A Recycling Puzzle

So here I am in the Flathead Valley, surrounded by magnificent scenery that's punctuated by a variety of human made additions, some that harmonize with the scenery and others that just highlight the difference between human fabrications and the work of Nature.

Being human and a participant in the economy we have, I use things and then find I have leftover material to throw away.  The puzzle:  people here in this amazing, almost pristine valley just throw things away..And the things they throw away end up in a landfill. That they have a program to recover gases from the landfill to make electricity is definitely a plus!

Apparently only hippies recycle.  Indeed, the Unitarian Universalist congregation has a system for helping people recycle, and we all know "they" are a bunch of hippies!

Actually, it is starting to change, maybe.  There is a limited recycling program sponsored by Flathead County.  When I go to the transfer station, in addition to the long row of containers waiting to be loaded on trucks and taken to the dump, there are other containers for cardboard (flattened, no milk cartons), paper (no brown paper grocery bags),  plastic (#1 and #2 only),and all kinds of metal cans.  Glass can be recycled by going to a container placed behind the Target store, some distance away. I was not alone when I last went to the recycling facility, and the others looked like ordinary people, not hippies.  That is encouraging.  So is the fact that recycling pickup is available.  It is provided by a private company separate from the regular trash pickup, and apparently people are using it.  

Flathead County landfill gas to energy project

Being aware of our waste and trying to send it back for reuse is surely the first step toward using less in the first place, to living more in harmony with the world around us.  Step by step.  But can there be enough steps, soon enough?