Zero-Waste For the Win

I stood nervously at the front of a packed auditorium looking out at a sea of cotton-white hair while shining spectacles reflected florescent lighting back at me. I gently placed each prop on the table in front of me, feeling as though I was setting up for a strange show-and-tell to a hundred grandparents. in essence, I was.

I give zero-waste presentations, and while this trendy topic is brimming with millennials on Pinterest and Instagram, I find headway mostly with Rotary clubs and other retirement groups. As I ease into my presentation discussing the Great Pacific Garbage Patch and the endless plastic that chokes sea turtles, beaches great whales, and reaches remote Henderson Island with a population of zero, I see their eyes widen, their mouths open slightly taking in the ghastly images. I move on to my table of goodies and as I hold up each one, I discuss it's importance in minimizing my personal waste. I show off my bamboo toothbrush and my toothpaste jar. I tell the crowd that I have convinced my Dentist's office to pretend they give out bamboo toothbrushes to kids. On our visits they covertly swap their freebie drawer full of plastic toothbrushes for the two compostable ones I sneak to them for my kids. A wave of laughter echoes off the walls.

The props always grab the crowd. Everyone loves a tangible example, and it's even better when the group has the skills to "make that themselves".

I hold up my 'un-paper towel roll' and the crowd ooh's and ahh's. I discuss the importance of refusing produce in plastic and the benefits of befriending the produce manager, who, after awhile, will begin showing you how much waste he too was able to reduce in trying to please his zero-waste addicted customer.

I end the presentation with questions from the crowd, and what I have noticed is that this particular group of retired professionals embrace this concept with the most enthusiasm.

It's reminiscent of their childhoods and just as I felt at the beginning that I was setting up for a show-and-tell, the question period is their time to tell. One by one a hand is raised and a quick story comes out along the lines of "when I was a girl my Mom bought her meat in paper from the butcher", or "when I was young we only had milk in glass bottles." And the stories keep coming. I listen attentively, even though I've heard them at presentations before. I see the excitement in their eyes when they begin to think of how they, too, could cut waste in their own homes. I hold up my jars of coffee and sugar that I filled at our local refillery, and they nod and smile. I hold up the cream I brought in from the local dairy farm and they laugh when I say you can visit the farm for a tour. There is a buzz of persuaded enthusiasm and chatter in the room as I conclude. Once dismissed, a crowd of men and women approach my table to touch and feel the cloth fabrics, to pull me aside and ask pointed questions like "what do you do about take-out?" and always one or two stare intently at the unpaper towels and how they could sew some for themselves.

The reward though, comes a few days after the presentation. It starts in the form of an email from the President of the club.

The discussion continues long after I've left the room, and changes begin to happen:

• The club no longer serves their coffee in take-away cups, and charges members $1 if they don't bring a reusable mug. That's 100 coffee cups per month that are now diverted from landfill.

• I get stopped in the grocery store aisle by a lovely elderly woman who attended the talk and is excited to show me her cart full of plastic-free finds. We discuss alternatives to laundry soap and I show her the items I still struggle with. We cheer each other on and part ways.

• I see a few ladies at a local craft market selling un-paper towels that they created from the design I showed them. They wave me over and want to show off their work.

• An older gentleman taps me on the shoulder on the street one day and mentions that since the presentation he has begun composting because he felt too guilty throwing his scraps in the garbage.

We often hear it's the next generation that will save us, but I would argue that it's this retired sector of savvy individuals that will light the way. They are, after all, the bridge between a life before plastic to a future where we must rid ourselves of it. Seniors are filled with the knowledge of how to create, repair and salvage, and they have the energy to take on the task of helping us reduce our personal waste. We just need to spark their memories and respect their insight, and I promise, they'll change the world.