On May 6 Greenpeace USA announced that Annie Leonard will take the helm as the Executive Director of Greenpeace starting in August 2014. Leonard is the creator of the 2007 short web film The Story of Stuff, which explores where all the “stuff” we consume comes from, how it is made, and where it goes when we no longer have need for it. She has also spent her career investigating the implications of over-consumption on the environment, the economy, and our personal lives, which lead to “The Story of Stuff Project” and a book with the same title as the original documentary.
The original video The Story of Stuff is powerful and thought provoking, and explores the many downsides to our desire to have so much stuff. From the initial depletion of natural resources, to the pollution and human rights issues associated with production, to the social value we place on unlimited consumption (an impossible goal), to the ultimate accumulation of waste in landfills, the story of our stuff as a linear system is a bleak one. But Leonard still has hope for a better future, which stems from the belief she has that we can break this chain and change the way we consume stuff.
I came across this news (and watched the video for the first time) at a surprisingly relevant time in my life: the week that I chose to, after years of putting it off, clean out my closet.
The project was necessary because after my third year in college I had finally reached the point where there just wasn’t enough space in my room for all my stuff. Imagine that! An entire room to myself and there is still not enough space for all the things I think I want and need. I decided it was time to downsize, and the first area to go was my closet, the repository for all the things I wanted to keep but didn’t need enough to make them easily accessible.
(To clarify, my room has two very small closets—one I keep my clothes in, and the other one exclusively for other stuff. I don’t buy many new clothes and I regularly go through my clothes closet and donate things I haven’t worn in years. The closet I am discussing is the one filled with everything else.)
After watching Leonard’s video, I became suddenly concerned about the final destination of all my stuff—wouldn’t it be better staying in my closet if the alternative was a landfill or incinerator? So I vowed that if I was going to do this, I would donate and recycle everything possible.
What I found was an eclectic assortment. Toys and games I had begged my parents for an hadn’t touched in years; bags and shoes I no longer used or wore; assorted scrap things and craft supplies I was just sure I would need some day (many, many empty boxes); all of my school notebooks, folders, and binders from kindergarten through my senior year in high school; and several beautiful winter coats I had always been too afraid to wear because I knew I would mess them up.
The school notebooks were the hardest. As a perpetual teacher’s pet, I kept them all thinking that of course someday they would be useful again—but, of course, they won’t. Nostalgia begged me to hold onto them, but practicality convinced me to spend two days separating the recyclable paper from the non-recyclable binders and spiral notebooks. I probably had the equivalent of a whole tree in my closet.
Perhaps most importantly, I found two out-of-commission laptop computers—one from 1998 (a donation to me several years later from my aunt, when it was too outdated for her use) and my very first laptop from 2007, which I saved the money for myself and loved until it burned itself up (it quite literally overheated and died) four years later.
In an age of rapidly advancing technology and planned obsolescence, one of the biggest problems we face is what to do with our gadgets we don’t want or can’t use them anymore. They are major investments of resources and money, but a couple years down the road they’re only fit for spare parts.
I decided to recycle both of my laptops. While as a whole they don’t really function anymore, some of their parts are still salvageable, and it would be a waste to chuck them in a landfill when it takes so much energy and so many resources to build new computers. Plus the more stuff we keep out of landfills, the better.
When all was said and done, I only kept about a third of the stuff that was originally in my closet, and then I moved the new stuff in. I recycled and donated everything possible, but still ended up with two landfill-bound trash bags of things for which there was simply no other use. These made me sad.
And now I look at the stuff that is left, and I wonder, how much of it do I really need? I recently read about the 100 Things Challenge, and I wondered, what 100 things would I keep? People always ask the extreme question, besides your family and pets, what one thing would you save from a fire? But I wonder, if you had to move and could only take 100 things, what would they be?
My journals. My books. Probably some clothes. Bedding. A comfortable chair for reading. But really, I am hard pressed to find anything else I need. I have pledged to spend this summer adding as little stuff as possible to my already sizable collection, and so far, besides food and gas, the only purchase I have made is a bookshelf.
What 100 things would you keep? What new things can you do without?
By Jessica Edington