Saturday, August 15, 2015

This Person I've Become - Earth Conscious

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Having lived in California for the past 7 years, certain things were bound to happen, but who knew they would happen to me.  About a year ago California banned all plastic bags at the grocery store. We were warned a year in advance and then once the law was implemented had a six month grace period to comply.

I, who never cared about such things,  now keep a supply of bags in my trunk at all times. When I go grocery shopping, once the bags are emptied I find myself immediately walking back to the car to store them in the trunk. I ensure that anyone in my house who may shop, also has a supply of bags. This is a new routine for me. The consequence of not doing this is having to pay .10 per bag whenever I shop and I refuse to do this. It seems that many folks think like me, because if they forget their bags they put everything back in the cart until they reach their car.

This new law has made me:

  • Cost conscious - It seems that you shop based on how many bags you have. I haven't seen any research to substantiate this but just by observation I've seen this phenomenon. Also many grocery stores now give you a credit depending on how many bags you have.
  • Bag conscious - Any bag that comes in to my house now has the potential of being reused as a grocery bag; so those fancy bags from high end boutiques, beach bags, or tote bags all now double as grocery bags in addition to grocery bags themselves. I have relearned the art of folding brown paper bags and then stacking them neatly in to one of my tote bags. I haven't gone so far (yet) as to make bags out of old t-shirts though!
  • Environmentally conscious - apparently those plastic bags were wreaking havoc on the environment, killing marine life and generally becoming a nuisance to clean up. In writing this post and digging a little deeper I've learned that those plastic bags are non-biodegradable which means they don't decay; so long term those handy bags cause more harm than good.

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This bag is surprisingly sturdy! I carried one in my pocketbook all the time

And this is a complete surprise to me since I was never a hippie tree hugging sort of person (please excuse my ignorance, if this offends! :)) Changes in the law can force us to change our routine, but other things may do so also. For instance I was recently convicted by my lack focus and I am now consciously working to change that.

Though change may be hard, if it is for our good why not embrace it to see how much better we can become.

The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.The world and all its people belong to him. Psalms 24:1 [NLT]
What new routine have you recently started? It can be anything but I'd love to hear.

1 comment:

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