LITTER!

LITTER!

by: Ann Rains, Writer-Editor For The New-Harmony Gazette.

Spring, the wondrous time of rebirth and renewal. Seeing the tenacious daffodils raise their blossoms to the sun after being beaten down with heavy snow is a lesson of life to be learned. Inasmuch as I am counting blessings for another year to view the farmer’s fields of winter wheat greening the land, there is a springtime blight that darkens my heart.

This blight is more noticeable now. Have you seen it? Are you aware of the damage it does? That blight is litter. One cannot drive down any road, whether it is a country road or an interstate highway without seeing bottles, plastic bags (modern-day tumbleweeds), styrofoam cups, and many other unidentified items littering the roadsides. People are becoming immune and/or oblivious to trash. They don’t even see it.

When I experienced a tragedy years ago while living in Maine, girlfriends wanted to do something special for me. They coordinated a trip to the beach. I tried to resist but they were adamant saying, “You need a day in the sun.” We went to Old Orchard Beach. The only thing I can remember as I laid in the sun was the beach looking like a gigantic cigarette snuffer. There were not three square inches of sand without a cigarette butt littering it.

Now, researching littering, I find that cigarette butts are one of the worst kinds of litter. Although butts may not be seen from your automobile, this small litter takes ten years to decompose due to cellulose acetate. Plus, the chemicals in the butt pollute groundwater (and ocean water) with arsenic and other chemicals. The entire world is littered with 4.5 trillion discarded cigarette butts per year. Lit cigarettes being tossed from vehicles are one of the major fire hazards.

The next most common litter is fast food containers and sometimes the fast food itself. Discarding these items leads to germs, bacteria, and viruses. Litter becomes a breeding ground which can attract vermin such as rats. Even a small amount of water that may collect in beverage containers is enough to breed disease-carrying mosquitos. Litter also becomes dangerous to farmers whose equipment is not meant to plow glass, metal, and plastic.

The listed reasons for people littering are rather repugnant. Topping the list is laziness. Does that mean that people are too lazy to keep their trash in the vehicle and clean it out when there is a trash receptacle available? Is it that they would rather diminish the physical beauty of our God-given home, Earth, just to have a clean car? Another reason is: “My friend litters, so I can, too.” How about, “Really, it’s just paper?”

Someone suggested that biodegradable containers should be required. But that doesn’t solve the problem. Last spring I put some cardboard in my flower bed to kill some hardy weeds with deep roots I could not pull. It is covered with straw but that cardboard is still there. Having biodegradable containers does not give one license to litter. It is still ugly no matter how short a time it takes to degrade.

Other lists say that littering is the result of poor education and poor parenting. I question that but if people have no sense of pride in residing on this amazing planet and taking care of it, maybe they need to know that their tax dollars, to the tune of $11.5 billion a year is spent on cleaning up litter. That money surely could be put to better use!

On October 4, 2010, the Posey Green Group sent a letter to the editor of the Democrat. It spoke of the worldwide phenomenon of littering and urged citizens locally to refrain from littering. At the same time, the Pacific Trash Vortex was a floating garbage continent the size of Texas. Now it is double in size (only seven years) and there are trash vortexes in all the oceans.

It is a crime to litter. Mt. Vernon has a minimum fine of $120. However, Indiana law allows fines up to $1000 and more if it is a lit cigarette. Community service of picking up litter in a specified area may also be imposed upon the perpetrator.

Like the camera on a bridge that records license plates of people traversing it, the future may have cameras on roadways capturing you tossing out that cigarette butt or styrofoam cup. Or, maybe there will be drone litter patrols! Just imagine, you could receive in the mail a fine of $1000 or more for your actions. And just maybe, you will have the pleasure of picking up litter. With the amount of litter on the roadways now, our future may dictate that more stringent laws be enforced.

Enjoy the bright yellow daffodils and other springtime surprises, but, please, do not be a litterbug.

Footnote: planetprayers@gmail.com copyright – Ann Rains, March 2018