my mind's been in the gutter

I signed a petition at church to close a recycling center on Adams Blvd. It is an ATM machine where drug dealers and gang members lay in wait to attack the newly moneyed. A boy was recently shot to death there when asked to name his gang, and he did not have an alliance. I never knew this and it makes me feel uneasy. I see the people, many sorts from old ladies to young men, sorting and sifting through our trashcans and recycling bins on Tuesdays when they line the street in wait for the city collectors. Rolling their carts. They are clever and have the sticks and gloves to make their jobs as easy as possible. I don’t know why I never thought they would be recycling my tuna cans for crack. It just never occurred to me; evidence that I am still naïve. I mean I didn't all these soda cans and plastic bottle collectors did this because they cared so very much about the environment, but my mind never made the connection to drug dealers.

In 12th grade government I learned something in about trash and drugs dealers. I learned that it used to be that people would just throw their garbage in the Glad Trashbags® on the curbside for the garbage collectors to pick up. A meth manufacturer (kitchen laboratory), threw his drug making waste on the curb tied tightly in your standard plastic trashbag. The police searched it found evidence that proved this man was a drug dealer. In a court of law, the drug dealer claimed his rights were violated because the police had no search warrant to search his private property: his trash. The judge ruled when you throw away your trash, it becomes city property and therefore it was fair game. The plastic trash bins that say Property of Los Angeles reinforce this truth: Your trash in no longer yours. I am okay with that. But the drug dealer didn’t like that ruling so much.

Today on my way to the bus stop, I walked behind an older man pushing his cart of recyclables down the street. He turned around because he sensed someone was behind him. Not being very threatening in my business casual, he smiled and asked how I was. Good I replied how are you? He started coughing, a deep chest with phlegm cough. Blessed. He managed to get out between coughs, blessed to be alive.



I passed him and continued my walk to the bus stop.

As I walked past the gas station I got a whiff of warm exhaust and sidewalk stench. It reminded me of Manila, and I felt a little homesick for a place that’s not mine. Between the stenches and the people living off our trash we are not so different from the Manila.

The recycling center on the Adams is a place of death, not renewal. I wonder about the people who recycle goods for good and not evil. Who are they and where will they go to find a safe recycling center and few extra bucks to buy dinner for the kids.