Say It: Don't Spray It

I am program coordinator at the Pesticide Education Project (PESTed).

We advocate for alternatives to toxic pesticides in North Carolina and empower people to make sound decisions about their health and environment. We do this through popular education, organizing in pesticide-affected communities, and watchdogging the state's pesticide policy makers.

Currently, I am basking in the glow of our organization's most recent victory -- the passage of the School Children's Health Act by the North Carolina legislature this past summer. This new law requires public schools in our state to reduce the risk of student and staff exposure to pesticides and several other environmental contaminants. Schools must switch from conventional "spray and pray" pest control to a least-toxic alternative system called Integrated Pest Management, or IPM, both indoors and out. Schools must now also notify parents and staff annually of their pest-management program, and 72 hours in advance of any high-risk pesticide application at school if they so request. This is the first right-to-know legislation ever passed in North Carolina, and boy are we proud.

I live exactly 1.2 miles from my office in Raleigh, and mostly I bike or drive, though sometimes I walk it when I'm feeling leisurely. But I travel to other parts of our state for work all the time, and for those journeys, I almost always have to drive. Sigh. I carpool when I can.

At the ripe old age of 26, I still feel I'm just getting started down my long and winding road. Some highlights of my relatively short history of grown-up-hood include working for a year as an English and computer teacher in Kangding, a small city in Sichuan Province, China, and interning at the Pesticide Action Network North America in San Francisco. I graduated from Stanford University in 2001, where I studied human biology, conservation, and international development, sang with a geeky-but-fun a cappella group, and traveled twice to Nepal: once to take part in a summer ecology course and again to volunteer at a Tibetan refugee camp.

I was born and raised in Rockland County, N.Y., and have lived in Raleigh, N.C., since 2003.

Vandana Shiva.

Travel by airplane.

I hang out at coffee shops on the weekend, sing with an alt-country band, and take my dog to parks for walking, frolicking, stick fetching, slobbering, and such.

My favorite book of late was Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides.

I perfected my eggplant parmesan recipe this summer in the height of eggplant season, and it is pretty great, if I don't say so myself. My real favorite meal is a spicy, greasy Sichuanese eggplant dish called yu xiang chie zi, but my version of that is still far, far from perfection.

I'm a well-educated, idealistic, middle-class, white, long-haired woman who doesn't wear makeup or eat meat. And that's just for starters.

The vegetable garden at the Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, N.Y., circa 1992.

Sarah McLachlan then; Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings now.

The Princess Bride.

Jodie Foster.

Buy locally grown, organic food whenever you can. Join a CSA, shop at your local farmers' market, and/or grow your own food. It's better for your health and the health of the people who grow it, it's better for the environment, it strengthens your community, and it promotes a more just and sustainable agricultural system. Plus, it tastes good.