By Dana Stovern
Written October 3, 2022
From July 28, 2022
Yakima River Valley, Washington
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I used to live in a beautiful, brand-new townhome overlooking the Selah, Washington river valley. There were sweeping blue skies with regular angel-wing clouds in our vista. Ridges embraced both sides of the valley like mountains. The Yakima River easily grooved below. It was pretty much a dream spot . . .
. . . as long as I could overlook the barrage of construction, incessant village traffic, socially unintelligent text messages from the property management company AND the commercial sized garbage dumpster beside my unit.
Today, the story is about that garbage dumpster because me and that dumpster had a “relationship.” The way this relationship went is that at first it was fine. That dumpster minded its own business because the weather was cool and the tenant numbers were low. The once-a-week garbage service kept up with the village garbage dumpster needs.
But then, our “relationship” changed. The weather warmed up and more people moved in as units were completed on the property and one day, as I came out of my townhome door, I found myself living next to the Leaning Tower of Pisa of garbage. The thing was overflowing and stacked to the hilt with village garbage. And it was beginning to smell. I was horrified at the lack of recycling that was unavailable (Eastern Washington is living in the Dark Ages concerning recycling) AND the lack of consciousness in how people literally dumped and walked away.