That’s Garbage
Friday’s are trash pick up day in our neighborhood and since we moved here in October, it’s been a source of tension in our household.
About a year and a half ago, Jack and I divided up the household responsibilities. I cover cleaning and laundry. Jack covers all things kitchen - grocery shopping, cooking, dishes. It was our effort at eliminating resentment or confusion around who does what around the house, and it has worked well so far. Jack knows I do his laundry on Monday’s and I know I can leave my dishes in the sink for him to load into the dishwasher (because apparently, I do it completely wrong). I can’t say it’s eliminated all frustrations around household chores, but it has helped greatly.
When we moved into our house, part of the kitchen responsibilities for Jack expanded and now includes taking out the trash and recycling. In my opinion, the trash should be taken out on Thursday night. For me, it eliminates any panic on Friday morning and any possibility that we miss the pick up time. For Jack, who likes to live a more risky life and who did not solicit my opinion, prefers to wait until sometime on Friday to gather all the trash bags from the house and roll the cans to the curb.
I should also note here, in an effort to encourage recycling, the garbage can you are given for free in our neighborhood fits approximately one doll house sized trash bag. Anything that doesn’t fit in your garbage can you have to pay for. Because of this, we are not afforded the luxury of missing a week of garbage pick up. And while trash and recycling do not fall into my bucket of responsibilities, my personality does not lend well to letting go of control, and I would be lying if I said I don’t think about it often or it doesn’t stress me out. (Adding to the list of things to talk about with my therapist.)
Well, one Friday morning last fall, I was up at an ungodly hour, working at my desk upstairs around 6am. That’s when I heard the garbage truck and could see it on the side street that runs perpendicular to ours. I began a great debate in my head - run to take the trash out, because again, we cannot afford to miss a week; or let Jack learn his lesson and he will have to figure out how to shove next week’s bags into the can. In the span of about 60 seconds, I thoroughly played out both scenarios in my head, even down to the made up, two way conversation I would have with Jack depending on which outcome I chose. My mind works rapidly and is a wonder to even me.
My final decision involved me, racing downstairs in my pajamas, throwing on the rain boots I found by the door and furiously heaving the trash can to the end of the driveway just as the garbage truck was coming to the intersection at the end of our street!
I was so proud of myself, while simultaneously beyond annoyed with my loving husband for his complete disregard to my advice. We will ignore the fact (and honestly, I do frequently) that the separation of household duties comes with an unspoken rule that meddling in each other’s chores is ill-advised.
As I got back inside and made my way to my office, I felt like a child on Christmas morning waiting to see their presents from Santa, I was waiting to see the garbage truck scoop up the contents of our can. But then I waited…
…and waited some more. I could still see the garbage truck at the intersection but then the unthinkable happened. Instead of turning left to come down our street, they turned right toward the park...
and disappeared.
Our trash was picked up that afternoon around 1pm.
And this was the day I learned that the garbage route in our neighborhood is, in my mind, completely inefficient. I guess it’s best to let Jack manage garbage day moving forward.
à la prochaine fois,
anna