The traditional view of a superhero may change for Tufts students upon reading The Adventures of Green Girl, a blog in which freshman Lily Berthold-Bond trades in x-ray vision and a cape for eco-friendly shampoo and herbal tea in order to prove that it is easy being green.
Berthold-Bond has created a blog on Care2.com, an online community meant to serve those interested in green living, health, human rights and the environment. The freshman's site deals with her experiences living an environmentally friendly lifestyle as a college student and the benefits that it has brought to her health and well being.
Berthold-Bond's exposure to green living can be attributed to her mother Annie Bond, executive editor of the green living section of Care2 and renowned expert in non-toxic lifestyles. Bond was chemically poisoned in her mid-20s, causing her to become extremely sensitive to chemicals. As a result, her daughter was reared in a household only employing all-natural products and rejecting the commercial lifestyle.
Growing up in a chemical-free zone made Berthold-Bond's lifestyle different from those of most children. Regular shampoo was not used in her hair, artificially dyed foods were not found on her plate and fragrance did not perfume her clothing. If she had even been in the presence of a friend wearing perfume, she was immediately required to change and wash her clothes.
Throughout her eccentric childhood, Berthold-Bond was sometimes embarrassed by her chemical-free lifestyle. When her friends would come over, they didn't understand why they couldn't use their own shampoo or deodorant.
"Whenever I would go on school trips, I would get a little bottle of Herbal Essences and be able to use it for about three days and think it was the best week of my life," Berthold-Bond said.
Upon arriving at college, Berthold-Bond realized that she could make her own choices about beauty products and food choices and this time, she willingly followed in the footsteps of her mother and led a chemical-free, eco-friendly lifestyle.
"I just decided that it was my life and I was going to try to make it last as long as I could," she said.
The idea of Berthold-Bond's blog was born a few years ago with the plan to create a mother-daughter journal in which Berthold-Bond protested the chemical-free lifestyle and Bond preached the benefits. The freshman's and her mother's writing styles were too different for the idea of a shared journal to take off, however.
After the concept of the blog had gathered some dust, representatives from Care2 approached Berthold-Bond again in the hopes that she would be the eco-friendly voice and activist for the next generation - college students. After going through the editing process, the Green Girl blog was born on the Care2 Web site in mid-January.
On the blog, Berthold-Bond deals with environmental health issues that are pertinent to college students.
In one entry, she investigates the best placement for a dorm refrigerator in order to escape the potentially harmful electromagnetic fields that they emit.
Another entry examines the benefits of tea over the college student's beloved cup of coffee.
Throughout her blog entries, Berthold-Bond examines the dangers of chemical beauty products and suggests eco-friendly alternatives.
On the Care2 Web site, Berthold-Bond's blog has met success and has become one of the most frequently read sections of the site. Readers range from college students to mothers of young children.
Berthold-Bond has found the environmental routine easy to follow at Tufts, given a good deal of preparation: She and her mother were very conscientious when shopping for her dorm, buying everything from a laptop shield to a stainless steel water bottle.
The freshman also said the community at Tufts is accepting of and enthusiastic about her environmental views.
"A lot of my friends are even starting to change some of their habits, which is really cool," she said.
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