Understanding my obsession with recycling and wanting to do his part while in our apartment, my roommate's boyfriend, Gabe, asked me if he could throw his styrofoam egg crate into our recycling bin. "Sadly, it has to go in the garbage," I answered before heading into a lengthy tirade about how I find styrofoam to be the most unnecessary and harmful human invention ever. It found out later that Gabe had asked me this question simply to bate at me, knowing my passions would overcome the calm mood I had formerly displayed. He certainly got the reaction that he was going for. I often do come across people that genuinely do not know about the harmful nature of styrofoam, and I'm not surprised since it provides many everyday conveniences and is used more frequently than we might think.
I was actually told once that styrofoam breaks down into small enough pieces that they can be detected in our air, water, and even in our lungs here in the United States. While I don't know the original source of this information, I do know that it's enough to scare me into wanting to take action against this environmental plight. My favorite smoothie joint uses styrofoam cups to serve their drinks, so I bought an insulated plastic cup that I can use again and again instead. Most places will allow you to do this and some will actually give you a discount for saving their supplies. Most styrofoam products are made to be disposable, but they have non-disposable alternatives that we can choose instead. If we try to choose this instead, we can save our natural resources from being turned into things that are destined to end up in a landfill only to outlast our presence on this planet. We need to conserve the resources that we have here, now. If we aren't careful now, then in the future, there will be no future.
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