Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

I believe Jack Johnson states it best in “The 3 R's” song from the Curious George Soundtrack:
“We’ve got to learn to Reduce, Reuse, Recycle”
It amazing to me how easy many people and places have made it for us to recycle, but “we the people” as a whole don’t take advantage of these opportunities. And many of us our guilty, including myself (on occasion), of finding it easier to ignore the FREE resources put in front of us.

For starters Memphis has had curbside recycling program in the city of Memphis since the mid-80s. Growing up my family home was selected as a test-market neighborhood, which supported the recycling project. I was lucky enough to be old enough to tote our bin back and forth from the curb every Wednesday. And it taught me just how easy it was for one family to care enough about the environment to use the bin to recycle our bottles, cans and newspapers.

The streets and recyclable pick-up days may have changed, but my parents are still faithful to the habit of recycling. And when I purchased my house the first question I asked the former owner was when recycling & trash were collected on my block.

And during this school year our religious school is collecting aluminum cans for recycling. In exchange for the money earned from recycling, the kids are able to purchase animals through Heifer International. These gifts help struggling communities worldwide fight hunger and poverty, while continuing the mission of caring for the earth.

My hope is that the kids will take away how recycling can benefit not just us, but those around the world.

My latest adventure in recycling came this past weekend. For the first time ever I attempted to rid myself of some of my E-Waste. It did not go quite as smoothly as I would have anticipated. I thought it would be easy, but after some additional information I was able to clear all the obstacles and dispose of my old dead Ipod and defunct laptop battery. I think we probably as whole don’t realize how much waste we really generate, until we seek out solutions on how to dispose of those electronic gadgets.

If you have concerns check out the manufacturer who created your product or find a local electronic recycling drop off center. But please don’t just toss it in your curbside bin. It will just sit in that landfill for… WELL FOREVER.

Or donate your outdated equipment to your favorite charity. They might be able to turn that obsolete cell phone or computer equipment into recycled non-profit cash.

Again, we should all head Jack’s words:

“If you’re going to the market to buy some juice
You’ve got to bring your own bags and you learn to reduce your waste

And if your brother or your sister’s got some cool clothes
You could Try them on before you buy some more of those
Reuse, we’ve got to learn to reuse

And if the first two R’s don’t work out And if you’ve got to make some trash
Don’t throw it out
Recycle, we’ve got to learn to recycle,

We’ve got to learn to
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle”