Garbage Day: Nov. 9

It's garbage day in my neighborhood. We have shiny new garbage and recycling cans. The one that's overflowing is the recycling. You can't see it, but the garbage one, the big one, is almost empty. These are a huge improvement over the old ones that blew away in a huge storm (global warming?) We dragged one home from the bottom of the hill a block away, battered and bent. We're not sure it was ours to begin with, but that's what we've used for the last couple of years.

These new garbage cans are the result of a long political battle in my suburb. The idea was simple. Reduce the number of large trucks careening through our neighborhoods each week. The city would be divided into sections. Current garbage haulers would be given the same number of customers, but all in the same section, so that each neighborhood had just one company serving it. Research showed there would be little difference in the cost to customers, the roads would be less torn up, and pedestrians would be a little safer.

But what, you might ask, about our freedom? Our basic right to the garbage hauler of our choice? The government wanted to take it away! A movement sprang up. "Hands off our cans!" said the signs. It didn't matter that the movement originated outside our city, our rights were on the line. It took months of discussion, but ultimately our city council was unswayed by the argument. Garbage freedom was thwarted, and we have a new garbage hauler.

Today that new company will carry away our trash. They will sort through our recycling to remove those 'wish-cycling' items that we threw in the bin, hoping that by some miracle they could be recycled. Our neighborhood will be quieter and safer, and we have new cans.

The trucks will drive on newly-paved roads, over sewage lines, past the water treatment plant. The may pass a school where the children are fed breakfast and lunch. They may pass a park or a workforce center where people get help finding jobs. They may pass a police station or a fire station. They may pass the Mall of America, which got huge tax breaks from the city of Bloomington for decades. All of these things we pay for together, for the common good. 

And then what? It's my freedom vs. yours, zero sum, black and white. If I'm gay, your religious freedom means I lose the right to marry. If you're Catholic, my right to birth control means you lose your religious freedom. If you're an immigrant, forget it. My right to be in a lily-white America without you, means you get out.

The little tree is gone. I took this picture in September and used it in a blog post about hope. I said, "The snow will come, and it (the tree) will disappear. If it survives the winter, it will grow again, no matter who is elected president." Well, it didn't even make it until the snow. Whether mowed down or choked out, it is no longer there. Hope won't bring it back.


I greeted my colleagues this morning by saying, "Welcome to the apocalypse!" It feels like the beginning of a post-apocalyptic dystopian novel. 

"In the year 2016 of the old calendar, civilization collapsed. Frightened people tried to escape the hoards of brown devils pouring over their borders by following a man who said he could save them. A madman, who led them into a hell they'd never imagined..."

Today I alternate between anger and resignation, hope and despair. This morning my entire class of adult immigrants broke out sobbing. Mexicans, Vietnamese, Somalis, Russians, Cambodians, all in tears. "They hate us, teacher," wailed Ayan, a Somali woman. "Why do they hate us?"

What could I say? They judge you because of your race. They fear your religion. They despise you because you're a woman. I was crying too hard to respond.

But I'm not entirely hopeless. We have a lot of work to do. People need the correct information about what is dangerous (lots and lots of hand guns, intolerant Christians), and what isn't (taxes, immigrants). I told my students the same thing. There's work to be done. In two years, they can find candidates to campaign for, even if they're not citizens yet. They can reach out to form relationships with people outside of their communities.

I found a verse I wrote in 2010 when the Tea Party took over Congress.

The people who hate

think they've won this debate,

But the people who care

need not despair.

Though great fear was spread, 

"Mine! Mine! Mine!" was said,

in time compassion 

will be in fashion.

It does seem like the end of the world. Today. Now. Forever. But no political party has held office forever. History swings back and forth. If we work for the time of compassion, it will return.