Bake Cookies, Save the World

As I understand it, in some parts of California, where people seem to be more aware in general of their relationships to the ecosystems on which we are all DEPENDENT for our very lives, it is in fact illegal to just throw stuff “away.” At least things that can be recycled. When you really take a hard look at garbage, it is piercingly clear that this should be the case everywhere. Before sitting down to write this, I was standing in line at the B&N Café for my mug of chai, and the guy before me walks away with a giant plastic cup of something, with a plastic lid, and a plastic straw, and a plastic container with his just-a-little-warmed-up muffin trapped inside it. He doesn’t take this stuff to go—he just walks over to a table and sits down to enjoy it. And I’m literally biting my tongue not to ask him, “Dude, what is going to happen to all that trash?”

“All what trash?” would probably be his response. Chances are he wouldn’t even see his armload of garbage—just the drink and the food inside it. If he did think a second longer and recognize the trash, he’d probably just say, “I’ll throw it away.” As if there is an away. Out of his sight, anyway, and out of his mind. (You can take that both ways.)

The "throw away" attitude is really a very immature way of relating to one's environment. If you would not want that thing (whatever you are throwing "away") in your own space, then why do you suppose anybody else would? ("The dump" is next door to SOMEBODY's property!) It needs to go back into the supply stream and be re-used, not just become garbage junking up the world (one thing we're not making any more of is land, so using it up to dump garbage on seems like a heinous choice, to me!). If it is not recyclable, then you probably should not buy it to begin with. If you’ve been reading awhile, you know I've started systematically calling companies whose products we have been using whose packaging is not recyclable and letting them know that we will no longer be buying their products if the packaging is not recyclable or compostable. Period. If enough people did that, you can bet every company would change over to "eco-friendly" (and thus LIFE-friendly!) packaging in a heartbeat!

A lot of people will think, "but I couldn’t do that, because I don't want to go to the trouble of making my own whatever," but as I tell these companies this, I keep realizing that if we really DO stop buying this product (this morning it was a package of cookies) and start making our own, not only would it eliminate the garbage problem and probably be even better tasting—certainly fresher and better for us—but we'd also save MONEY! We could bake several DOZEN cookies for the price of one small box of those cardboard-and-plastic-encased cookies. . . become enormously popular giving the extras away. . .and no plastic packaging to garbage up the world later! Instead of getting harder and harder (as I thought it might), it seems actually to be getting easier and easier--I don't feel "deprived," I feel like I'm finally seeing alternatives that are so obviously BETTER that I can't believe I've been living so mindlessly (and expensively!) for so long! I highly recommend it. Bake cookies, save the world.

: )