Confessions of a struggling Green warrior: Seeing the earth in one little girl

My name is Clay Robinson, native Houstonian and struggling Greenie.

Struggling as in, striving daily to overcome my natural urges to consume more than is necessary, produce excess waste, indulge in longer showers than are required to be clean, take advantage of the paper AND plastic bags at the grocery and not demand biodegradable to-go containers from my favorite haunts, just to name a few.

Frankly, the list of "personal best practices" grows with every blog I read, every Green Economy conference I attend. I am determined to heed the call. I want to succeed. I want to contribute positively in my community. I want to just be better. But, have I mentioned the struggle part, the how-hard-it-is-to-be-good part, and the guilt associated with dropping the ball?

This is both the beginning and the end of my story.

I may very well be like you. I choose to live in Houston, I am married, I have a daughter and three pets. I drive a carpool-friendly vehicle (a non-green SUV to be clear), and live in a not-too-big home. I collect emerging contemporary artists, I am a big music fan, I frequent Discovery Green and I love to travel. I am a concerned parent. I am hoping to get it all right. OK, at least most of it right.

A little girl, two cats, a dog & a recycling center

My household, as mentioned, is made up of three humans, two cats and a dog. I have a small-footprint, modern urban townhouse with minimal yard and few resource-consuming amenities. Yet, I find the trash we produce surprising even with regular visits to the nearest recycling center. Our electricity bills…don’t ask. We watch what we buy, attempt to be mindful of our carbon footprint and seek products and services that follow suit. All in an effort to improve who we are and how we live.

Back to the struggle. It has not always been this way. Only fairly recently have we begun to embrace change, attempted to be better stewards of our environment, our city, and the planet. Sometimes we fail. Sometimes we are lazy. Sometimes we toss paper or cardboard or plastic in the trash. Seriously, the waste that comes from having children and pets is astounding, not to mention hard to recycle. Sometimes we overlook the green answer in favor of something familiar.

In a word, we struggle.

Making Green work

Because these efforts at home were, apparently not enough of a burden, I made a professional decision and took the struggle to work. Little more than a year ago, along with Brian Conner of BC Woodwork, I founded TruTimber, an eco-conscious provider of timber industry products and services. Not only was it a startup, it was a startup with a mission, a higher purpose. A startup with uphill battle written all over its face in bright crimson lipstick. Now I have the opportunity to worry about zero-waste production systems, natural resource consumption, salvaged material up-cycling, LEED certifications, landfill diversion strategies and community involvement that follows a Green ethic.

Sound like enough self-torture? Well, just to get it all out on the table, I am forming a new company with a host of green economy products and services at its core. This new venture will offer sustainable solutions to residential and commercial clients including energy efficient LED lighting, automation products, solar systems and associated consulting services. Can you say struggle?

So, why not take it a bit easier, throw what is easiest to throw away in the trash and recycle when it’s convenient for me? Why evaluate my habits and attempt to steer them in a new, unfamiliar direction? Why start to get the word out to friends, family and neighbors about all they can do? Why make trips to the recycling center as much of a father-daughter ritual as going to the park?

My answer, like many much wiser folks before me have far more eloquently said, lies in the face and hands and heart and soul of my daughter. The struggle is for her, her cousins, her schoolmates and her park buddies. I want for her to learn these behaviors and practice these simple steps, these basic operating principles so that she never thinks them a struggle, an effort, a time consuming detour in her day. I desire to demand, to create, to establish, systems of eco-efficiency so that she will see them as the norm. So she will have them to build upon. So that she will have a cleaner, more efficient, healthier community to live her life in.

I will still be struggling when you see me at the corner coffee shop, resisting throwing my paper cup in a not-to-be-recycled trash bin, and failing. I will be struggling to make the right choices on my next vacation when nothing familiar is at hand. I will be struggling in the next month or two, when the summer heat sets in and I want to keep the house overly cool. I will feel guilty when I fail.

I bet you will be struggling just a bit more too. When you do, please think, not of me but, of all the bright young faces that one-day may not struggle with all these questions, these decisions. These measures, to them, will be effortless. Think of all they will do because they are free to.

This is both the beginning and the end of my story.

Clay Robinson lives in Houston with his wife Margaret Vaughan and their daughter Corbin Parc. He is the Co-Founder of TruTimber, CEO of Parclight Resources and a strategic partner with RA Energy Solutions of Boulder, Colorado.