It's easy being green.

I was amazed and delighted how my book club talked at length last month about recycling.

Yeah, I know. Evidently, we’re in between rounds of babies and get to talk about something besides lactation. Hurray!

It seems that everybody at the table is doing something. It was a given that everyone recycles. Our area municipal recycling doesn’t take glass, so we discussed the wheres and hows of getting all those wine bottles someplace besides the landfill. Even the most harried of the mamas was talking about her new reusable shopping bags.

People, we even talked about how to set up a compost pile. Really. It was amazing.

It causes me physical pain when I see plastic or cans in the trash – I just can’t believe that folks are still throwing recyclables away! But just when I think I’m the only human in the whole entire world who is recycling, I’m blown away by somebody else. Like my book club. Or Mr. Wonderful’s 4-year-old.

When I first started dating Mr. Wonderful, I confided in my friend Alice that while he was superfine and a heck of a catch, he didn’t recycle. She raised her eyebrows but didn’t pass judgment.

Mr. Wonderful started recycling at my house. And then he started bringing his recyclables to my house. And then he let me sign him up for curbside recycling. Yahoo!

His daughter, The Ladybug, has gotten really into what she refers to as “cycling.” If there is cycling to be tossed into the green bin, she has to be the one to do it. Cans, paper, whatever – she is queen of the cycling bin.

I don’t know that she necessarily gets the global significance of what she’s doing. She’s 4. I think it’s more about the sorting aspect of it. But they usually have a full bin of cycling at the end of the week.

I take a teensy bit of pride in this. But wait! It gets better!

Turns out that the old owners of Mr. Wonderful’s house left a recycling bin in the shed. With The Ladybug being so enthusiastic about cycling, the extra bin went with her to her mother’s house.

Yes. I indirectly got my boyfriend’s ex-wife to recycle. Bwah-ha!

What have we learned here? Manipulating children is easy and fun. And every little bit helps.