by Cathy
I always knew my husband was an old soul, but sometimes? I suspect he may have lived through the Great Depression.
Our family is all about recycling and repurposing; finding creative ways to use items that otherwise may be thrown away. For example, I save plastic egg cartons, cut them up into sections, and voila! Instant paint palettes for my kids. This, to me, makes sense, since there is a valid purpose for it and it goes in the arts and crafts bin where no one else will see it. My husband, on the other hand? He takes the "art" of repurposing household items a smidgen too far.
Countless times he's said to me, as I am about to throw something into the recycling bin: "Wait, don't throw that out! The kids can use it as a pencil holder/storage container/what have you!"
I stare blankly at the plastic peanut butter jar I am holding, blinking repeatedly at it while I try to process what he just suggested. Did I hear him right?
"Um, no that's okay," I say politely as I toss it. "The kids have plenty of pencil holders."
The kids, on the other hand, are not as forgiving with his suggestions, but rather state the more obvious, unfiltered version of my thoughts.
"WHAT?!" screeches Bella. "We can't use the peanut butter container as a pencil holder! That's so....weird!"
My poor husband. He's just trying to be helpful, doing his part in conservation. So, you would think he knows what truly belongs in a recycling bin but alas, he doesn't. He throws cardboard boxes, aluminum cans and milk cartons in the regular trash, willy nilly, without thinking, that duh, these should go in the recycling bin. So half the time I am carefully (and bravely) fishing these items out of the smelly trash all in the name of our great, green Earth. I am, after all, a purposeful repurposer/recycler.
My husband means well, but really? What's the purpose of his repurposing? Let me tell you.
The other night, as I was making my rounds before bedtime, turning off lights, pulling frozen chickens out of the freezer for tomorrow's dinner, I saw this:
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| Yes, it's a sawed-off milk carton. |
"Oh, I need it for something."
Thinking it might be for some kind of marketing research project, I left it alone...until the next day when he announced that he plans to use it for his utensils.
"Utensils? What utensils?"
"You know, my odds and ends. Pens, pencils, labels, phone chargers..."
The girls and I all stopped and stared with our mouths agape. We were literally dumbfounded.
"Um....papi...." started Bella carefully, but before she got a chance to finish, I did it for her.
"Bwahahahahaha!" I blurted. "Are you serious?"
"Yeah, what's wrong with that?" he said, half smirking at our reaction. This made me wonder if he just does these things to get a rise out of us.
I promptly took it and tossed it in the recycling bin. "That's what's wrong with it," I said. "I have plenty of decent baskets and containers to give you if you want to store stuff."
"I don't want those."
"Why? Because they're not sawed-off milk cartons or empty beer containers?"
Yes, ladies and gents. Here is what he uses as his other knick-knack caddy:
So what do I make of this? Here's what I know:
His life's work is marketing, so he's always looking at different and unique approaches to packaging and the way things are used and sold. He's always brainstorming, always innovating. There's a reason he has founded two companies and ran a franchise operation: he's an entrepreneur at heart. A purposeful repurposer he is not. But, he gets points for creativity and good intentions.
