Books in the trash can

A couple weeks back, I was talking to my friend Phyllis. I don't remember how the subject came up but she was telling me how when she was a kid, she and her friends would walk downtown (Kalamazoo) after school got out. They would stash their school books in the trash can, ask the local police officer to keep an eye on them, and head to the local soda shop for a drink.

Now...you might think this story would provoke me to talk about how sweets were viewed as treats during the time P grew up or...that it was wonderful how much activity the kids got so they could actually calorically afford to go to the soda shop...

But those are not the things that struck me first while she was telling the story.

What I got hung up on was that she stuck her school books in the trash can -- GROSS!!
When I asked her about this ("Didn't anyone ever dump something on them???") She said it was always fine because they didn't used to have trash like we do today. Hmmmm....that got me thinking.

How would your today have been different if...

1. you had to either make your coffee and drink it at home (no travel mugs or cup holders in the cars)

2. you had to go to the diner and sit and drink your coffee there (and possibly eat your breakfast sitting down at a table .. gasp!) because you just didn't drive thru back then. And paper cups and plastic wrap were not plentiful.

If these options were taken away from you, would you consume foods differently than you did this morning?

Could you get back to more of this view of food? Not eat in the car. Not eat out of plastic wrappers or paper cups or travel mugs (the travel mugs is what would be hardest for me)?

Could ya? Would ya? Just give it a try -- just for a week. Maybe you will learn you can be happy living with real dishes and real coffee mugs and making less trash. If you take away the multitasking while we eat -- we would reduce how many times we eat a day -- no question about that. Calories saved. Weight to be lost.