Here’s a story:
Frankie the Wonder Dog and I are walking in the city park and we see a kid drinking a Big Gulp out of a 1-quart Styrofoam cup. He finishes about half of it and tosses the cup along with its plastic top and plastic straw on the ground. He’s standing five feet away from a trashcan. Frankie rushes over to lick up the mess. While Frankie licks, I tell the kid not to litter and use the trashcan. He tells me to perform an unnatural act and walks away.
Yes, I know Trump is morally and financially bankrupting yet one more enterprise, but I’m tired of describing the same accident over and over again. So, let’s take the above story apart instead, okay?
The first part of the story is about failure. There’s a general consensus that littering is a basic civic no-no, but somehow, the kid didn’t get the message. Does that mean his parents failed? His school (that would be you, teachers and principals)? His church (Hello Pastor! Hello Elders!)? Or has his community as a whole failed – you know, peers, neighbors, cops, the mayor? Who’s responsible for the Little Darling’s robustly crapulent character?
Now that you agree I should follow the kid’s suggestion, let’s get on with the story:
I pick up after the kid and use the trashcan. While Frankie happily continues to lick the pavement – she will later lick my face and put her tongue up my nose – it occurs to me that the trashcan is only a “middleman” in the Big Gulp’s journey. The lid and straw will travel from trashcan to landfill where – like 9 out of 10 plastic lids and straws – they’ll stick around for the next 400 years before filtering into the ocean. Only 9% of the 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic waste currently in our landfills gets recycled.
The concluding and entirely scientific postscript to the story is that I owe the kid an apology. Whether we use the trashcan or not is merely an aesthetic preference. We can hide our sins – and our trash – but we can’t be free of them.
Yep, you probably should follow his instruction. You want to lay the blame at someone’s feet, look no further than yourself. I’m no fan of our political situation as it now stands and I think it certainly has it’s negative effect on our society but the problem stems from parenting alone. Teachers and preachers can only do so much with what they have to work. Policemen and women don;t teach the insolent little brats (that grow up to write articles for tiny town weeklies) they just enforce the law when able. The one positive I see from your writing is that you own up to your “sin” even if you mostly lead that passive aggressive lie.
I have to disagree. First because I am not certain that sin is real so, I may not be imprisoned by them, hence I am free of them. And secondly, I’m just feeling contrary and don’t want to agree with anyone today.
His ilk is likely to think/ say, “Hey, we pay the convicts to pick up after us. Let them do it.” Good take on the subject. Was this a “white supremist” kid, do you suppose?