April 2023

At my age, thinking, in and of itself, is often difficult, if not painful. But here I am advocating "Rethinking" (sounds like something my mother might have me do because I screwed up the first time). As any physical trainer would have you believe - use it or lose it. Much of what we do in life has been thought out by us or for us.

Maybe we need to continue thinking about these practices (laws included) and constantly remind ourselves of why they are necessary. In terms of recycling, many of the rules and regulations have been determined by city councils, provincial governments and perhaps federal legislation. Here on Mayne Island, we are fortunate to have a very involved group of people who are determined to constantly rethink the recycling process and procedures and to look at better ways of dealing with many of our consumables and their packaging.

I look at what our Depot does and the materials that it takes in for recycling and I am awed. The past two summers I have been fortunate enough to visit Alaska (fishing). The fishing part offered a terrific recycling aspect - catch the fish, fillet the fish and return the entrails to the ecosystem for nature to do her part as the eagles, gulls and turkey vultures thrive. Enter man (men) up at the lodge and the number of 500 ml. plastic water bottles, 335 ml. beer cans and plastic wrap from our convenience foods and things start to look quite disgusting. I asked about any recycling programs and those I asked made it clear that there was no money in recycling and therefore there were no programs in effect.

In the next few months some of us on Mayne are going to be involved in a beach cleanup. Last year, we pulled a few hundred kilos of waste product from our shoreline. This was my first rodeo, so to speak, and I was told that the amount was considerably less than the previous year. My never-failing faith in mankind hopes that this year will be less than last year. That will likely be because many people have already picked up various pieces of flotsam and jetsam and disposed of it. Wouldn't it be nice if the reason for this year's lesser amount was that there was less garbage disposed of in our oceans or on our shores?

Enough of my "Rethinking". I plan to run it past the Board of Mayne Island Recycling Society that we run a contest in the spring/summer. The contest will allow the people of Mayne Island, particularly those who frequent the Depot, to pick up an entry form and submit their own ideas of how the Reduce, Reuse, Recycle mantra might be "Rethought". I would love to be able to write a MayneLiner article sharing some of these ideas but better yet, I would love even more to be able to bring some of these ideas to the Board to see if any of them might be viably implemented at the Depot. You will have to wait with bated breath for next month's article.