In Ways You Never Imagined

Four years ago we made a decision as a family -- we would own only one car. Our family, at the time, consisted of the two of us and a dog and even though the death of our old dog changed our configuration temporarily, we now have a new dog and still one car.

The choice to be a one-car family was made for a variety of reasons. First, my job was a half mile away. I began walking to work and home again every day. There was no need for a second car. Next, by selling one of our two cars, we were able to pay off the loan of the other limiting our "debt" allowing us to apply for a nice big loan to remodel our house. In fact, when we met with the representative of the mortgage company, she meticulously listed our "assets" and then asked about our debts. Aside from my student loan and what we owed on the house, we had none. She looked up and said, "Really?" We nodded, surprised by her surprise and she said, "Good god, I can get you oodles of money."

The final reason we made a choice to be a family who owned only one car had to do with our commitment to the environment, our commitment to reduce our ecological footprint.

Living with one car hasn't been that difficult though it does limit some of our options. For instance, if one of us has the car and the other is at home without it, it's difficult to run errands or go anywhere particularly if the weather is bad. Yes, we ride our bikes or take the transit if need be, and we even walk 5-6 miles to get where we need to go. There have been frustrations when we both need the car at the same time for separate commitments and occasionally we've had to spend energy figuring out how it's all going to work or worse case scenario, one of us has had to cancel our commitment. Though that rarely happens it still adds a friction we didn't have when we owned two cars instead of one.

But now I've started working with a dog trainer not only training our dog, but learning "how" to train dogs in general. Three days a week I'm driving to a training session 25 miles out of town, which can take me anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 hours depending on traffic (the 2 hours is rare, but it does happen on occasion). This has made the dance of who gets to drive the car a bit more complicated. And so we have begun to talk about getting another car.

In the past this decision wouldn't have bothered me, but as my knowledge of negative impacts on our enviroment has increased (I currently teach environmental science), I'm struggling with the decision.

We've been looking at more environmentally friendly ideas like hybrid or even something we can run on biodiesel, but my research into these options hasn't made me feel any more comfortable with the idea of being a two-car family versus a one-car family. It's a long and complicated dialogue in my head...

...IF we get a biodiesel car, we lose the car's warranty as biodiesel isn't regulated and car companies aren't inclined to service a vehicle that runs on old vegetable oil purchased from someone's home-brewed concotions...and while biodiesel is becoming more popular, biodiesel stations are still inconsistently available. To fill a tank with biodiesel, we'd actually have to drive about 10 miles roundtrip.

...IF we get a hybrid, well, we're still using gas...less gas, but gas still the same.

But there are deeper issues...at least for me. There's the issue of class and privilege, of being able to own something most of the world cannot. There's the issue of consumption of limited resources, not just oil, used to produce a car. There's the issue of using gas in our other car and increasing our overall consumption of gas as a family. And there's the issue of choice -- and this is perhaps the most difficult for me.

Choosing to purchase another car is the proverbial choosing the lesser of two evils. The best choice, of course, is to stick with one car, or if possible, no car at all, but if I wish to continue my pursuit of becoming a dog trainer, we need at least one car and one car has a negative impact not only on the environment, it also has a negative impact on our lives -- arranging our schedules so we can get where we need to go.

I torture myself with these internal debates. Today, in fact, while I escorted my students on a field trip to see the Sockeye salmon spawn, I heard our guide talk about the evils of oil runoff on our watersheds, the contamination of our oceans from CO2 emissions, and the suffocation of salmon runs by the construction of roads and highways. When we got to the river where the salmon were to be spawning, we found only two decomposing salmon on the riverbank and about 10 or so dead salmon floating in the river. Last year when we went to this very same river, there were at least 100 salmon working their way upstream or rotting on the shore inviting bald eagles and hungry hawks to fly over our heads as we marveled at the salmon cycle.

"Last year," our guide said, "We had about 6,000 salmon for the season. This year, we'll be lucky to see 2,000 at this river."

"What are the issues preventing a good salmon run?" a parent chaperone asked.

"It's complicated, but much of what we know points to human impact with development, pollution, and destruction of the salmon's complex and expansive habitat (from the ocean to the rivers)."

It didn't make me feel any more hopeful, at the end of the day, when we all piled into our 6 different cars to head back to school and it didn't make my internal struggle any easier to resolve.

Though this idea did come to me...

...we could sell our gas-powered car for a hybrid (one with the best gas mileage and the lowest emissions) AND purchase a small used diesel car (sans warranty) to run as a biodiesel for our town driving. While we'd still become a two-car family, the impact of those two cars might actually add up to the same impact as our current gas-powered SUV.

"You need to make an educated choice," I heard our guide say as she pointed to the housing project butting up against the edge of the salmon-free river. "The more you know, the more your choices will have less of an impact on our wild places."

I'm not sure how much our students picked up on the message or how much their "education" will inform their choices, but I know that even if what they learned today does make them better stewards, it's still not an easy road because when you KNOW that very same knowledge can paralyze you in ways you never imagined.