While visiting our friends John & Ellen in the States over vacation, John had to leave on a business trip. On his way out, he asked me to 'help Ellen with the garbage on trash day'. This seemed easy enough, so after discovering that 'Trash Day' was on Wednesday, I promptly forgot all about it.
It was not until a few days later, as our family was heading off on some outing, that I remembered my task. "Crap!", I said, as we drove thru the neighborhood & I saw all the overturned trash cans. "I was supposed to help Ellen get the trash out!" Ellen had left for work earlier in the morning without a word about the trash. It now dawned on me that not only was I supposed to 'help Ellen get the trash out' ; I was actually supposed to 'help Ellen REMEMBER to get the trash out' - obviously a chore I was not up handling. I did feel bad, as we were staying with them for several weeks - seemed the least I could have done was do this one thing for them.
"We'll have to go out later," I said to my husband. "We'll have to go out & find a dumpster somewhere to get rid of the trash before John comes home."
He made a face.
"We'll have to be sneaky," I informed him, "I think it might be against the law."
My husband growled, "I'll take care of it."
My hero.
Later...
My hero & I were going thru our friends garbage - getting it out of their garbage cans & bagging whatever had not been bagged before. It was mildly disgusting. I tried to lighten the mood by reminding him of an incident that I considered worse than this in our past: "Remember that time I accidentally threw away your Swatch & you had to go dumpster diving in Las Vegas?" I chuckled at the memory of him standing in a dumpster late at night with a flashlight. He did not seem to enjoy this memory as much as I did. He gave me a look that clearly said, 'this is all YOUR fault - don't even TRY to cheer me up' & lugged a huge bag of garbage out to the trunk of our rental car. I followed with two more bags.
Inexplicably, at this point, with one bag of garbage in the car & two bags leaning against the tire, my husband decided he needed lunch, so he marched off to wash his hands. I stood contemplating the garbage bag stuffed into the trunk & the advisability of leaving it sitting there marinating on this sweltering July afternoon, but what could I say? I was on shaky ground here - one comment from me might end up with my husband 'washing his hands' of the whole affair. Besides, he was right, it WAS my fault, & I was thankful for whatever help he was going to give. So, I said nothing & went inside the house to eat my apple & almond butter.
Upon our return to the car, some 25 minutes later, we were met with one of the reasons we do not have pets - our friends dogs had had a field day with the nicely accessible trash bags, & the trash line extended up the driveway & into the yard. I made no comment, nor did my husband, tho we were now nearly equal in stupidity, it occurred to me. Neither of us said a thing (tho I could hear the muttered french curses under his breath) as we collected the garbage & slammed it into the trunk.
Now the search for a dumpster began. Technically, when breaking the law, one should do it under cover of darkness. But, being older & with poorer night vision, we figured it would be harder for us to FIND a dumpster. So, we operated in full daylight. "No one would suspect that!" I exclaimed. My husband shot me a Look. We set off down the road, Mission Impossible music playing inside my head. My husband made no comment, until about two minutes later, when the smell finally hit us.
"Oh, my God!" I shouted. "It REEKS!"
"Puta--" my husband stopped in mid swear to roll down the windows.
"It's over 100 degrees out there!" I pointed out.
"So?" he demanded. "What choice do we have?"
Well, I had no answer for that. We hurtled down the highway toward town, hanging out the windows with the air conditioner blasting. I imagined those cartoon lines that indicate a strong aroma waving around us, & a trail of deadly invisible stench extending from the trunk like the tail of a comet. I could picture the swath of dead wildlife we must be leaving behind us, & the possibility of maybe being an item on the 6 o'clock News:
"Tell us, Sheriff," a reporter with a gas mask would be thrusting a microphone into the face of a swooning Sheriff being administered oxygen by paramedics, "Are there any leads as to what killed these animals?!" & the Sheriff would say-
"Are you looking for a dumpster?" my husband queried.
"Of course! What do you think?" I responded.
Silence.
"Look, there's one! Beside the Quik-Stop." I compared this dumpster against my mental checklist for The Perfect Dumpster.
The Perfect Dumpster:
- It must be mostly out of sight
- It must not be locked
- It must be mostly empty
"No, no - ", I said, as we circled the parking lot, "Too out in the open."
"Right." my husband agreed. Down the road we went. Along the way we encountered several 'imperfect' dumpsters.
"This one's too close to the store."
"This one's got a lock on it."
"This one's in a gated community."
"This one's full."
"This is ridiculous." said my husband, gasping for air & sweating profusely.
"It will be a funny story later." I suggested hopefully, my hand over my nose.
"I mean," he pointed out, "it's not like we're trying to dump a dead body or something!"
"Exactly! Here we are worried about getting caught for doing the RIGHT thing! We could be just THROWING the trash in the FOREST, but NO! Here we are, just trying to be law abiding citizens, putting trash in it's place, & --"
"LOOK! There! There behind the car wash! I'm turning around."
We made a U-turn in silence, each of us hoping that THIS would be The Perfect Dumpster, while taking short breaths thru our mouths.
"I think this is it." I began going thru my list, "Not visible from the office, not locked, not full..."
"I don't care. I'm going to dump the trash here anyway. I'm tired of this s**t."
Yes, he swore in english. I could tell he was at his breaking point.
"Do you want me to help you?" I asked reluctantly, sliding down in my seat, searching for cleaner air below.
"NO!" I heard the implied rest of the sentence: 'Haven't you done enough already?'
So, my part in this escapade involved slinking guiltily in my seat while my hero took all the risk, &, fully exposed to the one customer at the GooGoo Car Wash, he boldly hefted those trash bags out of the trunk & into the dumpster, on an exquisitely hot & humid July afternoon in the beautiful state of Georgia. I imagined telling this story later, to my grandchildren maybe -
"The first Dumpster was TOO close.
The second Dumpster was TOO full.
But the last Dumpster was JUST RIGHT!"
Two weeks & two bottles of FeBreze later:
"What are you going to tell the rental car people about that smell, Mom?"
Hmmm....good question.
No comments:
Post a Comment