Here in the UK there is an initiative called Reduce, Reuse, Recycle that has been running for a few years now. The idea is to encourage people to think about the household waste they dispose of, and to dispose of it in more environmentally friendly ways, rather than simply sending it to landfill. Today on the #AtoZChallenge I allocate the letter R to recycle.

I have always been conscious of the need to recycle our waste. It began as a child when my mother was very keen to reuse what she could, and to dispose of our empty cans, bottles and paper products efficiently. Recycling became a way of life, and so it was natural to continue the habit when I moved out of the family home. I was also further encourage (or is that coerced) by my now husband, the eco-warrior himself, Daniel Green.

My husband is so conscious about the need to recycle everything, that he took it upon himself to strip down our old double mattress recently, so that he could take it in pieces to our household waste recycling centre. He wanted to put the metal springs and coil base into the scrap metal bay so it can be melted down and reused, and the fabric part of the mattress could be incinerated and turned into fossil fuel. Mattresses are a pet project for him. So many of them end up in landfill because people simply don’t know what to do with them, and most probably don’t even take the time to consider what their waste does to the environment.

It surprises me that people generally still refuse to accept the need to recycle more of our waste. I mean, during the world wars there was no waste, and every civilian family learned to make use of almost everything they could, because there was no endless supply of simple cooking ingredients, fabric for clothes, and raw materials to make furniture and utensils. During the past 30 years or so we have become lazy because manufacture became cheap, and we had nothing to fear in the Western world. Now, hopefully, the world is changing again, and people will once again become mindful about their waste, and the need to reduce consumption, reuse what we can, and recycle the rest.

Thank you for stopping by, now why not check out my fellow writers on the #AtoZChallenge? See you tomorrow!

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