We are human, and most of us grew up in the USA, better off than other countries. So things came easier, and we have more possessions and spendable funds. Most of us do better than our parents did at our age. Ok, so that's not a bad thing, but we also dispose of things faster than our parents and grandparents did. I remember my mother saving aluminum foil so she could use it again. My father would never just throw a fan away when it broke, he'd repair it, or at least try to. My grandparents would never throw food away, they fed it to their pigs, or they compost it for the garden. When I work on a car or truck, before I throw away a bolt or nut, I check it to see if it is reusable. That is recycling.
I am going to repeat what you may hear on the news, we are killing our world with pollution. Whether it be chemicals, plastics, carbon monoxide, construction trash or space junk. Yes, space junk.
In 1956 when the first satellite, 'Sputnik' was launched, it had the whole sky all to itself. Today there millions of pieces of debris and satellites zooming around coming close to other orbiting objects. Do you remember the short lived 1979 (if you are older like me) TV series "Savage 1" starring the late Andy Griffith? He and his team went into space and captured space junk to sell it for scrape. Well, they are trying to do that again. Go figure. I wonder where they got that idea.
One thing that burns my backside is someone tossing a cigarette butt out the car window, or gum, or take-out food and drink containers. I have even seen people empty their ashtray at a stop light. Can they not do that at home? Billions of dollars are spent annually collecting and disposing of trash and garbage.
To make things worse, if your TV, camera, radio, refrigerator breaks, it may be more expensive to get it repaired than to buy a new one.When our daughter was buying appliances to replace the old ones, she ask the salesperson, "I want one that will last for 20 years like my Mom's did." Car manufacturers rate their cars to last for 7 years before owners trade or sell them. Why? Because the one you bought 7 years ago is broken and it may cost more the repair than to buy a newer one, which gives you piece of mind. And at a shop rate of $175 an hour, that does not take long.
We ALL love our conveniences and working possessions, but we hate trash and garbage, so just toss out with the garbage truck, right? Yes it is more work to recycle, and compost, and walk instead of drive, and keep a litter bag in your cars etc. But it helps.
Nancy and I resolute in conserving our part of the earth. We recycle almost everything we would trash, we collect rain water for plant instead of using groundwater, we are looking at electric vehicles in the near future (I am planning to build one), Nancy composts yard trash and food scraps for her garden, and I even recycle fluids from cars I work on. Our entire garbage consist of one 30 gallon garbage bag a month. Everything else is recycled. Our home is 60-70% solar powered. We have no grass to mow and all of our home lighting is LED. Not bragging, just doing our part.
Next time you think about not conserving, look around at all the trash laying on the streets and highways and reconsider. Do you part for the earth. Take care and stay safe with a vaccination.
No comments:
Post a Comment