This Landfill Was Made For You And Me
Because my office is getting ready for The Big Move, people have been cleaning out their offices and cubicles like the Second Coming of Martha Stewart and her poncho posse were coming over for an impromptu inspection. (We have five large black dumpsters, lined up like recalcitrant circus caravans, moodily crowding the hallway.) Recent … ahem … acquisitions of mine include a brand-new stainless steel thermos (obviously company swag), a small wicker basket with handle, a beer glass, a vintage “The Saint” paperback, a massive folder full of empty (possibly vinyl) CD sleeves, and a TON of packing paper.
I think if it wasn’t for my monthly Country Living fix, I’d have needed to be institutionalized a long time ago. (It was the only thing holding my sanity together when I was waiting in line at the Social Security office this morning, feeling my lifeforce ebb away by the minute, and trying to ignore an older gent who wanted to know if I was from China or Japan1.) The flagrant wastefulness absolutely breaks my heart—which, yes, I sometimes admit to having—because you know it’s all going to the landfill, more often than not, in someone’s backyard.
We need a new mantra to reflect the zeitgeist: want not, waste not.
The rest of us are trying to leave a living planet for our grandchildren.
Now GET OFF MY LAWN! No-good punkass kids.
1Because, he said, he could usually tell, but I was a tough one. Also, he told me not to be offended because he loves the Asians. Makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside, doesn’t it?
Adelin said,
April 6, 2006 at 7:33 pm
Argh! I wish I was there — Andras and I are always up for rustling up other people’s trash for ourselves. When we moved out of college there were so many things that were being thrown out, we recycled a whole bunch of lamps, chairs, bowls, plants, etc for our apartment senior year. In fact, I have three wicker baskets (lined with a nice kind of off-white fabric), and a set of small shelves I still have from when someone threw them out at school…
And then there was sophomore year when I had a La-Z-Boy in my room because someone left it in the parking lot. It was in perfectly good condition, with funky 70s brown, orange, green tweedy upholstery but alas — had to get rid of it when I went to London and eventually moved back into a tiny tiny room in the Co-Op.
All these things have wonderful histories. I wonder what happened to my (or his/her/its) La-Z-Boy.
The Worsted Witch » Salvage Rescue Operation said,
April 8, 2006 at 1:46 pm
[...] I am just one woman. HOW MUCH MORE DO YOU WANT OF ME, OH LORD? [...]
Christine said,
August 2, 2006 at 12:28 pm
Heh- that Chinese/Japanese question really made me pause. I’m an unrepentant Asiaphile, and while I would never ask someone their ethnic background unless I know then well I did get in trouble once for not making assumptions.
I have a Chinese character tattooed on my back, and I was working at a coffeehouse when a customer asked me what it said. I told her, and then she went on to say something that revealed to me that she knew perfectly well what the character meant, to which I exclaimed, “Oh! You read Chinese!”
She got all in huff and said, “I AM Chinese.”
Stupid me. I thought she was Asian-American.