WILDERNESS 50

View of the top of Arrowhead mountain from Gavan Hill
trail that goes along Harbor Mountain in Sitka, AK.
SO took this photo during our trip to AK in July '13.

The Wilderness Act was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson fifty years ago, almost to the day. It was a watershed moment for the conservation movement, having established the National Wilderness Preservation System, and a necessary reminder that man needs to preserve and protect nature.

My SO and I visited Alaska for two weeks in July, 2013. He wanted to show me the place where he feels most at home. He visited AK for the first time with his Mom when he was just 10 years old, and has gone back almost a dozen times since then. Last year was my first time to venture "North to the Future" :). 

SO hiking in the meadows on the Harding Icefield Trail alongside
Exit Glacier in Seward, AK. (July '13)

While there, my sense of humanity in the great scheme of life came alive. 

I had known for some time that being in the great outdoors was healing and inspiring on multiple levels. However, it wasn't until I visited the wild places of AK that my sense of responsibility and genuine love of nature arouse within me like the first sounds of a bird's song at dawn. 

Since that visit, my life has changed in myriad ways and this blog attest to that evolution. My partner and I seek to live our daily life in a way that contributes to and honors the life around us, in whatever form it comes. We also seek, on a regular basis, the spiritual and physical refuge of the wild. 

It is home away from home. It takes our hearts deep beneath the ground; our minds among the diversity of life; and our souls high among the forest canopies and breathtaking skies. 

Me overlooking Exit Glacier in Seward, AK. (July '13)

May this 50th anniversary of the Wilderness Act inspire all human beings to recognize the connective tissue between us and all of life that surrounds us for generations [of species] to come! 

Be WILD-ly happy!

~Modern Akhmatova

CELEBRATING LACK OF LANDFILL WASTE

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"In the garden of your days cultivate festivity, play and celebrations." - Mary Anne Radmacher

A couple months ago, I believe it was right around Easter, I told my SO that we should start creating our own holidays to celebrate. It makes perfect sense to figure out the things you really honor, love, and/or admire, and then designate hours, days, weeks, and months to celebrate those appreciations. Some things we came up with were "Off the grid" a.k.a. celebrating no electricity Sunday evenings (5pm-bedtime); "Nature Wonder" a.k.a. celebrating all that Mother Earth has to offer - so some days can be about food, others can be about sunshine and stars, yet others can be about insects, and so on. 

Over the last few weeks we've realized we should start celebrating our lack of waste for the last four weeks or so! I'm so excited about this, because it directly speaks to the zero waste lifestyle principles - Refuse, Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Rot - that we read about in Bea Johnson's book "Zero Waste Home". So first thing's first, this is what we achieved over the last month: we reduced our regular trash, meaning stuff that goes to the landfill, to one grocery bag-worth per every two weeks or more!

How did we do it? 

1. First, we refuse to buy packaged things (mainly groceries, since that's mostly what we shop for regularly) and are trying really hard to avoid plastic. The exception to this rule is glass, because we're still in the process of collecting glass jars to then store our food in and use to buy bulk foods in the future. And actually one of the key ways to avoid packaged foods, is to buy in bulk at the farmer's markets or local health food stores. We now bring all of our bulk food containers when we go grocery shopping. It's kinda fun. I feel like a kid carrying all of its stuffed toys out and about. :) 
2. Second, we reduce how much we buy. This has actually been happening for about a year now. We're trying to simplify our lives, by going through every single thing in our home to examine what we really need to keep and what can be re-purposed, donated, or tossed. This also allows us to see what we are missing and need to buy. So far, we've been astonished to find that there isn't much that we need when it comes to clothes and most house-items. 
3. Third, we are committed to finding ways to reuse things we already own and shop with this purpose in mind. Some of the clothes we decided we don't need as part of step #2, have now become cloth shopping bags, food storage bags, cleaning rags, etc. This is also critical when it comes to groceries. We have a growing collection of glass jars that we use to store food, serve drinks and desserts in, or use as water bottles. 
4. Fourth, we recycle all of the plastic, paper, and cans. This is something that we'd like to improve upon actually. When we started this whole waste management experiment, I decided that we should designate our regular, tall-size trash bin as the recyclables bin and a bucket for our regular trash. While regular trash has been minimal, we were shocked by how much recycling waste we were producing every week. It's really incredible and unfortunate, because we are trying so very hard to reduce our use of packaged goods. Then again, we're just starting down this road, so I am sure we will get better with time. 
5. Fifth, we rot EVERYTHING that can be rotted. We are passionate about this step! Although we don't have a composting bin yet, since we live in an apartment and are hoping to have our own home and land in the near future, we are trying to do our part as best we can to save our food scraps. We currently put all of our food scraps in bags and store them in the freezer throughout the week. Granted, we have two freezers, so this makes it easy on us when it comes to space. This way, we don't have to worry about fruit flies and the smell. Then at the end of each week or every two weeks, when we do our grocery shopping, we stop by Whole Foods or MOM's to toss our compost in their bins. It's worked out really well so far. 

