“I’m living in an apartment next year”.
“OOO. I still have to live in the dorms.”
“I’m living in my fraternity house, it’s way cheaper. Celia, where are you living next year?”
“I’m living in a sustainable cabin”
All of my friends just laughed, rolled their eyes, and said, “you would, Celia”
My friends, along with a large majority of the population, have this preconception that only certain people would ever voluntarily live in an eco-cabin. But why? Why does it have to be that only an environmentally minded person would live in an eco-friendly cabin? Us environmentally-minded folks generally find ourselves removed from the rest of society at times. However, the complexity of sustainability issues requires that everyone, in every profession, in every area of the world should start to care about these deep-rooted unsustainable practices that can cause irreparable damage. We should become the majority instead of the minority. In my effort to make aware these unintended environmental issues that have become so engrained in American society, I chose to live in the Greenbelt cabins.
However, many times people have misconceptions about what the cabins do. Being environmentally conscious has become an onerous undertaking in society’s mind. Thus when people hear the reality of the eco-cabins they are astounded. For instance, I have been asked, “do you have timed showers?”, or I’ve heard “you have to hang your clothes to dry them”, or “you guys don’t have AC or heating”. People assume that sustainable living is burdensome. So when I tell them that this is not the case, that we can take showers as long as we want and we have drying machines and we have AC, they are surprised. Sustainability does not have to be a steadfast anti-21st-century technology lifestyle; it is simply the commitment to doing everything in your mental, physical, and technological capability to live a lifestyle in which future generations will not be at risk. The idea is to help the future livelihood of the human population, and you get to decide how worthy a cause that is worth fighting for. So while none of these previously mentioned assumptions are necessary, they are all still available. It is up to all of us to live a sustainable life and I hope that we cabin-livers will show the rest of the Furman community that sustainable living is not as awful as they make it out to be.
-Celia C