Valuable quotes

"No person is your friend who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow." ~~



"The minute you start talking about what you're going to do if you lose, you've already lost." ~~



Cree Prophecy - "When all the trees have been cut down, when all the animals have been hunted, when all the waters are polluted, when all the air is unsafe to breathe, only then will you discover you cannot eat money." ~~


Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Misplaced pride, Ignorance is unbecoming...




Vintage 1887 patchwork quilt
In this day of environmental awareness and looking after our planet, it has resulted in many people doing their part to assure the earth is hurt no more than it already has been and with each of us making our own contribution to that cause, we should be able to, if not turn things around, at least halt much of the pollution that's seen today growing worse. So many of the people born into this generation are thinking this way and it becomes second nature to them to recycle and pick up bits of trash and litter as they see it laying around the streets and wilderness. But as good as they are, they have one thing terribly, terribly wrong!
 

This became abundantly clear while standing in line at checkout one afternoon when the young woman at the register peered at the woman in front of me and told the elder lady that she 'should be doing her part'. That that she should bring her own grocery bags, because plastic bags are not good for the environment!

The woman apologized to the young girl, saying she'd remember this for next trip to the store and explained, "We didn't have this 'green thing' back in my earlier days."


The young clerk responded, "And that's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations to come."

The older lady said that she was right -- our generation didn't have the "green thing" in its day. The older lady then went on to explain:

"Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over.
So they really were recycled...but we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day.


Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags that we reused for numerous things. Most memorable, besides household garbage bags was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our school books. This was to ensure that public property (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribblings. Then we were able to personalize our books on the brown paper bags. But, too bad, we didn't do the "green thing" back then.

And if we had a cat, the shredded bags were placed in a pan and provided kitty a place to pee if she had to go. No expensive litters or fancy mechanical self cleaning litter pans using electricity back then.

We walked up stairs because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks. And very few of us had weight problems for these same reasons."

  And she was right. We didn't have the "green thing" in our day.

Back then we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throw away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 220 volts. Wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing.
But that young lady is right; we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day.

Back then we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana.
After the dishes are done...by hand...


In the kitchen we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us either. 


When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not 'purchased for the purpose' Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap. Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.
But she's right - we didn't have the "green thing" back then.

We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or carrying around a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of throwing them away and buying a new pen...and we replaced the razor blade in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.
But we didn't have the "green thing" back then.

Back then we did recycle our outgrown or out of fashion clothing much as they do today, but we also made use of those clothes that weren't fit for wearing any longer. They became patchwork quilts! No buying brand new cotton when there was so much good usable cotton in the shirt with the blown collar or elbows. Or the dress with the stain or the blouse with irreparable seams...or sheets with too many patches became the quilt backs of the 'new' patchwork quilt. 
But she was right, we didn't have the "green thing" back then.

Your ride to and from school everyday...
Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service in the family's $45,000 SUV or van, which cost what a whole house did before the "green thing." We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest burger joint.

But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the "green thing" back then?

Please feel free to share this with another selfish old person who needs a lesson in conservation from a smart ass young person.

We don't like being old in the first place, so it doesn't really take much to piss us off... Especially from a tattooed, multiple pierced, spiky haired smart ass who can't even make change without the cash register telling them how much to hand us back.



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