Guilt Be Gone
Recycling has long been a conversation in my Pflugerville circle of friends over the past nine months. And recently, even my Austin friends have had a say in the topic. At the end of last year, the city of Pflugerville slapped stickers onto our recycling bins that said they no longer accepted glass. I called the City of Pflugerville and asked them what was going on and was told that it was too expensive to recycle glass. I was given a number to call so that I could have a conversation with the person in charge. I was then told that a recycling center was in the works, but I didn’t believe it. I thought they were just blowing me off.
I went on my merry way, recycling what I could curbside and taking the rest to the appropriate recycling destinations; paper in one bin (always located by a school because they earn money for recycling), cardboard has to be dropped off at a separate location because the paper bins don’t accept cardboard, and glass…. well, this is where I’ve been getting some slack lately.
When they first told me I couldn’t recycle glass in the curbside bin, I was diligent about setting it aside in a separate tub in the garage and taking it to the recycling center in Austin. Then, I got lazy. So, I stopped buying our bubbly water in glass containers and switched to cans (cause I could recycle those at the curb). Beer and wine bottles- which are plentiful at my house, those just ended up going in the big green trash can. I’m a bit obsessive about this kind of stuff and am pained every single time I have to throw away glass, but I’ve managed to ignore the pain and throw them away instead of making the extra effort to recycle them.
A couple of weeks ago, I had a get-together at my house and received a lot of negative comments from my Austinite friends- who, by the way, can recycle way more than I can at the curb- about being too lazy to take the glass bottles into Austin to recycle. I felt bad. And a little guilty since I love recycling. Yes, my head was held down in shame for ruining Mother Earth. I had a couple of people offer to collect the bottles and take them with them to put in their huge recycling bins. That made me feel like even more of a recycling slacker. But, there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. I am saved from this guilt that I’ve been carrying around now for months!
A recycling center is opening, in partnership with Ecology Action, right down the road from my house here in P’ville! I thought I would share with all of the other P’ville mamas out there who have the same guilt about not recycling their glass and let all of my Austin friends know that I’m on it now! The center here in Pflugerville takes glass, cardboard, paper, batteries, scrap metal, motor oil, tree limbs and more. Check it out and recycle away!!
July 8th, 2009 at 12:04 pm
awesome! the community impact blurb on this new recycling center wasn’t complete…it didn’t list glass. thanks for posting this article and the link! i’m collecting A LOT of glass babyfood jars that need a new home.
there is also a recycling center in round rock that takes plastics. i have been taking all my cardboard and plastic there and stockpiling glass to take to austin. at least the trips are fewer in number and shorter indistance now!
here’s the link to info about the round rock recycling center : http://www.roundrocktexas.gov/home/index.asp?page=378
July 11th, 2009 at 10:22 am
I, too, feel the shame of throwing away items I know are recyclable. At first I the glass in a separate bin to take to my mother’s house (who lives in Austin) but would forget for months until it filled up and I had to to put them in the trash can. The guilt never eased up, so kudos to Pville for doing the best it can in terms of recycling.