On the way back from the supermarket the other day, I wandered into our local garden center. It had just been stocked with all the good things of spring after a long winter. Fresh herbs. Flowers. Baby lettuce shoots. Tomato plants. The smells were heady. I didn’t buy anything but resolved that I would come back a few days later and get started on a garden.

As I unpacked my groceries at home, the fresh smells of the garden center lingered in my nostrils. And it made me think.

I unpacked a jar of prepared salad dressing. Hmm. I could easily have made my own dressing . Oil, vinegar, a little mustard and some of those herbs I had just seen. That would have meant one less bottle in the recycling and who knows where that bottle might end up anyway.

I looked at the lettuce I bought. Packed in plastic, triple washed. Convenient, yes. But I could easily have bought a fresh lettuce, washed it myself and doused it with my own herb-infused vinaigrette.

I'm not a let's go green fanatic. But the simple act of spending a few minutes making a salad myself would have helped the effort.

And besides, plastic lettuce bags don't smell anywhere near as nice as a fresh sprig of rosemary.