I haven’t owned a car in almost 6 years. For a while I lived in Manhattan, where car ownership was costly and complicated. So I didn’t—I bicycled everywhere. Including bicycling around the entire perimeter of Manhattan and over the bridges to four of the five boroughs. A great strategy session with our Sports Editor Mike Kasdan was spent crossing the George Washington Bridge into New Jersey. And I remember meeting up with fellow Good Men Project Editor Mark Greene one evening. We both took CitiBikes on the way home, riding part of the way together. At one point he just threw his arms in the air in delight and yelled “I’ve never done this before!” I hollered back, “You’ve never biked in New York City before?” And he said, “Not through Times Square, at midnight, in the rain, with Lisa Hickey. And had it be such a sublime experience. No, never done that before!”
And then I moved to Pasadena, to be closer to our Good Men Project Board Chairman Ken Goldstein, as well as the tech and film industries. As I was planning my cross-country move, I posted on Facebook that I was thinking of continuing to bike everywhere. People immediately tried to talk me out of it: “Nobody bikes in LA!” and “You can’t survive without a car!”
And of course, I doubled down. If you think I am going to not do something because it’s not status quo or others think it’s impossible, then clearly you don’t know me well at all.
The move itself was easy—I’m a minimalist, so everything I own fit into two large suitcases. From LAX I hopped in an Uber, and told the driver my destination. When we got there he said “Are you sure this is right? It looks like a bike shop.”
Day one in Pasadena, I had my bike and bicycled up the mountains.
Day two, signed a lease for a co-working space three miles from my new home and just kept biking.
I have a small office on the 9th floor. I ride the freight elevator up with my bike and keep it next to me in my office. I’m a minimalist, and so it fits in there fine. And of course, everyone in the building knows me. I’m the girl that bikes. Rain, shine, heat and everything in between. Not having a car is great that way. I never have to make a decisions about whether to bike or not. I simply bike.
For a long time, I was the only one. Then, I noticed other bicycles popping up around the office space. I ran into a guy I knew on the freight elevator, who also had a helmet and bicycle.
Me: “Hey, you’re biking to work now?
Yeah: “Us guys couldn’t have you make us look bad.”
As you know, I’m all for breaking down gender stereotypes. But when it comes to climate change….whatever it takes baby. Whatever it takes.
***
Besides biking, here are some of the actions we take to keep Environmentalism at the forefront of The Good Men Project:
–We talk about the Environment every day!
–Hold weekly calls on Environmentalism “Climate Change by the Elements with Thaddeus Howze and Carol Bluestein. Get call in information and reminders here.
–Instead of a large office building, we continue to have a small co-working space — shared resources mean we each use less of them.
–The majority of our staff works virtually — lessening the impact of commuting to work.
–Pasadena has been a leader in banning plastic bags and plastic straws. Recent reports indicate that Americans throw away 500 million plastic straws each day and worldwide, plastic straws are among the top 10 marine debris items.
We’re not perfect, we’re human. But we’re more conscious humans than we’ve ever been, and we’re working hard to change a wide range of systemic abuse. And knowingly destroying our ecosystem, climate inaction, climate denial, predatory delay are all forms of abuse.
Won’t you join us in helping to solve one of the biggest problems of our times?
—
#GreenerTogether
If you believe in the work we are doing here at The Good Men Project and want to join our calls on a regular basis, please join us as a Premium Member, today.
All Premium Members get to view The Good Men Project with NO ADS.
A $50 annual membership gives you an all-access pass. You can be a part of every call, group, class, and community.
A $25 annual membership gives you access to one class, one Social Interest group, and our online communities.
A $12 annual membership gives you access to our Friday calls with the publisher, our online community.
Register New Account
Need more info? A complete list of benefits is here.
Join the Environmental Activism FACEBOOK GROUP here.
Share our memes!
***
***
***
***
***