Object graveyards

I am clearing out the ‘shed’ part of my workshop so it is no shed and all workshop! Amazingly, almost everything that was in the shed (not part of my mosaic life) has found a home elsewhere. There is nothing like decluttering and sorting stuff so that things have a proper home rather than being shoved out of the way. It was soooo satifying. We are now nearly ready to insulate and paint and put in new work benches. Very exciting.

The sorting included making “keep”, “give” and “chuck” piles. We are regular users of freecycle so the ‘give’ pile will be distributed there and to charity shops.

Then comes the “chuck” pile. Granted, things have come some way – at our local dump, we were able to put old batteries, wood, cardboard and old electrical items in seperate piles, trusting they will be properly recycled. Yet, what I saw was upsetting. A mountain of TV’s. I am sure half of them (if not more) were perfectly fine, just not ‘flat’ enough. I mean, even if you get a flat screen telly, what do you actually do with the half a metre of extra space that you gain behind your TV cabinet?

Then I saw this mirror, full length , beautifully framed and pristine. Left there to be dumped. I so wanted to rescue it. So much you can do with a mirror if you are a mosaic artist. But no, I had to leave it because it is the property of the dump. Oh my. It reminded me of the Object Graveyard webiste – the afterlife of everyday things. Check this out http://webecoist.com/2009/03/15/object-graveyards-the-afterlife-of-everyday-things/

I think Freecycle should have people working at dumps to re-house perfectly good objects to loving homes.