Post 359: Plastic

Plastic: A Toxic Love Story by Susan Freinkel. ISBN: 978547152400 (eGalley - Publishes April 18, 2011).

My grandfather would have owed his life to plastics had he been born much later than 1917. He was a premie, and no larger than the towel lined bread pan they kept him in to keep him warm in the oven. He had a very low chance of survival, a chance that would be much higher today now that they can keep even the smallest of premature babies alive with plastics. Had my grandfather needed a blood transfusion or nutrient bag, he would have been out of luck because the tubing just wasn't small and delicate enough for an infant that tiny.

Strangely his life was dominated by plastics anyway. Although they didn't come into wide use until the late 1940's, my grandfather's whole life centered around working with plastics. He went to the University of Chicago where he earned a PhD in Chemistry. He later went on to work for various chemical companies including Dow and Amoco where he likely worked with at least a few plastics in his time.

Later, his wife's life would be saved by a dialysis machine as well as other countless plastics when she underwent a mastectomy for breast cancer. His grandchildren's first toys were plastic, and even my mother had Barbies (in fact she was the first generation to have the doll). In fact, my brother spent time in a plastic tank as a newborn so they could monitor his breathing.

It seems somehow fitting that a man whose life started so tenuously worked with a material that would have automatically increased his chances of survival if only he had been born in the late 1960's.* And how troubling it is that those same plastics have been shown to be potentially harmful in later developmental stages? Does it mean we stop using plastics in NICU and other medical procedures? No, but it does mean we can find better plastics or materials. One might say that lives depend on it.

My review can be found at Goodreads.
LibsNote: Free review copy provided by Netgalley.
*This is when Neonatal ICU's were set up; they did not begin using plastics until the 1980's, at least according to Freinkel's research.
**Oh, if you have a strange fascination with my grandparents, you can read about my paternal grandfather here... or at least about his dog.

Post 358: Plastic

Plastic: A Toxic Love Story by Susan Freinkel. ISBN: 978547152400 (eGalley - Publishes April 18, 2011).

I've always kind of hated plastic bags. It's almost visceral how much I hate them. Reading this book didn't so much tell me why I hate plastic bags, so much as it put those feelings into words for me. I hate them because they are everywhere and they get everywhere and there is pretty much no way to get rid of them once you have accumulated them.

And yes, I am one of those people that collects plastic bags. It drives me crazy because I don't feel like I can just throw them out. They are disgusting are annoying pieces of trash, but a lot of energy went in to making them, and the idea of throwing something away that I've only used once for non-hygiene purposes bothers me to no end. But then I end up with a cabinet full of plastic bags that I can't possibly use as fast as I obtain more. Certainly I use the reusable bags whenever possible, or just skip bags altogether, but the convenience, oh that seemingly convenient inconvenience that plastic bags provide.

It is so much easier to walk into the store with nothing and walk out of the store loaded down with those flimsy diaphanous puffs of white bag loaded down with even more plastic packaging containing my food or other recently purchased products. How wonderful it seems when I am walking the 60-100 feet from storefront to car, and really not even that if I'm using a shopping cart. Sometimes their usefulness is only really from cart to trunk and then the very short walk from my parking space to my apartment (look Ma, no stairs!). Honestly, in the situations where I go to the grocery and forget my reusable bags, I could easily just ask the bagger/cashier to put them directly in the cart. When I get home it is not overly difficult to run in and get a bag for that short transport from car to refrigerator. So why don't I do it? Because it's easier. And so I am stuck with more plastic bags than I know what to do with and a cat who poops in volumes, but not enough to fill all of those bags.

You know, I kind of miss paper bags. They might have taken up more space to transport,etc. but they take up less space under the kitchen sink. They are easier to reuse as long as they don't get wet. I miss the smell of them. People talk about missing the smell of books; shopping just doesn't feel the same with plastic bags. Paper had this sort of dark earthy smell to it. Even though my fruit often came in its own plastic, it felt a bit like pulling something out of the earth when I removed it from that dark, crinkly bag.

