Waste Not, Want Not

I missed Treehugger Tuesday this week because I was away in Bloomfield. (I saw Gord Downie walking down the dunes at Sandbanks with his three kids, which made me feel like I made a pretty cool vacation-spot choice. Unless, of course, Gord isn't cool anymore. He was at a beach with his three kids, not partying like a rock star. Then again, I was sitting on the beach with my two kids and not partying like a rock star either, so there you go. Sandbanks must be the vacation spot of choice for people who used to be cool. But aren't anymore.)

We spent the week in a small cottage with my dad, stepmom, and two of my brothers (the youngsters, they're 13 and 16, and they don't think I'm cool either). Then there was my husband, myself, my two-year-old son and my one-year-old daughter. It was a little tight, but we made it work. In fact, I never once felt cramped.

This is my dad's style. Why rent a huge cottage when you can rent a small one and be just as happy? As the week progressed, I noticed some of my dad's other waste-not-want-not habits I'd forgotten about, since it's been a while since I lived with my old man. (Or partied like a rock star, for that matter.)

He throws nothing away. Nothing. They should ship him to Toronto to teach us how to deal with the garbage strike. There'd be no need for park dumps and pesticide blow outs if he were around. The man saves leftover tablespoons of homemade dressing in teeny jars to use the next day or add to a new dressing. (He makes his own, since preservative laden store bought stuff doesn't taste as good as throwing some olive oil, rice vinegar, garlic, and basil together in a jar. Obviously.)

I saw him save an inch of tortilla wrap with a smidge of grated cheese inside that my son didn't finish for lunch. He later had it as a snack. (My son, not my dad. Although my dad probably would have eventually consumed it rather than see it go to waste.) Every morning, he made me a bowl of fresh fruit. Every morning, I suddenly decided I was back to being a teenager and left in on the table, untouched, in favour of a cinnamon waffle. He'd doggedly put the bowl in the fridge, and I'd always eat it later.

If we didn't finish a bottle of wine, he'd funnel it into a smaller bottle so it wouldn't oxidize over night. (Admittedly, this wasn't often a problem.) Seriously, he saves everything. At first, I looked on in bemused wonder. But as the days passed, I began to realize my dad is probably the most sustainable person I know. Some might call him cheap. He is part-Scottish, after all. But from now on, I'm going to call him eco-friendly. (I have to admit, watching him in all his item saving glory made me feel a little nostalgic. I still remember visiting my grandpa's apartment as a little girl and there being a clothesline across the kitchen, hung with rinsed out paper towels.)

I think the rest of the world is starting to catch on to the fact that being eco-friendly saves money. In the face of economic crisis, big companies like Walmart (they installed motion detector lights in their freezer section and saved millions) and Home Depot (switching to energy efficient light bulbs proved to be a huge money saving boon) are making environmentally minded choices because of the bottom line. Sure, it would be nice if we all decided to be eco-citizens because it's the right thing to do, but there's really no point in arguing about sizable reductions in carbon emissions, is there?

Last year, a good friend of mine, who works as a project manager for the Humber River Watershed, asked me to be her date to the Charles Sauriol Environmental dinner. The keynote speaker was Ray Anderson, whom I looked up on Google and discovered was the CEO of a company called Interface. Interface is the largest carpet manufacturer in the world. Definitely wasn't enough to give me goosebumps. I was sure the dinner was going to be fun, but listening to the owner of a carpet company in Georgia speak ... well, I was going to drink a few extra cups of coffee after dinner just in case.

But from the moment Ray opened his mouth and began to speak in his Georgia peach accent (can you call a man a peach? Trust me, this man is one.) I was riveted.

He spoke of reading in Paul Hawken's The Ecology of Commerce that industry leaders had the power to change the world, environmentally speaking, and deciding that he was going to. Change the world, I mean.

At first he started small, but none of his changes proved to be thus. Recycling carpet trimmings into new carpets instead of sending them to the landfill saved hundreds of thousands of tons of waste, for example. Since 1995 he has reduced the waste his company produces by a third, and his plan is to produce no waste by 2020. (I don't have enough room to wax ecstatic about all the things he does, so if you want, you can learn about him here.)

He relayed what people always tell him: "What you're trying to accomplish can't be done". His response: "It has been done. And if it has been done, it can be done."

I almost swooned. (Yes. This is what it takes to get me all hot and bothered these days. I'm definitely no longer cool.)

As I walk around the city, watching the garbage fester and wondering what kind of person simply throws bags of garbage on the ground beside taped shut bins (seriously, what is that??) I've been thinking of my dad, and Ray Anderson, too.

It's been done: my dad saves everything, and, in his own words, that's helped him pay off his mortgage faster - and also, reduce his impact on the planet.

And, on a bit of a grander scale, Ray Anderson saves everything, too, and the business model he's operating on is one of the most cost efficient ones in the world. He saves money, while saving the world.

So there is hope. Because if it has been done, it can be done.

xo Marissa