Whole-isticism, Knowing Enough about Everything

If you own a pet, or have read the front page of any American newspaper since mid-March, you know that there have been massive pet food recalls in the United States due to the use of imported grain proteins in the manufacture of pet food. At first conscientious pet guardians, like me, drew deep sighs of relief for shelling out the extra bucks on premium pet food. As the days and weeks went by, over 100 different brands were effected by the tainted wheat and rice glutens- many of these brands were premium or organic. Recent news articles indicate that adding chemicals to the grain proteins has been common practice for some time- as it is a cheap way to make the protein content appear more elevated than it actually is. In large amounts the added chemical, melamine, causes acute kidney failure in dogs and cats. I'm not sure what it does in smaller doses- but it is safe to say this practice deprives animals of the protein they need to live long, happy, healthy lives.

When several formulas in my premium brand landed on the recall list, I, like thousands of pet lovers, looked for home made options to feed my cat using food deemed safe for human consumption at my local grocery store. But a companion animal can't live on a diet of people food unless it is properly supplemented. I started to sweat- and look for solutions. Holistic pet care, waiting quietly in the corner for over twenty-five years- beckoned me to check it out. Apparently they'd known for years that junk lands in commercial pet food.

Wikipedia says the word "holistic" comes from the Greek root ὅλος- which, from my study of modern Greek, means "all". Holistic health care means looking at all the factors of our lives- the whole person, or the whole cat, as the case may be. Nutrition and environment play big roles in holistic health, as does spiritual and emotional well-being. Holistic health care is usually discussed in connection with homeopathy, chiropracy, yoga, acupuncture- alternative therapies I've used with good results in the past. Holistic health care can also be lumped in with crystal therapy, and people who talk to the dead- giving it, for the newbie uneducated like me, an air of unscientific mysticism.

I'm a science fiction writer. I love science and technology and am unlikely to solve my next headache with a smoky quartz. However, my brief foray into the world of holistic practice shows there is no reason to throw out centuries of wisdom and healthy practices gleaned from a variety of cultures simply because they aren't new, or don't come from the latest issue of Scientific American. I see no incompatibility in a modern lifestyle that takes the benefits of both cutting edge science and holism.

That doesn't mean there aren't drawbacks to holism.

As the word all implies, holism requires the practitioner to know all there is to know about everything. In the case of feeding my cat, I had to learn about bacteria found raw meat, lead accumulation in animal bones, calcium to phosphate ratios, what the heck nutritional yeast was, why kelp is something a sane person would feed to a feline, and how long cat poop has to sit in the litter box before toxoplasmosis becomes a risk.

Holism is more revolutionary that it sounds, because holism requires you to reverse the tide of civilization by becoming an expert in things unrelated to your profession. Since human society separated the hunters from the gatherers, specialization has been the cornerstone of civilization. See- I'm an expert in language and literature, and I normally leave calcium to phosphate ratios to people who make their living producing cat food. The simple act of figuring out what to feed my cat literally took weeks and weeks of study, research and decision making. That's a lot of work- so what do I get out of it?

I get to make my own decisions.

The power of holism is that the practitioner who knows it all can make the best decision for a particular individual. There is no one-size-fits-all treatment- everyone's diet, remedy, environment needs to be tweaked on an individual basis. At first I found this disappointing- I needed somebody to tell me what to feed my cat! The more I researched, the more I liked the idea of making more of my own decisions. When I'm in control of making decisions, I can take the needs of all my family members into account, and design a solution that's right for our special bunch.

For holism to catch on as a future American trend- and as a science fiction writer I see potential that it could- emphasis will have to be efficient, pain-free education of lay clients (like myself) so that they can know enough about everything to make their own decisions about how they live their lives, care for their pets and children, and treat their illnesses. Not only that, an attitude of independent decision making will need to be generated.

Independent thinking- isn't that a hallmark of the USA? Society, especially American society, is geared to accept the opinion of experts, people who have devoted their professional lives to knowing everything about one specific thing. It isn't until trust in those experts is broken (such as has happened with many pet owners and commercial pet food producers), that people exactly like me scramble to find the knowledge they need to know everything about everything- or at least enough about everything. Once that knowledge is obtained, we must find the wisdom needed to make important decisions. Then, once the decision has been carefully made, we need the courage to follow our determined path- with or without the expert's guaranteed seal of approval.

