Live and Learn

Our experiment in living without new plastic has been going swimmingly,

but what would it be without a few lessons along the way?

Such as, don’t assume ones favorite restaurant has eco friendly to-go-ware.

I felt sick bringing home all this styrofoam with leftovers from a rare dinner out. Ever practical and searching for meaning, I looked for the lesson in the disaster. Apparently this week’s take home message is something along the lines of Always Be Prepared. Or maybe it’s to get out of the house more often.

I’ve trained myself to always have canvas bags filled with an assortment of small muslin sacks, a couple jars, and a plastic squeeze bottle at the ready in the back of the Suby when I’m out and about. To that stash I’ve added a tiffin for situations like the one above. For good measure my purse now houses a set of silverware wrapped in a napkin. Some folks even carry a glass drinking straw, but I can’t imagine what would happen if my Favorite Pickpocket got ahold of that. Oh, and if you’re in the market for a new one, a mason jar with a sock cozy makes a splendid travel mug.

Our ways are changing, slowly but surely, and it’s encouraging to see the new ways taking hold. The experience of accepting food in styrofoam felt like a threshold moment, right on the brink between who we’ve been and who we are becoming. My hope is that it never happens again, but in the meantime it offered a reminder that lest we get too smug about our good deeds, there are many more habits from a lifetime of careless complacency waiting to be cracked open and remade.