Danger: Safe Sex

Last week, on the roadway in front of my car, a bit to the left toward the yellow centerline, rested a condom. I say "rested" because, after all, this open-ended (one side) sausage casing, was tired, spent, used, discarded, exhausted of any capacity for further employment. I spied this object in the morning. What carnal circus or mayhem had taken place overnight? I was relieved to know my car was not a venue for whatever tryst or ambush or dalliance had occurred. My car was still locked and had not been broken into. I was annoyed, embarrassed, and irked at the sight of a post-coital condom. This was not a merely puritanical or judgmental response. Such objects in one's environs are hardly welcome; they don't raise the value of surrounding properties. Still, why does this particular bit of detritus rankle me more than, say, a gum wrapper or cigarette box, though I abhor all litter, as I have noted in this space abundantly? Is it the cavalier disregard of others or of others' surroundings it hints at? (What else was the penile perp to do?) Some might celebrate the object as forensic evidence of safe sex. Yippee. (Such hurray-shouters would inevitably reside from afar, proponents of No Condoms In My Frontyard, NCIMF.) So, what did I do? I went to the trunk of my car and retrieved a pair of work gloves. I daintily picked up the thing, using two fingers, squinting in disdain, averting my gaze. Then what? I wasn't going to waltz into my apartment and put it in the trash. Nooooo. It would make for a rude and uninvited guest, an awkward visitor. I walked up near the house, by some bushes, and tossed it amidst some thickets, where it can rest, unseen, for centuries, known only by me. And now by you as well.

Detroit style

Several yards ahead of me and my dog, they walked. One of them carried a pizza box and ate the remains of a pizza. Little Caesars (ubiquitously missing the apostrophe). "Detroit Style." I imagined an empty pizza box being tossed as litter. Should I preemptively speak against such a vision? I decided against that. Maybe I'd be wrong, and Pizza Eater would not discard the pizza box in the park on this golden spring day. So I walked on, silent. I passed the couple. Then I reversed direction. Sure enough, the couple, including Pizza Eater, walked toward me, no pizza box in hand. I could not resist. "I'll take care of that pizza box for you," I said, looking straight at Pizza Eater. "Appreciate it," was the reply, as if Pizza Eater expected old men to serve as personal valet on litter patrol, or as if Pizza Eater was politely grateful for this correction of a mere oversight, an "accident." "Yeah, sure," I said, tugging against saying a lot more, vehement, sarcastic, righteous, angry, incredulous, instructive, despairing, dangerous. I walked on. I found the evidence, the discarded Little Caesars box. I picked it up, mumbled angrily, and carried the pizza box up the hill. I tossed it in the trash barrel. (I never opened it to confirm if all the slices had been consumed.)

Notice that I have refrained from describing the litter perps. Are there demographics detailing who litters?

Earth Day? Spare me the pious (pie-ous; get it?) cleanups. What about today?

a surprise of snails

After my post-office errand, I walked down Solar Street, in Syracuse. I had two pieces of litter in my hand, a flattened beverage cup with straw and a flattened cigarette pack. I had already recovered and delivered to the USPS doorkeeper (closing time had passed while I was writing a check in the P.O.) a white paper plate stamped with tire tread and some remnants of plastic bag that resided in front of the P.O. (Or something else. I am already forgetting.) I did not want to bother the affable clerk to open the locked door once again. Plus, he might see me as some litter-gathering psycho. In the shade of sunny Solar, I spotted, on the border of cut grass and overgrown shrubbery, a split-open empty potato chip (or similar contents) bag. I hesitated. Why pick it up? It will dirty my hands. What difference will it make? I could do this all day and not make a dent. Just yesterday, strolling through Solvay, I passed the lawn of some young people with kids adrift and noise aplenty. At the edge of their lawn, garbage, litter, filth. I paused and looked at the detritus, angrily hoping to catch the attention of the residents. And then what would I say? And would my life then be in danger for saying it or silently conveying it? Killed over litter. Not the way to go, I guess. Or would it be a bold statement? Um, no. Walking home, I had a revelation. If they could care less about their own house or (most likely) rental property, why should I be surprised if they toss junk from their car window or from their hands as they walked? It makes no difference to them. Just as, perhaps, nothing makes much difference to them in their lives. As I picked up the shining foil of the snack bag, I was surprised to fine dozens of snails in the dirt. I jostled the shells. They all seemed vacant of snails. I guess they would be. So, it was a surprise of snail shells, not snails. I know little of snails, despite my reading of the fiction of Anthony Doerr. Naively, I expect shells like these to be found near the sea. The closest water is Onondaga Lake, and the stream leading to it, Nine Mile Creek. James Lipton compiled An Exaltation of Larks. Are snails, or shells, included in his taxonomy and lexicon?