The holistic market today consists of educators and practitioners who have learned to put a leafy green stamp of approval on their treatments and products. What will the holistic educators and practitioners look like tomorrow?

Green Cleaning (Part 4- Looking back to see a better future)

"Organic chemicals are widely used as ingredients in household products. Paints, varnishes, and wax all contain organic solvents, as do many cleaning, disinfecting, cosmetic, degreasing, and hobby products. Fuels are made up of organic chemicals. All of these products can release organic compounds while you are using them, and, to some degree,when they are stored."

-from the EPA.

Many Americans are poisoning themselves with the products they use to clean their homes- and this information isn't just coming from nontoxic cleaner manufacturers like Seventh Generation- it's coming from the Environmental Protection Agency.

Last November I made the switch to green cleaning. I'd like to say it was a gesture of my deep commitment to protecting the environment for future generations, but the truth is, I made the switch to improve the health of myself and my husband today.

Here's some more cheery news from the EPA:

"Research shows that some VOCs can cause chronic and acute health effects at high concentrations, and some are known carcinogens. Low to moderate levels of multiple VOCs may also produce acute reactions."

What household cleaning products produce these damaging VOCs (Volatile Organic Compounds)? The answer lies under the bathroom sink, in the linen closet, wherever you keep your cleaners. Products such as chlorine bleach, ammonia, oven cleaner, and toilet cleaner produce damaging VOCs both when you're using them, and when they're sitting seemingly harmlessly beneath the bathroom sink.

I have none of these products left in my home. So how do I clean? By traveling back in time and looking at what people used to clean their homes before these harsh chemicals were on the market. There is nothing in my home that can't be cleaned with vinegar, baking soda, and vegetable soap.

Vinegar can be used in place of chlorine bleach to remove stains. Half a cup left to sit in the toilet gets the bowl sparkling clean. A solution of vinegar and water cleans glass, shower doors, the refrigerator. Vinegar's acidic properties dissolve mineral build-up, and give it disinfecting properties. If your child broke into the cleaning cabinet and drank the bottle of vinegar, he might get sick to his stomach, but if he drank the same amount of chlorine bleach or toilet cleaner he would die if you didn't make it to the hospital in time. Even if he doesn't get into the cleaners, the EPA says it's possible their presence in the cabinet may cause him to develop cancer when he gets older. What do you want in your house- vinegar or toilet cleaner? Most people don't have to care about saving the whales to answer this question.

Baking soda is my abrasive cleaner of choice. It scrubs pots and pans, stove tops, scours bathroom tile, and eliminates grease and grime wherever I find it. It gets rid of odors in the refrigerator and on carpet and upholstery. (Bon Ami is a household-friendly and environmentally-friendly step up from baking soda for tough scouring jobs).

For everything that can't be cleaned with vinegar or baking soda, there's soap. But before we go any farther, let's talk about exactly what soap is.

As I learned in the fourth grade, soap is a surfactant, a substance that keeps water from beading up so the water comes closer in contact with dirty surfaces. The closer the water gets to the dirty surface, the easier those surfaces are to clean. Until World War I, all surfactants were soaps, and they were made from fatty oils derived from animal or vegetable sources. Wartime shortages of vegetable and animal fats during WW led to the development of synthetic surfactants in Germany. These surfactants used petroleum as the "fatty" oil source. These "artificial soaps" were called detergents, and became "widely available in the United States in the 1940's...today, detergents have all but replaced soap-based laundry products." (Martha Stewart's Homekeeping Handbook)

Petroleum-based products haven't stopped their domination in the laundry room. Our dish soap, bath soap, all-purpose cleaners and countless household and health and beauty products are made from petroleum. Using a bottle of dish soap causes many of the same environmental problems as filling your car with oil, such as depletion of natural resources, and pollution and contamination from drilling. What's more, use of these products (especially in higher than intended concentration) pollutes your home! Detergents are less severely damaging to your health than the other cleaning agents we've talked about today, so I'll leave you with this thought: which would you rather wash your baby's bottle with- detergent made from petroleum, or soap made from vegetable oil?

