GeoffC Chocolate Grasshopper ...



Posts: 27,600 Karma: 20821184 Join Date: Mar 2008 Location: Scotland Device: Muse HD , Cybook Gen3 , Pocketbook 302 (Black) , Nexus 10: wife has PW

The Green Thing The Green Thing







At the checkout at the supermarket the cashier told an older woman that she should bring her



own bags in future because plastic bags weren't good for the environment.







The woman apologised to her and explained, "We didn't have the green thing back in my day."







The checkout girl responded, "That's the problem today. Your generation did not care enough



to save our environment."







She was right -- our generation didn't have the green thing in its day.







Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the shop. They sent



them back to the factory to be washed and sterilised and refilled, so it could use the same



bottles over and over. So they really were recycled.







But we didn't have the green thing back in our day.







We walked up stairs, because we didn't have an escalator in every shop and office building.



We walked to the grocers and didn't climb into a car every time we went to the shop.







But she was right. We didn't have the green thing in our day.







Back then, we washed the baby's nappies because we didn't have the throw-away kind. We



dried clothes on a line, not in an energy gobbling machine burning up electricity. Wind and



solar power really did dry the clothes.



Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing



(and they walked to school).







But she was right. We didn't have the green thing back in our day.







Back then, we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had



a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of a bus.



In the kitchen, we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to



do everything for us.







But she's right; we didn't have the green thing back then.







We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle



every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new



pen, and we replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor



just because the blade became blunt.







But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because



we didn't have the green thing back then?