Un-Eco Bag

I had a major realization today or an epiphany you could say. It happened in the simplest of places and during the most mundane situation.

There I was, pulling the trash out from under the sink, when my plastic shopping bag stash exploded, yet again, and I was forced to clean up the mess. Ever since I was a child I honestly can't say I've been to a house that didn't have at least 20 plastic shopping bags stashed away somewhere. Even with the advent of Eco bags, there are still plenty of times when you find yourself in a store, unprepared, and saddled with plastic bags.

So what was my epiphany you may be asking? It was this: what's the point of an Eco bag? Isn't it just a waste. The things that make an Eco bag different from the plastic bags stashed in our house is that they are small, lightweight, compressible, and reusable. Wait a second. Aren't plastic bags from the grocery store all of these things.

I think they were originally termed disposable when they were invented, which was ironically around the time DDT was banned (well 5 years later). That was at a time when environmentalism was still young. I'm pretty sure they can be reused as most of us reuse them for trash, but we don't have enough wastepaper baskets to keep up with the number of bags we bring home.

I often find myself using plastic bags because I over-shop and can't fit everything in my bag. So here's my suggestion, instead of buying an Eco bag, which is kind of a waste considering we have all of these bags lying around, why not carry around a shopping bag or two.

The simplest, most energy efficient way to recycle is to use something in the same form that it's already in. Creating something new, ie. an Eco bag to replace this simply wastes energy, resources, and time.

So instead of jumping on the green bandwagon and buying a lot of new products to save the environment, remember the most important thing is to not waste and the easiest way to do this is to take a little time and think about what you really need and what you can find to fulfill that function with what you already have.

I inlcuded a few videos to show some other ways to use your bags.