More or less Paper

As I look around my office, the calendar on the wall catches my eye, it is just above a monthly list of things to do and beside a world map. Stikkies, post cards, even a promissory note from T's sister are all pinned to the wall in front of my eyes. And that's just one wall. Behind me along the far wall are two book shelves that groan with the weight of favorite titles or needed reference works. The floor carries its share too. Three boxes: work to be filed, work to be entered into the computer, or work to be kept out for quick reference purposes sit along one side of a four drawer file cabinet that hold most of my past story ideas/journals or reference news articles. The closet stores its treasures too - Six boxes of past year's tax docs on the floor, and two boxes of business records on the shelf. And yet here I sit musing about the possibility of going paperless.


Maybe I need to define the term. By paperless I don't mean to go totally without paper just use less paper. Online dictionary, Wikipedia provides an excellent reference for understanding the immensity of the problem in this discussion of the pros and cons of recycling. Meanwhile, our changing world and culture may provide unexpected answers like the story in today's L A Times about the new line of clothing that Crocs Inc., you know the ugly plastic shoe people that inspired one of Bill Maher's New Rules last week, is bringing out. In both men and women's style, a form of the same resin material it uses for the shoes will be used to move them from a niche shoemaker to a (I love this line) "lifestyle brand". Who knows maybe this material will become the new paper.