This is not the usual sentiment of shopkeepers, I presume, and even if it is I doubt they are blogging about it.

Maybe it is all those years of stating “I don’t need a bag” for my single item purchase, but getting one anyway. “No, really, here” the salesperson would insist. Even worse and darn near traumatic is when the cashier put my lone item in a bag before I can make my request, and when I take it out and give it back to her she throws it in the trash. Although we have a long way to go, this bag issue has gotten better in the past few years. It is nice to see people using canvas bags and stores giving a few cents off the bill if you use them.

Packaging gets me down too. Can anyone tell me why most of the organic produce in my grocery store is on a Styrofoam tray and shrink wrapped? The conventional cucumbers are not held hostage like this. Ironically, they are free to look like cucumbers. Why on earth are the organics looking like something that came off a production line? Which is worse, pesticide residue or Styrofoam?

Then, there’s that unregulated word “natural”. It is a pretty useful word. I use it myself, and when I do I mean it. But the word is so popular, in fact, it has lost its true meaning. Natural products are similarly unregulated. There are a lot of good, caring, do-the-right-thing companies out there making great natural products, but there are also some making claims without evidence to back it up, particularly regarding health claims. For better or worse, these products are not subject to the rigorous and expensive Food and Drug Administration (FDA) review to which conventional pharmaceutical are subject.

As if this is not enough, there’s more. Truthfully, I cannot look at an item without thinking about its ultimate destination. This is clearly a shopping handicap, a work-induced obsession, I suppose. My husband refers to it as “analysis paralysis”. He has begged for basic household items that he still doesn’t have because I can’t find the exact product I think should exist. I feel a sense of sadness for the towel or shirt that was once, at least in part, a plant that through its marriage with synthetics has been taken out of the biological cycle and won’t ever be a plant again.

So, there I am, in the middle of the store feeling confused, mad, depressed, and empty-handed, so I’ve pretty much stopped shopping.

On the other hand, I love shopping for Compostable Goods. My shopping bags are compostable and I don’t force them on people. I get to make up my own packaging and request minimal packaging from suppliers who share similar goals. I get to be honest about the products, what I know and what I don’t know, and they can all be a plant again someday if given the chance. So, on the one hand my profession may be the cause of my shopping ills. On the other hand, it also might just be the cure.