I've been thinking...

I'm not sure how I pulled it off, but over the past couple weeks I have convinced several supersmart people to let me encroach upon their supersmart, supersecret gatherings. First I watched the live webcast of the supersmart TED2009 conference at Mark's house with Eric and Andrea and Joanna, all of whom have job titles like Futurist, Strategist or SmartAssMoFo and speak in a supersecret language that's 70% comprised of supersmart-sounding buzz words. (What I couldn't add in conversation I donated in Dynamo Donuts and snarky commentary for their Tweet streams.) It was, in a word, killer.

I've also been volunteering my services as a blogger for Compostmodern, a sustainability conference happening here in SF on Feb 21, wherein I tricked those supersmart peeps into letting me have private conversations with 10 of the supersmartest creative people in the design world. Made my brain hurt so good.

Then last night I winked my way into a sustainability round table hosted by the supersmart dudes at Adobe XD. We're talking a literal round table filled with famous designers and cameras and microphones and name tags and me getting sweaty and eventually gulping down enough Chablis to say something. Or a couple things, both of which I hope weren't, in a word, facile. Again, killer.

So far February 2009 has been the most inspired month of my entire life. Which has got me reflecting, in a deeper way, on my year of Not New and what it did for me. Sure, I saved money. And sure, you've already heard how I'm totally a better person than you due to my extraordinary personal sacrifices. But I hope somewhere in the last 160 posts it came across that sustainability is FUN. It's totally confusing and labrynthine and full of potholes, but there's so much opportunity in the process. I've done dumb stuff, had tantrums, picked fights with grocery boys and revealed a lot of self-indulgent crap to the entire world, but I'm laughing every step of the way. I'm learning constantly because I finally have an excuse to follow my curiosity. I've reconnected with my friends and family over face scrubs, toilet-showers and tofu. I've become a more involved member of my community. And most importantly, I find myself applying my creativity to every single nanoparticle of my life, which opens up more opportunities for joy and discovery and supersecret invites than anything else I know. In the words of Wooderson from Dazed and Confused, I am L-I-V-I-N'.

But that's just me. Now I want to see how other people are doing it. I think instead of populating this site with tips and eco news and one more reprimanding voice of responsibility, I'd like to try to paint a broader picture of the joy that comes with sustainable living. What does a sustainable life look like? Taste like? Feel like? Who's trying to live it? Who's living it without trying? I want to meet people who fight for chicken rights or eschew refrigerators or pedal-power their cell phones or build houses for neighbors in need. Not Ed Begley Jr or Paul Hawken, but normal peeps like you and me.

I'm not sure how I'll do it yet or where it will take me, but hey, that's exactly the fun of it.