Recycling Time

In anticipation of Christmas I'm trying to clean out things we don't use any more. In fact, I have a large box full of clothing and other "stuff," on top of which is piled two more garbage sacks full of things we just don't need any more or have grown out of and an additional pile of clothing on top of that. It feels good to send it on to someone else who will be able to put it to good use. I used to worry about sending any clothing with holes in it to Deseret Industries, our local thrift shop chain, but I learned a while ago they sort out those things that aren't wearable any more and recycle the cloth into blankets that get sent out on humanitarian aid shipments. I love that old clothing is not just sent to the landfill. And this cleaning out versus recycling versus saving for a rainy day is a hard balance for me to find. I detest wasting anything that might possibly be useful, which means that I have always been something of a packrat. But I am learning about the emotional price tag of Things. How many times am I willing to nag my children to pick up one of their Things? How many times am I willing to pick it up myself? Can I repeatedly do this without feeling resentful? If not, then it's probably time to donate the Thing to someone else. I'm trying to also use this philosophy in my shopping in the first place. The question goes beyond "Can I afford the money for this item" or "Do I really *NEED* this?" to "Can I stand to pick this up off the floor fifty billion times without losing my patience?" If the answer is "no" then I should probably leave it on the shelf. Saves money.

As part of my recycling I included our resident poultry in the list. A couple of days ago I listed our chickens on a local classifieds website and tonight they were picked up. I offered them for free since they were getting a little long in the proverbial teeth. They're not laying as frequently as I would like, and I'm trying to be practical about the cost of feeding them versus what kind of payback we get from them. And I wanted to start my flock over with a new breed in the spring (we're going to try five Rhode Island Reds). Anyway, I happened to be away from home when we got a call about the chickens. Evan handled it very well, though he called me when I was forty-five minutes away from home to tell me I had to get home right away! I told him to get our next-door neighbor to come be an adult on site when the man came to pick up the chickens. When he arrived he told my boys he had a very large flock of a variety of hens, that he wasn't going to kill them but let them live out their natural lives and possibly see if they could raise any chicks of their own. He also told them he kept quail and something else. And he brought his two very young daughters with him. I'm not sure if he was just telling this to make the boys feel better about the chickens going away, or if he really is providing a retirement home of sorts for them. I'm inclined to believe his story. Now I have to make sure I get their chicken feed put away out of reach of rodents for the winter. This will also give me a chance to properly rebuild the chicken run so it is secure, and clean things out thoroughly to prepare for the next batch.

Recycling feels good.