Tosh Sivertsen came into the world during a home birth attended by a midwife, and then slept in the family bed for years. “Baboons don’t put their babies in another tree, right?” joked his mom, Linda. The goal was to raise Tosh as close to nature as possible, despite living in L.A. His diapers were made of cloth, his diet was (and still is) organic (he didn’t eat a piece of meat, dairy or sugar until he was almost 5), and his days were spent mostly playing outdoors.In 1994, when Tosh was 4, the family moved to 360 acres in the forest of New Mexico, where his parents built their own eco-friendly home. Life in a solar house off the grid—meaning without running water, piped in heat, telephone lines, or toilets—was an adventure.
Tosh’s only siblings (and some of his best friends) were his pack of dogs; visitors called him Mowgli the Jungle Boy as they watched him streaking naked through the snow in his little black cowboy boots, trek through the hills hunting for arrow heads, study the movement of birds and small animals for signs of danger, gather and eat in-season pine nuts, and collect dead wood for the family cook stove. Other than worrying that a snake would bite him in the you-know-what while sitting in the dark outhouse, life for Tosh under the big blue New Mexico skies and bright stars was mostly idyllic.
Tosh attended a two-room schoolhouse with a total of 17 students of all ages, and his after-school sports “program” was hitting baseballs, tennis balls, and golf balls as far as the eye could see into the sagebrush beyond their driveway. He and his parents studied with a Native American Medicine Man and learned to walk lightly on Mother Earth. “It’s easier to see your footprints when they’re literally in the grass or clay beneath you,” he says.
But while conserving resources is easy in such a purified place, Tosh would soon learn that life in the city gets a little complicated. In the 4th grade he moved back to L.A. for the school year. That’s when he discovered flush toilets. And carpet! And malls! Right away it was impossible for him to hide his love of long showers and easy access to most anything—especially video games and fast food. That’s when the daily conflict between being green and being comfortable would rage. Some days he’d lose the war and find himself being a “lazy, junk-food-eating slug”(that’s a technical term, by the way), and other days he’d lecture his friends about how crazy wasteful they were. Welcome to the green teen life.
At age twelve, Tosh followed his father into acting; he’s done mostly national commercials and even a little modeling. Today he works hard to do all the stuff that most teens love—sports (he loves working out and playing tennis), gaming, cruising around in his used Honda—and keep his footprints light by biking, line-drying his clothes, thinking a little harder before buying something, and growing “crops” like cucumbers, tomatoes, corn, and lettuce instead of the standard flowers/shrubs of their planned community.
“It’s still a balancing act,” Tosh admits, “but isn’t it for everyone? We all want comfort. We all want to fit in. In truth, we’re all a little spoiled—at least in my generation. But things are changing fast and it’s becoming so much easier. It’s amazing to me that the way I was raised is becoming the ideal. My mom’s friends—the ones who used to laugh at her while throwing their glass bottles in the trash in front of her at parties—are now recycling and asking us for advice! My friends who used to liter and hassle me for taking bottles home to recycle are now telling me that they’re sorry and have changed their ways. How cool is that?!”
Today Tosh lives with his mom in Los Angeles, and is looking forward to college and owning an electric sports car or better—preferably one of the hydrogen fuel cell cars that “pees water!”
Tosh’s only siblings (and some of his best friends) were his pack of dogs; visitors called him Mowgli the Jungle Boy as they watched him streaking naked through the snow in his little black cowboy boots, trek through the hills hunting for arrow heads, study the movement of birds and small animals for signs of danger, gather and eat in-season pine nuts, and collect dead wood for the family cook stove. Other than worrying that a snake would bite him in the you-know-what while sitting in the dark outhouse, life for Tosh under the big blue New Mexico skies and bright stars was mostly idyllic.
Tosh attended a two-room schoolhouse with a total of 17 students of all ages, and his after-school sports “program” was hitting baseballs, tennis balls, and golf balls as far as the eye could see into the sagebrush beyond their driveway. He and his parents studied with a Native American Medicine Man and learned to walk lightly on Mother Earth. “It’s easier to see your footprints when they’re literally in the grass or clay beneath you,” he says.
But while conserving resources is easy in such a purified place, Tosh would soon learn that life in the city gets a little complicated. In the 4th grade he moved back to L.A. for the school year. That’s when he discovered flush toilets. And carpet! And malls! Right away it was impossible for him to hide his love of long showers and easy access to most anything—especially video games and fast food. That’s when the daily conflict between being green and being comfortable would rage. Some days he’d lose the war and find himself being a “lazy, junk-food-eating slug”(that’s a technical term, by the way), and other days he’d lecture his friends about how crazy wasteful they were. Welcome to the green teen life.
At age twelve, Tosh followed his father into acting; he’s done mostly national commercials and even a little modeling. Today he works hard to do all the stuff that most teens love—sports (he loves working out and playing tennis), gaming, cruising around in his used Honda—and keep his footprints light by biking, line-drying his clothes, thinking a little harder before buying something, and growing “crops” like cucumbers, tomatoes, corn, and lettuce instead of the standard flowers/shrubs of their planned community.
“It’s still a balancing act,” Tosh admits, “but isn’t it for everyone? We all want comfort. We all want to fit in. In truth, we’re all a little spoiled—at least in my generation. But things are changing fast and it’s becoming so much easier. It’s amazing to me that the way I was raised is becoming the ideal. My mom’s friends—the ones who used to laugh at her while throwing their glass bottles in the trash in front of her at parties—are now recycling and asking us for advice! My friends who used to liter and hassle me for taking bottles home to recycle are now telling me that they’re sorry and have changed their ways. How cool is that?!”
Today Tosh lives with his mom in Los Angeles, and is looking forward to college and owning an electric sports car or better—preferably one of the hydrogen fuel cell cars that “pees water!”
Linda Sivertsen wasn’t raised like a jungle baby (she slept in a crib, with footsy pajamas), but her mom was the greenest mom in their town in Northern California. During summer droughts, Mom would take buckets of Linda’s bath water to the front lawn, and when it did finally rain, theirs would be the only sudsy yard in town! Linda admits that her parents’ passion for the earth was sometimes embarrassing—especially when she had to bring her funky health-food lunches to school while everyone else ate white bread with yummy fake cheese! But good habits die hard, and she’s grown to be even more dedicated to eco-friendly living than her mother in some instances. “With her distaste for germs, I can’t see Mom for a minute living without running hot water!” 
