Happy Thanksgiving! I am home from school this week to commemorate the holiday, and I’m remembering how nice it is to not have to run from class to class and do tons of homework all the time. As usual, I had a very long ride home, and this time as I was traveling I made a resolution worthy of a blog post:
I’m going to stop using my car. I have been considering this for a while… The idea got into my head partially because of the influence of great environmental writers like Colin Beavan (aka No Impact Man), who has been car-less for a while, partially from my brother Theo who never had a license and has been doing fine without it, and partially from a lot of my friends at school, who manage without cars.
There are a lot of things that will become far less convenient as a result of this decision. For example, I will have to start worrying about getting rides to and from school. It will become a lot more difficult for me to go shopping for food (I’m probably going to be riding to the Potsdam Co-op on my bike, or even walking there, weekly, even when it snows). It won’t be as easy for me to, on a whim, drive somewhere to do something fun. I will no longer be able to be a nice person and give people rides. I will miss the “side effects” of driving, like the opportunity to sit around and listen to music, which is something I have only really had time to do while driving. And if I have a hot date, it’ll have to be somewhere we can walk to, unless she wants to give me a ride.
Even with all of these inconveniences, I honestly can’t imagine I will miss it much. This means I will no longer have to pay through the nose for gasoline, repairs, and insurance. (Actually, I have been lucky; my parents have been covering my insurance costs, so I’m saving them money!) I will have more free time; Car maintenace sometimes feels like as much of a timesink as, say, TV. I won’t have the chance to get traffic tickets, which are not fun. But I think some of the biggest gains I will get out of this are philosophical ones.
First, I will gain an appreciation for things that are closer to me, things that do not require lots of travel to get to. Similarly, I will be forced to get by with less stuff in general, because it will be more difficult to transport it places. Second, I will see how well I can follow through on something that I have been thinking about for a long time, to (proverbially) see if my “bark” matches my “bite.” I really don’t like cars. The negative impact they have on the planet depresses me. I’ve only been driving them because I saw them as “necessary” to do the things I do from day to day. But are they really? For a lot of people, they aren’t.
I’m going to do this Steve Pavlina style and do a 30-day trial, completely driving-free. This is going to be a challenge, because right now I am visiting my parents for Thanksgiving break. I’ll leave my car here, and get a ride back to school with my friend Nora and her family. More difficult, while I’m at school I will need to bike/walk in the cold to get my groceries, or wait until my roommate wants to go shopping and travel with him. This will force me to plan my day differently, taking longer times, and the availability of others, into account. Then in three weeks, when final exams are over, I will need to find a way to cart myself and whatever belongings I need back to my parents’ house. At home, I am going to find it very difficult to spend time with friends, especially friends who live far away. This whole experience will be difficult, but I am sure I will find it enlightening and enriching.
On December 26th (the day after Christmas!) my 30-day trial will be over. At this point, I will make a decision to either give up and start using my car again, or to get rid of my car by selling it (or even giving it away).
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We need to find a more sustainable alternative for the car that is just as, if not more, convenient. We can't just stop using them.
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