When you reach a certain age, you find you say things about the past and people look at you like you are totally, completely and irrevocably insane. And so it was when I mentioned there once was no garbage service.
Well, WHAT did you do with the garbage??????
What garbage??????
All left over food was buried in a trench in the garden where it composted for the next years plantings. If some animal dug it up, well, they have to eat, too.
Everything that broke was downcycled. Now you know what upcycling is but you probably never heard of downcycling.
Let's take the lowly shirt that finally through stain or ripping just died. That's your garbage. In our world it had several fates. It is was a particularly good design that fit really well, it was cut apart and use as a pattern to make more just like it. If it wasn't, the good parts were cut out put in the quilting bin where it would eventually reincarnate as a quilt. The large worn pieces became rags as this was before the wasteful and infamous paper towels. And the small strips would be tying up tomatoes and rotting the next season becoming mulch. Gardens were really colorful in the spring with plants neatly tied up with multicolored cloths in cute bows.
Machinery was disassembled into parts and the good bits saved for when the next one needed parts. Manufacturers didn't change parts by a millimeter or so every year to make certain you have buy new ones from them. They weren't driven by greed but the need to produce the best product. The bits that couldn't be reused were made into something else: flower pots, stepping stones, the prospects were infinite and to be considered in the winter when you couldn't do much else. Stray bits of metal became hair clips, kitchen utensils and art work. Wood was reworked or burned.
So what did you do with the things you didn't want any more?
You had a red dress and a blue dress. You didn't wake up and decide, I'll toss the blue one and wear the red everyday for the rest of the year because you weren't nuts. You might try to trade it with a family member or friend to get something "new". There just weren't things you didn't want any more.
There were things that were too small, weren't needed like toys and cribs or fit anymore. Those were treasured give away items for which the competition was stiff. It was not unusual to exclaim when visiting, "If you ever decide to part with that, I have dibs on it." Dibs were carefully recorded and honored. Normally, they resulted in a trade. You never remarked, "Oh, wasn't that so and so's dresser." That was bad taste.
So as I watch the 30 something's cruising the garage sales and big garbage pickups to upcycle things, I have to laugh. They think they are trendy. I've been doing that my whole life. Finding the first second hand store was a mystical experience for me. Our secondhand stores were old barns everyone had fixed up where you brought things you didn't need and no one had dibs on and just left them there. Eventually, someone would drop in, need it and take it home......sorry....you were not permitted to leave spouses, small children or mother-in-laws. Good cooks and strong backs were already spoken for.
