Keep the Scene Clean
This time he brought his trash pincher, purchased from the Dollar Store. With his pincher in one hand and his white cane in the other, he walked up the dirt road off the Blue Ridge Parkway like he meant serious business. Because his eyesight is limited, I called out the alert when I spotted a piece of trash and directed him to it. He was interested in naming and describing the color of each piece as he carefully raised it up into the bag I held open. His trash pincher might have been a metal detector, and we could have been looking for coins on a beach because each piece of trash we discovered was like finding buried treasure. Working as team, we collected silver, clear, green, and brown plastic and glass with his pincher. He decided we should be called the McClean Team.
When the bag was full, we walked back to the house, sat on the porch and drank some water. My black and white notebook sitting on the picnic table got his attention. “I bet you got that on the Price is Right,” he said.
Post notes: "Keep the Scene Clean" was coined by my friend Grateful Steve and once sold as bumper sticker at Grateful Dead concerts. More neighborhood litter patrol from The McClean Team is HERE.
Comments
That is such a great thing to do. We all should get out there and do this. It makes we think of why people would just litter like that. michele sent me!
Posted by: michelle | March 21, 2008 12:21 PM
The litter here in NC is increasing hourly. We used to have such clean roadsides, but no more. I should do that clean up here too!
Posted by: kenju | March 21, 2008 3:11 PM
I love this story!
Posted by: Poe | March 21, 2008 3:16 PM
If we each would do this a little, we'd clean up a lot!
Posted by: June | March 21, 2008 7:48 PM
Cane or not, it takes some community effort to keep the garbage mess down. Glad you guys did it.
Posted by: Pearl | March 21, 2008 8:01 PM
Oh the Cougars (or whatever you call them) definately do exist - you should go to the Link on my post, which tells about proof of them in here.
Posted by: Chrissie | March 21, 2008 8:39 PM
Oh I love John! You had him last weekend - do you have him this weekend too?
Posted by: Chrissie | March 21, 2008 8:40 PM
Nope. This is a lag time post, written last Monday-Tuesday.
Posted by: colleen | March 21, 2008 8:43 PM
good work! it is the teens in our area who throw the trash, and i have become increasingly intolerant of the younger generation as a result. if i knew where they lived i would visit their parents. : (
Posted by: sky | March 21, 2008 9:26 PM
Love this story, it deserves 2 easter eggs.
here via Michele.
and will return
Posted by: Marisa | March 22, 2008 12:41 AM
Yay for the McClean Team keeping the scene clean! I need to get one of those trash pincher gizmos--I have nearly fallen in the water recently trying to fetch litter from the water-filled ditches on our road!
Posted by: Beth | March 22, 2008 8:48 AM
this is me daily in the park !!
Posted by: sandy kessler | March 22, 2008 10:19 AM
I love this story too!
Posted by: Sherry | March 22, 2008 3:26 PM