Garbage, Garbage, Garbage

I love the movie Wall-E.  When watching that movie one wonders about garbage; I thought it was quite unbelievable that our world would become like the garbage infested world portrayed in the movie, but lately I have began to wonder.  The last few months I have been working casually as a garbageman; I thought the job would be a change and seemed to be a good workout once a week.  There are many things that have been impressed on me from the job such as how the municipality work, working with different machinery, but I have especially thought the most about garbage and the waste we produce as humans.  It has disgusted me how much we waste as humans.  As we speak, the town I work for is a few months away from filling our landfill to capacity; which is going to mean serious changes to how the town picks up and disposes of trash.  There is no need for our landfill to be almost full at this time, but it is do to wasteful living and laziness to sort and properly dispose of our trash.  Our province has had a recycling program for beverage containers for almost 20years; which consists of paying deposit on beverage containers at purchase and receiving that money back when the empty containers are returned to a recycle depot.  Despite this, there are numerous people who throw out numerous cans and bottles in their trash (we trash collectors usually fill a garbage can each week with the ones we are able to scrounge without really digging in the trash)  Think about this people are literally throwing their money away; even if they didn't want it for themselves there are many non-profit groups who will gladly pick it up for you. So, there are many of these containers needlessly filling space in the landfill.
Our town has had a cardboard recycle program for at least five years, but yet there are numerous people who throw out large amounts of cardboard; again take up space in the landfill that it doesn't need to.
Working at the dump you realize people are lazy and throw out stuff because it doesn't work, but only needs a minor repair.  Lawnmowers that need a $5 part or an oil change.  A guy I work with once took home a Serta Queen Mattress that was brand new and still in the plastic; I would have loved to know why someone threw it out.
It's also awesome to know when there are thrift stores and poor people all over the world wearing rags that people commonly throw out bags of clothes; big garbage bags of clothes.
The other thing that makes me take a step back is the amount of garbage bags some households chuck regularly.  In a small town, you know who lives where and I am taken back how it is becoming common for households to have more that 1 bag of garbage per occupants per week.
This last week it was wonderful to see homes that had unsuccessful garage sales throw out enough garbage to fill a car.  This next year will be an eye-opener for my little town; when sorting garbage will be strictly enforced, no one out of town will be permitted in our landfill, and getting rid of our waste will become expensive.  And despite having 20 years of environmental education we will continue to see the waste of our excessive living pile up in this fallen world.