December 1, 2011
This is part of a series of articles that will be published intermittently throughout the year. They are written by HEAG members, but they do not necessarily represent the opinions of the entire organization.
Picture this: You are at Commons (you can do it, D-Siders) just finishing up dinner and mentally preparing yourself for what promises to be a long night: Welcome to college. So you do what any intelligent Hamilton student does and pack a few snacks.
Maybe coffee and a cup of cereal, some goldfish, peanut butter, ice cream or chocolate chips. Perfect. Now balancing your tower of paper cups and plastic lids, you navigate your way back to your table through hordes of inconsiderate freshmen who think it is acceptable to carry on a conversation in the middle of the walkway, rude!
You pack up your snacks and trek to the library. In between Facebooking, online shopping, catching up on your TV shows and a little bit of work,you munch away. At the end of the night, you toss the garbage filling your cubicle in the trash, thinking of the five hours of sleep you will get tonight.
Then in the morning you wake up and grab another disposable to-go cup and chug coffee while running to your 9 a.m. class. Later, maybe some ice cream after lunch and a late night latte from Opus. In just a short amount of time, how many paper cups have you now used? We are constantly rushing around, trying to make deadlines, working all hours of the night, cramming for tests and preparing ourselves to save the world (yay us!).
But how often do we stop and think about what things, little things, we can do right now? For example, take all those paper cups you just used. Think about how many paper, cups and plates you use on a daily basis. Now multiply that by seven days. Now by 20 weeks. Now two semesters for four years. It really starts to add up.
Let’s take this even further. You just finished the best Opus cookie ever, warm and gooey and delicious. But now you have all this yucky oil on your hands (gah!), so you obviously wash them. After washing them you dry them with a paper towel, then head back to your personal hell that is (insert class-of-death here). Pause. How many pumps on the paper towel dispenser did you use? One? Two? Five? Ten? Of that two-foot-long piece you just ripped off, how much of it did you actually use? Did you need all of that? Now apply that to toilet paper and napkins.
No one really thinks about using these products, ever since we were little these things have been readily available. We never think that these things come from trees.
Most of us come from places where we are not exposed to the destruction caused by our demand for paper products. And because we don’t see it, we don’t think about it. Out of sight, out of mind. But it can really make a difference to realize that the paper towel, cup or napkin you are using is made from a tree. So next time, think about it and use a little less. Get a head start on saving the world.