I hate litterers. I mean, I really hate them. I know I should hate the sin and not the sinner, but I have a special loathing for the type of person who thinks it’s somebody else’s responsibility to pick up his/her shit.
When I taught in New York, my students were constantly throwing trash on the floor of the classroom, and I’d have talks with them about being responsible and maintaining a nice environment for ourselves. And I’d make signs for the classroom that said things like
Keep it clean! :)
Then one day, I got on the city bus. It was packed, but I could see that the mother of one of my students stood by the back doors, sipping on a cup of coffee. At the next stop, when somebody exited, she pitched her cup unceremoniously into the street.
And I was like, WHY DO I EVEN BOTHER?
Now I live in a neighborhood that’s kind of sketchy—lots of rentals and low-income folks—and for the most part I love it. It’s close to everything. I love my house. My immediate neighbors—minus the crazy lady and her delinquent son—are cool. Our email listserv has pretty solid participation.
But it’s shitty, in the ways that low-income neighborhoods are. People don’t mow their yards regularly. Landscaping is minimal. And there’s trash all over the place all the time. Four or five times a week, I find discarded food/drink containers or wrappers in my yard, often in the front but also in the back, which has a 6-foot privacy fence around it and is set back from the street. That means that the person has to pitch their garbage twenty feet, or walk up to the fence to toss something over. The dogs inevitably shred it, so pieces get distributed all over the yard, which I then pick up.
I get so pissed. And I think about ordering signs for my front yard and fence that say sunshiny things like
Feel free to use my garbage cans there, neighbor! ;)
Or I consider starting a neighborhood education program about littering.
Instead I think about my student’s mom and post passive-aggressive status updates on Facebook. (Click for bigger.)
And sit around being a grumpus.
But then my nephew comes over and says, “Nunu, why is there a CD in your mulch pile?”
And I think something positive might come out of this whole littering business because whose life is not improved by Earthquake Booty Number 4 (especially after the magna opera of Numbers 1-3)?
But no. It’s scratched.
Note to my sister: If I disappear tomorrow, please explain to the authorities that my Google search history doesn’t usually include links to works by “big-dicked entrepreneur B. Pumper” who “showcas[es] thick black girls with enormous asses”. I was just curious about what I was missing by not being able to play the disc. Swear to god, I thought it was a hip hop CD. (And how apropos! Mine could probably be categorized as an earthquake booty, or at least a tremor trunk.)
But no. It’s porn.
So now I don’t know what my sign should say. Maybe
If you’re going to litter porn in my yard, please make sure it’s a fun hip hop CD instead! :/
P.S. “These monster asses are causing tragedies and creating major earthquakes.”