First Post

I am 30 years old.  I work as a garbage-man for a public park somewhere in the United States.  Really I'm a sort of outdoor handyman; some days I pick up trash with a trash picker and a barrel on wheels; some days I change the liners in the 28 trash barrels (lots of dog shit and coffee cups); other days I fix the wooden benches, remove graffiti from the roads and walls or rake leaves out of the sewer drains. Much of my work life involves garbage.  The perimeter of the park is surrounded by city streets, and there's a street that bisects the grounds, so the streets form a kind of figure 8.  People throw cans, bottles, drinks, packages, CD's, DVD's, cigarette packages and other things out their windows as they drive by.  I don't really mind, they're the reason I have a job.  (I do spend a lot of time ruminating about the waste created by advanced industrial capitalism, and on a broader scale that drives me crazy.  A new Styrofoam coffee cup every day!?)  People park at the gates at night and on the weekend when they need a private spot; I clean up their condoms and underwear.  You'd think they would want to put the underwear back on afterwards, but this is clearly not always the case.  People leave syringes lying on the roads and walls.  I have a red sharps container where I collect those.  At some point I'll take them all out and take a photograph of them.  At certain times of the year, people leave sacrifices on the grounds; lots of coconuts, sometimes other vegetables and sometimes animals, usually chickens or other birds.  I find those.  I haven't been able to figure out exactly what religion these ceremonies belong to but my guess is either Haitian Voodoo, Cuban Sanataria or Brazilian Condomble.  All of those communities are represented in our area.People leave couches and televisions, dolls and toys, books, clothes, magazines and torn up photographs.  Once I found two 45 automatic shells.  My plan is to begin photographing the trash and post it for you to see and share.  My trash is your trash.