Earth Day 2014

I've posted about this before, that Earth Day is a feel-good escape, a chance to feel environmentally holy, if you will. Sure, many of the priests and priestesses of this secular religion practice the same rituals for the other 364 days of the year. But the cleanup rites are typically around Earth Day. It is not unlike waltzing to the soup kitchen on Thanksgiving and handing out turkeys. Good for one day, maybe even a week. But I'm no better and my saying this does not exempt me from such criticisms.
p.s. I hate litter. It is contemptuous of civil order, an act of self-loathing and belligerent degradation, a despair.

messyanic vision

So, Saturday night, just before the commendable "Hamlet" at the Red House, I strolled on the sidewalk across the street along the so-called connective corridor. It seemed the only thing it was connected to was litter. Is litter too nice a word? Garbage. Crap. Detritus that makes things Detroit-us. Plastic bags (I wish we would ban them), cigarette boxes, paper, plastic, you-name-it. Who does this? Who are the litterati? And if I had more time and work gloves and some sort of trash container, I would have done more than bitch about it and would have stooped to conquer; would have picked some of it up. What an unappealing greeting to visitors or residents! It was as if the melted snow revealed the shame of an entire winter of cavalier disposal. Consumerist caches of junk tossed in the wind amid the shrubs. This is why I hate Earth Day. Earth Day is the salve upon one's social conscience, the balm of do-gooderism that pretends the other 364 days are just fine, environmentally and socially. Right.

Lit 101 Redux

Yesterday's random litter pickup while walking in the blazing 95-degree Syracuse heat:

Newport cigarette boxes (two or three), Burger King bag, Whopper cardboard box, Seneca cigs box, wadded-up paper, coffee cup, Goya pineapple juice can,  something-something, and some more something-something else.

Did I like dirtying my hands to do this? No.

Why did I do it?

Did you see me doing this?

When you were panhandling over near the Dinosaur Barbecue, did you know I almost walked over and told you to abandon your statuesque, catatonic beggar's stance and pitch in in my cleanup?

Would this have resulted in violence against my person?

What does all this litter add up to?

D-I-S-G-U-S-T-I-N-G.

american eagle

so i exited the delavan center too tired or hurried or apathetic to worry much about uppercase letters and walked across west fayette street and headed east, under the railroad overpass, facing traffic, the minutues of living dangerously by walking on the side w/o a sidewalk like a knucklehead. seeing an american eagle shoe box or sneakerbox smack dab in the middle of west fayette street near west street I picked it up, angry to find such a blatant display of street rubbish. i carried it in my right hand. my left shoulder held my heavy backpack w/ my white MacBook; sometimes i simply carried the pack, almost dragging to the ice-melting pavement or roadway, with my left hand. the red american eagle empty shoebox or sneakerbox served as a display to oncoming traffic that someone was afoot, like ratso rizzo in midnight cowboy saying 'i'm walkin' here!' but as i went along the pedestrian-forbidden west street ramp and over west genesee street and down herald place i saw so much litter that i was tempted to toss it in the road. who'd know the difference? bottles boxes cartons wrappers plastic cans glass metal. the detritus of urban what? decay? carelessness? morass? lassitude? a pity. you walk you see it. you drive, you don't. i became sad at my quixotic quest. who notices? one piece of litter or one million pieces of litter in syracuse, new york, or nearly any other city in america; who notices? what is it about our national character, or lack thereof? (it's not national; it's individual and individual and individual ad nauseam) americans especially those so-called lowercase tea-baggers would be hugely insulted if they heard someone say that americans are dirty, that america is a dirty country; they'd be offended. but compared to some other places on the globe -- oh no, not all, not all, that's for sure -- we are sloppy and litter-strewn and not proud at all of our living space. proud american. eagle. but people get all up in arms, literally, about symbols of america, flags, eagles, etc. as if they are pristine, but the same people, do they accept the presence of a landscape strewn with litter? but i held onto the american eagle box until finding a plastic, bag-lined trash barrel (empty) over by mission landing. i tossed it in there, feeling vaguely as if i was being watched disposing of contraband. i continued walking across the mission landing parking lot and my left leg slid out from under me, the victim of melting black ince [now there's an everyday oxymoron]. my left hand caught the fall. my kneck and back wrenched. i got back up, uncut, unbroken unbowed. this reminded me of two years ago when completely invisible black ice caused my left leg to rip out from under me almost making me lose my breath and tearing my hamstring such that it was bruised, bruised!, for weeks afterward, even while in berlin, germany. i marched onward, to freedom of espresso, an oasis, a welcome respite.

a litteration situation

Walking illuminates life at a slower, detailed scale, and along Syracuse's West Genesee Street, with its largest former car dealers shuttered, I witness the lonely signs of the Great Recession, ending my pedestrian promenade at the joyfully libertine Freedom of Espresso on Solar Street, but not before seeing the detritus of American consumption, the litteroti of careless consumerism: cigarette cartons (why so many crush-proof boxes of Newport?), a cereal box, a can of Arizona ice tea, lottery tickets, a squashed plastic water bottle, and so much more lessening the landscape, aching for trash cans either missing or brimming over.

The Portals of Peccadillo, Redux

Okay, righto, true. Trusted commenters to the last post have a valuable point. I heartily concur, namely:

It is just as rude -- perhaps even more rude -- to fail to extend gratitude, or nod, or in some way acknowledge human kindness, urbanity, and civility, when someone politely holds open a door for others to pass through. Not to do so reeks of entitlement, condescension, and disdain.

Littering?

This seemingly pickiest of peccadilloes (unpickiest -- the failure to pick up) is a symbol of the decline of order and respect; it is a symbol of ruin.

Just like running red lights.

Just like the lack of courtesy.

I sound Victorian (I am; I love those naughty tales of covered-up lasses), but mutual civility equals civilization. In American cities, people are shooting each other over a perceived lack of so-called respect, not having done anything whatsoever to merit the respect in the first place (Michael Vick, anyone?).