The Great Unsubscribe, aka: Dealing with Junk Mail

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I tend to prefer my paper to be in the form of trees.  Image via.

Since moving to Idaho, I've become even more passionate (read: fairly obsessed) with the idea of creating a zero waste home.  

This is somewhat ironic considering that I just left the epicenter of green living for a state that bleeds red.  The godmother of the zero waste lifestyle, Bea Johnson, lived just ten minutes from me in the Bay Area.  Grocery stores were optimized to reduce packaging.  San Francisco set a goal that as an entire city to send NOTHING to the landfills by 2020.  

They made this habit easy on residents and stores by providing recycling and compost bins which they picked up weekly alongside our dwindling trash bins.  

So how fitting for my stubborn, rebellious little green soul to decide now that I live in a city that doesn't recycle glass that I want to seriously zero waste-ify my home.

And yet, of course, the timing really does make sense.  Part of why I loved San Francisco so much was being surrounded by people who shared my environmental sensibilities.  It was made easy for us all to live lightly.  Heck, an entire terminal at San Francisco International airport only served food in compostable containers -- "If you bought it here, it can be composted" read the signs.  

But part of what happens when you are surrounded by compostable, post-consumer recycled objects in a city of hippies is that you get lazy.  Or at least complacent.  You don't necessarily have to try that hard to live lightly.  And you get to be a judgy little a-hole when you go to a *gasp* non-coastal city who isn't quite as innovative in the green arena.  Long story short, it's easy to eco-friendly in the Bay Area.

I figure that if I can be zero waste in Boise, Idaho -- a state equally known for it's love of potatoes, the second amendment and fly fishing -- then it can be done anywhere.

First up on my list of things to tackle: Mail.  

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#RUDE

It appears that the absolutely lovely people who owned our home before us liked to shop by catalog as a new one pops up at our door daily.  Literally, every single day.  While my specific goal is to produce no trash and paper can of course be recycled, it nonetheless feels obscenely wasteful to get a hundred pages of paper in the mail each day to only be placed straight in the blue bing.  

It also appears that USPS must have sold our new address info to a million and one home goods and supplies stores, because we are getting non-stop flyers and coupons for every store in town.

And on a related note, the ultimate asshat award goes to: Restoration Hardware who sent me TWO separate thousand-plus-page catalogues, all wrapped up in plastic.  Apparently they've been doing this since 2014 and have continued even after receiving repeated complaints.  #nevergettingmybusiness #notthaticouldaffordyouanyways #dicks

HOW TO ZERO WASTE: YOUR MAIL

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1) Catalog Choice.  This amazing, free service allows you to create a profile for yourself (and any past residents of your home) in order to rapidly unsubscribe from catalogs and other mailings.  I've been using this service for years, but it's come particularly in handy with our most recent move.  (Pro tip: create profiles for "Current Resident" and "To Our Friends At" to stop those generic mailings as well.)

2) Call them up.  There are a couple of companies whom CatalogChoice isn't able to help with unsubscribing from.  For those companies, simply find their number on the back of the catalog, call them up and ask to be removed from their mailings.  When asked why I no longer wish to receive their company's catalog, I usually say something along the lines of, "I do all of my shopping online and don't want to waste precious paper."  The super sweet workers at L.L. Bean seemed to appreciate that:)

3) Fill out change of address forms for former residents at the Post Office.  If you, like us, have really kind former residents and you happen to know their new address, you can do this for them.  Otherwise you can write "no forwarding address."  The good news is that this tends to be implemented rapidly (unlike catalogs which can take 6-8 weeks).  The bad news it that this only applies to First Class mail, while Third class mail often doesn't get forwarded.

4) Get it by email.  For mailings that you still want to receive -- not that you want to get your bills, but you know what I mean -- sign up for electronic mailings.  Every single one of my providers in Idaho has an e-delivery option, even the city's recycling program.  It takes a minute or two to create an online profile and account, but it's worth it.  You can also often sign-up for automatic payments ensuring that you never miss a bill in the future.

Life in the Slow Lane

On a hike to fly fish in one of Idaho's many rivers... 

Cam and I moved…  Again!  

This time we left our little chunk of paradise in the Bay for a slower, more mountainous way of life in Boise, Idaho. 

Cam and I have for years sought to really put down roots in the Bay Area.  We’d imagined settling there for good, buying a house, starting a family, raising our kids and dogs among the redwoods.  We love California for a couple of reasons: the insane and diverse natural beauty, the environmental / social activist culture, and, most of all, our dear group of friends who’ve become our family over time.

And yet, something was always missing.  

Life is complicated, until it’s simple.

The truth about a new minimalist lifestyle is that when you deal with and consider and think through your stuff, you can’t help but gain clarity in other areas of your life.  In the past year it became completely clear that Cam and I were ready for the next phase in our life. 

We wanted to be somewhere slower, somewhere affordable, somewhere with great and expansive natural beauty and — in a dream world — be close to family.

