I try to create the smallest-size environmental footprint and impact as I go about my daily life. I recycle paper and plastic, but I don’t really know what happens to my own personal containers. The internet tells me that less than ten percent of plastics actually gets made into usable products. That’s pretty discouraging, but I keep doing it because it keeps me aware of how challenged and fragile our current environment is. I feel I am making a tiny contribution to what I think is an important issue. 

Over the past years, I heard people talking about, advertising for, and actually doing composting – which is a form of recycling. During that time, I didn’t think much about it because I have been very committed to eating leftovers and putting very few food leavings into the trash. Still there were always the peelings from carrots, cores from apples, and an occasional vegetable that I found rotting in the back of my crisper drawer. 

Then, one of the fellow-residents at my condo complex helped lead an effort for composting. She became a stalwart advocate because one of her elementary-age grandchildren got fired up and determined to reduce food waste while turning orange rinds into something useful. Pretty impressive! 

She, with a small dedicated group, sent out posts on our building’s communication system, held informational gatherings, arranged for recycle bins with pick-up and delivery, and acquired counter-top pails to be distributed to willing participants. She pointed us to a video that shows what happens to the smelly, gross matter in those little pails. The output of that yukky debris is compost.

I didn’t pay much attention at the beginning of her efforts, but when I watched the video, I had an epiphany. Unlike plastic detritus, I know exactly where kitchen waste is going. That formerly-disgusting mess gets turned into rich soil that can be used to grow healthful things in either my own garden (if I had one) or someone else’s garden. At my more optimistic times, I think of this whole process as  benefiting someone I don’t know and contributing to a promising future. My collected and composted kitchen scraps help grow tomatoes, zucchini, or cucumbers in a back yard somewhere. If the people who grow those veggies also compost healthy plant leaves or overripe tomatoes, they have good things to eat and are also helping to shape what’s ahead of us. What a great vision!

This whole new way of thinking about recycling food makes me feel less guilty if I do put some borderline produce in my pail. For example, I recently had half a bunch of asparagus that had started to get floppy and a bit pale. In the past I would have tried to be imaginative with it – like maybe a soup – but this time, after removing the rubber bands and tag, I tossed it knowing that it would make a great contribution to a nearby garden plot. 

In these scary, stressful times, I hear so many people express worry and frustration, and not knowing what to do about those anxieties. I also get messages from various media outlets to get involved locally. Well, composting is about as local as I can get. It’s in my kitchen. Not knowing what to do or how to be proactive in our fraught times can be paralyzing. For myself, I am surprised and relieved to know that by doing this one seemingly minimal task, I feel that I am putting into action and making real my values for a gentle world and initiating a positive vision for the future. 

Maybe this one action will encourage me to find another seemingly small, but satisfying thing to do, and perhaps another one after that. Then my tiny achievements could start to add up to something greater than anything I can imagine now. I have hope.