Monday: Trash

Monday's challenge was to "Find out if wasting less improves your life."  The first part of this challenge was to stop making trash.  The second part is to keep the trash I make by mistake or necessity throughout the week - by stockpiling trash, I can see how much (and of what) I actually generate.

This challenge to stop making trash is hard.  It has gotten me thinking about all the small things that accumulate into my trash daily.  Looking at the trash I've collected since Sunday, I see that a lot of it is organic waste.  Ideally I would compost this, but as I live in an apartment without any outdoor space, that is hard to do.  I know that the LES Ecology Center collects compost at the farmer's market in Union Square, but that would mean lugging it over there every week - and compost is super heavy.  At this point in time, I don't think that is feasible for me.  The rest of my trash consists of tissues, the occasional paper towel, and packaging waste (a lot of which goes into recycling).  I suppose I could phase out paper towels, but I'm just not ready to resort to a handkerchief instead of tissues...  The packaging waste really bothers me.  So much food comes in boxes, plastic containers, cans and plastic bags.  And then there are shampoo and other toiletry bottles, vitamin and prescription bottles, etc.  Although a lot can be recycled, that's not really an excuse.

It's almost impossible to buy anything without packaging these days, even while shopping at places like Whole Foods or my neighborhood natural foods store.  I feel good about buying most of the products that I do buy from companies that I think are trying to do the right thing ethically and environmentally... but my new challenge is to take it a step further and try to cut my packaging waste in half.  This means buying more in bulk, shopping more at the farmer's market, ordering less takeout food or drinks (which means cooking more at home, and carrying around a reusable drinking container), learning to make more of my own household cleaning products and toiletries, and ordering less online.

And then there are the perpetual problems of receipts and junk mail... It seems impossible to be truly put on a "do not mail" list.  Although I always call and cancel unwanted catalogs, I still get other junk mail.  Aside from continuing to call distributors to have my name removed from their lists, I've decided to use more of this junk mail as well as the backs of receipts as scrap paper.  I know that the less waste I create, the less guilt I feel, so I guess that is improving my life :)