Pay It Forward {Day 3/Year 2}

Three days in.

Twenty-seven left to go.

Today Liam and I went out to one of our old favorite trails. It can get quite muddy out there in the fall but we decided to give it a whirl anyway. We brought along two plastic grocery bags and thought we'd pick up a little trash along the way. Because paying it forward doesn't always have to involve money.

Liam loved this! He loved having a task (shouting TRASH when we saw some) and a responsibility (holding the bag while I collected the discarded items). He loved it so much that he lasted THREE hours on a hike. Awesome!

It gave us a great opportunity to talk abut taking care of our environment and taking care of the messes we do create. He couldn't understand why people didn't just "throw it in the trash can".

We collected two full bags of trash and found two more full of picnic trash left out at the rocks in the river. It was interesting to note that the trash all but disappeared 45 minutes into the hike. As if that is the magical time frame where the careless hikers/walkers ended their trip and the "leave no trace" folks began.

It was also very disheartening to see the scores of plastic bags in the trees. We saw no less than 60 or 70 of them strung out and twisted amidst the branches of the trees. It would seem that a fair amount of them got swept up in the trees from Hurricane Irene. Some the regular plastic bag from the grocery or department store and others full size trash bags. Several adults could have spent whole days out there cutting them down with ladders.

Have you found a way to pay it forward yet?