Green thing

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This is not a blog about gardening particularly, just about the environment, the following was sent to me in an e-mail, and I was asked to pass it on, so I’ll pass it on to you.

Checking out at the supermarket, the young cashier suggested to the much older lady, that she should bring her own shopping bags, because plastic bags were not good for the environment. T he woman apologised, and explained ‘’ we didn’t have this ‘green thing’ in my earlier days’’

The young cashier responded, ’’that’s our problem today, your generation did not cars enough to save our environment for future generations’’.

She was right,- our generation didn’t have the ‘green thing’ in it’s day.

Back then, we returned milk bottles, lemonade and beer bottles to the shop, the shop sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized, and re-filled.

But we didn’t have the ‘green thing’ back in our day.

Grocery shops bagged our groceries in brown paper bags, that we re-used for numerous things, most memorable, besides household bags for rubbish, was the3 use of brown paper bags as covers for our school books, this was to ensure that public property,
the books provided by the school, for our use, 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 have the ‘green thing’ back then.

We walked up stairs, because we didn’t have a lift in every supermarket, shop or office building, we walked to the local shop, and didn’t climb into a 300 horsepower machine every time we had to go half a mile.

But she was right, we didn’t have the ‘green thing’ in our day.

Back then we washed the babies terry towelling nappies, because we didn’t have the throw away kind, we dried clothes on a line, not in an energy gobbling machine, burning up to 3 kilowatts, wind and solar power really did dry our clothes, back in our early days, kids had hand me down clothes, from their brothers and 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 1 radio or television in the house, not a tv in every room, and the tv had a small screen, the size of a large handkerchief, {remember them?} not a screen the size of Scotland in the kitchen.
We blended and stirred by hand, because we didn’t have electric machines to do everything for us, when we packed a fragile item or the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.
Back then we didn’t fire up an engine and burn petrol, just to mow the lawn, we pushed a 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, powered by electricity.

But she’s right, we didn’t have the ‘green thing’ back then.

We drank from a tap or a fountain when we were thirsty, instead of using a plastic cup or bottle, every time we had a drink of water. we re-filled writing pens with ink, instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the 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, people took the bus, and kids rode their bikes to school, or walked, instead of turning their mums into a 24 hour a day taxi service, in the families " people carrier", which cost the same as a whole house did, before we had 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 computerised gadget to receive a signal, beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space, in order to find the nearest pub.

But isn’t it sad that the current genaration, laments how wasteful we old folks were, just because we didn’t have the ‘GREEN THING’ back then.

• 26 Jan, 2014
• 12 likes

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