We discovered the “essay and book series about the hidden lives of ordinary things” called Object Lessons through The Atlantic a few months ago, when we shared an article on real cheese. Today, I learned an unsettling – and to borrow a phrase – inconvenient truth about tote bags. Pretty much any time I go grocery shopping I use a couple reusable totes, unless I need some plastic shopping bags to replenish my trash-can liner supply, so what the folks at Object Lessons have to say about the issue is very informative about how we need to change the way we look at certain everyday objects:
For at least a few decades, Americans have been drilled in the superiority of tote bags. Reusable bags are good, we’re told, because they’re friendly for the environment. Disposable bags, on the other hand, are dangerous. Municipalities across the country have moved to restrict the consumption of plastic shopping bags to avoid waste. Many businesses have stopped offering plastic sacks, or provide them for a modest but punitive price. Bag-recycling programs have been introduced nationwide.
Pretty much any time you walk out in the woods at Chan Chich Lodge, at some point during your hike you should be able to hear the rocking branches that are a sign of either spider monkeys or howler monkeys moving or eating in the treetops. And if you’re lucky, the swinging simians might stop and watch you with an uncannily familiar curiosity (or boredom), interrupting their normal activity for a minute or two before continuing on their way.
