The Potential For A New Life 只要有心，即便“废品”也会重赋价值

Portland artist and activist damali ayo believes in recycling. Yes, it's good for the environment, but she also enjoys the challenge of finding new uses for stuff people discard. And ayo doesn't want her trash polluting someone else's backyard.

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Finally Damali Ayo must have heard about her cheapskate way. She sent us an SA about how she went green and saved some green at the same time. Her story is the latest installment of the award-winning series, This I Believe. The revival of Edward R. Murrow’s 1950’s radio program has been hosted by National Public Radio since 2005. Here to tell you more is series curator, independent producer Jay Allison. Jay?

Thanks Michele. Here in America, as you know, we are often persuaded to believe that newness is a positive value, and in other itself. Advertisers will brag that their products are disposable, then when we are done using them, we can throw them away. But Damali Ayo’s experience led her to rethink that principle. Here she is with her essay for This I Believe.

Last summer, I looked out the door of my 100-year-old house at my newly planted garden and my adopted dog. I paused. I was overcome with appreciation. I realized nothing is trash.

I started to look around me at all the things that we ordinarily think of as trash — discarded plastic bags, water from boiled pasta, pulled weeds, rubber bands and newspapers, busted-up concrete, clothes and furniture we outgrow — and I began to think and act and live according to a belief that all things have a continued purpose in the world, if we just find it. I realized I believe in recycling.

The kind of recycling I mean is not just the dividing up of glass and paper and cans and putting those in a bin to be hauled away, but the kind of recycling that requires creativity and commitment, even love.

In my neighborhood, everyone puts out their raked autumn leaves to be picked up by the city — out of sight, out of mind. This didn't fit with my newfound love of reintegrating "trash" into my life, so I mapped out a new garden with flattened moving boxes and put up a sign that said, "Dump your leaves here." I watched through the autumn as my neighbors piled their leaves on this new garden. I watered the leaves with collected rainwater, and even composted some of Stevie's doggie doo. Finally, I got topsoil from Craigslist. Now, I have a new ornamental garden.

My belief in recycling isn't trivial or novelty to me. The trash we make is often dumped in places populated by the people of color. Every piece of trash I throw away, I can feel being thrown in the backyards of the people I care most about in this world.

Nothing has to be discarded, really; if you try hard enough, everything can be reintegrated. I even use my bath water to water my garden. Gross as it might seem to my friends, I see it as potential waiting to be filled, as future heads of lettuce, tomatoes and poppies and lilies. This might seem like a big step, but if we can get down to watering our gardens with our bath water, maybe we wouldn't be so afraid of admitting our flaws, mistakes, and failings — maybe our discarded layers would be things to learn from, and ultimately turn into something better.

When I look at my dog, Stevie, I see one of the greatest joys of my life. But someone once saw her as something to be thrown away. She was abandoned and blind and found on her own in the woods. She's a wonderful dog, and when I look at her and remember what she's been through, I'm moved to tears. Maybe this is because I hope to be recycled one day, too — that someone will have the heart to see treasure in me, not just a past full of discarded relationships, but the potential for a new life, just like I do with all the things I recycle in my world. Just like those things, I sit in my metaphoric recycling bin, waiting for someone to pass by and say, "Hey, you're just what I've been looking for."

Damali Ayo with her essay for This I Believe. Ayo is now focused on her new enterprises, it's a sustainable fiber clothing company that also gives her resources on health and social justice. Michele, as always we invite Tell Me More or less news to contribute their thoughts to our series, all the information and all the essays are at NPR.org. For This I Believe, I’m Jay Allison, back to you, Michele.

Thanks, Jay. Jay Allison is co-editor with Dan Gediman, John Gregory and Viki Merrick of the book "This I Believe: The Personal Philosophies of Remarkable Men and Women.” As Jay said, to find and about submitting your own This I Believe essay, visit NPR.org/This I Believe. This is Tell Me More form NPR News, I’m Michele Martin, let’s talk more tomorrow.