This morning I had an egg sandwich for breakfast. It wasn’t any egg sandwich though.
You see, I’m visiting my parents in the town I grew up in, in the very house I grew up in. Mom’s going to be 79 soon, and Dad recently turned 80. They use everything.
When mom makes a chicken, or any meat with a bone, she’ll save the bones, and make a broth. Fat drippings, reused. Containers, zip lock bags, and most things I might call trash, they reuse.
I’m a critical thinker and I care about the environment. So I ponder questions like, “Are electric cars really better for the environment?”
Just the other day, I saw a Tesla with a vanity plate. It was something like 0EMISSIONS or ZEROEMSN or whatever it was, read out loud, “Zero Emissions.”
I wanted to meet this person and understand how they justified that claim, and in general, what they thought about the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and higher order environmental impacts of the car.
What do you think about nuclear power plants, coal mines and coal energy plants, and other sources of electricity, including the waste that those plants create for our world?
What about other natural sources of energy? Solar, Wind, Waterfall? Have you considered the environmental impacts of those plants, what materials are used to construct them, capture the energy, and convert that into electricity?
What about the oil used to lubricate the components of that Tesla engine?
What about the batteries, how they are produced, and discarded, and that impact on our global environment?
What about the power exchanges from original source, through transformers and power lines all along the way, to the charging station, to the car’s battery, and then finally converted to locomotion?
I don’t have the answers to these questions. Nor do I know what is better for our environment, gas guzzlers or electric cars. What I do know is that the answer isn’t as easy as, “Zero Emissions.”
So yesterday, Mom and I went to the town’s farmers market and bought eggplant. Last night, mom and I (mostly mom), made eggplant parmesan. This consisted of flour, then egg, then frying, before layering into a dish with gravy and cheese.
There was a little egg left when we were done frying all the eggplant. Mom said, “that pan’s still hot, fry up the rest of that egg.”
“This egg that we used for the eggplant?”
“Yes. That egg.”
Wrapped up in a likely previously used plastic, I found that fried egg in the refrigerator this morning, and used it to make a breakfast sandwich.
While I’m not so certain about electric cars, recycling plants, and solar power’s total impact on our environment … I do feel pretty good about using that egg.
Health & Happiness for All
Andrew
Thank you Andrew, for all the affirmation in accepting our feeble efforts to reuse, recycle and make positive contributions. Waste not, want not.
Your Dad observed years ago that the gimmicks folks use to dupe the uninformed into thinking they are being ecologically sound, may indeed be just playing into slick advertising. Yet I often wonder if we are missing the boat as well. I have a phobia about waste. Knew too many stories of those less fortunate as we mindlessly waste and discard; also saw too much plastic on the beach.
I recall begging Dunkin Donuts to let me take the “older than 4hr. donuts” to St. John’s Soup Kitchen. They would rather dump them in the dumpster where kids, etc rummaged through the trash. I can’t claim to be anything more than “trying” ; I am proud that some of it filtered through to our kids – by osmosis.
That very low salt eggplant was well worth our culinary experiment – leftover egg and all 🙂
Hello Andrew, Hello Ms. Dimeo,
It’ Vincent, Andrew’s French friend from a long time ago. Andrew took me once to your home across the river from NYC. I loved it because it had felt so much like home, … in France, but it was in NJ.
I hope everyone is doing well. Stay happy and well. Vince