Most vegetable based soaps on the market today are made from coconut oil- this goes for laundry soap or shampoo. Brands like Seventh Generation and Mrs.Meyers manufacture coconut-derived soaps. You'll also find dozens of health and beauty brands whose products are derived from coconuts instead of petroleum. Soaps are gentler on your skin, your clothes, your house, your health. And they're a heck of a lot gentler on the environment. To promote its products, Seventh Generation claims that if every U.S. household replaced their purchase of dish washing detergent with dish washing soap, the savings in petroleum could heat and cool 4,800 American homes for an entire year.

That's a lot of oil.

I think a lot of people feel that being environmentally responsible will lower their standard of living. This simply isn't true. In many cases, what's kinder to our outside homes is kinder to our inside homes and our personal well-being. Being environmentally responsible means being aware of the products you buy, and knowing your options. You don't have to buy petroleum based products and top-loading washing machines- there are alternatives. And green cleaning doesn't mean going back to the stone ages. Did you know a dishwasher run at full capacity uses about half the energy of washing dishes by hand? (Martha Stewart's Homekeeping Handbook).

Every person, every town, city, province, nation has a unique set of physical and cultural needs. In order to make the Earth a good place to live, an effort needs to be made by government, industry, and individuals to establish guidelines, innovate solutions, and make choices that find a balance between our needs today and our needs tomorrow. Last night I heard Vice President Gore speak at the Oscars about environmental concerns as a "moral issue" as opposed to a political issue. I'd say it's an issue of survival.

This concludes the practical portion of my Green Cleaning series. Tomorrow, we'll take a look at coconut fuel and other nutty solutions to pollution problems. I don't know how many of them will be viable in the future, but it's a lot of fun to see what people come up with, and imagine some of my own.

Green Cleaning- Part I (Our Inside and Outside Homes)

When the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) announced its Fourth Assessment Report on February 2nd, global warming finally made significant headlines in the American press. Global warming was considered a fact of life six years ago when I moved to Italy. I was in Turin for the 2003 European heat wave, one of many climactic crises brought on by global warming. I spent the agonizingly hot days, like many Europeans, with no air conditioning. I lay on the sofa in a half-conscious daze, occasionally remembering to eat gelato. 20,000 Italians who weren't as young and strong as I was died.

The next summer, still in Turin, my husband and I bought an air conditioner. The torture of the past summer overrode knowledge that air conditioning units would only make the heat problems worse in the future.

And isn't that where we all are, those of us with the means to choose whether or not to buy the new A/C, the new car, the next can of furniture polish? See, human beings are wired to survive the day- which is why I bought that A/C, and human beings are also wired to care for themselves and their loved ones. Parents change diapers, people clean their toilets, wash their windows, use wads of paper towels when the cat spits up a hairball. So we're faced with a situation where the products we use to make our inside homes inhabitable are making our outside home uninhabitable. What can we do? More importantly, what will we do?

I think this is a fantastic discussion for people who are writing about the future. Not only will global warming change the fabric of our future world, but the things we do to try to prevent drastic environmental consequences (whether they work, or not) will color our everyday lives. Having lived overseas, I've seen that local climate and culture play a huge role in the way people keep house. I'm talking things that sound insignificant: how people do the laundry, how people clean the bathroom, how people take out trash. We're learning that all these "insignificant" daily acts have a huge impact on the environment.

So this week I'm going to share some of my experiences of the seemingly small differences in how Italians go about their daily lives, and do a little research to learn how things are done in a variety of places. I'll examine why some of these foreign practices are only suited to certain climates and cultures, and discuss the possible impacts of what might happen if selected local practices were implemented on a global basis. How might the typical American house be changed? And to conclude the series, I'll discuss what I learned about green cleaning when I went cold turkey last November, and how green cleaning (which comes from a previous generation, not a foreign culture) could change the touch, the taste, the smell, the experience of living in future homes.