After having tried several times in several different venues to freecycle or donate some damaged but salvageable chrome-and-wicker dining room chairs, today I finally took them to the recycling center (the metal frames) and dump (seats and backs).
I really really (really!) hate throwing away stuff like this. The wood is in good shape. The wicker on the backs is in good shape. The metal is in good shape, and the sooper seekrit magic chrome de-ruster would spiff 'em up in no time. But they are too damaged to be usable as is, our family has no use for them anyway, and they are hopelessly dated and out of style. No one wants them. So some perfectly serviceable stuff -- for which trees and bamboo plants were grown, fertilized and harvested and metal was dug from the earth and God only knows how many noxious chemicals were released into the world -- end up sitting in a landfill, or perhaps incinerated.
It seems, though, that that is the only fate available to them, other than sitting in our attic and being dragged from one storage location to another for the rest of time.
I know this seems an odd thing to get depressed about. I have no emotional attachment to these chairs -- they were my mom's and I never liked 'em. It just eats at me to feel compelled to participate in the consumer culture that pains me.
Comments (2)
True dat. Brother- and sister-in-law were in town, and other brother-in-law showed up with his latest prizes from dumpster-diving, and we got to talking about the number of business that go out of their way to damage merchandise they're throwing away anyway (I learned that Pier 1 carves the store number into the tops of furniture, and Harbor Frieght pours some kind of slime over the dumpster contents each night), and it's just sickening - Habitat, Goodwill, and the like would give them tax receipts, but they'd rather feed the landfill out of the corporate equivalent of spite.
Posted by Karen in Wichita | September 12, 2007 5:48 PM
Posted on September 12, 2007 17:48
Karen: ooooooh, that's just makes me quiver with frustration!
I know restaurants and food stores do that -- deliberately spoil the food so homeless people won't dumpster dive there -- and that's bad enough. But to lay to waste a perfectly good piece of furniture because the line's been discontinued...it's...crazymaking!
Posted by Mrs. TDH | September 12, 2007 8:25 PM
Posted on September 12, 2007 20:25