Disposable

Many thanks to Jeff for sending me this article, it's very interesting, and should be very alarming. I try not to get up on my little high horse all that often, mostly because people find it irritating. Just ask Special K, who gets to hear the unfiltered version. But here's something that drives me nuts. What is our fixation with disposable stuff? Yes, some things shouldn't be re-used (syringes and some other medical equipment), but the damage being done to our natural environment should really be greater than someone's aversion to doing dishes. Nothing is ever really disposable - all of this plastic crap that we so carelessly throw away because of our need for convenience doesn't really go anywhere. It stays here - maybe it goes farther away from our individual homes or places of work, but it's still here. Plastic water bottles that people don't recycle (the water quality for which really isn't even better than most US tap water. Yemen or Pakistan, it may be another story), plastic plates, cups, utensils - all of this crap. It's clogging up our landfills, our oceans, our rivers, our entire freaking planet. And because we think "hey, it's just one ___", and because a lot of what we need (food products, for example) come in plastic packaging of one kind or another we don't think of what the damage is. We don't think too much about the toxic chemicals used to make it that leach into our water, that get spewed into our air, that get into our bodies.

I had some cottage cheese for breakfast this morning. Sure, the container says it's recyclable, but most places in the US only recycle plastics #1 and #2, for a variety of reasons ranging from ease of processing to expense to the structural integrity of the plastic after its been recycled to marketability of the material. This container, like many, did not fall into that category. So I can't recycle it - so it's more plastic crap clogging up our planet. I try to avoid excess packaging when I shop, and I try to look for things that I can recycle as well. I try to reuse containers that I can't recycle, and I try to avoid plastics if possible, which it often isn't. But really, our planet is a finite resource and we should take better care of it. It's the most amazing gift we have been given, and we're continuing to exploit it like it's going out of style, despite the prevalence of corporate greenwashing.

I know I'm part of the problem, too. I'm not living in a yurt that I made of twigs in the middle of nowhere, growing my own food, and not using any electricity, fossil fuels, or toxic chemicals in my daily life. I may try to minimize my contribution to the problem, but I know I'm still part of it. So I don't want to sound holier-than-thou about all this.

And now that my blood pressure is nice and high, and I probably didn't state what I wanted to state nearly as well as I wanted to state it, I'll be off.