ava gannon

Ava Gannon
F block Sustainability
Interview with a person 20 yrs older: I chose to interview my next-door neighbor, a drummer and an artist who works with my dad. 
As far as what they used to make and repair, he said that since there weren't cell phones to call anyone at any time people were more handy - they knew how to fix simple things around the house such as locks or electric circuits.  You wouldn't call to have someone come fix something every time something went wrong, you would try to fix it yourself or have a friend or neighbor come over. He talked about neighbors and how you knew your neighbors a lot more because of reasons like this. He told me that you didn't throw away anything nearly as much, you kept spare parts and manuals to help you later. Food seemed to be one of the biggest shifts to him, that people were so wasteful now, and food is so easily accessible today. Going to get food used to be a weekly affair, and you only got what you absolutely needed. Eric lived in rural Ohio, and so he said his whole family learned how to provide for themselves at a very young age - growing food, fixing what you could, and even making some of their clothing. He said today's world is totally different - you can buy anything at any time, order anything online, communicate with your friends from anywhere in the world. He mostly misses the personalness that came with human interactions that people can so easily avoid these days.

Eco-Challenge -  Supporting local business. For this eco-challenge io decided to support more local businesses, and I started out with my local gas station instead of all the chains in Santa Fe like Allsups. The local gas station is owned by a family who has run this gas station for a very long time and who I know need the money more than the chains. I also chose to support the local grocery store in Madrid, even though it's a lot more expensive than most stores.

More response to Eco challenge: How can I being more involved to contribute to a fair and sustainable community - I think I could contribute more too this by joining a local community that helps; possibly the fire department or something similar. Communities become stronger when there's more input from the people their choices would effect. 

Response to Eco-challenge: This past week I chose to help at least 2 people out, and connect with a non-profit. For the first part I gave a ride to a friend who was walking along the road when it was cold, and  helped a friend out on her farm. The non-profit I connected to one I already and pretty familiar with Wise Fool. Even though I've worked with them I tried to get involved with more of there public work; I found out about a public workshop they hold where you can go and help them make art that is used in protests and plan to go sometime soon.

The livability score for my area is 46. Most of this has to do with the fact that it's far away from any major stores or work scenes.  Access to public spaces like parks and libraries is the lowest because it's about 30 minutes to any of this, and without a major form of public transportation that you can rely on for real life needs. The economy got a low score too, because the amount of jobs is extremely scarce, mostly small businesses. The social engagement got the highest score; which I think is very accurate because there's a lot of public events to bring out everyone in the community. Options for education is non - existent, either home schooling or drive elsewhere. Personally I find it way more livable than other places because I think it depends on your prioreties and willingness to compromise. For me it's more livable to have people in my community who are friendly and make the effort to know you - but that means driving for most everything else.

My water footprint is about half of the national average. It's 1,138 gallons a day, and national avg. is above 2,000. Most of my water usage from virtual water, meaning from my household's diet. Though my dad is pretty much the only one who eat's meat, he eats enough to have a large footprint. I also use a lot of water in my commute - driving about 60 miles each day. My outdoor and indoor use are not nearly as high,  only about 350 gallons. This is because we have low flow water spouts, and we don 't have a dishwasher. No one in my family takes very long showers, but this changes during the winter when we have to take baths because our pipes freeze for the shower outside and we have to take baths. I know we could drastically change this by putting a spout inside and not take so many baths in the winter. As far as my commute, i could try and carpool more, but it's challenging because I can usually get a ride in but not back to my house. We don't have a lot of plants outside but we do have a water catchment system for most of this. Another option is drip irrigation, which saves a lot of water for gardens. I'd say the most inefficient part of my household is our energy/electricity, which all comes from propane. The hope is that we can switch to solar within the next year.

Ecological Footprint
My ecological footprint is 3.9 gha, my carbon footprint is 7.4 tonnes(emissions), which was 65 percent of my footprint. I'd expected to have a lower footprint than i do, but I'm also unsure of some of my exact contributors, like how far i drive weekly and how efficient my house is. I do think i could carpool more often, but as i just got a car it's a little hard to give up that freedom and be dependent on someone to always pick me, and living out of town it's just inconvenient for everyone. Also, my dad has been trying to convert our house to solar and rain collection for a while, but it's still unfinished. If everyone lived like me we would need 2.4 Earths to sustain us. This is depressing as shiii cause I always thought i was doing an effective job at producing a very little footprint on the world. As far as the the impact of what i eat, I seem to be doing pretty good. I don't eat any meat and rarely do so with fish: but even the transportation of dry good and other foods that i substitute for meat still has a huge impact on the world. If i could do as much locally and seasonally produced food then I could lower this by a lot. Food and transportation are the biggest contributors to my footprint, and I could definitely help this.

Watched the documentary Generation Wealth, not necessarily about sustainability but about consumerism and how our society is based of the idea of worshipping other peoples lives and what they have/we don't. It explains how our culture has a need for material things and how this is supposedly the key to happiness, but in reality these people we worship are the most unhappy. The wealthiest people in our society are not happy, but only struggling like the rest of us. I think this pertains to sustainability in that the reason we cannot focus on sustainability in our society is because we were raised to consume and want more, not protect and be content.

From this sustainability course I'm hoping to get some real life experiences of putting sustainable thinking into sustainable practices. I don't feel like I know how to make a larger impact; in that I regularly do small things like recycling and composting, but I want to be able to reach other people and have a bigger impact with my actions. I'm also hoping to get more experience in gardening because I can't keep any plants alive. I hope that if I'm able to learn more about working with plants that I can pass it on to other people in my life. As far as making a bigger impact I don't necessarily know what that will look like, but maybe a program that reaches out to the larger Santa Fe community and to people that have less access to sustainable practices.
For myself I'd like to support products[like food] that have sustainable practices, and also support more local when I can. I think it's harder to be passionate about bigger practices when you yourself don't make the effort in your own life. For the group I hope to contribute new ideas and realistic perspective.