Postcards from the Edge
We walked to school and recycled, thanks to pigs and rag-and-bone men, says Mary Kenny, a member of the post-war eco-generation
Green parties are described as the dominant force in the new European Parliament, and we are being tutored by children on how to save the planet – or we face extinction.
Oldies are sometimes blamed for having brought the poor planet to the edge of environmental disaster, but may I point out that some of us grew up practising emphatically green lifestyles?
We didn’t drink from plastic containers – we took lemonade bottles back to the shop and retrieved the thruppence deposit. Bullseye sweets were decanted from a jar and wrapped in a cone of rough paper. Sugar was sold loose – this was the Ireland in the Fifties – and butter and cheese were cut from the slab, and wrapped in greaseproof paper.
Milk came in bottles, also recycled. Animal manure was delivered, by horse-drawn cart, for garden fertilisation. Rag-and-bone men, à la Steptoe and Son, collected items for recycling.
At my aunt and uncle’s in Limerick, the slops of food and drink – vegetable peelings, Guinness overspill – were fed to pigs, who produced the most delicious bacon. My mother was known to wring a chicken’s neck, pluck and eviscerate it before cooking it – very organic!
We walked to school, or took a bus. People didn’t have fresh clothes daily – men changed their shirt collars, not the whole garment. You didn’t shower daily either; you had a bath once a week. Your aunts would say, ‘Waste not, want not,’ and clothes were repaired, recut and recycled.
Heating came with winter fires; it was thought decadent to have one in summer. At my convent school, enduring the cold was considered good for your character.
Americans were ‘soft’ for their addiction to comfort. Still, when we got the chance to embrace the American way of central heating, daily showers, convenience foods and everything pre-wrapped, we jumped at it.
Now, it seems we will have to go back to that simpler lifestyle, as directed by 16-year-old Greta Thunberg, possibly the single greatest influence on green European politics.
Could there be a war between Ireland and Scotland over Rockall, the volcanic Atlantic rock located between the two Celtic nations? It’s disputed territory – Donegal fishermen claiming fishing rights, and Nicola Sturgeon warning off the Irish with Scottish patrol boats.
My sympathies are always with fishermen, who ply a dangerous trade. Moreover, a Scottish-irish argy-bargy might make for larks. Still, if there are mineral deposits underneath this godforsaken rock, it could get really serious…
A friend who was staying at an apartment in The Hague was surprised to open the door to some kind of government inspector, who was enquiring about her entitlement to be in the dwelling.
My friend is originally from Central America, and doesn’t automatically defer to an official asking questions, however courteously. She was inclined to challenge the official in return.
It transpired that he was from the local council, just checking up that inhabitants occupying apartments were entitled to do so. He was satisfied that all was in order.
Dutch citizens told her that they trusted their local and government authorities. If an official knocks on your door, there is no need to be apprehensive. ‘Here, the government is on our side!’
She reflected later that this was a definition of civilised governance – when people feel that the state is with the citizen, and that the state can be trusted. And that this is often a feature of northern European countries.
Isn’t it nice to feel that the state is ‘on your side’? Or, par contre, is it not sometimes healthy to challenge the state’s entitlement to ask questions?
Being ‘agin the government’ may also produce less conformist, more argumentative citizens, which mightn’t be a bad thing either.
In these days of declining high streets it’s nice to see practical local shops around the corner surviving.
In Deal, we have just such a shop, Lynda’s, in Queen Street.
Lynda’s is crammed with kitchenware, bathroom stuff, gardening implements, knobs and knockers, boxes and baskets, tools and nails, hooks and clocks, toys and tinsel, ornaments and packing boxes, stationery, cutlery, china, glass, wallpaper, picture frames, beach hats, swimming rings, knick-knacks, electrical goods, mothballs, pet food, bird accessories, loo seats, mousetraps, cards, calendars, placemats, doormats, toast racks, teapots, barbecue sets, tissue paper in all colours, miscellaneous haberdashery and ironmongery, all crowded together as in a Victorian cornucopia – and all at sensible prices.
Lynda’s is a small family business, 51 years old, owned by Tracey and Trevor. In an era of big corporate enterprises and online robots, such a traditional, useful, local store is a little treasure.