Impact

Our new house is just that - new. There is no need to replace, update or install sinks, floors, doors, fixtures, handles, paint or cabinets. However, to make the rule there must be one exception, and ours is that one of the toilet seats is nicked and scratched and missing paint, and also is a mismatch for the toilet itself. This weekend, we replaced it. And I realized that of all the mounds of garbage I've seen or read about in the world's landfills - the refrigerators, the toilet seats, the old drywall, the scuffed floorboards - I have never directly put part of a house in that mound. And that's a good thing for 29 years of living with rental toilets (with wooden seats), rental showers (with lilac tiling), rental screen doors (complete with rips) and rental paint (always white)... but it's also the beginning of a new search for ways to recycle all manner of trash. The toilet seat, I fear, it headed for the landfill, but John balanced our environmental pro-con list and installed this:




Our new 55 gallon rain barrel! I have to figure out how to paint it or cover it in decals, because as water-saving as it may be, it still needs to earn it's aesthetic keep around here.