PICK UP A LOT OF TRASH . . . FIND A LOT OF CHANGE!

 

I went out to pick up trash on this gorgeous Sunday, and I was feeling so great about what I'm doing.  When I saw this mess on Wilbeth Road, I wasn't discouraged.  Firestone Park looked this bad when I started picking up trash, and now look at it.  People who live in this area will eventually start helping.  I know they will.

I started at Arlington and walked east on Wilbeth Road.  I picked up over 4,000 pieces of trash in four hours.  You can see in this picture how nice the sidewalk and road looks after I cleaned it.

There were a bunch of plastic oil jugs here.  I wonder why.  There's no logical reason why plastic oil jugs should be left here on the bike part of the road.

And here's another thing that didn't make any sense at all.  I picked up dozens of pieces of trash in this overgrown front yard.  I saw the "Poop Free Zone" sign and didn't think anything about it, but then I went back and took a picture.

Tell me why it matters to these people if dogs poop in their front yard.  They don't care about all the trash, or they'd pick it up.  Why do they care about dog poop?

And here's a great big pile of broken glass, right where the kids play football in the grass.

I picked all this glass up with my hands wearing my cut resistant gloves.  There's nothing much harder than picking glass up out of the grass.  

I don't know how the people who throw glass bottles in the grass, knowing children play here, can sleep at night.

This area was such a mess.  It didn't take me ten minutes to pick it all up.

The reason there's so much is because the people who mow don't pick any trash up, and it just keeps adding up.

Tonight, I cleaned the messiest playground.  There was ketchup, mustard and barbecue sauce all over the sliding boards.  Hopefully the rain will wash that off.  But I picked up all the trash, and very soon after I finished, kids started coming to the playground.  That felt good.

Then I saw a teenage boy with a can of spray paint.  He was shaking it and I could hear the ball inside clunking around.  I hesitated and then I asked him if he was headed to the dumpster.  He said he was.  So I took the can and threw it in my trash bag.  (I was sure a teenager with a can of spray paint was not going to end well, but it did.)

And after that, I saw a young girl, about 12 years old trying to learn to roller skate.  There was so much broken glass on the parking lot, I told her to wait, and I cleaned it all up.  Can you imagine trying to roller skate with pieces of glass all over the pavement?  That's horrible.

And here is the change I found tonight!  I'm pretty sure it was a record for one day, because I've never had to line the coins up in rows on my paper towel before.

When I cover a lot of area, I find a lot of coins.

It doesn't get much better than today.