A warm, fuzzy green

Re “A lazy shade of green,” Opinion, July 12

Susan Straight’s piece really touched me. Thinking about my own recent attempts to “go green” at home, I realize that there is a nostalgic component to it.

As I rinse out plastic bags for reuse and hang them out to dry, I remember my grandmother doing the same and wonder what we did before all the plastic. I remember more glass and metal, more saving and reusing. I remember school lunches wrapped in wax paper. I remember sunny days in the backyard, helping my grandmother hang clothes on the line.

I now live in the house that was my grandmother’s. The clothesline is gone, but I wash out glass jars and save them under the sink, just as she did. When my husband asks why, I can’t answer.

Something in Straight’s writing gave me a glimmer of understanding. Yes, it’s environmental responsibility, but it’s something more too -- a connection to the past and an understanding that if we lived with less and were happy back then, we can do it again now.

Carola Bundy

Gardena