I am on a mission today. I must be brave and not procrastinate like every other day so far. I keep missing the mom pack who hang out in the park long after my kids are in bed……I think it would be a little strange to show up at the park without a child in tow. So, today, I am going to walk across the street and knock on a door. I am going to introduce myself and ask if they want to be our friends…..I feel like I am ten again, and starting a new school. But, it is for the best. Gas prices aren’t going down anytime soon and all our friends live out of our town…so I have to bite the bullet and make a friend or two. Who knows, soon I might be the talk of the town….ha ha ha.
Gassed Up May 25, 2008
The times are frightening. I turn on the radio or the news and the information I am given isn’t all that great. I worry about the times we live in. I try not to catastraphise things, the news does a good enough job itself doing that. But, times are rough and I worry in a sort of War of The Worlds way, what will happen in the not so distant future?
We moved to a rural setting last fall. We love it out here. Happy to have the quiet and the space to raise our family. We know our neighbours and love that our village has only a few streets…non of which are paved mind you, but that is another story. We weren’t thinking of future times and the cost associated with living this distance from a major center. Not that we live far, thirty two kilomoters ins’t a great distance. But, with gas prices the way they are, traveling in and out during the week has become a luxury not a convience. Before I get in our car each time, I plan out how to get as much done as possible with two little ones tow. I worry about getting the most milage so to speak for my money. I can’t afford to come in and out of town for little trivial things. This bothers me. It is my first regret about moving out of the city. I say first because I am sure over time I will have more.
So, we sit and wonder how best to downsize our vehichle for our needs. We have two children in car seats. We don’t need to sit seven people like we have currently. We really, only need space for the four of us. So, how best to do this. Compact car or sedan? Hybrid? We don’t really have any problems with this sort of change. In fact, we are both excited to make the change. We are looking forward to what we will see in our pockets at the end of each payday.
The thing that I don’t understand about this though, is most other people’s attitudes to the same dilema. Most poeple I know are starting to find it a bit more difficult to fill their tanks up each week. Complaints of gas prices are so common now adays from everyone. Why then, aren’t most people seeing the need to make the change? Why are so many people still buying big trucks and large SUV’s? Once you know better, shouldn’t do better? I don’t know how people can justify living a certain lifestyle with the transportation, when they know they are doing not the best thing…not for themselves financially or the world at large?
I would love to see a huge tax on bigger vehicles. I don’t just mean a tax on new purchases. I mean, a tax all the time. Insurance should have a different price, gas, you name it. People who choose to drive a larger, gas guzzling, environmental beast should have to pay more than the person driving a Honda hybrid! That being said…our governments need to step up and start providing alternative methods of transportation by means of commuter rails, LRT’s and expanded bus routes.
I think it’s delusional to think of a future when gas and oil is cheaper than now. This is how it is and it is only going to climb. I think we need to pull our heads out of our asses and live in the here and now, and start being more responsible. I think about my daughters futures all the time. Almost daily there is a new tragedy somewhere on our planet. Luckily, we haven’t had to face that one head one…yet.
