Green with anger

As I turned off all the lights in my house last night – except for one, for safety purposes – I realised what I had become. I was an eco-nomist. An eco-warrior. A big green monster.

I think I’m currently driving my flatmate crazy because of my affliction. I’m outraged by the sight of an unused electrical appliance plugged into an outlet. I feel my blood boil if there’s paper in the rubbish bin. When I pass a computer that’s been left on for the weekend, I yearn to flip the switch. And lights – don’t get me started on lights.

While it’s fine for me to be like this (that is: kind of crazy but for a very good cause that I believe in wholeheartedly) I realise that it may cause the people around me some frustration. Case in point: my flatmate, who has to deal with my indefatigable need to recycle every piece of paper that passes through our house, turn off every light that’s not being used and unplug every appliance currently soaking up our precious juice. I think she finds it a little annoying when I accidentally unplug her phone charger mid-charge – and I swear I saw her eyes roll when I whipped out our new eco-friendly cleaning products.

What’s worse, though, is the sense of moral superiority I feel about my too-green-to-be-true ways. When I walk to work, I mentally give myself a pat on the back for saving the world a little (even though I don’t even own a car, so I would have bussed it in anyway). When I purchase ‘green’ products, I get a little smug. And when I start parading around our flat, switching off power outlets, I feel quite satisfied with myself, thank you very much.

Could this be the way of the future? A generation of genuinely concerned enviro-freaks who frequently annoy and antagonise their less-enlightened* colleagues? Should I calm down and relax my pull-the-plug attitude, or should I try to convince my flatmate to follow my lead (even if she’ll never talk to me again)?

* See? There I go again…