Are you an occasional freegetarian?

In our house, we are "occasional freegetarians".

According to the Urban Dictionary, a freegetarian is "someone who is toying with the idea of freeganism, but still works and pays for things most of them time." A freegan, in contrast, is someone who opts out of the traditional economy and prefers to salvage what would otherwise be wasted.

Basically a freegetarian is someone who gladly accepts free stuff. Haven't we all done that? Someone we know is getting rid of something, offers it to us, and we're interested so we accept.

Where this gets weird for some folks is accepting (or even going after) free food. But again, haven't we all done that? Thanksgiving dinner at family's place, take home a share of the turkey and some side dishes. Not weird, right? Ah, but the weirdness comes in to play when the free food does not come from family or close friends.

Some freegetarians dumpster dive, urban glean, and forage in the wild. I draw the line at dumpster diving. I'm just not comfortable with that. But some folks are, so I'm not judging. It's just not for me.

I do pick berries along the side of highways. A neighbor offered us the opportunity to pick their apple tree, which we gladly accepted. And we also just seem to be in the right place at the right time, when perfectly good food is being disposed.

Two weeks ago, my two daughters worked at a tea at our church, and the nice ladies gave them 3 pies to take home. Yesterday afternoon, my daughters and I served at another tea, and the ladies there asked if we'd like sandwiches, fruit, raw veggies and cookies to take home. Yes, please! (No dinner to cook!)

So, this is what I mean by "occasional freegetarians". We aren't out there pursuing the free food (most of the time), but it's a happy bonus when it does come our way. 

Then what's the difference between a freegetarian and a freeloader? Well, that's like what's the difference between a symbiotic relationship and a parasitic relationship. With symbiosis, both parties benefit. While a parasite just shows up at mealtime, rather coincidentally, every Sunday evening at 6 PM.

For our family, does this ever feel like we're being freeloaders? No, and I think it's because this free food is always offered in generosity, or as a thank you for something that we've helped with. And we reciprocate whenever it's possible. Which makes for a very nice relationship. When I have a surplus of baking supplies and time, I bake a bunch of cookies or pies for events. And then, when I'm bushed from helping out with some event, I'm rewarded with a meal, all prepared for our family dinner.

If only more things in society could work that way.

Don't beat yourself up if you don't have the "perfect win" every time

--or even half the time. 

The "perfect win" is when you find something like chicken, or peanut butter, or ketchup at the rock-bottom sale price of the season, and you stock up so well that you have enough to last until the next time the price is that low. 

The perfect win was when I found full-sized candy bars for 10c each, on the clearance rack. I bought five of them, and on Hallowe'en, we each had one. (Sorry trick-or-treaters, you got the tiny bars, while the family got the full-sized ones!)

But the perfect win just doesn't happen for us all the time. Like this past week. November 1st was my produce stand's big clearance day. It's best to get there when they open at 8 AM. But I had to work. I knew that if I went later in the day (after work), most everything I wanted would be gone. 

So, what did I do? Well, I made a list of everything that I really wanted to stock up on. Then I went through that list and guessed which items would sell out before I could get there mid day on November 1st. I did my best guessing. And I stopped in late in the afternoon the day before, October 31st. They'd already begun to mark down some things, and I could see the stock of other items, that I knew I wanted, was very limited.

I picked up probably 2/3 of my produce stock-up on October 31st. I paid more than if I'd been able to come the next morning, but much less than grocery store prices. Then the next afternoon, November 1st, I stopped in again, and filled out the rest of my shopping, at their great clearance prices. I bought more of some things that I had bought the day before, but now were cheaper (garlic and sugar pie pumpkins), and I added some other items.

I did mis-guess on the 25 lb bag of carrots that I wanted. I didn't get them on Oct.31st, and they were sold out by the time I got there on Nov.1st.

I didn't get the perfect win this time. The perfect win would have allowed me to stop by first thing, on the morning of the clearance. But I did do good enough. And sometimes, good enough is just that, it's good, enough!

I remind myself to take a step back and look at the big picture. Are we still doing well with our budget? Yes! Are we carrying forward a surplus every month? Yes! Am I able to feed my family well on less that the USDA says I should be spending for a family of five? Yes! (Do I care what the USDA says about any of this? No!) Am I satisfied with the balance of time and convenience vs. money spent? Yes! Then I'm doing fine, even without getting the perfect win every time.

When you start to feel like your frugal efforts are just not matching up to your expectations, take a look at the big picture. And remind yourself that your good enough is truly good, enough. You'll have a perfect win again sometime, and you can gloat to yourself all about that when it does.


If you're curious what I bought at the produce stand this week, on clearance and on not-quite-clearance, here's the list: 20 pounds of russet potatoes, 17 heads of garlic, 10 pounds of oranges, 7 sugar pie pumpkins, 6 green bell peppers, 5 avocados, 4 sweet mama squash, 2 acorn squash, 2 eggplants, 2 heads of cabbage and a large bag of mushrooms. (Shouldn't there be a partridge in a pear tree on this list?) And I spent just over $36.