And we were more likely to reuse them too. There were infinite uses for paper bags. Not only were they convenient as small trash bags or even temporary trash cans, but we often used them to wrap presents after designing our own wrapping paper with stamps and markers. My mother frequently used paper bags to make sewing patterns that were far more sturdy and durable than the flimsy ones provided by the pattern companies. We used them as book covers for my textbooks (why buy them?). They were used as shelf paper, they were way better than newspaper for drying wet shoes, and often they were more fun to draw or color on than regular paper.

Apparently paper bags are just as bad or worse than plastic, but when you're done with a plastic bag... It really only has one more use: bathroom/small trash bag or Pet poo collector.

My review can be found at Goodreads.
LibsNote: Free review copy provided by Netgalley.
There's a great blog that was mentioned in this book about a woman who is trying to eliminate her use of plastic and has greatly reduced her use. Read about it at My Plastic-free Life (formerly Fake Plastic Fish).

Post 357: Plastic

Plastic: A Toxic Love Story by Susan Freinkel. ISBN: 978547152400 (eGalley - Publishes April 18, 2011).

Freinkel did an interesting experiment in which she wrote down everything she touched that was plastic in a day. It's quite illuminating. In fact, I've probably touched about 20 items made of plastic or that have plastic components and it's only 10AM. Here's my list, in no particular order:

• Pillow (filled with poly-fibers)
• Coverlet
• Pajama pants
• T-shirt
• Underwear
• Menstrual pad (sorry, but it's honest)
• Toilet seat
• Tooth brush
• Toothpaste tube
• Hair tie
• Coffee grinder
• Coffee pot
• Cell phone (aka alarm clock)
• Birth control pill packaging
• Plastic coated box for a day-by-day calendar
• Kitchen counter
• Trashcan
• Carpet
• Linoleum floor
• Nail polish (my fingernails are painted at the moment)
• The Wall (and anything else painted)
• This computer and its cords

This is only after about an hour of being awake and most of those I touched before I even got out of bed. There are some days where I wake up and I reach for my eReader and don't move unless I have to pee. There are things I'm probably leaving off just because I forgot I touched them or I touched them with something other than my hands and therefore I was less aware of it. If I had taken a shower this morning or eaten breakfast I would have increased the number of things I touched drastically. There would have been the refrigerator, the bath tub, my shampoo and conditioner bottles it comes in, my hair brush, my towel, the shower curtain.

Plastic is in almost everything we touch and interact with, yet only 80 years ago that wasn't true. It is amazing how invasive and adaptable plastic is. And if you asked me which of the objects I mentioned earlier that I feel most guilty about, I would actually have to say my birth control pills.

I don't feel guilty taking them: it's been a blessing not to worry as much about pregnancy and to have shorter and more reliable cycles. But I have always hated how much plastic packaging goes into providing me with reliable birth control. Not only am I given the punch out cardboard/aluminum foil/plastic pack, but every time I fill my script I am also given a brand new sleeve of plastic to keep them in. Those sleeves come with new warning labels on them (made of plastic) and come in a plastic resin coated paper bag with more stickers inside so I can change the days of the week to accurately reflect my pill schedule.

I will say that the off-brand packaging is slightly better than the original Orthotricyclen dial packs (in that awful shade of vaguely flesh-tone pink). At least the plastic sleeves are a little less obvious, a little more travel friendly, and I can tear them up and use the sheets that don't have my prescription info as book marks. But it's still not great. I wish they didn't automatically give me a plastic sleeve when I fill my script, because I really don't need it. Having one is nice, but having 12 is just unnecessary.

I would potentially feel guilty about my cell phone, since the industry encourages us to get a new one every few years, but I've had mine for about 4 years now. I haven't even had to replace the battery yet. It looks crappy, and it has no other function than as a phone,* but I spent $90 on it with the corporate expectation** that I would only use it for a year. There's something wrong with that.

How much plastic have you touched within the first hour or so of your morning? Is there something you feel especially guilty about owning or using? Or do you just not think about it?

My review can be found at Goodreads.
LibsNote: Free review copy provided by Netgalley.
*Okay AND an alarm clock, timer, and very clunky calculator.
**My editor asked me to clarify what I mean by corporate expectation. It means that there is the expectation that the technology will be out-of-date or irrelevant and/or that consumers would want a new phone regardless of the continued functionality of their current model. This mostly applies to electronics, but we see this pattern in car buying and clothing as well.