Crap In A Bag

Remember this: Someone has to pick up that crap.  

Yes, having peace and quiet is a good thing.

Yesterday, I went down to the river to sit in the shade and read an anthology of Ray Bradbury’s work. The breeze smelt of fishy river water. Eastern caterpillars fell off the trees to crawl across the expanse of my white soiled t-shirt.

It was a nice way to relax the tension in my neck muscles.

I was watching the water reflect off the oak tree I was sitting under. I heard some vehicles pull up and looked over to see a man and a blonde woman fishing from the bank. Another black truck pulls up with the cigarette smoking man and his friend getting out and throwing in a line.

I went back to reading a story of murder and a not-so-smart chick escaping a serial killer but comes back to find her lemonade where she left it.

I looked over at one abandoned camping area on the bank. Someone had vandalized the trees with red paint by putting letters and pictures on the trunks. Someone left a red hammock with a white teddy bear and cooler hanging in the trees. Cut up trees were piled up on a camp fire. You would think an idiot would know you have to cure cut oak a while for it to burn, otherwise it is too wet and hard-so that was a waste of cutting down some river trees. 

The blonde woman walks past my truck in search of a fishing spot on the other side of the river. She comes creeping back in a semi-disgusted weary way like she has just stepped in dog poop but can’t get it off her shoe-so the smell follows her everywhere.

She was telling me about the drunks on the other side of the boat ramp and how nasty they were. I didn’t go over there. I hoped they would leave. The blonde lady asked me was I not scared to be there. I told her other people were here so I didn’t see it a problem. She said she would be scared. I thought for her the idea of a clump of drunks down at the river could be capable of anything-along with the sober ones-all they need is the itch to do something bad.

I take it like this: If you don’t mess with a wild animal it won’t bite you. Some will seek you out just because of boredom and opportunity. The campers at the river insult wild animals with their antics. Mind you, some of the campers are not bad but a lot of them drive less than 25 minutes from their homes to trash the river area, leave it, and then go home to the squalor of their lives.

Here is the problem of the average nature-goer experiencing the “turn-off” of a potential interaction, directly or indirectly, with other not-so-savory nature-goers that make the landscape psychologically feel like a threat, or something to form an aversion to.

The blonde lady felt like she couldn’t say anything to the drunken people. It could be that she just didn’t want to go to the river to find that waiting on her and ruin her good time. 

This bids the question:

Who carries more weight in voicing a possible discretion on the part of another nature-goer, when that nature-goer is causing harm to a protected area where wildlife and the public can enjoy an experience-a good experience?

When there is no law authority present, is it an issue to say to someone who comes into an area, hacking away at trees, and leaving their human excrement everywhere-that someone feels like they can’t say to them, “Stop that shit!”

The boat landing being a public place, these people take public drunkenness to all-time-highs. It is scaring away the sober people who legitimately want to be there and fish from the bank without the molestation, or view of soap opera-type shenanigans.

It was getting late and I decided to leave everyone there.

Today, I decided to go back and read my book some more-to get myself out of the house. I figured the drunks would be gone. I took a rake and some trash bags. I drove down there and parked.

This man that lives down the road said to me, “It is a damn shame that you have to come down here and clean up someone else’s nasty mess. They cut that shade tree down Sunday after moving their campsite three times.”

Undoubtedly, I am not the only local that gets pissed off with people ransacking the public boat ramp. He told me he’d been there on and off over the weekend and it was the drunks in the blue tent.

I walked over there and asked them who cut the tree down. Three drunk birds chirped, "Not me!" The local man said he saw them do it.

A tree doesn’t seem so important. This tree was a young tree that stood on the bank of the water to shade you so you didn’t stand in the sun. These douches “allegedly” cut it down to hopefully burn their trash so they wouldn’t have to take it home. The drunken trio was already in the shade, swaying in a hammock tied on the river between two trees. I felt justified in not telling them about the alligators that creep in that stagnant water.

I asked them if they had trash bags and told them I would give them some if they would pick up their trash. They took them. The diabetic drunk woman followed me around constantly asking me who I worked for. She followed me so much I got her to help me pick up the trash. She told me that she had a court date for public drunkenness.

I laughed and asked her, “You didn’t go? Aren’t you going to get in trouble?”

She was a sweet, clueless little drunk woman and said, “No, I put it off for another day to come down here.”

I replied, “You do know this is a public boat landing. You don’t want to get yourself in more of a situation over a drink.”

She just kept talking and picking up trash. I said nothing. We finally got to this box that was filled with individual grocery bags filled with human excrement. Oh, the cherry on the cake!

She ran from the box and I laughed. I bent over laughing watching her run away from this box. I told her to leave it and someone else could come pick that up. By the time I got finished, we had a truck load of trash that I drove to the recycling center. I gave her some more trash bags and told her I had to be off and to enjoy her day.

When you think about all the sober people going in and out of there with fancy boats to enjoy the public boat landing it is funny how a drunken little old lady was the only one helping me pick up the trash. Shakes head.

Everyone wants to enjoy the bounty of what Nature has to offer but don’t ask them to clean their crap-left-behind up. You also have those people that literally take a dump on Nature and leave the grocery bag behind. Somehow, I don’t think that is a form of recycling? Or is it?

Written by: Angelia Y Larrimore