Unforgivable Waste
Yesterday, at about 4:40, I left my house and started walking to El Coloso and my friend Sandra Bradley’s condo for a gathering. I took advantage of the light and chose the scenic route up Guerrero/Cuathemoc, which I don’t/won’t walk after dark. There is often construction trash dumped on the side of the road, and regular trash tossed from cars by people who should know better but clearly don’t.
It’s a quiet street, a few cars on the dusty road, and even less foot traffic, so I can make good time without bumping into someone that I know. I heard a feral cat cry and immediately prayed I would not come across a mama cat and her kittens. I didn’t, but what I nearly stumbled over took my breath away. I stood shocked as the dust kicked up from my feet settled, and there, in an oversized black garbage bag that had burst open or maybe was never closed – the weight would have been enormous –
Thirty, 50, maybe more paperback books in English.
They were dusty, of course, but I couldn’t see mold or water damage and didn’t have the time or inclination to dig through to see if any were salvageable. The bag was not there the last time I walked the street, and I am still baffled this morning at the degradation. And the loss. And the waste. I thought about the authors of these books and how dismayed they would be to see their work trashed.
Used books can cost up to 200 pesos for a single paperback! I don’t know if there were any authors I covet in the broken bag, and that is not the point. There are so many ways to recycle things you no longer want; throwing them away on a lonely, barely used road like that is never the answer. And, who could have lifted that bag in the first place? Someone did. From the trunk of a car or in the back of a pickup truck. Saw fit to throw away perfectly good reading material. In English. Waste makes me crazy!
The sight of the books jarred a long-forgotten memory of being at the city dump in Calgary, maybe 50 years ago, dropping off some irreparable pieces of furniture when I saw a massive truck with Salvation Army logo all over it stop, open the rear doors of the truck, and dump what had to be a thousand pieces of clothing into the sloppy pre-separate-the-organic- waste mess that was already there. I have never set foot in another ”Sally Ann” in my life.
In these days of so much plenty. So much food. So much stuff at Christmas. Please recycle. Share what you don’t want, can no longer use. Give things away, sell them. Trade them. Try to remember that books are sacred: dammit. From Here.
