In my last post I mentioned that driving was a big change for me. Since high school, I haven’t had any kind of regular access to a car. I went off to college knowing that I didn’t want to pay for a car, and later realized I didn’t even want to drive one. I didn’t want to support an addiction to foreign oil, pollute the heavens, compromise my safety, or look for parking. I found that I much preferred living in close proximity to the things I needed, and I still want to support a sprawl-free world.
The automobile basically represents a whole lists of ethical negatives for me, while offering but a few practical positives (primarily convenience and loud, rocking, music). I was a non-driver for ten years, and a devoted non-driver for the past two years, which is evidenced by my doubling my commuting time and trekked through blazing sun, thunderstorms, blizzards, and sub-zero temperatures to get to work every day. Finally, I moved (not far) on the same day that my company moved (very far by walking standards) to create a nearly impossible drive-free commute. So I gave in.
What’s next for me? TerraPass? Carpooling? Toyota Prius? Time will tell.
Monthly Archives: May 2007
I Got Engaged
On the scale of things, getting engaged is significant news. I’ve been together with my fiancée for almost five years now, and it’s time for a legal union. Getting married is really evidence of a life-long commitment. I think that commitment itself was made a long time ago, but now we’ll make it official.
We’ve been planning our wedding for a couple months now, and it should be fun. I’m learning all about the wedding business, which capitalizes on the once-in-a-lifetime mentality of engaged couples. I have that mentality too, which is unfortunate for my savings account.
Over the last half-year I’ve done two other things of significance, although these occupy a distant second and third place to getting married: (1) I bought real property, and (2) I started driving. I’ll hopefully post more about these soon.