What's Down in the Dumps?

Although I could probably do a pretty long blog on the phrase "down in the dumps" in regard to the way I feel about life far too often, today my focus is literally about what can be found down in the dumps. I am a person that has always been intrigued by trash. My husband makes my boys take the trash out, not so much to be nice to me, but because I often come back with more stuff than I took when I go out to the alley. I have found some pretty good stuff and the silky black outer space PJ's that I made my 4 year old out of trashed fabric were his very favorite. When I was growing up it was my brother's job to burn most of our trash in a big metal barrel. It was sometimes a dangerous job, but that's a story for a different blog. Even though we burned most of our trash I do remember taking trips to the dump just outside of Midway with our excess garbage. It was always so hard for me to leave all the exciting stuff I saw there behind. It was OK though because up and over the hill behind our house was a treasure trove of really old trash if you knew the right place to dig. I always found interesting things there such as broken china, a syrup can shaped like a log cabin, old silverware... I had a whole collection of marvelous stuff that I kept in the "play cabin" out behind the pheasant pen in our backyard. Now that old dump is a housing development and I am always jealous of the back hoe operators that got to dig up all the treasures that were buried there. They probably just scooped the dirt up and didn't even notice what was hidden in the piles. Yesterday my 16 year old son got to take his first trip to the local dump along with some other scouts who were helping with an eagle scout project. I was disappointed when all he could say about it was that it "smelled horrible"! Where is his sense of adventure? Last night we went to a nephew's birthday party and one of the family friends there was listening to a new ipod nano. He works at the land fill on the reservation and there is a local discount store whose loads all of the workers apparently wait for to arrive. Rumor has it that they just throw away all of their returns. When that trash gets dumped all the workers descend like vultures to see what great things they can acquire - ipods, portable DVD players, a 52 inch plasma TV, an air compressor- are just a few of the things they have come away with. When my teenager heard that story he immediately decided he could probably get use to the smell! Me too! 3 things to be grateful for today. Opportunities to serve - I am so glad that the church and the scouting program give my kids, and me, lots of chances to serve and make a difference in our own little world. Recycled Treasures - that's my new name for cool trash. My immediate family - all back home in Arizona where they belong for now.