a medal

When the Olympics came to Atlanta, I was an impressionable 15-year-old involved in two different high school sports.  The day after Muhammad Ali famously lit the torch, my family and I were sweltering in the Atlanta heat, working a concession booth at the aquatic center.  It was thrilling for me as a young teenager to be at the very center of such an electric venue.  The atmosphere of any athletic event has some electricity to it, but the energy in an Olympic stadium sent sparks through the entire city. 

I felt lucky to be living in a city that hosted the Olympics, and even luckier to have a front row ticket for many of the aquatic events.  As I walked up and down the stands, selling frozen lemonade from an enormous bag draped around my neck, I would be lying if I said I wasn’t impacted by what I saw. 

The Olympics also came to Los Angeles when I was living there as a child and perhaps because of those combined first-hand experiences, along with the fact that I chose athletics over other pursuits in my formative years, I’ve always gotten a thrill of anticipation when the Olympics come around.  This year, I eagerly hunkered down with the rest of the country to watch our 529 athletes take their moment. 

Besides the remarkable athletic achievements the Olympics always inspires, I find the two weeks when the Games take place to be a moment in time when the world can draw together.  It is a singular worldwide event that is for something good and simple, for pure competition and gamesmanship.  And each time, I find that there is a hope, however small or naive, that we can come together for something as simple as a sport, something as innocent as winning a game or a race.  As a citizen, I have found watching the Olympics leaves me with an enormous sense of pride.  As a nation, we can rally around our athletes without worrying about crossing party lines, racial divisions, or socioeconomic separations.  It’s as simple and uncomplicated as cheering for an athlete of our country.

This is the first summer Olympic games that have transpired since I became a mother, and I find that this distinction has allowed me to see these incredible athletes through an even sharper lens.  In a world where our celebrities don’t often do anything to deserve the word, or the admiration we give them, I find these athletes have a lot to admire.  They offer up real role models for our children.   Coming from all across America, from every race and background, these kids are making their dreams solid and achievable. 

There is a lot our youth can learn from these incredible athletes: the pursuit of a goal, the intricacies of competition, how to lose gracefully and win modestly.  They can learn about what it takes to feed their bodies appropriately and how to use their minds to push their bodies beyond their limits.  There is the opportunity to learn how to interact with a team for a common goal, how to strategize and design for an achievement.  And perhaps most importantly, there is the chance to learn how to take pride in yourself for an accomplishment, no matter if there is a gold medal.  For the athlete that has taken 4^th or didn’t make it to the final, simply to make an Olympic team is an enormous achievement. 

Every four years when that torch is lit, I find that I can remember the thrill of the Olympics being in town, where dreams are sometimes measured in a matter of inches or hundredths of seconds.  I can now point to 529 new people of my own country and countless others around the world to admire and look up to.  I applaud the excess of courage it must take to follow a dream as far as the Olympics.  My hat is off to our athletes and eagerly await the lighting of the next torch.

Previously published in "The Star," Grand Coulee, Washington.  August 8, 2012

Water savings brings satisfaction

Before coming to Grand Coulee, my family and I lived in New Mexico where I held a job as a water conservation specialist.  When we found out we were moving to Washington, I didn’t think that much of the knowledge I had gained with my profession would be that useful here.  Even knowing that eastern Washington is considered a semi-arid environment, I assumed there would be more differences than similarities.

Every day I drive by the lakes and appreciate what a gift it is to be literally flanked by water. After spending years in an area with little open water and sparse rainfall, I don’t go by the lakes in Grand Coulee without appreciating their splendor. 

But, in a way we are teased with so much water here.  Living near two such substantial lakes can give a false sense of entitlement.  Why conserve water when there is a lake on the other side of the road? 

But making a life in a semi-arid environment demands that we be aware of any overuse of scarce resources.  And regardless of the plethora of water at our fingertips, it doesn’t necessarily mean that we should abuse its gift.

In my past life as a water conservation specialist, my job consisted of educating the public about the most efficient ways to save water and I’ve retained a few bits and pieces that might be beneficial to pass on to a town that has more similarities to a high desert environment than I initially thought.  With summer at its peak, monitoring outdoor water usage is our most efficient way of protecting this precious resource. 

As the days have hit their high temperatures, the best way we can save water is to refrain from any outdoor watering between the hours of 10am and 6pm.  Any watering outside of those times will maximize your efforts, for your garden and for your water bill.  Watering in the cool mornings and evenings will minimize the amount of evaporation from your garden, allowing it to retain the most amount of the water you shower on it.

Other ways to maximize outdoor watering efforts are to mulch any open soil areas to help retain moisture and keep the roots of your plants cool, thereby reducing the amount of water they might need on these hot days.  For those of us who aren’t lucky enough to have an automatic irrigation system, it’s helpful to set a kitchen timer to make sure not to over water when sprinklers or hoses are on.  Pots and hanging baskets may require a little water every day in the heat of the summer, but grass, trees, and vegetable gardens will benefit from longer watering less frequently.  And as much as I hate to admit it, keeping a garden weed-free is a sure way to save some water at any time of the year.  Weeds tend to be water hogs and will steal water and nutrients from your plants, making them suffer and require more watering.

Leaky indoor faucets are noticed almost immediately, whereas outdoor faucets, pipes and hoses may have to be consciously checked a few times a season to stay leak-free.  And as it is the season to enjoy our beautiful Grand Coulee sun, spending a few extra minutes in the yard can’t be too bad, even if you are just checking for leaks.   

Clearly, there are plenty of ways to save water indoors as well.  Older models of toilets, washing machines and dishwashers can be extreme water and energy hogs.  According to a new study out of the University of Bonn in Germany, washing a load of dishes by hand can use on average 27 gallons of water, yet washing the same amount of dishes in an energy-efficient dishwasher uses approximately 4 gallons of water. 

Regardless of the size of your household, garden, or lawn, there are ways we can all pitch in to monitor our use of water.  As we enjoy our lakes this summer, you can be proud of what you’ve contributed to preserving as much of this precious resource as possible.

Previously published in the "Grand Coulee Star," Grand Coulee, Washington. July 25, 2012