We tried the ‘no plastic’ challenge

We walked into local food co-op and our jaws dropped. Even here, most of the products were wrapped in plastic, from the lettuce to the tofu. 

The week began, as do all good weeks with my children, with an official challenge.

A family’s competitive streak, after all, can be magically exploited for parental gain. I have set up contests for making beds and tending the litter box, running soccer drills and practicing instruments.

And while I tell myself that one day these contests may evolve into pro-social habits, mostly I like them because they seem to work, my girls are happy, and I scratch one or two things off the never-ending to-do list.

So when I read climate scientist Peter Kalmus’ 2017 book, “Being the Change: Live Well and Spark a Climate Revolution,” I was intrigued. Among many other things, the book proposes personal behavior shifts – using only cash, eschewing industrial beverages, avoiding all packaging – often beginning as a week- or month-long personal challenge.

Over breakfast, I outlined our mission: For a week, I said, we were going to shop without buying any plastic. (I’d been reporting about plastic for a while, including for a recent Weekly magazine cover story.)

The girls were in.  

We collected our reusable shopping bags and jars, and drove (I know, I know) to the local food co-op. We walked into the store and our jaws dropped. Even here, most of the products were wrapped in plastic, from the lettuce to the tofu. The local bread came in a plastic bag. Even the cardboard boxes of penne had plastic windows.

Still, we found some loose carrots and apples, filled up our paper bags and reusable jars with items from bulk food bins, and were starting to feel OK.  

But then we had a crisis.  

“Mama, what are we going to do about cheese?” my little one finally stammered.

It was going to be a long week.  

We persevered, though, if a bit hungrily and with a cheddar craving. But more importantly, we began to see.  

Even I, as a climate journalist, had simply not noticed the plastic coating our lives. And even we, as a family with the means to drive to the sort of grocery store with an aisle of color-coordinated bulk foods, had a hard time avoiding this fossil fuel coating. 

Now, my girls and I are trying to think up the next challenge. Because something else happened with our plastic-free-week experiment. Shopping without plastic was fun. It might not be the answer to the problem overall – as I write about in my cover story, there are a lot of people who criticize the “all my waste in one Mason jar,” individualistic approach to the plastics crisis.  

But it felt good to be going about our lives in a way that felt just a tiny bit more in tune with what we like to believe are our values. And it turned a chore into a treasure hunt. After all, a little competition can go a long way.