Garbage

The human species is the most complex, specialized and highly evolved of all living organisms, and as such, is completely dependent upon all other life forms that came before it. The irony in that is that it doesn't work the other way around, for no other life forms depend upon humans for their survival. No matter how superior we may think we are, we have essentially proceeded from all other forms of earthly life, and they were all here long before we were. I would go so far as to say that none of them would be all that traumatized were we to mysteriously drop out of the biological equation.

Yet no other species, however enlightened, is as capable of upsetting the ecological apple cart as humans, and nowhere is that more apparent than in the garbage we produce and that we seem to have no idea what to do with. No other living creature produces so many byproducts that nature cannot reassimilate to the extent that we do, and no other even comes close to the disrespect for the environment that humans are capable of.

No matter where I go, I see it. Be it on the lovely path at the bird sanctuary at Biddeford Pool or along the edges of the Mast Road in Lyman, the evidence that humans have passed this way is painfully evident in the form of all manner of detritus such as food wrappers, empty cans, and the infuriatingly ubiquitous cigarette butts. If there is such a thing as violence against nature, then this is surely one manifestation of it, and one that is so easily avoidable.

Many cities and towns regularly dispatch sweepers to clean their streets and roads, yet who is there to monitor the less-travelled paths and lanes? And isn't it, or shouldn't it be, incumbent upon each and every one of us to display a proper respect for nature by at least not asking her to dispose of our garbage, too? Yes, certain things do disappear into the soil given enough time, but the best nature can do in most cases is to wait until enough autumn leaves have fallen to cover the unsightliness of objects that simply do not belong there.

I've been just as guilty myself in the past of rolling down my car window and tossing out a gum wrapper or a used tissue. But as I sat in my car on Main Street in Biddeford recently waiting for a friend who was on an errand, I noticed a man walking along with a long-handled grabber, picking trash up along the sidewalks and depositing it into a bag he carried. It occurred to me that the visible trash, of the sort that clogs our streets and drains, is considered more of an eyesore and an affront, and so it must be quickly disposed of. But conversely, it seems that the old "out of sight, out of mind" maxim applies to the less frequented by-ways where it seems less of an transgression to crush a cigarette out or toss a granola bar wrapper because fewer people are likely to see it. Yet are we doing our environment less of an injustice because no one is likely to make a fuss?

I feel one should be made, as it is very unpleasant to walk along the roads less taken, absorbing the beauty of a grass carpet dotted with wildflowers only to glance down and spot something completely incongruous and that spoils the view. If we are to smugly claim the honor of being the most civilized species, then shouldn't we act the part as well where our Earth is concerned, consider our origins and stop this needless desecration of our surroundings?

There are places for trash, and the seaside, roadways, fields and secluded woodland paths are not among them. While many of us are trying harder to recycle and to be more careful about how we dispose of our trash, we can't stop there. We must become the species that not only takes freely from the Earth and from nature but gives back to them as well, not in the form of garbage but in one of respect and a passionate unwillingness to defile their sacred beauty.


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Incongruity

Sometimes, when I take a look around me, I try to imagine what this place looked like before the advent of modern technology, before culvert pipes redirected water through the soil and telephone wires crisscrossed the blue sky and leafy backdrop like enormous spider webs to convey messages quickly from one point to the next. Objects like the transformer on top of the electrical pole or a blue reflector marker poking out of the earth seem incongruous, unwelcome and superfluous additions to the landscape and that, at times, just don't seem to belong here in this place where just about everything else simply evolved from where it stands. Even my truck, sitting in the middle of the yard, offends me some days, and I wish I could just erase it so that it wouldn't spoil the view.

The rock walls, however, are a different thing entirely. Yes, they were placed there in their particular configurations by human hands. But being of and from the earth, they fit, plainly and simply, into their biers of leaves leftover from years long before I arrived, nestled into the soil as though they've been there forever, a living chain trailing through the woods. I never cease to be amazed at the industriousness it took to construct them, and to how well they have stood the test of time, delineating boundaries between farms and pastures, many of which the woods have since reclaimed.

Having taken many walks deep into these woods, I'm aware that it wasn't always so easy to navigate them before someone decided to blaze paths and wear wheel ruts through the undergrowth. In some places, I can see how it could have taken days to cover just a few miles, tangled as they are with low growth and branches, the ground littered with dead trees in some places or too mucky and bug-infested to traverse in others. It doesn't take long for nature to reclaim what is hers, as I discovered having blazed my own path through the woods behind the shed a few years ago and that is now only visible from the marks I left on the trees there. A mere year's worth of fallen leaves is enough to obliterate a trail and to render it once again invisible to anyone who didn't know it was there.

I am most saddened, however, by the debris I find whenever I walk down the dirt road, which is a legal right of way to the properties closer to the pond. Empty styrofoam coffee cups, beer cans, and other trash litter both sides, and at the foot of my driveway across the road, there is what appears to be the remains of an old dump where I've found rusted pails, jars, bottles, and other crockery, intact or in pieces, that clearly date back to an earlier time. Many autumns have come and gone since then, effectively burying the cache, but a few items still poke up through the soil once the snow melts away each spring. Judging by the types of things I've found there, my guess is that the spot once served as a dumping ground for whatever the locals no longer wanted, and nature did them a favor by camouflaging their detritus.

At least it's not all that visible unless I'm actually looking for it, which I do at times just to see what new treasures the earth's heavings may have uninterred. Unlike the other unsightly obvious things that are not of these woods, I can conveniently forget that it's there, shifting my gaze rather to the hazy panorama that is this place at the height of summer.


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