Sustainable spring cleaning

By Ariana Lim

Social distancing = a lot of time in the house = SPRING CLEANING!!

I know a lot of us have moved back home recently, and that means a LOT of boxes and unpacking all your stuff, which I must admit, can be a little intimidating. It took me a couple of days to have enough motivation to start unpacking, most of it coming from the fact that I had absolutely zero space to walk in my room (I had to parkour to get to my door from my bed). And so I decided that since I wasn’t leaving the house any time soon, I might as well get started.

So there I was, just me and the boxes and bags of things. And as I was putting stuff away, I found myself wondering WHY did I have this much to begin with?? My room was FILLED with useless knick-knacks and things that I feel like I haven’t used since 2009.

Cue my feel-good playlist on Spotify and thus began my long journey of decluttering and deep cleaning of every inch of my room. Every. Single. One. Because why not, right? I had plenty of time. And oooh boy do I have tips for you.

1. A lot of the stuff I threw away were things that I barely used. I’m talking about those promotional materials given away at festivals, papers that I kept and never looked at (why did I think I would look at my fifth-grade progress reports ever again?), and things that other people gave to me that I did not need. There is a special feeling I get when I receive things. ESPECIALLY if they’re free. Honestly, I’m a sucker for a good freebie. But at the end of the day, I don’t need most of them. So here’s tip number one: Refuse. If you don’t need it, don’t accept it. Eventually, they will end up as trash, and that’s a big no-no.

2. Cleaning can literally be the opposite of sustainable. I’m not going to lie, I went through a couple of Swiffer dusters and a bunch of Lysol wipes. Here are a couple of quick changes you and I could make: use rags instead of paper towels/dusters and make your own eco-friendly cleaners (learn all about cleaning products here).

3. DONATE or SELL gently used items and give them another life. One man’s trash is another man’s treasure, after all. It doesn’t have to go to the landfill. Since many donation bins centres are closed or unavailable right now, please hold onto your items until they reopen! Another alternative is selling your stuff on Facebook marketplace, Kijiji, or even consignment shops. If you have a lot of clothes and accessories, consider making a closet account on Instagram to sell it, or have a garage sale in the summer! Go get that sustainably-earned bread.

4. With so much stuff, it can be tempting to just toss everything in a large garbage bag and throw it away. However, you need to remember that everything should go to where they are supposed to go. For instance, I had a lot of old perfumes and nail polish. Those should be properly disposed of however your city collects them. In Waterloo (and in many other cities), we have a household hazardous waste centre, which accepts household chemicals, cosmetics, batteries, and much more (learn more about it here). There are also a lot of drop-off centres for electronic waste. Even the University of Waterloo has multiple locations on campus at which you can drop off small e-waste. Lastly, textiles usually end up in the garbage, which should not be the case. Socks with holes in them and fabric scraps CAN BE RECYCLED. They can be turned into a useful resource used as filling material in a lot of products. Although municipal textile recycling is usually less common, there are some stores at which you can drop them off, such as H&M. I know it requires much more effort to go through these proper disposal procedures, but it’s important to consider the safety of workers, the community, and the environment.

Happy cleaning! Make me (and Marie Kondo) proud.