One More Mom Guilt

I have a lot of guilt in my life.  Lately, a lot of it revolves around how I’m treating the environment.  Today I had to make a quick stop into the grocery store for some forgotten items and of course I didn’t have my reusable bags, so there I am in the checkout line stuffing as many items as I can into my slouch purse and sticking the rest under my arms.  I walked out of the store like some kind of bag lady with all her belongings clutched to her body.

At the park the other day I was ashamed to pull out a non-reusable bottled water that I had hurriedly bought after forgetting the perfectly good filled ones we had left on the counter at home.  I looked around at the other moms trying to see if any of them were obviously glaring at me.  It doesn’t help matters that the park we were visiting is very close to our very own granola city.  I made the kids drink as quickly as possible and hid the bottle away.

It hasn’t always been this way.  I remember a time when I could use plastic bags without guilt, buy plastic water bottles at every gas station if I was thirsty and if I happened to forget lunch I could stop at a fast food place and buy whatever my heart desired as opposed to packing a lunch in a reusable container that I carry in a reusable sack.  Times have changed.

My children will never know a different time.  They are confined to carrying their own grocery bags to the store, their own water bottles to the park, their own sack lunches everywhere they go.  I like this time.  It’s a good way to live.  On the other hand, there is a lot of guilt when for whatever reason a mom happens to run out the door unprepared, as moms sometimes do.  I’d like a little forgiveness for these days.  I’ll look the other way if I see a mom open a bag of fast food or pull out a plastic water bottle.  However, I do expect the same treatment in return.