Neither Plastic Nor Paper

This column originally appeared on Sunday, Feb. 10, 2008

When it comes to movements, social or political, I’m more of a leader than a follower.

That is why when I was in college, for example, I didn’t join in the popular “Don’t Eat Grapes” movement. (For those of you who have forgotten, or never knew, there was a time when grape pickers were trying to organize a union and the way you showed your allegiance to them was to swear off grapes. I can’t remember if the effort was successful or not.) At the time, I didn’t like eating grapes but just on principle I used to munch a few when I had a chance just to declare my non-conformity.

No, when it comes to movements, I like to create them on my own rather than fall in line with the crowd.

That’s why I formed the “Move Chadds Ford to Chester County” movement and the “Illuminate the Twin Bridges of Creek Road” movement and the “Build a Public Swimming Pool in My Neighborhood in West Chester” movement. These were movements that I could hold complete sway over with little effort, largely because the movements were made up of me and no one else.

But lately I’ve been drawn to a movement that seems to be gathering steam across not just the country, but the globe: a rejection of the plastic grocery bag.

You know, the so-called “undershirt bag” that looks like a man’s athletic t-shirt. The ubiquitous carry all shopping bag routinely dispensed in stores of all manner and stripe.

They are an environmental nuisance. Made of fossil-fuel based polymers, the bags are non-biodegradable and virtually indestructible. They remain for centuries in landfills, and clog the waterways. Ducks and fish presumably die from trying to ingest them.

Lately, local governments in New York City and San Francisco have enacted legislation to seeks t o reduce their use. In Ireland, they are taxed. In China, the world's fastest-growing economy, they are banned and shoppers are encouraged people to use cloth ones instead."This issue is not going away,”said Allen Hershkowitz, director of the solid waste program at the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group. (He’s my presumptive choice for leader of the movement, mostly because his last name sounds so unbelievably impressive.)

I was introduced to the situation when reading pieces in The New Yorker by Ian Frazier, a wonderful writer, who discussed his growing hatred of seeing bags in trees. He even invented a device for removing them, called and patented as the “bag snagger.” He wrote: “To me, a bag in a tree is like a flag of chaos, and when I remove it I'm capturing the flag of the other side. In the end it doesn't matter how ironic or serious or even effective on a larger scale bag snagging may be. Doing it demonstrates that even in the odd little overlooked wilderness the bags inhabit, people still can use their eyes and hands and brains, and still have dominion over the chaos of bags in trees.”

Now, when I see a bag in a tree I wish them ill, and vow never to carry another one out into the wild. I have a growing collection of cloth bags from a variety of stores, and my biggest worry seems to be using one franchise’s bag in another’s check out lane.

From now on, all my eggs will go in a non-plastic basket so to speak. Ditto the grapes.

What A Beach!

This column appeared on July 22, 2007

We consider this column to be, among all other things, an extension of the Daily Local News’ commitment to public service.

Over the years, we have endeavored to bring attention to various social, environmental and gastrological needs that have gone unmet in the general West Chester/Chester County area.

It is well established that we have campaigned vigorously for the addition of the township of Chadds Ford to our county’s boundaries, unchaining it from the tyrannical yoke of Delaware County; that we have urged the powers that be to open a public swimming pool within walking distance of the 300 block of South Church Street, preferably one with a diving board and a cool, shaded area for sitting; and that we have decried the absence of authentic Cincinnati chili from the menus of restaurants across the county’s landscape.

Although to date none — give or take — of those causes has received so much as a passing nod from cartographers, politicians or restaurant owners, we are proud to have raised them as issues of concern.

But now we come to an even more pressing need that has yet to be addressed by any responsible party involved in county government or business.

Folks, we need a beach.

Chester County has been around for more than 300 years (I checked), and although it has amenities such as a world-class public gardens, a historical Revolutionary War battle site and a potato chip factory tour, it does not have a large expanse of sand and shells and horseshoe crabs that sits beside a large body of water, one that features waves.

We, meaning I, recently spent several days at two beaches that find themselves attached to the Atlantic Ocean — one in Delaware, one in New Jersey — and we can say with confidence that days spent lounging on a beach with the sun overhead and a breeze at one’s back is good for the soul. Maybe bad for the skin, but good for the soul.

Why, we would even venture to suggest that the estimable former county Commissioner Colin Hanna would declare, “¡Estoy teniendo un tiempo muy, muy bueno! ¿Puedo tener otro mojito?” (Translation: “I am having a very, very good time! Can I have another mojito?”) if he were sitting on a beach in the county.

But we hear you say that Chester County does have a beach already, up at Marsh Creek State Park, right next to the snack bar. We have seen this beach. We have spent time on this beach.
We, however, do not consider it worthy of the name “beach” and would suggest that anyone who does has spent too much time in the sun.

(Besides, we have it on good terms that the lake at Marsh Creek is going to be drained soon to make way for additional open space in the county.)

We are confident that once this idea gets in the hands of the proper authorities at the Army Corps of Engineers that the day will come soon when we can all enjoy a day at the beach without having to drive to New Jersey or Delaware.

Or having to cross any large bridges on the way.