Posted by: Trina September 13, 2011

When I look outside my Chicago apartment on Sunday mornings after a weekend’s worth of festivities, the corner garbage cans are overflowing.  I suppose I should be grateful that the trash is properly disposed of rather than landing on the sidewalk, but I wince every time I pass a can.  Does all that trash really need to be created in the first place?

We’ve become a society that generates enormous amounts of garbage.  The average American throws away more than 1600 pounds of trash every year, and I’m willing to bet most of us don’t give a second thought to our garbage once the garbage truck pulls away…

…how often do you think of a plastic milk jug you threw away six years ago?  Do all the pop bottles you tossed during late-night cram sessions in college ever come to mind?  Do you regularly consider how the magazines you didn’t recycle as a teenager are now faring in the landfill?  Like it or not, almost all the trash you’ve generated in your lifetime is still sitting somewhere on our planet, taking up precious space and poisoning our water while waiting for future generations to figure out what exactly to do with all of it.

There are limitless ways to limit the garbage you send to the landfill.  Making meals from scratch is a wonderful (and healthy!) solution – I also make staples like peanut butter and yogurt just to avoid sending more plastic into the earth.  Creative repurposing helps, too – use vegetable scraps to make homemade broth or find uses for empty fruit cartons.  Skip bottled water and beverages and opt for a reusable container like a KleanKanteen (I never leave the house without mine!!).

But, in my opinion the best way for all of us to cut down on our garbage is to tell ourselves “no” sometimes.  NO I do not need that coffee in the disposable cup. NO my kids do not need those packaged snacks when a fresh apple will fill their tummies.  NO I don’t need another tank top when I’ve got six already.  NO I don’t need a plastic bag because I brought a reusable one. NO my baby will not wear disposable diapers when cloth diapers will do just fine.

As I write this post I am sitting outside at Argo Tea Cafe, sipping my favorite iced Green Tea Ginger Twist.  But, rather than using a disposable plastic cup, I brought my own reusable glass.  Yes, it took a bit of foresight to bring it along, but in good conscience I can’t enjoy an indulgent beverage knowing that the cup will sit in a landfill for the next 10,000 years.  If I don’t have a reusable cup on-hand when the urge for an icy beverage strikes, I just tell myself “no.”

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Maureen Smithe Brusznicki is a wife, mother and friend to Mother Nature.  When she's not playing with her kids, experimenting with homemade cleaning products or coo k ing in the kitchen she likes to blog about living a healthy and simple life at Homemade Mothering.  Follow her on twitter and join her on Facebook