Simple Living with Wanda Urbanska

Wanda's Diary Entries

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Over the weekend, I was privileged to be an auditorium speaker at the American Library Association annual meeting in Chicago. My topic: “A Greener Library, A Greener You.” Though I’ve spoken frequently during the 23 years since publishing my first book, I can honestly say that I’ve never felt better about a presentation. Maybe I’m getting more comfortable at the podium with age. Maybe it was the subject, for which the time has finally come. I’m sure the audience played a part, as this group of astute and forward-thinking librarians was self-selected by their interest in environmental stewardship to roll out of bed a Sunday morning. Maybe the stars were lined up because we were in Chicago — a city that is working overtime to make its name as a “green” city.

Whatever the case, when the appointed hour — 10:30 on Sunday morning — rolled around, a large crowd had gathered in the auditorium, with a number of folks coming in 40 minutes early to get good seats. Leonard Kniffel, editor in chief of “American Libraries” magazine, offered a masterful and eloquent introduction. I carried to the podium some beautiful flowers given to me at dinner Friday night by the writer Wesley Adamczyk, author of “When God Looked the Other Way: An Odyssey of War, Exile, and Redemption” (University of Chicago: 2004). Having that touch of nature with its sweet aroma and the well-wishes that accompanied it cheered me on as I presented.

I told those gathered that the era of overconsumption in America is over, that the disease of our American affluence, affluenza, is on its death bed. I bolstered these points by citing evidence in rapidly changing behavioral patterns in our country: we’re driving less, saving more, and putting more thought into such issues as food security and energy efficiency. Drawing on the research I’d done for several articles for “American Libraries” magazine on the topic, I cited the “best practices” of librarians who are “going green.” I talked about Louise Schaper at the Fayetteville Public Library in Arkansas, a LEED-certified silver building, in which the green revolution is an on-going process.

With my Power Point, I showed how the Fayetteville library was reducing its energy consumption with new technologies like “thin clients,” how decision makers there eliminated contract cleaning services, replacing them with in-house staff who use non-toxic natural cleaning products, and how Louise herself models numerous behaviors for her staff and clients. I poked fun at David Siders of Cincinnati, who lives so close to the Popular Library downtown that he can walk to work in his pajamas. (For his part, David cooperated, by posing for a playful photo for me, in PJs, no less!) We looked at green programming around the country, at efforts to recycle paper, books, and bike to work.

During question and answer period, folks asked for strategies about how to get procurement to pay more for recycled content product, for instance, when some grinch with an eye on the bottom line, throws back requests insisting on the lowest price item. Fred Stoss, the librarian from the University Buffalo who heads up the ALA Task Force on the Environment, offered smart ideas for affecting change. Another visionary librarian suggested writing a press release to the powers that be showing the great press they would receive by making a public commitment to eco-friendly practices.

After it was all over, a line of librarians snaked around the hallway in McCormick Place waiting for autographs for my newly released anthology, “Less is More,” co-edited with Cecile Andrews. I signed every one with the optimism of feeling that that morning had made a difference, that together we’re on an unstoppable path to change. “I’m giving this book to my daughter,” one librarian said. “She lives the way you describe. She bikes to work and cooks from scratch. It’s not always easy, but I know “Less is More” will make her feel that she’s on the right path.”