Found things that might come in handy
by Michael Smith
While I am definitely one of those that picks up all those things that may come in handy, and in my day job quite a few things come my way, there is certainly one problem with that philosophy. The problem is that one tends to run – sooner or later, and often it is sooner rather than later – out of storage space for it all and things can get rather cluttered.
The things that one can find, however, are, as I have said before, and can be, rather amazing; from the lost single glove or even a complete pair, over other items of clothing and here especially woolen hats, top abandoned bicycles. And then there are all the things in between.
While the “waste no – want not” attitude and philosophy is rather a green one the results of which can rather take up a lot of space and many of us want to live a life that is less cluttered, as this is also seen by many as one that is more friendly to the environment. I am not, necessarily, convinced as to that, however.
Personally I cannot see that we have an impact on the environment with regards to the stuff we have rescued and stored at home for use the “just in case” event. Those items that are – maybe – cluttering up my place or yours and which have been rescued from ending up in the trash and finally in landfill do less harm with me or you than they do in the landfill. And, given time, there may come the day that we can, indeed, make use of them.
Those of us that are recycling craft orientated do, I am sure, have a way or even ways, of turning many of such items into useful things for this or that purpose and even for sale.
I have a collection, as it could be called, of clothes that were found that are mostly children's sizes and I am looking at a way of giving those to those in need. The aim is to link up with trusted folks that will pass those to children that can make use of those and who will appreciate them.
This is one way of dealing with such found items of clothes that one cannot use oneself or that cannot be used by those that we know, maybe.
Other items, obviously, find their own uses and others lend themselves to be recycled into this or that usable thing. All that is needed, as I have said in previous articles on recycling, is the imagination to envision what this or that could be used for.
Only drawback with this all is that, until such a time that either you find what to use it for and turn it into or just simply find a use and user for it, you end up having to store it somewhere. It also requires the time to actually make this or that out of the items that you have thus acquired.
“Waste not – want not” also applies to other things, that is for sure and I can vouch for the clutter that creates as well. There are the computers that I hate to let go into the waste – anyway it all has to go to special recycling nowadays and rightly so – as they might just be upgraded for little money and then be turned into Linux workhorses. As long as the RAM can be upgraded to something useful, that is to say 256MB or higher than processor and processor speed will hardly matter.
While such computers are no longer of any use with Microsoft Windows they can be fast and powerful using the various Linux distros or other Open Source operating systems, such as BSD, for instance. It does not have to be Windows.
It is the likes of Microsoft – and as far as computers are concerned it is Microsoft – who build in obsolescence into computers and other things. Most computers that can no longer run the latest version(s) of Microsoft Windows are very happy indeed running this or that Linux or other Open Source operating system. Does it really always have to be the latest hardware? No, it does not.
But, I digressed a little again...
It is like that, however, with so many things and we can see that day in day out at the refuse centers, for instance. The things that people throw because of faults, very minor faults, is mind boggling. Nigh on brand-new bicycles are thrown away into the trash simply because they have nothing more wrong with them – and now hold on tight – a simply single puncture in the (back) tire. Stereo systems thrown out because the plug on the power cord has been torn off by some freak accident – as someone explained, having been trapped in a door. Erm, so? There are replacement plugs one can buy. We do not even have to talk about cycles with a flat tire. No one can be that stupid as to be incapable of fixing one of them. Well, apparently they are that stupid and also, more often than not, simply too lazy.
Well, as far as I am concerned, if they want to throw such things, although it hurts me to see that being done, I gladly take them and, if necessary, fix them up again, for own use and/or to give away or even sell.
The only problem is, and I said so before, where to store them all before they are fixed and then either put to use or passed on to another user.
In a perfect world people would just not even trash those things and would themselves continue to use them until replacement needed. The “must have new because there is a new one” is an attitude that is killing our planet and us, literally.
I rest my case...
© M Smith (Veshengro), January 2009
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Waste not! Want not!
