Cardboard.
“I’m just here to do some recycling,” I told the woman at the booth.
She eyed the inside of my car, eyed me, then eyed my car again. “Where is it coming from?”
“From the coffee shop down the road,” I replied, with a bit of a smile. “No one else recycles it, so I’m trying to.”
“Well, you can’t bring that here. You’ll have to take it over to the scales.”
“I must have appeared to be confused, as she said, “Since It’s coming from a business, it needs to be weighed.”
I deflated. “how much will that cost?” I asked her.
“Well, it’s prorated at fifty dollars, but you can bring it back here and recycle it.”
I deflated further. I didn’t HAVE fifty dollars.
“But five hundred pounds, which that is not, is only about 12.50.” I didn’t even have that much.
“Well, thank you anyway,” I said. “Where else could I take it?
I eyed the sign, which said that recyclables were free to leave at the dump. The woman then proceeded to tell me about a firestation near where I live that had, unfortunately, discontinued their drop off location.
“Can I do a uturn here?” I asked, dejectedly, hoping that at least THAT would be allowed.
When given permission, I resisted the urge to pull into the recycling area anyway and quickly pull out the cardboard, then take off like a bat out of hell. I knew that if I did that, I would never again be able to pull in to take my household recyclables without serious trouble. I went down the road, and headed home.
How is that as an individual taking responsibility for the recyclable materials of a store, where we have no means of recycling these things, needs to pay to do what they should be doing? When I go to the firestations that I have found with recycling areas in them, will I eventually have to move from station to station just to find a place to leave things I am tired of throwing into the trash? Will the curbside pick up pick up all of this, or can I convince the powers that be to have better recycling facilities for those businesses in strip malls? It’s amazing how many walls one starts to find when one wants to do something about their environment. But I’m convinced that there are just as many ladders about that I can use to get over these walls, one step at a time.