HA!  You’ll enjoy today’s guest post!  We moved from a small town in NY to rapidly growing Charlotte, NC almost 10 years ago and I can totally relate to Andriana’s frustration over entering the world of “waiting lists”.  I never encountered such a thing until moving to a larger city and boy do I feel for our friend from Hank & JoJo!  {Hank & JoJo socks by the way are still, and I think always will remain, in my top 10 gift picks for baby showers.  Have you seen their packaging??  Go take a look!}  Andriana and her team have one truly remarkable product and we’re so happy she’s joined us today with a story to make you smile, a story to relate too!  Happy Memorial Everyone…enjoying your LONG weekend!

I am officially on every waiting list in Brooklyn.

We moved here from Manhattan in December to make life easier but really, REALLY Brooklyn? You are starting to hurt my self-esteem! As much as I love you, admire your uber-creative and unique inhabitants, and adore your historic landmark neighborhoods, you make me feel like I am just a one-in-a-million mom/entrepreneur/wife tryin’ to make a difference by buying local organic food, composting my diapers, and sending my kid to a progressive cooperative preschool. But seriously Brooklyn, you’re making it impossible for me to live up to these incredibly chic standards, because I just can’t get in! ANYWHERE!

I wanted to join the food co-op, which is a cooperative store where you can buy lower priced, local food in exchange for hours worked at said store. But of course, the one in that other nearby hip neighborhood has applications on hold until they renovate their facility. So, I settled to join the “up and coming” food co-op that doesn’t even exist yet in my neighborhood. And who knows when it will actually open, could be years. (Really. The application says this.) But I do get to be a “founding member” which is really just code for “you were desperate enough to send us money before there’s even a glimmer of a store in your future at which you will be able fulfill all your organic and local produce dreams.” The other option would be to join a CSA (community supported agriculture), which involves monthly fees that would pay for weekly crates of local produce, meat and dairy for us to pick up at a neighborhood spot. But have you looked at those prices??? I definitely do not currently spend that much on food for my family. Do I? I want to be one of those people who buys all organic and local food, I really, really do. I know why it’s important for a number of reasons and I believe in those reasons. But when Pathmark is down the street and they sell a rack of short ribs for $5 versus $25 at the organic store, and you’re feeding a family of four (and your sister who lives down the street), sometimes you have to close your eyes and just ignore the pestering thoughts about what it took for that meat to get to Pathmark. Instead, envision beautiful happy cows somewhere in fantasy-land, put your head down and cook.

Walking home one day I discovered a community garden tucked away behind majestic vine-covered gates. I was so excited at the thought of solving my produce/cash flow dissonance by growing some of my own vegetables!!! I went to sleep that night with visions of myself harvesting tomatoes and zucchini, and then making gourmet, home grown dinners for my husband and children each night. After hours of internet research, I tracked down the garden coordinator who promptly told me (and by promptly I mean, wrote me back practically before I pressed send) that there are 9 people ahead of me on the waiting list for garden plots. But, you can have a key to the garden, they tell me, so you can visit. This reignites many deep-seeded VIP section feelings of worth, or lack there of, of my former life. Yes! I got in! Sort of. Oh but what does this mean? You can enter the garden, and help anyone that needs help with their plot. Oh, and you can use the compost. Great! So when one of my girls blows out of her compostable diaper I can put the diaper in a bag, carry it down the street, and put that diaper in the compost. 5-10 times a day. Easy enough.

We were way ahead of the game by checking out preschools for our daughter last summer who wouldn’t start school until the fall of the following year. Or so I thought. We settled on one in our soon-to-be new neighborhood that was also a co-op (there’s a theme here in Brooklyn). We loved it, it was the most reasonably priced, it had awesome values, done. Except we weren’t the only people who apparently thought so, because we were promptly wait listed! Immediately, the mad desperate rush ensued as I frantically sent in applications to every single preschool within walking distance of our apartment (each application with its own $50 fee by the way). As my desperation grew, so did the waiting lists. Finally, I reached out to several if not all of the daycare centers in our area thinking there’s no way they would have the same amount of competition. Silly me, Brooklyn. I’m sorry I doubted your popularity!! Alas, my first choice, (one highly recommended by several moms in my building) has 125 kids ahead of us on the waiting list. 125.

So here I am, waiting. Just trying to make a difference in the world, but you’re not making it very easy for me, Brooklyn. I want to be all that I know I can be. All the things you have shown me to be possible. To be socially conscious, environmentally sound and supportive of my community, all the while being wonderful loving wife and strong devoted mom. I want to get up each day and pick up my organic food (or better yet, go pick it out of my garden!), and send my kids to a school that doesn’t allow high fructose corn syrup to enter through it’s grass-fed doors. But really, to be totally honest Brooklyn, sometimes I just don’t have the money, time, or energy to keep up with you! And sorry, sometimes you’re kind of stuck up. There. I said it.

So for now, while I wait to rise to the top of one of these epic lists that will surely catapult me towards “Mom and Green Citizen of the Year” status, I will just have to be happy being me. And I am! Scary short ribs and all.