I’m trying to reduce the amount of waste I produce, but Trash Happens.

Trash can easily become procrasticlutter, especially the small, odor-free variety. The tags we cut off a new shirt, the mile-long CVS receipt, the empty seltzer can… these items can accumulate quickly and make our living space seem cluttered, even if we have minimized and organized our possessions.

When city leaders want to reduce littering in the streets, they install more trash cans. If a nearby trash can is just as convenient as throwing trash on the ground, people respond to that convenience with better behavior. (Hefty fines don’t hurt either…)

We can use the same principal in our homes. The more bona fide trash receptacles we have in convenient locations throughout our house, the less household litter will collect on our surfaces.

If the minimalism police saw my numerous waste bins, they’d revoke my membership.

But if I had to walk to one singular kitchen trash can with every used tissue and torn envelope, inertia and laziness would override my best intentions. I’d end up placing them on the nearest surface, where they’d be the first of many additions to a stalagmite of trash.

So, I have additional small waste bins in the office/guest room, the bedroom, the bathroom, and the laundry room.

I’ve even considered getting a recycling bin counterpart for my bathroom for empty boxes and toilet paper rolls, but for now I just chuck those down the stairs for future-me to place in the kitchen recycling.

Unless we go zero waste like those committed heroes with their astonishingly small jar of yearly trash, we’re going to need to regularly and routinely contend with trash.

If household litter is making your home untidy, the silver lining is this: contending with garbage takes some time and effort, but requires almost no thinking. No decision-making, no identifying a beneficiary, no optimizing storage and retrieval. Just round it up and take it to the curb.