it ain't easy being green.

You’d think that living on the farm would make it easy to live a little greener.

It isn’t.

In fact it’s bloody difficult.

I suppose that at one time it wouldn't have been that hard. When my father was young the roads were poor and Endiang, only four or five miles away, had most of what you might need – driving wasn’t a big part of life. Most families had a big garden and raised their own meat. Just looking at those factors I can imagine that one’s carbon footprint was drastically different in the sixties than it is today.

Of course now we need to travel for just about everything. When the railroads died so did most of the small towns and there constituent businesses, schools, and community organisations. You can still get some of what you need at the store in Byemoor, but for anything outside of milk, bread, and coffee you really need to head to the bigger towns further afield.

And then consider the fact that the local farmer’s slogan seems to be if-it-ain’t-supposed-to-be-there-spray-it-real-good. Or that the local oil men won’t be content until every square inch of land has a compressor station or pump-jack on it.

It makes my soul hurt.

What frightens me is that I seem to be one of the few out here who feel this way. I'm sure there are others, but to date the only person I’ve found who agrees with me is my wife Kayla. Ditto for the preservation of the local ecosystem. For the most part my neighbours sit firmly in the I-love-my-big-truck-and-bigger-oil camp.

Of course, I can’t blame them. Most of us here have spent our lives being made to feel inferior by people who believe that no one of worth exists outside the city. And when the same people who write you off as an inbred-redneck-hick turn around and tell you that your lifestyle is harmful to the environment it’s a little hard to swallow.

That being said, I think the neighbours get a kick out of me. Every time I try to walk the kilometre from my house to the main farm yard someone pulls over to ask me if I’m okay – why would I walk when I could just drive?

Or how about last summer at the local gymkhana. I showed up wearing my fair trade organic cotton “Live in Harmony” shirt. I was met by a group wearing “Kill Anything” shirts – and I could just smell the sweat of those little kids on them.

And then there’s the times when I ride my bike out to the field (couldn’t he just take a truck?) or take pictures of wildlife (couldn’t he just stuff it?).

In the end I like it here, and just who’s going to stop me from greening up my life a little bit anyway?

So here I’ll stay with my chickens and my garden, my bagpipes and my indy music, my David Suzuki books and anarchist literature. At least until the government uses Bill 19 to replace me with a transmission line.

Regards from Alberta’s brush plain.