WHAT’S it like spending five years kicking plastic out of your life?

Local blogger Lindsay Miles, who took the plunge into a poly-free(ish) world in 2012, hasn’t perished and will be sharing the highs and lows of her journey at a talk at Spearwood Library on Friday, March 18 from 1pm (if you’ve picked up an early Herald).

Ms Miles took up the Plastic Free July challenge after seeing a notice in her local library, and was so concerned about what she learned there was no turning back.

“I was so far down the rabbit whole that it was like the matrix; I had to choose which pill I wanted, and I couldn’t turn back on what I had seen,” she says.

“I just didn’t want to have to say to future generations ‘sorry there are no resources left for you because we used them for tomato sauce sachets’.”

• Lindsay Miles has gone plastic free. Photo supplied

Ms Miles says people can reduce waste by buying food and cleaning products in bulk from retailers and using reusable bags and containers.

“When plastic was invented, it was cheap, strong and lightweight; industries celebrated it but didn’t think about the consequences of single use everything. In the 60s we thought it would free us up to have more time but we are still so busy, the convenience hasn’t helped.”

Her talk follows on from the recent screening of the documentary A Plastic Ocean at Luna in Fremantle, which was so confronting many people left in tears or were too upset to watch until the credits.

“I had no idea of the threat to human health nor the fact that the chemicals that are attracted to it in the ocean are entering the marine food chain and magnifying on their way up,” says doco producer Jo  Ruxton.

“Even if people don’t care about the future of our planet, most care about their own health and that of their families and that is one of the most important messages in the film.”

by KORO BROWN