We took the 3 boys and one of their friends to Red Robin a few days ago and the kids' drinks all arrived in these nice plastic cups. It was very reassuring to see that Red Robin reminded us that they favored these earth friendly cups because these cups are made with "fewer carbon emissions"!
Now don't get me wrong. I like Red Robin and their food. The waitress noticed the thirsty boys and she gladly asked if they'd like refills, to which they all replied with a resounding YES! Instead of collecting the empty cups, she brought out the next batch of eco-friendly plastic cups!
By the time they were done eating I counted eight empty plastic cups. Eight! I was afraid to ask for a to-go container because I knew I'd receive a big tub-o-styro-foam to add to the jumble-o-permanent-waste. We tipped the waitress and left. Our hunger satisfied.
I'm not an earth-muffin. I wear Nikes and I don't know anything about Tibet. I throw my garbage in a Glad trash bag. Yet somehow I felt a sense of guilt in leaving all that plastic behind.
We had a garage sell the other day and an African man stopped by to ask if he could buy every single pair of our old shoes to bring back to the needy in Africa. My wife let him have them all for free. I thought that was very noble. I thought about these cups. Couldn't the needy re-use these cups too? The cups will just end up in the garbage where they'll sit for 500 years.
Why did these cups have to be made in the first place? Why do so many restaurants and convenience stores serve their items this way? It's cheap and easy. When our garage sell was over we collected the unsold items and I took two pickup loads to Goodwill. I'd estimate that about a half a load consisted of plastic toys that were less than a few years old. I thought back to my childhood when virtually everything was made of wood or metal. I'd challenge anyone to visit a toy store and walk the aisles to check out all the plastic toys. Now I'm not "down" on plastic. I just think that it should only be allowed to be in items with a certain life-span or in life-saving equipment. A cheap 3-foot long plastic water blaster gun that lasts half a summer shouldn't be allowed to be made from plastic (just a thought???).
It's just too bad that most of us don't challenge this way of thinking when making our purchases. I honestly think most of us (including me) are too busy at times to stop and think about the consequences of our actions and our impact, both good and bad, upon everything around us.
