Photo courtesy of Eric Z. Grey

This sign for Free Grinds at Murky Coffee in Clarendon got me thinking: recycling is really catching on, and not just recycling for substances like glass and metal.

You can recycle your old junk now too, with Freecycle. Rather than chucking your stuff in a landfill (or just outside the apartment like lazy puppy-yuppies do at Melrose Place-Arlington where I live), give it to someone who wants it.

And believe me, someone wants it. If you’ve got to get rid of that old VCR, bed frame, or old Baby-Sitters Club paperbacks, someone will take it off your hands.

I’ve personally disposed of a bed, frame and box spring on Freecycle when I couldn’t get a homeless shelter to pick it up. It felt a lot better than chucking it in a landfill to rot. And I’ve received stuff on Freecycle too.

Freecycle groups are popping up everywhere, like DC, Arlington, Bethesda, Alexandria, Silver Spring and Annandale/Falls Church among others. You’re town/hamlet/soulless subdivision probably already has one.

Check ’em out. I’ve found there is this strange karmic circle with Freecycle. Every time I give something away, rather than throw it away, I receive a check in the mail or something similar.

I’m serious about the karmic circle. I give away my old queen size bed to some Army NCO, and *BAM* I get a check in the mail for some refund. I seriously think that if you waste not, you will want not, and every time some pampered puppy-yuppy at Melrose Place throws out an old shelf or worse yet, working electronic appliances, I feel sick to my stomach. Time was, people would save things, repair them, and count their blessings. Now we’re a disposable society. Disposable utensils, disposable clothes. Don’t get me wrong, some things are just meant to be thrown away. But haven’t we gone overboard?