Our Idaho roots

I’ve been visiting Idaho for as long as Cam and I have been together.  His father was raised in Boise and almost his entire extended family remained there.  We went hiking in the Sawtooth Mountains, skiing at Bogus Basin, snowshoeing in McCall.  When Cam’s parents decided to return to Boise after raising him in New Jersey, we were intrigued.  

Boise, while we loved the place, hadn't been on our short list of possible, more affordable locations we would trade in the Bay for.   Our Idaho trips over the past year showed us a new way of life that was open to us: a slower, more affordable pace of life balanced with a vibrant downtown, a line-free regional airport within biking distance and the eternally enthusiastic presence of college students at nearby Boise State.

Once we opened our hearts to the possibility of life in Idaho, the stars aligned in ways we couldn't have imagined. 

We found a home that we love with a sweeping backyard, tumbling down to a creek with our very own water wheel.  We adopted the sweetest, most precious and adventurous dog in the world. 

We walk along the river, have dinners with family, never worry about traffic, bike anywhere in the city we need to go, and spend about 40% less on our mortgage than we did on our SF rent.  We have a whole new sector of this beautiful country to explore and come to know.  We have a small but amazing group of friends who have taken us rafting and hiking and taught me to fly fish (which, by the way, is every bit as romantic and beautiful and meditative experience as the movies make it out to be).  

Ohana is everything.

My older sister recently surprised me by flying to Boise for my birthday.  If that wasn't a gift enough, she gave me a shirt with the perfect saying on it: "Ohana is Everything."  Ohana, Hawaiian for family.

While Cam’s family is without a doubt my family now as well, it was hard to settle away from my folks and siblings.  

Which is why Cam and I agreed that as often I needed/wanted/desired to visit family, I would.  I’m on the plane to Chicago right now to help my folks move. I’ll be back in November and for Christmas (with sweet Bodhi in tow).  Part of living in Idaho meant that we would have real space for all of my family to visit whenever and for as long as they desire.  I knew anywhere we ended up long-term (if it wasn’t in my parent’s basement, as I think my dad would have loved) I needed my family to feel totally comfortable and at home in my home. I wanted a real guest room and a real bathroom and an experience of ease the would lure them to the Treasure Valley and keep them here for a long while.

Our little mutt is part terrier and part something that will jump in the river after ducks!

I look forward to sharing with you guys a new way of looking at and living the NM lifestyle, from a much less urban city in a stand alone home, which we own, in the mountain west.  While I’ve always been so proud of my Chicago roots (go Cubs go!), it feels brand new to be an adult not living on the Pacific Coast and all that stands for.  My hope is that these new learnings and adjustments will connect us with and serve a broader range of people seeking out a simple, easy, inspired life!

Big Changes AHEAD

Major moves taking place over here at New Minimalism!

Cary here to share the biggest news ever:  Cam and I moved to Boise, Idaho!  If you’re thinking to yourself, "Wait, didn’t you just move?"  You are right. 

Our new Idaho backyard!

Earlier this year, Cam and I moved across the Golden Gate Bridge to Marin County.  This was a really beautiful and really challenging time in our lives.  But I will say that this mini-move was the stepping stone that gave us the clarity and impetus to make our real, long-desired, big move to Boise.

When we first moved out of our rent controlled apartment in San Francisco, we knew, intellectually and emotionally, that leaving San Francisco proper meant we were completing a certain phase of life.  Within the Bay Area's housing market, prices have skyrocketed, and giving up rent control made this move effectively irreversible.  Though it was made far less scary knowing we would be a mere 20 miles north, we would never again be able to afford the type of apartment we enjoyed in the city. 

The baby step of moving to Marin untethered us from life in the city and made us savor the quiet evenings of a non-urban landscape.  It forced us to acknowledge that we deeply longed for a place we could put down roots, build community, and care for a piece of land that would feed and nourish us over time.

We are overjoyed with the opportunity to explore a slower, more affordable way of life.  I am so ready and excited to adventure throughout this new landscape will be sharing with you all the lifestyle tips I learn along the way. 

But, what does this means for New Minimalism?

We are using the remaining months of 2016 to adjust to these new changes and set forth a proper vision for 2017.  And in the meantime:

1) We will have limited in-person sessions: From now through the end of 2016, we have only 10 remaining sessions available with the original decluttering duo, Cary & Kyle.  Please reach out to hello@newminimalism.com if you’d like to snag one. We plan to continue in-person sessions in a new incarnation in 2017.  

2) We are hard at work on our beloved book, to be published with Sasquatch Books in January of 2018.  It’s going to be a gorgeous, full color, photography-filled book about our process and client work.  We’ve poured our hearts and souls into the writing (and now the photoshoots) and will keep you up to date as timing gets closer to its release.

3) We are focused on bringing quality, consistent content to the blog and Instagram! We'd love to hear from you in the comments about what questions you'd like answered and which topics most inspire you!

Thank you dear readers for being patient while we have quietly (almost silently) undergone this transition over the past few months.  If you would like to read more specifically about my move to Idaho (and the newest 4-legged member of our family), I will be publishing a more detailed post next week!