“In this picture I see what every average american sees, a pile of garbage.” This is what I would have said had you asked me the day before our excursion. Today, however, I see something much different. In this photo, I see the future. I see my next meal; the carrots that I munch on at lunch and the lettuce that I put on my sandwich at dinner. What looks like the end of life, in this photo, is in fact just the beginning, thanks to composting. For many, like me, the process and benefits of composting elude us. Yet, when I look at this picture, all I can think about is how much beneficial organic material we throw away everyday. For example, if you look closely, you can see the remains of some orange peel amid the pile. I can only imagine how many banana peels, orange peels, broccoli stems, and other useful material I dump in the trash everyday that is shipped off to a landfill, lost among the pizza boxes and milk cartons. This picture makes me feel lousy knowing how much good material I’ve let waste in these landfills when there was an easy outlet of disposing it right outside my backdoor. This picture is meant as a message. It means to tell us that there is another outlet besides landfills. An outlet that will actually put life back into the earth rather than just taking it away. We need to transform our relationship with earth from a parasitical one to beneficial one.
Thanks for your thoughts, Taylor.
You’ve identified something important: Shifting perceptions of our waste from “trash” to “resource” is crucial for promoting environmentally-friendly practices. But how can we help more people arrive at the same conclusion as you?
-Blake