The Power Of A Simple Life

The Power Of A Simple Life – What Its All About

Dusty, Linda’s Cat

The Power Of A Simple Life website is dedicated to finding ways to live a more simple life through a simple, back to basics plan. In The simple life people will be doing more than just their “bit” for the environment. We will be finding ways to live with creating as little waste as possible.

Ruth is the wife of a retired minister and lives in Scarborough Ontario. She is a musician in charge of the pre-service music programs at her church. She works from home and is an expert in the field of electronics and internet website hosting and planning. They have two beautiful dogs, Nikki and Shortie and are members of the Therapeutic Paws Of Canada, an organization dedicated to bringing loving animals and humans together.

Ruth is very serious about the environment and works hard to promote her ideas. She can remember when children and pets could safely paddle in the Rouge River and Highland Creek.

Sometimes it was just meant to be. One day Ruth and Linda, strangers, started a conversation while standing in line at the grocery store. It was a defining moment to discover that they both had the same interests of music, pets and computers. Before long they found themselves working on this website project with the hope that they will be able to supply good information and help get people back to basics.

Linda is a retired piano teacher living in Scarborough with her retired husband, their dog Rusty and cat Dusty. This is her journal page from New Year 2006:

“This year my New Year resolution is to become more aware and to do everything I personally, can do to help the environmental situation”.

Around that time, a young councilor in Scarborough, Glenn deBaermaker, was on the CTV News one night. He was going around with the garbage collector and was dressed in all the equipment and was in the back of the truck. He was ripping some bags open and showing the news camera how they are overlooking most things that should be recycled. If one of our elected politicians can do this and really give his attention to this important issue, the least I could do was to do my best as well.

While taking stock of things, I found it easier than I thought. Inspired by Glenn my first task was to recycle everything possible. Up until now, yes, I have recycled, but many things were going by the wayside. I took the Garbage calendar, which contains all the information regarding the recycling program and renovated our household program. In re thinking this issue, I recalled my childhood when plastic bags had not been heard of. Paper towels and paper products in general were either unheard of or for the “rich” people. We even carried cloth handkerchiefs.

It is unbelievable how many things go into the blue or green bins. I made a pact with myself that I would only fill one green “garbage” bag every two weeks. This being the absolute trash that can’t be recycled anywhere else. Then I started on cutting down on the recycling materials.

From there I looked at the electricity, water, natural gas, household hazardous cleaners and also the way we have been doing things in our home. It’s a big issue, but if you take things one at a time; see each problem as it is now and give each some thought, you will find ways to improve and you will be taking a big step in being a more responsible citizen as well as living a more simple life.

In our articles and newsletters, we will be discussing all the simple ways to accomplish these tasks. One by one, one step at a time.

You can do it; we can help you with that.

Ruth and Linda