Header Challenge: Landfill

From August 21, 2011

Stewart's header challenge of the week is "landfill." Driving through Virginia and Pennsylvania the other day, Adella and I rolled past plenty of landfills parading as gentle, grassy hills abutting the interstates. The scenery was bucolic in every way but aroma. Egads. Some landscapes really do need "Excuse me!" billboards mounted on them. I probably drove my fastest through these grass-strewn garbage dunes.

They brought to mind the landfill in New Milford, Connecticut, where I worked as a reporter many years ago. At the time, the landfill seemed to be the highest point in that hilly town. When it was retired, its creators--Waste Management--suggested it would make a lovely golf course with a little grass seed and a few pipes to channel the methane gas.

Closer to home--I mean heart--my daughter and I discovered a make-shift landfill alongside a turtle nest on North Topsail Beach. Some local geniuses buried 18 empty beer bottles right alongside the thing. The sand-filled bottles were in the original carton. I was intrigued by the amount of effort that someone put into desecrating the landscape when the garbage can was a whole, oh, 40 feet away. Della and I dug out the bottles and threw them away. (To be fair, I suppose 40 feet might as well be 40 miles to a person with 18 bottles of beer in him or her.)

(Surreal and strange: While we were moving this litter, a woman photographed her son in front of the nest alongside the recently unearthed empties. The duo returned to the child's father, who was fishing, after crossing in front of us with our arms full of litter. It struck me as odd that they saw the wonder of the turtle nest but felt no compunction to protect the integrity of those babies' environment.)