All in all, I'm super excited about the work we've done thus far to go down to one grocery bag-worth of landfill trash on a bi-monthly basis. There is of course always room for improvement, and that's what we'll continue to do as we try to refuse and reduce our acquisition and use of packaged goods of all kinds.

Happy waste reduction!

~Modern Akhmatova

AMERICAN SUBURBIA

I sat on a train headed to Washington, D.C.

Looking through the trees passing by,

I wanted to imagine immensities;

not houses filling up the empty spaces in between.

~Modern Akhmatova

A RAY OF SUNSHINE

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People that affect us deeply

People that we think of often

People that inspire us

People whose spirits are connected to ours

People that make our hearts smile

They are like rays of sunshine

Bright, warm, otherworldly and immense in our lives.

They are there everyday

in spirit

Present in the most beautiful and necessary way.

Their energy shines on us from above.

And all we have to do is look up, recognize, and enjoy.

~Modern Akhmatova

THE BLOG THAT CHANGED EVERYTHING

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When my SO and I started living together over a year ago, we didn't know that we were embarking on a lifestyle change. As mentioned in one of my earlier posts, getting bikes and using them regularly, is what started us down the path of healthy living. The more we biked and observed our lives from that vantage point, the more we became interested in living our life in a way that would not only benefit our bodies, but our wallets and planet earth too. It became an intoxicating idea.

Once we started to explore this online, we were gratified to find out how many people out there were trying to do the same thing in their own way. Actually, it was my SO who first started reading blogs about alternative lifestyles. I started to appreciate blogs much later on, when I realized how inspiring and comforting it is to know that what you are trying to learn about and act upon is part of a collective effort to make this world a better place.

But as with anything, there was a pivotal point that sparked our imagination and made us believe that indeed, we could live a more mindful, sustainable, and fulfilling life in the midst of the consumerist, stressed-out, polluted, and disconnected society that surrounded us. The moment came when my SO discovered Mr. Money Mustache's (MMM) blog in October, 2013. In short, this blog is about how to take control of your finances, so that you can live a meaningful, creative, and healthy life, free from society's constraints and status quo pressures. The idea being that if you can figure out what you're spending your money on, what you'd like to have money for, and what you can afford, then you can proactively manage your finances in order to create the life you want.

MMM doesn't just discuss the idea in abstract. He is a living proof of the idea itself, and uses his blog to share his family's experiences, useful tools and tips on how to achieve an authentic lifestyle through financial freedom. So much has happened and changed since we started discussing and trying out some of MMM's suggestions a little less than year ago:

• We started tracking all of our expenses using MINT.com and scheduling financial check-ins at the beginning of every month. 
• SO fixed up and outfitted two bikes that we bought for cheap on Craig's List. I immediately started riding to work, while he worked from home. We did all of our errands by bike, including shopping at COSTCO and riding 90 lbs. worth of groceries back home in our "child" trailer. 
• We decided that at least one of us would always be within biking distance from work. 
• I biked to work and back, 12 miles a day, throughout all of winter season. It was one of the hardest and most exhilarating experiences I've had thus far in my life.
• We gave "homemade" gifts to all of our loved ones for Christmas. Not one shopping trip at the mall or any (online) store, other than the grocery store, during the entire Christmas season!
• We started tracking all of our grocery spending.
• We moved closer to SO's work, so that he could bike to work and back (18.5 miles/day), while I started to work from home. 
• We sold my car and are down to one car (see earlier post on this) now! 

All of the above happened in large part because my SO discovered the MMM blog. There are many other blogs and resources we discovered along the way that I will share in a future post. For now though, I just wanted to express how this wonderful journey of ours started and the power of blogging.  

Happy beginnings!

~Modern Akhmatova