I was just about to toss my Fresh Market grocery bag full of almond milk cartons, tuna cans and yogurt cups into my building’s recycling bin when I noticed someone had tossed an entire Hefty Cinch Sak full of garbage in there. Come on, people, I thought. It’s Earth Week!
Even if that plastic bag was full of actual recyclables, the whole thing would still get sent to a landfill. All because of one well-intentioned, clueless recycler. One bad petro-polymer spoils the whole bin.
This Earth Week, along with my soup cans and wine bottles, I’ve found myself recycling some old experiences, too. Ones that will never go into a landfill.
Back in the ’90s, when I was living in Rochester, N.Y., I put an old HP Pavilion on the curb in front of my house. I set it out on the grass next to a box of Windows 95 floppy disks. With the bulky grey monitor precariously stacked on top of the computer tower, it looked a little like a hungover R2D2 about to do the walk of shame.
I was busy doing yardwork when I noticed an old guy with white hair and a long beard standing by my discarded computer. “Is for sale this computer?” he asked. He was dressed in black and had a thick Eastern European accent. A woman stood silently beside him; I assumed his wife.
“No, it’s free!” I said.
He looked at me in disbelief and said, “I can take?”
“Yes!” I replied. “It’s all yours.”
“Only in America!” he exclaimed. “People put computer on street!” He was on foot, he told me. He had to go get a wagon so he could take the HP home. I promised him I wouldn’t let anyone else take it. He insisted his wife stand guard while he fetched the cart.
A little while later, he returned with a grocery wagon that held an enormous mason jar. He took the jar from the cart and presented it to me like Simba in “The Lion King.”
“Here,” he said proudly. “You give me computer. I give you best in world peach preserves!”
I took the jar and he loaded up the computer gear.
“So … if I have problem …” his voice trailed off as he warily eyed the stack of floppy disks.
I could see where this was going.
“Sorry,” I said. “It doesn’t come with tech support.”
One woman’s trash is some old guy’s treasure. And I got the world’s best preserves, which turned out to be about 50 percent peaches and 1,000 proof grain alcohol.
Another time, I was shooting a piece about recycling for a magazine. While the photographer and I were scouting locations inside the recycling facility, I spotted a bookcase filled with a weird assortment of items.
The recycling manager saw me looking at it and said, “Oh, that’s just our collection of a few of the crazy things people have tried to recycle.” A mannequin. A bowling ball. A trophy that looked vaguely familiar. As I got closer, I realized it was an advertising award. But not just any advertising award. I can’t make this stuff up: It was mine. I’d thrown it out a few years ago when I was moving.
The manager picked up the trophy and read the inscription aloud, “Fuzzy Sex! What the hell is that and why did you get an award for it?”
I explained that the award was for a brochure I’d written for Planned Parenthood encouraging parents to talk to their kids about sex. The headline was, “Let’s talk about the gorilla in the living room. SEX.” “Fuzzy Sex” was just our shorthand title for the awards-show entry. “Sounds good to me,” the manager said, laughing.
Now, as I think about what’s recyclable, I realize that it goes beyond what you can and can’t put in the bin. It’s also about thoughts and feelings, fuzzy and otherwise, which can sometimes come back to life in the most unexpected ways.
The other night, I attended the first Park City Women’s Circle at The Shop. Hosted by local yoga teacher Whitney Reed, the evening was about an idea that gets recycled a lot: authentic connection. To be honest, I was skeptical and more than a little uncomfortable. Be my true self in a room full of incense and strangers?
Yet, there I was; meditating, setting intentions and taking part in my first cacao ceremony. We drank spicy Lococo cacao provided by Park City entrepreneur Anna Bloom to bring about “spiritual growth, healing and connection.”
We did walking meditations and shared emotional insights one on one as if we’d known each other all along. We allowed ourselves to be open and vulnerable. It was enlightening and awkward and wonderful.
In the end, it felt like a whole new kind of recycling. The kind that reconstitutes your soul.