I saw this documentary that was about people all over the world making life better for other people. It wasn’t a film about the environment per se, but about people doing things such as helping kids susceptible to joining gangs in Argentina, and other humanitarian work. It was a touching film, but one portrayal struck me especially hard. It was of a man that started a women’s collective in India and employs them to make products out of recycling-trash that is sent to India from the United States.
Standing in a room filled knee-deep with paper, this man picked up a handful of used sheets of paper and, as if he was discovering a rare flower, he showed that if you simply turn the paper over, you will see a perfectly usable blank side that can be made into notebooks for school children. He said this is such an incredulous way, as if we silly Americans are so naively giving them our perfectly good paper that is only half-used up, when little do we know that we can get more use out of this blessed sheet of paper!
Humbling to say the least.
Now, it is without fear that I say, if we actually appreciate paper more and put into practice using both sides of it when printing from our computers or choosing to not print at all when possible, that this collective in India will still have plenty of recycling-trash to make into notebooks. So get a nice little box and keep it next to your printer to keep a stack of perfectly good, half-used-up paper to use the back of when printing things for personal use. I use paper that inevitably comes my way through work, or my daughter’s school, and I asked the local printer if he had any misprinted paper I could have and he gave me a box. I put an X through the old side so I don’t get confused. And if you take this habit to work and print everything double-sided, well just imagine the paper you will save: Half.
Also, instead of buying notepads for lists and such, I keep a stack of paper cut into fours for when I need to scribble something down.
Paper is the number one source of trash in this country. I did an experiment where I did not take my trash or recycling out for a month to see what added up the most. The compost pile did it’s job for the organic matter, I had half a milk crate of commingled containers (I buy in bulk as often as possible), and the trash can was half full of the usual big bag of used kitty litter and small bread bag of used tissues and twist ties and the like. But I had three bags full of paper (and this still added up even though I rarely get mail after getting my name off many junk mail lists.) If we can cut this down to half by reusing paper as much as possible, why wouldn’t we?
