THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING MY POSTS!

 

Thank you so much for reading my posts!  I love sharing my stories with you.  Every day is an adventure!

Yesterday, I had this idea that I would clean the low-income housing area off Wilbeth Road.  I imagined all these lovely people going out to get in their cars for church on Easter Sunday, and they might not know why, but their world would just look nicer.  (People don't typically notice when trash is picked up, they only notice when there's trash.)

So I picked up 3,734 pieces last night and got up bright and early to continue where I left off.

At Virginia & Wilbeth, I cleaned an area behind an apartment building.  I pulled all this stuff from behind the bushes.  I think there's part of a wheel, a plastic rake, a milk carton and a busted up counter top!

What a difference it made to get all of that out of there!  

I think these heavy pieces of trash have been there for years.

I cleaned all around their dumpster.  It was a big mess.  There was a half a couch behind the dumpster where I'm guessing a homeless person sat to eat his dinner.  It was disgusting!

Somehow, I managed to get that into the dumpster by myself.

A tenant came outside and thanked me for cleaning up this area.  She said people were throwing their bags at the dumpster, because it was so messy around it.

What a big difference it made to get that cleaned up!

This morning, I picked up 3,952 pieces of trash.  I think that's a record for one session.

I found needles.

I swept up DOZENS of piles of broken glass.

I picked up DOZENS of heavy glass liquor bottles.  DOZENS!

I picked up DOZENS of icky baby diapers.  There's nothing worse than baby diapers!  After they get rained on, they weigh about 20 pounds!

I said hello to a skinny dog that was tied outside on a rope that was about three feet long.  My heart broke for him.  He was shivering with his ears pressed back, and I wanted to so much knock on the door and ask if they wanted their dog, because I'd take him home and love him if they didn't.

I started to take a picture, but then I decided I had enough on my plate.  I'm picking up all this trash, and I can't start picking up dogs too.  As much as I wanted to, I can't.

This is the most amazing thing of all!

I PICKED UP 47 NAILS AND SCREWS IN THE PARKING LOTS TODAY!

I know that's a record.  How on earth can there be so many?  It almost has to be on purpose, don't you think?  These people have so many problems.  Flat tires shouldn't be among them.

As I was picking up trash at Virginia & Wilbeth, where I try to clean every week, I saw the worst mess.  I just tried not to be overwhelmed, and I started picking it up.

A man about 50 years old with a very critical face yelled out, "HEY, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"  I said, "I'm picking up trash."  He said, "YOU'RE ON MY PROPERTY!  GET OFF!"  I walked toward him and said, "You don't want me to help you?"  He said, "NO I'LL PICK UP THE REST."

I'm so used to people being grateful, I was in shock.  I pick up thousands of pieces of trash a day, because people are grateful.  I don't do it for money.  I do it for gratitude.  What would cause anyone to be so sour?  Do you think maybe nobody ever did anything nice for him before?  Do you think he was embarrassed?  I know it's not his trash.  There's a lot of traffic at this intersection.

I grabbed my trash cart and continued down the street, and I told myself, "I need thicker skin.  I can't let one sourpuss hurt my feelings.  I've met so many wonderful people as I pick up trash."   

I wish I could have told him about my amazing day.  I wish I could have shown him the pictures I took of nails and needles and broken glass.  I wish he could see all the good things I'm doing for him and his neighbors.  All he saw was that I was trespassing on his property, and actually, I wasn't.  I was standing on the road.