I never considered myself a New England Yankee per se. Rather, I thought of myself as a northern born child of New York City transplants. Growing up in Vermont and New Hampshire I was constantly reminded that to be considered a native, you needed to have several generations in the local graveyard.

“But I was born here,” I’d insist.

Which, of course, always brought the old adage, “Ayah, but if my cat had kittens in the oven, I wouldn’t call ‘em muffins.”

It really didn’t matter. I didn’t fit the bill anyway. I was much too gregarious never answering questions with a single syllable when I could give a long winded monologue. I gave extensive directions to out of staters and conversed with complete strangers in the supermarket.

I grew up as part of the disposable generation, throwing away used or slightly worn products and purchasing new ones (unlike my mother, who carefully folded and saved tinfoil as well as twist ties from bread wrappers.) “Prudent,” she called it. “Weird,” I thought.

And then one day, as I was mowing the lawn, it hit me: I’d become a real Yankee in my middle age. The epiphany occurred when I realized that instead of taking my usual walk or jog that day, I chose to get my exercise by mowing the lawn. How Yankee of me!

And there was more: I realized that somewhere in my forties, with tens of thousands of dollars in tuition bills looming, I’d become frugal. I found myself actually saving the rubber bands that held the broccoli stalks together and finding countless ways to recycle and cut back.

This was something I feared some folks in my affluent community would never tolerate. So I decided to call it something else. I told my friends and neighbors that I’d “gone green.”

Mowing my own lawn is a great way to stay fit, I tell them. Practices such as mulching my garden with grass clippings, using compost for fertilizer (I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that Prince Charles does the same thing), and recycling copper pipe scraps (left over from when we built our house) into plant supports are all good for the environment.

Frugal was lowbrow, but green? That was socially acceptable. With Hollywood stars like Brad Pitt and George Clooney driving hybrid cars to help rescue the environment, I found myself suddenly on the cutting edge of shi shi.

I saved a bundle by firing my lawn care company and applied worm castings in a hose sprayer to keep my grass green without the use of chemicals. In fact, I’m now looking for ways to eliminate as much of my lawn as possible. It’s all the rage.

I know I’ll have to be careful so as not to go too far. While driving to work one day, I heard a piece on NH Public Radio about a woman who was taken to court for hanging her clothes outside to dry because her neighbors felt it devalued their homes. It appears that Americans will only go green until it affects their wallets, and then all bets are off and the environment be damned.

But I think my frugality is catching on. I spotted two large barrels in front of the house down the street, hooked up to the gutter drains to collect rainwater. Surprisingly, it didn’t look strange at all. Not for a moment did I think, “That cheapskate, why doesn’t he just pay for town water like the rest of us?” On the contrary, my first impulse was to find out how he made the devices and then try the same thing myself next summer. That way when the inevitable water ban goes into effect, we’ll have reserves to keep the garden alive.

And so it behooves us all to be “Green Yankees” finding ways to be ecologically kind and, yes, saving a few bucks as a benefit along the way. My mother always used to say “just because you have money doesn’t mean you have to spend it.” The old girl knew what she was talking about. After all, there’s also such as thing as New York Yankee.

By Susan Ferber, Master Gardener