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The soaring prices at the pump have had a profound effect on practically everyone living in the U.S., probably reaching the four corners of the globe. Fuel prices have an impact on almost every aspect of our daily lives.

Take food for example - something we can't just decide to do without. That pack of hamburger meat and those canned veggies didn't just magically appear in the grocery store. Someone had to grow these products, and tractors don't run on air. Machinery has to be used to grow vegetables, fruits, and the wheat for breads and bakery products. Farm animals have to eat grain that is grown and harvested with diesel-powered machinery.

Even if your food is produced by more primitive methods, it has to be delivered to you or to your market by gas or diesel-powered vehicles. Just for the sake of argument, let's say you grow all your own food in your own garden, using only manual tools. Fine. But where did you purchase your seeds and your fertilizer, and how did they arrive at your home and garden store? So unless all your food is produced by a fossil fuels-eschewing Amish farmer and is delivered to your door by horse and buggy, the very basic of survival is directly dependent upon oil.

Practically every asset of our lives depends upon transportation. Our nation, along with much of the rest of the world, runs on fuel. Even that blood pressure pill you took this morning had to be shipped from somewhere. That coffee you're sipping was flown in from some distant region, unless, of course, Juan Valdez and his burro dropped it off at your home.
The same goes for your bedroom slippers and your pajamas.

We Americans are spoiled. We've had a love affair with the automobile for decades, and many of us drive big gas-hogging SUVs, or sleek sportscars with huge engines. We like speed and power and the freedom of the open road. For too long, we've taken for granted being able to hop in our cars and go wherever we choose. Now, however, most of us are having to re-think this selfish and costly mindset. I know I am.

I used to think nothing of driving across town for some trivial food item, just because I was in the mood for it. I don't do that now. I spend part of my Sunday afternoons compiling menus for the upcoming week, along with a detailed grocery list. I purchase the weeks' groceries in one trip to the store.

I used to pay many of my bills in person, too, running all over town to deliver checks. That has come to a screeching halt, also. I've decided stamps are much cheaper

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