October Cleanup Update

​Hi friends!

It’s been a little bit since my last CL post and that’s solely because I have been BUSY. I’m currently working an additional seasonal job and fighting off a cold which has had me spending any free time mostly just sleeping, but! I haven’t stopped my Sunday cleanup commitment, even in the nasty rain this week. I debated pushing it off to Monday and writing about the rain and a nasty cold keeping me in, but littering doesn’t stop on rainy days and this commitment isn't going to stop either. The garbage doesn’t say “hey, no one wanted to go outside today, let’s just stay right in place until a sunny day brings some friends to clean us up”. In fact, it more so says “hey, rain...wind...cloudy skies, let’s go for a ride to the closest waterway or waterway entry (sewers, drains, river beds). Then, we can get swept up with the rest of the trash and go for a lazy river ride” (Can you imagine how exhausting it is to be in my brain?). Alas, I got out of my sister's cozy car while she went into the store to get soup and got myself into the parking lot.

The thing about doing cleanups is you don’t have to be on a great hike or kayaking down a river to do one. You can be WHEREVER you are at any time of day. I filled an entire GIANT Go Puff bag (which is a topic for another conversation) with trash in under 21 minutes walking up and down just half of a parking lot aisle at Walmart. Could you imagine the amount of trash that could be collected if there were five of us? Ten of us? Now imagine if all ten of us committed to cleaning up for a full hour. Woah. I can. I can imagine it because I know what groups of people can do. When individuals come together with like-minded goals, the unthinkable is possible and the unthinkable occurs.

Sunday, October 27th is the last Sunday of the month. That means, I’ll have been at my Sunday cleanups for 4 weeks. Want to join me for November? Get a head start by joining me this Sunday, wherever you choose to be, and use #consciouslivingcleanup to show me what you do. With the holiday season coming up, people's lives tend to get a bit busier and it seems harder to find little pockets of windows to do cleanups, but my next post is all about the small amounts of time you can find to make a difference. Stay tuned!

- jamie