Remember this dialogue in The Graduate (1967)?
Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just one word.
Benjamin (played by Dustin Hoffman): Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Benjamin: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: Plastics.
Benjamin: Just how do you mean that, sir?
Back when The Graduate was first released, plastics were mysterious, and to me, then a business studies undergraduate, it was plausible that they would yield a promising business career, if not in Ireland, certainly in America! Now after over 40 years of development, plastics have given us bulletproof vests, credit cards, slinky spandex pants, and have led to breakthroughs in medicine, aerospace engineering, and computer science.
But now it seems everyone is about to collapse into a “wrist slittlingly depressed” mood because the flaw with plastics is that they last and last, even when we want them to disappear! Solutions besides wrist slitting please? Anyone? Anywhere?
When we were in Ireland last, we were surprised to be told at the checkout in Spar at The Glebe in Donegal that we would have to pay for plastic bags. After that we always brought reusable shopping bags with us when we went grocery shopping there! Ireland calls this charge on plastic shopping bags at checkouts a “Plastax”. An awareness of plastics in the environment has been created by the charge (more) Instead of being filled with gloom about plastics in landfills and in the ocean, the Irish have begun to get interested in reducing the amount of plastic that they themselves throw away. And recycling has been added to the already long list of topics which you can bring up “for a chat” by the fireside or over a pint of Guinness!
Recycling plastic is so necessary and at the same time provides endless opportunities for being creative. I saw a dog on a leash made of plastic bags two days ago in Desert Hot Springs. OK, I must admit I thought that that was a bit extreme, but why not do that? At Home Grown Food Network we are growing potatoes in recycled garbage bags! Air Bear, is an example of Garbage Bag Sculpture (watch video here). And you can find at least 20 ways to re-use plastic bags over and over again here.
I have not even touched on reusing plastic containers such as milk or yogurt cartons. The gardening trend is to re-use them in the yard, especially in areas where water is scarce, and ideas abound for doing so creatively. As a word of caution here, Home-Grown Food Network has discovered that this could be more difficult for low income people in an urban environment. Low income people frequently get discriminated against for being untidy when they use recycled materials in their yards (more).
I planted six new tomato plants today in tins that canned tomatoes were shipped in. As a gardener growing my own food and a responsible citizen reusing a container to grow them in, I felt calmer about the plastics “crisis”- I was taking action to play my own part in the solution to this global problem. Back in 1967 I could never have imagined that it would one day become socially responsible to start tomatoes growing in a can that was used to ship tomatoes in instead of throwing that container in the landfill.
Maybe this is why Dustin Hoffman asked Mr. McGuire “Just how do you mean that, sir?”
Peter Naughton-Manager, Home-Grown Food Network.
Filed under: Flower Power 2009, Gardening for the Baby Boomers, Growing tomatoes in the desert, Partnering with Nature, Potatoes, Renewal, Teach your children, YAWNS, mobile home park rules, recycling in the yard
