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There is a space between what we say and what we think, and that gap is never fully realized. But we can continue to try to connect the points, and eventually maybe we can get somewhere.

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Consumer waste is mostly created out of hygienic fear


Today was an especially glum day. The sky was drizzling for the better half of it, and the chill is back in the air. You would think summer would finally be here to stay considering it's mid-May, but alas it is not. Hopefully soon though. So after a few hours of work today, I headed home to watch my new netflix movie No Impact Man. In case you don't know the story, it's about a man and his family and their decision to not impact the environment for a whole year. They do this in steps and stages, but after six months they've already gotten to no toilet paper, no electricity, no food grown outside of 250 miles, no environmentally damaging transportation such as cars, planes, elevators, etc, and many other limitations. The movie, although it seemed very difficult, did not seem very out of reach. The family was extremely inspiring, and the wife, who started out pretty damn resistant, gave in mid way through the movie. It was a movie that couldn't help but make you reconsider your daily decisions: the coffee in the morning in that paper cup, the sandwich wrapper, the TOILET PAPER, the car, and just overall all the garbage. It's astounding when you really think about it. There are so many things that I purchase without considering the consequences, but as human beings (not even being human beings in this day and age) it doesn't make sense for us to not be thinking about the before and after of our purchases. I guess this is me really thinking about making more adult decisions here.

But the most astounding thing about the movie was afterward I was thinking about the couple and visualizing this one particular scene where they're riding through times square on their bikes, and I was thinking they were just being human. And they were- all of the choices they were making forced them entirely away from any pre-developed system, any system that is considered "standard" really in our society. And they were living and making their choices out of entirely natural and pre-societal ideals. They were acting as pure humans- devoid of not all but most man made distractions and "necessities" as we now see them. That was the most inspiring part. They were able to live in this concrete metropolis of a city and be completely harmless and conscious and thoughtful and it was incredible.

I would be stupid to not try and change things in my life after seeing that movie, so here are a few things I'm thinking of doing:
1. not buying any new clothing, for a least a year (bc I definitely don't need any)
2. making the majority of, if not all, of my household cleaning products and body products (such as laundry detergent, body lotion, etc)
3. only eating out if it's at a place that uses recyclable dishware (I'm talking metal utensils and ceramic plates, not "recyclable" paper plates and plastic utensils that I take home and reuse for a couple days)
4. buying as much as I can from the farmers market
5. trying to convince my roommate to let us have a compost bin :) - we can keep it on the fire escape, yeah?

So wish me luck!

1 comment:

  1. talk to me senorita I have suggestions for your suggestions

    ReplyDelete