The title is from a great song by the country artist Jerry Jeff Walker, and I keep singing it in my head during this trashy period in Marblehead.
First, let’s all give a shout-out to the hard workers at the Transfer Station, and Tom McMahon in particular, who are doing their very best to get us through this little crisis. I say “little” only because I have friends who live in the boondocks like Norton, MA, where they do not have trash pickup at all. They have to lug their trash and recycling to their own transfer stations and have been doing so for many, many years. So, while this is certainly an inconvenience for Marblehead, it’s not the end of the world. And you don’t even have to have a facilities sticker for the time being.
I can say all this with the good fortune of disposing of only one trash bag and a half-full recycling bin per week. This is because there’s only me and my dog in my household, so we don’t have much output. (His output in the yard is a whole different matter.) Conceivably, I can skip a week (and have done so) of putting my bins on the curb with no repercussions. I remember the days living in Lynn and having recycling picked up only once every two weeks. Notwithstanding our current situation, we’re lucky that we have it picked up every week. Every two weeks, it adds up quickly.
Because trash is on everyone’s minds, I’ve been thinking back to my extended time in the hospitals in 2023. Specifically, Salem and Mass. General. If you’re only there for a night or two, it’s not that noticeable, but being there for so long made me aware of all the waste in general in probably any hospital. Doctors and nurses who enter a room where the patient is susceptible to infection are required to put on gowns, masks, and gloves. When they leave, all of that is taken off and thrown into the wastebasket. Every time, and it’s several times a day. I also had meals delivered, blood drawn, vitals taken, visits from the transplant team, and housekeeping/janitorial services. Gowns, masks, gloves, tubes, needles, bags, and I could go on and on. The waste that accumulated was just insane.
And when you have nothing to do, you start questioning things (well, if you’re me at least). When I had COVID and was treated in Salem Hospital, I was quarantined. Supposedly, every single thing that came into my room couldn’t leave it. You know those pink plastic water pitchers? After a single use, they were thrown out rather than refilled. I was appalled because I recycle as much as I can. I kept asking them, “What about the sheets on my bed? The Johnny I’m wearing? What about the IV poles? Why is my bed allowed to leave with me when I’m being taken down for testing or a CT scan, etc.?” Somehow, those were exceptions? I couldn’t get a straight answer. I know that Mass. General has an incinerator, which I’m sure applies to other hospitals, so much of the waste is likely disposed of there (along with problem patients like me, ha ha). But the fact that nothing is recycled is distressing. In Massachusetts, no less.
I was in Alabama and Mississippi recently, and I was surprised that hardly anything is recycled there either. And I have friends who are convinced that what we “recycle” is actually just thrown away. I did a quick online search and found this on Wikipedia:
“There is no national law in the United States that mandates recycling. State and local governments often introduce their own recycling requirements. In 2014, the recycling/composting rate for municipal solid waste in the U.S. was 34.6%.* A number of U.S. states, including California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, Oregon, and Vermont have passed laws that establish deposits or refund values on beverage containers, while other jurisdictions rely on recycling goals of landfill bans of recyclable materials.”
No wonder there’s an island of plastic in the Pacific Ocean. It’s likely that a lot of what we think can be recycled actually can’t, and after separating the good from the bad, much more ends up in a landfill than we intended. This is discouraging but also enlightening. We can do better.
*Advancing Sustainable Materials Management: Facts and Figures. EPA. Sept. 22, 2015. Retrieved May 31, 2018.
Lisa Marchionda Fama is a retired attorney who has lived in Marblehead for seven years, loves this town, and hopes she never leaves. Visit her blog at TheSoberWidow.com.
