I was paying attention. I promise.

For work, all field workers had to sit in on a seminar about lead paint. It outlined the hazards and the extensive steps we must complete when scraping old paint from a simple window sill up to an entire house. The following is a glimpse into my wandering mind as I sat, riveted by the presentation.

----------------------------------

I listen to our presenter list all the precautions I must take in order to escape lead poisoning and I shake my head. If only people prior to 1978 had not built every home with a hazardous material, we could save much time and money. As a non-profit organization that is trying to build green consciously, now has to drape everything in plastic before we scrape the paint, plastic that must be thrown out afterward, not to be reused. Talk about increased waste. We must purchase special vacuums and equipment. It's expensive stuff. Also, we must have all volunteers wear a ty-vek suit (fits over entire body to protect from outside particles; there is no ventilation in these suits) when completing a scraping job, a job that already scores us an earful of complaints. Those suits are fun to wear in the humidity.

The thought of having to apply all of these practices makes me wish I could go back in time to beg and plead with these pre-1978 builders to NOT USE LEAD PAINT!! All that work, because they didn't know the dangers that would come from putting a little lead in the paint (it's suppose to help prevent mold). Which makes my mind wonder... what kind of things do we do now, that will cause someone to be sitting in a seminar in 30 years learning how to fix our mistakes?

I'm not going to take you on the scary journey my thoughts traveled from this point. You can ponder it. I would just like to apologize ahead of time to future generations. The sad part is that in many cases we can't even claim - We know not what we do. It's simply - We care not what we do.