Resolutions & Plastic Bags

Much has been said about New Year's resolutions (good thing / bad thing / indifferent thing) and I see the arrival of a new calendar year as an opportunity to challenge myself to take another step along a road I'm already travelling. It's not a success / failure thing for me - rather an exploration of what changes I'm not making because I'm just being lazy, and which remain for other reasons.

Last year my resolution was only to buy Fairtrade Chocolate. I've long known about, and supported, Fairtrade generally and do make an effort to buy Fairtrade. However, last year I discovered that my own challenge with only buying Fairtrade Chocolate was in choice and availability - usually when I'm out and about and want chocolate, I want "light" chocolate. "Light" in my books translates as average quality, easy to eat and in a snack sized portion. Most vegan Fairtrade chocolate doesn't fall into this category - instead it's good quality, very rich chocolate in 100g bars. And that's when I can get my hands on it. I don't buy a lot of chocolate (generally gifts through the year keep me fairly well stocked) but when I want it, I often struggle to find a Fairtrade option which fits my needs. A very middle-class problem, I acknowledge, but that's the place I live. So I have returned to buying Fairtrade where I can (not just chocolate - and, infact, Traidcraft's Fairtrade wheat & quinoa fusilli is one of my staples) and bowing to my desires occasionally when I can't.

So - this year! This year is plastic bags - not to ask / accept them when I'm shopping. Again, I'm not starting from scratch on this - I've been avoiding getting plastic bags for donkey's years but, I believe mainly through laziness, I do occasionally fold and ask for one. Perhaps I haven't got enough capacity in the bags I've got with me. Perhaps I just didn't think to take a bag at all. But given how unnecessary (yet ubiquitous) plastic bags are, this seemed a good habit to sort out.

Already I've learnt my first lesson of plastic-bag-acquisition-avoidance: plastic bags are sometimes a very handy resource to have! I was buying tofu yesterday and the containers were a bit wet (in fact I think one has a slight hole in it) - the temptation to ask for a plastic carrier bag was high but being Jan 3rd I opted to take the lesson and get my backpack a bit damp on the cycle home. So now I just need to make sure I have a couple of plastic carriers stashed along with my cotton bags when I'm off out to buy this and that. More lessons I'm sure will come along but already this year's resolution is doing exactly what I want it to - challenging me gently to live in a way that's one step lighter on the planet.