Cooper

The United Nations conference on climate change is in full steam: lots of talk about carbon emissions, greenhouse gases, etc. I hope it won't be all hot air. Politics often takes precedence over science; and passion over reason. My modest contribution to the international debate on environmental degradation focuses on plain, old-fashioned rubbish. We seem to feel that once rubbish leaves our hand it's no longer our business. That's pure garbage. So here's my little fable.

Once upon time, I used to get upset about the rubbish that piles up on the sidewalk in front of my house and up and down the road. Twice a week, when the truck was expected to come, I would religiously bag the garbage. One of my neighbours wickedly suggested that picking up rubbish was my therapy. For what? I've given up. I'm cultivating a new attitude to street garbage. I've decided that it's really 'found art'.

I keep reminding myself of the Damascus Road experience I had a few years ago when I looked into a canal in Curaçao. A friend of mine, Annie Paul, who is a part-time art critic, pointed out the beautiful collage that the rotting fruit and other debris made in a small corner of the canal. And it was lovely. She regrets not having photographed the scene.

Incidentally, Annie used to write a witty column for one of the other Sunday papers. She gave up in despair when an uninformed editor changed 'Bollywood' to 'Hollywood.' Since the 'h' is just above the 'b' on the keyboard, I can see how the editor might have thought it was a slip of the finger. But, surely, the context should have made the meaning clear. So now, instead, Annie writes a brilliant blog, 'Active Voice.' She has been long encouraging me to follow suit.

Art in garbage

These days, I try to see art instead of garbage: the beautiful blues, yellows and basic black of scandal bags. The lovely reds and greens and vibrant oranges of juice cartons and disposable boxes from fast-food joints. The stark simplicity of white styrofoam containers. The translucence of sky juice bags. Not to mention the delicate pink bowels of the occasional dead dog!

I must admit that there used to be something slightly evangelical about my former sense of duty to the environment. I took very seriously the words of this hymn from my childhood:

Do not wait until some deed of greatness you may do/Do not wait to shed your light afar/To the many duties ever near you now be true/ Brighten the corner where you are.

I would have willingly paid someone to brighten my corner for me. But I couldn't find anybody to take on the job. I once asked a helper to pick up the garbage outside the gate. She dismissively told me that she cleans up outside her gate but she wasn't willing to do so outside mine. I could see her point. She was not a professional sanitation engineer, as the Americans so politely put it.

In my past life, I used to get into quarrels with people about garbage. Like this very proper-looking young man, all dressed up for work. I saw him peel an orange and drop the skin on the sidewalk. So I asked him, "Sir, who you expect to pick up that?" His haughty response was, "Garbageman will come sweep it up." He got quite offended when I started to carry on about his lack of civic pride. He airily told me to 'gwey' and then he 'gweyed' about his business.

In the old days, I might have suggested that the Government impose an environmental tax on every box of juice, chicken, pizza, etc, that would be used to help clean up the rubbish. But now that I've learned to appreciate the art in garbage, I say 'litter and let litter.'

THE RELAPSE

Oh how I wish I could tell you that I've kept true to my Damascus Road experience. I suffer from regular relapses. The longest I can hold out for is about three weeks.

Day 1: I smugly drive by and refuse to see rubbish. I envision, instead, the raw materials of great art. By the end of the first week I'm on a high. Great! I'm proud of myself. You can do it. Let nature take its course. See the pretty patterns the bits of paper make.

By the middle of the second week, I'm not so confident. How come the place looking so bad? I'm about to rush out and start cleaning up. And then I get a vision of the Curaçao canal. And I catch myself in time. Hold strain. There is beauty in surprising places.

By the beginning of the third week, I'm starting to break down, decomposing like the garbage. The place really looking bad, bad, bad. By week's end, I surrender. Surprisingly, there's not as much rubbish as you would imagine. The breeze is very efficient at blowing it along. So I clean up. And wait to see how long I can hold out next time.

And there are rewards. My helper heard a taxi man reprimanding one his passengers who was about to throw garbage out the window: "Yu can't do that. Yu no see Miss Cooper a walk up and down a pick up rubbish!" Surprisingly, he doesn't think I'm mad! And that's therapeutic.

Of course, all of this carefully collected garbage is heading straight for the Riverton dump. There it will go up in toxic smoke. So we're right back where we started: adding fuel to the conflagration of global warming. What goes around certainly comes around. That's the nature of the environment.

Carolyn Cooper is professor of literary and cultural studies at the University of the West Indies, Mona. Send feedback to: karokupa@gmail.com or columns@gleanerjm.com.