Waste Removal

         I love yard sales and thrift stores. Limited means inspire me to buy a gently used, quality item for less than a brand new shoddy one that's liable to disintegrate pitifully under my cruel usage. I was born in New England, and I'll admit to the guilty thrill of scuttling back to my car with some lovely treasure, sold to me for a laughable sum.(This stinking avarice does have limits; I'll overpay at stores run For A Good Cause...I'm not so low as to rip off the volunteer employee who is, incidentally, someone's grandmother.)

         I experience joy digging through other people's junk. I hold an antique book, and wonder what stories it could tell, what history it has seen, what parts of the world it has visited. Scraps of other people's lives hide within its leaves; sales receipts from 1963, Christmas cards from the forties, inscriptions in the sepia scroll of an era when penmanship was a matter of pride. My imagination follows speculation merrily down any joyful or mournful path the smallest clue reveals.

         I have a friend who removes junk. Knowing my penchant for treasure hunting, he called me to assist at his latest job. The house, a modern structure of eyeball stabbing angles and giant panes of plate glass, is set on high bluffs that command a 180 degree view of the rocky shore. The doctor who owned it passed away; it still contained a great deal of his possessions, cataloguing a full life of mental and physical travels. The couple who purchased the house removed the gentleman's belongings into a heap on the lawn and contracted to have it disposed of.

         There was a mindboggling assortment. Walking up the path from junk-truck to pile, I came upon a little book mashed unwittingly into the snow by my friend, entitled "Wit and Cynicism" written by Walter Pulitzer, published in 1914. There were signed prints, an oil painting of a sampan or Chinese junk, a wooden Louisville Slugger, a voice activated tape recorder. Reams of unused bond paper from a prestigious college. Throw rugs that would have washed up nicely to serve their purpose elsewhere. "Forum, the Magazine of Controversy", from September of 1929, still in amazing condition, despite its latest resting place in a snowbank. (I'm still scouring it with a critical eye, suspicious it was reprinted later, although why anyone would is beyond me.) A map of the area from 1850. Cassettes of classical and blues music. An axe, an ancient pickaxe, a walking stick, a cane, a forty year old license plate... Books, countless books, a box of sci-fi from the 1950's, a biology dictionary, hefty reference books on metallurgy...

         Perusing the bits of paper that detailed lives, embers of resentment in my soul were fanned into flame. A yearbook from the 1950's, heavily inscribed with the loving best wishes of classmates. Family pictures. A recent college diploma. Surely someone, somewhere, valued these items, would object to their being unceremoniously tossed into a heap to be snowed on and thrown out.

         I can hear you now, "Well, someone had a chance go through these things, if there was anything they wanted they would have taken it..." It's tough work going through the collection of a lifetime, and if that person is a dear relative, grief may make you throw your hands up in despair and walk away, not realizing you've missed something until time has cleared the fog.

         It is equally possible that there were no relatives left to care. So, maybe we can rationalize this wanton disposal, and cease speculating if we should forward these items through the real estate agent.

         But there is disrespect inherent in the casual tossing of a one hundred year old book onto a lawn, a glaring lack of respect for the author, the editor, and the laborer who produced it, a shocking lack of respect for the era it was written in and the reflections it could inspire, a disheartening dearth of respect for the written word.

         The bulk of the goods in this pile could have served a purpose, had a modicum of reasonable discernment and the slightest shred of imagination been employed. Instead, most were irreparably ruined by a combination of ignorance and the elements.

         I pity these strangers, so devoid of curiousity and romance that an antique map of the historic seaside community they have just purchased a home in is fit only for the trash. I pity them, that no voice of charity stirred to suggest a donation to a local goodwill organisation. I pity our society, that we have brought up individuals like this, for deliberate waste of this magnitude negates efforts to preserve our world. This was a funeral pyre to forests and an insult to human endeavor.

         Hand in hand with that pity is my thankfulness for my own perception, a deepseated appreciation for my imagination and empathy. I lead a far richer existence at the opposite end of the financial spectrum than these spiritually impoverished strangers. I picked up that sodden book, wrapped it in a terrycloth towel, and pressed it between two heavy books to dry. And I think a Louisville Slugger is an excellent first line of home defense, don't you?