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I used to be a “neat freak” – maybe not on the level of antiseptic obsession – but I’ve always I liked order over chaos.  As time and kids have molded me – I have learned to accept a certain level of untidiness. But garbage still bothers me. Garbage is that stuff that is completely unusable – even by the slugs and ants of the world.  When nature’s cleaners can’t handle the mess we’ve made – we’re in trouble.

We live in the countryside so we have a few alternatives that city people may not.  For instance, we are able to compost a lot of our organic waste by putting it into outdoor bins where it will break down into next season’s fertilizer.  We have chickens who love whatever scraps we have left from the day’s cooking project.  We also have a few dogs and cats who do their part to keep our little homestead free from rodents and larger predators who wouldn’t mind a free dinner once in a while. They get the left overs from each meal – and though it isn’t much – they tend to be very appreciative.  We also heat our house with wood, so the used paper products are helpful in lighting the winter’s fires.  So you see, we can reuse a lot of our daily trash.  Yet, because of the way things are packaged, we still have all the plastics, tins, and glass to contend with.  Any stray metals I can usually send over to the local recycling center.  Glass I can sometimes use for storage containers.  But the plastics are a problem.

I know that plastic is a gift to the food industry for keeping products fresh and safe.  I just wish there was a way we could recycle them better.  You can only use so many frozen-orange-juice-containers-turned-into-pencil-holders.  As with many problems, I will continue to struggle with the best way to address it on a daily basis. As a steward of this earth which God has gifted us with, I feel a responsibility to do everything I can, short of filling the world with pencil holders, to make the best use of everything I can. Impossible job? Yeah, but in faith I can even attempt the impossible with joy. Still, every time I pass the mile high garbage mountain on the way to St. Louis, I cringe.  Are any of my orange juice containers up there?

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