Member-only story
ENVIRONMENTAL STEWARDSHIP
We Are All Litterers
Admission is the first step to overcoming the problem
Driving through West Virginia last fall, and seeing “Almost Heaven” roadway signs juxtaposed with roadside garbage, I was struck by the irony that people who think of their state as “almost heaven” would throw trash out their car windows. “Is there litter in heaven?” I wondered. “And, if so, who picks it up?”
It’s not just West Virginia, of course. My small town in Maine also has more than its share of litter. If I walk 50 yards down the road, I see plastic bottles and beer cans that have been tossed out of cars. At a town park, I might find a plastic bag from a fast food restaurant containing half-eaten food together with the wrappings.
More than a few back roads in our town have become unofficial dumps where people offload old tires, sofas, and refrigerators, leaving them to slow decay and rust amidst the moss-covered stones.
Then there are the domestic garbage gyres, the shanties where the inhabitants hoard trash and increasingly live within a circle of garbage. A circle that expands for months or years until the inhabitants abandon it, leaving the town to pay for the cleanup.
