It‘s a good thing I did not board my flight to Germany last Tuesday for my usual winter trip to my roots. Yes, I missed my cousin‘s 86th birthday, but I also missed catching the Coronavirus. There are some cases in Germany and - as much as I savor my trips to Regensburg - I don’t want to be stuck there due to possible travel bans. 

Germany, see you later.

Help me, instead, obsess over every bit of news coming out of New York City where our daughter lives and tries to stay healthy despite daily commutes on the dirty subway and a scarcity of hand sanitizer. 

Let’s talk, instead, about New York‘s plastic bag ban that took effect this morning. 

According to ABC, shoppers in New York now must bring their own bags to stores or pay 5 cents each for paper sacks.

Great move! 

A New York State Plastic Bag Task Force (isn‘t there always a task force?) estimates that New York residents use 23 billion plastic bags every year. That‘s a lot.

I have seen them. They lie squashed in the gutters, hang in the trees, float in the Hudson, and waft around in subway stations. It is not a tidy town.

New Yorkers will still get plastic bags with purchases of meat, fish, prepared and delivered food. That is a lot of plastic. 

New Yorkers do not seem to cook. At all. I‘ve seen that first hand.

So let‘s get back to the 5-cent fee for paper bags. Three cents, the article says, will go into the state‘s environmental protection fund. And two cents will go towards giving reusable bags to the poor.

The poor will need them. As with everything else in New York, reusable bags in the city are absurdly expensive.

Jumping on the trend today, Vogue Magazine recommends that readers carry home their bodega purchases while making a fashion statement with a Zappos BAG for $100, or one from J. Crew for $58. Or a linen model from FOOD52 for $50. 

Come ON!

Help me get my daughter out of that insane asylum.

People, do not pay more than a couple of bucks for your tote. Better yet, search your closets. I have stacks and stacks of reusable bags I‘ve gotten for free in the mail, were once branded by stores, or that I‘ve bought on trips as souvenirs.  

I‘ve also been known to - gasp! - carry a loaf of bread or head of lettuce from the grocery to my car without any kind of a bag at all! Call me crazy.

So how did I get so smart?

I learned about carrying your own bag on my frequent trips to Germany, where they certainly do not have all the answers to the world’s problems but where it is common to have your own shopping bag and UNcommon to buy one at the register. 

Purchasing a bag means that you haven’t planned ahead, are inconsiderate of the planet, or are a foreigner. Plastic shopping bags are nearly gone there. And reusable bags are available all over for a pittance.

It aggravates the tar out of me to see plastic bags still in daily use here in Virginia. The Chesapeake Bay, the ocean, our rivers and streams, our forests and fields and wildlife are right HERE!

Good news: Several competing bills aimed at reducing the number of plastic bags in use were tossed around in Richmond this winter. They’re being refined even now.

Instead of dictating how shoppers will carry their victuals - New York loves BANS - Virginia will likely levy a tax on plastic bags. The old carrot and stick approach.

Progress. I like it!