Recycling.

Library recycling. 

Going green at our library means I get to sort the blue bins of recycling... and what an adventure it is.  Being one who naturally likes to save things... it's actually a tad difficult to part with some of the stuff I find in the recycling (though there is occasionally something that will make me gag.) 

One of the most bountiful items in the library recycling is old newspapers.  I've taken stacks to use at kids' art projects.  You can glue pages from old magazines onto the newspapers for some great collages.  As a library student, it's great to findi the month-old library association magazines in the recycling.  Free subscription to American Libraries! 
Among the more interesting finds were several packets of wildflower seeds.  I keep forgetting to plant the forget-me-nots...  Oh, and I did clean the bathroom a few weeks ago with a free sample packet of some green cleaner.  I'm still looking for a purpose for the local maps... I may have to re-recycle those.  My dad, however, loved the 'Barn of the Year' posters.

Of course, there are a great many things the library recycler must destruct - (not for the faint of heart!)

Many of my library-loving friends are dismayed when I come home from work telling stories of book destructing when I get weeded library books or rejected donations in the recycling.  (The Readers Digest Condensed books have really nice covers... I had to restrain myself from saving them for a craft project when I ripped the pages out..) 

Ripped up pages of mysterious pictures that come from the computer lab printer, old journal pages, school notebooks from the past school year - a whole slew of local and social history in the recycling.  (I promise I refrain from reading the notes... but be careful what you write on the front cover, kids.)

Staff cleaning of offices also yeilds fascinating library recycling.  I can't help but laugh out loud at meeting notes typewritten from the 1980's and 'Friends of the Library' letterhead that nowadays would be utterly laughable and dismissed as archaic.  Has technology really advanced so fast? 

Don't forget the unmentionables, or the 'trash' people add to the recycling that, I certainly don't know how to recycle: gum, used: bottles, empty: and yes, even diapers, soiled. 

I am not sure how to recycle a dirty disposable diaper.  That one sorts its way into the trash - sorry to whatever green mom really wanted that diaper recycled... I'd suggest using cloth if you really want to go green. 

recycling
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trash