My first attempt was on October 7th, I left out a bag in my kitchen that was titled “self-intervention, please do not throw away”. Unfortunately, my roommate with good intentions, took out ALL the trash including my self-intervention bag. From that, I was worried this project would take longer than expected. My second attempt was a success going from October 8th-October 15th. Looking back on the week, I was able to see where I was doing well and what practices I could work on. To start on a positive note, I saw how using reusable cups for coffee, reusable zip lock bags, Tupperware for lunches, and simple plates and utensils reduced the amount of trash I accumulated throughout the week. Even though I went to a lot of coffee shops this week, the project reminded me to bring a reusable cup each time. And I’ve gotten in the habit of bringing reusable tupperware to school for lunches and dinners so that wasn’t much of a change. On the other hand, a large amount of my trash came from food wrappers which is harder to control. When I go grocery shopping, I tend to buy things like meat that comes wrapped in plastic or I put my produce in the plastic bags they offer at the store. Something I can do differently is bring reusable bags to put produce in. Even though this isn’t eliminating all the waste I accumulate from groceries, it is a step towards the right direction. This self intervention got me wondering what grocery stores can do to sell more things in reusable containers. Or maybe it is something we should do on our part as consumers.
