Last week kept me pretty busy and I didn’t get a chance to post much. I took advantage of the warm weather at the beginning of the week and started the cleaning work on the larger of the two buildings. I am amazed that there were once people living in that amount of garbage. The most recent denizens of the site are the feral cats. They have discovered places to sleep and have used much of the old clothes and junk lying about as their litter box. That has left me with a dilemma. I hate to see anything go into a landfill, if there is anyway to recycle it. There are, however, at least 5 or six contractor’s bags full of old clothes. I was able to separate some that were safely tucked away and kept clean, but most are soiled, and smell of animal urine. What do I do? I would like to clean them all and donate them. When push comes to shove, though, it is unclear if they are even usable if I clean them. I do not have the time to wash, fold, and evaluate so much clothing. The amount of water involved in getting them even reasonable clean is probably enough to support a third world country. Top that with the fact that there is no running water at present at the site and the logistics become impossible. I managed to fill one entire room with nothing but garbage. I took a carload or recyclables to a city drop off spot. There is a bit more. I have found a company that will recycle mattresses, and there are about three in the building. What to do with the rest? In our own home, we generate less than a bag of garbage a week. I am unable to reconcile the fact that there is enough landfill at this site to equal over two years of our personal trash. This doesn’t address the building materials or demolition stuff that cannot be recycled-that is a part of the rehab project. This is just the trail of waste left behind by former tenants. It angers me. Not only have they left a mess for me to clean up, but all this could have been reused if someone had picked up a phone and called the Salvation Army. So, we are left to pick up the slack for those who can’t be bothered to make an effort. It makes me wonder what more I could be doing in my own home. Is there something more that I could be doing to divert trash from a landfill? Is there one more thing that I could be recycling or reusing to break the chain or close the loop? What about you? If those of us who are being responsible are making up for everyone who isn’t. we have to be diligent and go that extra mile, because for everyone who is reducing, reusing, and recycling there are surely several others who are doing none of the above.
Tags: environment, recycling, trash
Hello! I am one of your neighbors in the EcoVillage. I’ve been following your progress off and on and wanted to comment on the clothing/trash issue: you are right – you will not be able to get that stuff reasonably clean without a major input of resources. Better off trashing it. My cat peed on some clothes and we didn’t find out right away, and I think we had to wash them four times to get the smell out. And that included using massive amounts of baking soda, and line drying to use the natural freshening power of the air and sun etc. etc.
Anyway, best of luck! And don’t get too hung up on the trash issue. You will find quite a bit of it around here. Just look over the bridge down to the train tracks. We also have an illegal dumping problem, especially in the empty lots and alleys.
[...] fill it in less that 3 hours. I am still sick about all that garbage, but I won’t rehash that story. Just as a teaser, here are some of the images from the building that will be our offices: Main [...]