Litter used to enrage me. I passed some young men once just as one of them threw down a paper coffee-cup and they were getting into a car to drive away. I put the cup on the car roof and said politely, “This is yours, don’t forget it.” I wouldn’t have been as bold if a car door had not separated us. These days the town council employ efficient delittering teams on the theory that people think twice before desecrating a clean space.
Things change. The other day I walked along a hedgerow at the edge of a recreation ground, with a highway behind it. A wide variety of trees was planted, mostly native including hawthorn, field maple, wild plum and others I cannot identify but which have lovely blossoms and fruits in their season. They haven’t been cut back or pruned so everything luxuriates. It’s a precious place of pilgrimage to me and the other day I found empty plastic bottles laid out so that you could see that four or five people had sat there and enjoyed water and other drinks. I just found myself glad to know they had been there and appreciated the place. I didn’t blame them for the non-biodegradable quality of the bottles. Personally I’m unable to litter and have walked a mile with a banana-skin till I could find a suitable place to drop it.
I imagine an alternative world where bottles decay in weeks except for those which people treasure because they’re hand-painted earthenware & thus works of art. So litter would be scavenged or disappear on its own.
Poor countries recycle better because rag-picking is economically supportable there. It would be nice to invite rag-pickers here but they would have to be paid the minimum wage unless they were illegals and I don’t like that because it is so often tainted by organised crime.
My picture shows the upside-down remains of a van I found in a bluebell wood.
a wayfarer’s notes 
A rare person it is who is able to see the beauty in litter. I truly mean that it is an ability. It means you are a positive thinker.
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Thanks for visiting, Sophia, and your comments. I have got into the habit of trying to see everything from a natural perspective. Some people would call it a primitive viewpoint.
It was on a particular day (see this post) that I was inspired to see things from a teenage point of view and understand graffiti. Adults had provided a sterile coiffeured environment with nothing creative for them to do, only prohibitions. This is very unnatural!
In a more tribal culture, boys would have been initiated into adulthood by this time and participating in the tasks of men; whilst girls similarly would have been performing vital roles in a different arena.
I tried to see if you have a blog, Sophia, but no luck!
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It might be primitive in a positive way, in that you are seeing things with fascination and wonder, and haven't had the coldness and boringness of society pulled over your eyes. I have a strange feeling you're probably like me. I bet you still get thrilled at seeing lightning bugs or rainbows, too.
Somedays I feel good about graffiti. If it's good art, I feel it expresses culture and human variety. If it's bad art,though, normally I feel a bit sad to see something in ruin. But sometimes I try to see it as a moment captured in time when someone was expressing something they were feeling or experiencing.
Strange. I clicked on my name and I can't get my profile to come up, either. Hopefully it will work this time, although I don't know what kept it from working last time. In any case, my blog is at http://visionsoftheworld.blogspot.com
I found you through Jim's blog.
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“Personally I’m unable to litter…”
so empowering a word. i will try to able myself unable to litter.
honestly i will.
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Oh, Sophia! What is a lightning bug?I'm thrilled by every kind of bug. We used to have mint bugs in the park. The mint grew in a dried up river, but died in the drought, and any remnants have been drowned by the river's resurgence.I have posted many times in A Wayfarer’s Notes about bugs, but I don’t think lightning bugs occur here. I was fascinated by lovebugs in Florida “flying united”. We don't have them either.
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