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Earthly delights
Did you get in touch with your earthly self on Earth Day? My plan for Sunday was to pick up garbage along the street we live on. As it turned out, a whole lot of garbage, from the street, had blown into our yard. In less than two hours, LOML and I filled four large paper yard bags full of leaves and one large bag full of garbage, which he later sorted into blue bins and the waste can. We were going to collect the garbage in plastic bags but, seriously, isn’t plastic one of the biggest pollution problems the Blue Marble is faced with currently? As you can see, I left LOML to do the yard work. But I did busy myself thinking of small changes we could make in our wasteful ways. Changes that would help to make the world a better place next Earth Day. From the start of this year, I certainly have tried to be more conscious of our purchases; how our purchases are packaged; if our purchases were really necessary and how did their manufacture impact the world. And while I was pondering my dilemma with garbage and purchasing, someone invited me to join a group on Facebook. The essence of the group is to ban single-use plastic straws in the Quinte area. I joined the group—but only after I made sure other members understood I was interested in banning more than plastic straws. I figured while the group was about to embark on a crusade to get rid of something that was so forward-thinking in the middle of last century, why not push for more? Indeed, why not ask for the whole pie, instead of a single slice? And, if we’re getting pie, make sure the container isn’t single use and the cutlery isn’t toss-away.
Before the Plastic Straw Ban invite I had embarked on a crusade to eliminate some of the plastic waste in my life. I had already started by purchasing reusable straws, reusable cutlery (for take-out occasions), reusable water bottles and reusable coffee cups. I was on a roll, so to speak and feeling just a bit smug with my travelling mugs. Interestingly enough, most of what I purchased, in my quest for the end of disposable plastics, was made of plastic (partially or completely). What the H E double reusable chopsticks was I going to do with all of that stuff when it was worn out? Rather than stress too much, I had to comfort myself with the numbers. How many uses would I get out of a reusable travel mug versus how many non recyclable ones would I toss, the same with the cutlery and the reusable straws. But the singleuse, plastic straws are the item that is making headlines at the moment. Believe it, or suck it, North Americans use upwards of 600 million, single-use, drinking straws every day. Holy freaking frappe in an non-recyclable container. Enough of this single-use crap is thrown away, every day, to circle the earth four times (don’t ask me who actually does that measuring). Like a lot of all y’all, I’ve comforted myself with tossing those paper cups and straws into blue bins at coffee shops. I was pretty sure, as I took a pull on my icy-smoothie-latte-chino, that I wasn’t the problem nor was my cup and straw because it’s recyclable, right? Well, some of it is, but only about five per cent of it is actually recovered and reused/recycled. What the heck happens to the rest of it? What happens to the 95 per cent that doesn’t make the cut into the recycling world? Think about your answer when you decide it’s easier to put your recyclables into the garbage rather than take five minutes to rinse it, sort it and blue bin it.
Since January, shopping trips of any sort have become guilt trips for me. Should I grab the flimsy plastic bags and put my green pepper into it? What about the bag of apples? What about the black styrofoam trays the salmon was on? What if I bring my own containers into the grocery store? Will I look like a goody-goody? Should I stop buying peanut butter because it’s in plastic containers? What about shampoo and household cleaners and excessively wrapped OTCs? Even with meditation and the medication my blood pressure soared. I can’t recycle stress, but I can buy fruit and vegetable bags that are reusable. I can speak with the local grocers about wrapping meat and deli products in materials that can easily be recycled. I definitely can remember to bring cloth grocery bags with me when I’m out— goodness knows I have enough of them. Baby steps. I can do it.
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