Junk v. Garbage

"Some people, they don't know junk," says Rosskam, a character in William Kennedy's Ironweed. "It ain't garbage. And garbage, it ain't junk."

Rosskam collected junk – was a "rag man," a collector of cast-off stuff that still had some value or use. And that is what he meant by "junk." He rode around Albany, New York in a horse-drawn wagon, collecting the stuff.

Rosskam's distinction between garbage and junk is useful, at least to me, as I continue my anti-littering crusade.

My intolerance toward litter has grown considerably over the last year. Starting in the summer of 2010 I began taking a shopping bag with me on bike rides, a bag made with ties allowing it to be worn backpack-style. I'd fill it with the discarded bottles and cans found along my bike routes.

Then, toward the end of the year, I began picking up stuff during my walks. Mostly I pick up cans and bottles I later drop into a recycling bin. But I also pick up trash, like candy wrappers and fast food bags. I just can't pass it by anymore. Litter offends me; it's appalling how badly people treat this planet.

Sometimes I come across stuff I won't pick up, as much as it might need it. Cigarette butts are a good example. I did a little Googling and read that four and a half trillion butts are dropped on the ground each year in the United States. (I don't buy that number; it's just too staggering.)

And I don't pick up wet, nasty stuff. I might consider it, but I'd have to bring rubber gloves. You gotta draw the line somewhere.

After my walks, I always sort out the trash from the recyclables and place each in the proper container.

Then I wash my hands.

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Literary note: Read Ironweed. It's one of my favorite novels, a truly brilliant piece of work.

John Breaux

There used to be a guy who biked around my town picking up litter and recyclables.

His name was John Breaux, and it's been just over two years since he died. Two articles about him appeared recently in the local press: first in a community weekly, and second in the daily paper.

Both articles told essentially the same story. A local tavern has set up a webcam that streams a live view of an adjacent courtyard, where a statue in John Breaux's memory is on public display.

http://www.olirish.com/

Breaux died on January 30, 2009, after being struck and killed by an automobile as he picked up litter along the side of the road. The community responded with a tremendous outpouring of grief.

Breaux was one of those people everyone in this town knew on sight, but few actually knew. Almost every day, he spent long hours riding around town on his mountain bike, collecting litter and discarded recyclable cans and bottles.

He was also known for random acts of kindness, like the bumper stickers suggest.

John Breaux suffered from schizophrenia but seems to have been harmless. When I first saw him some years back I thought he was a wandering old hippie. Others thought he was a vagrant, but he lived with his brother.

In death, John Breaux has been lauded as a sort of saint, and maybe he was – a selfless man whose kind and generous soul belied his shaggy appearance. The very day he was killed – within a few hours – someone created a tribute page to him on Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=58301824082&ref=mf

"It's amazing how many people he's touched," says the owner of the tavern.

But it seemed to me then, and seems to me now, that members of this community tried to out-do each other with praise for him. Much was made of his Christianity. There was talk of naming a park in his honor, and creating a "John Breaux Law" to punish litterbugs with mandatory sentences of picking up trash along the side of the road. (No one suggested we stop littering so damned much in the first place.)

In the end, they made the statue. I can't remember how it got funded, but the sculptor donated her services. The city unveiled it on the first anniversary of Breaux's death.

I think all of this, while well intentioned, was merely a stunned and saddened community's reaction to senseless loss. Most of the praise for John Breaux, I suspect, was withheld during his lifetime.

Now two years have passed, and things have reverted to the way they were. But for a brief period many of us here treated each other with a little extra kindness – in John Breaux's memory, perhaps, or in the name of our shared humanity. It is an ideal discarded as easily as a beer can, but one we should pick up, and use again, and strive for every day.

Muck Muck Goose

Today's haul consisted mostly of the usual stuff: wadded up fast food bags and wrappers, empty carry-out cups, empty Bud Lite cans, and so on.

One less bag of crap strewn over the landscape.

I came across a trove of litter in a big drainage area behind a shopping center. I wonder how stuff accumulates there? There was more crap there than I could possibly stuff into my little bag, so I'll have to make that a regular stop.

Being a drainage area it was a bit wet and mushy from a recent snowmelt. I wore clean shoes, and trod carefully amid the muck.

Soon enough I got through it all, and got back up to the nice, dry sidewalk. By then I was by a parking lot along another edge of the shopping center.

This is where I encountered a handful of Canadian geese, perhaps taking a breather from a long migration. They just flew in from Santa Fe, and boy, are their wings tired.

I saw these geese, or their cousins, a few days ago – and at just about the same location. They are understandably nervous around humanoids. I tried getting a little closer to them for a picture but they just kept moving away, showing me their backsides; this was about the best shot I got. Unfortunately I did not have a zoom lens. Or at least, not much of one.

Yeah, I always take my camera with me.

The most interesting "find" today was a high school ID card with a magnetic strip on back. Which is not really very interesting. Not at all interesting, in fact.