Pollution

Nisi Dominus aedificaverit domum, in vanum laboraverunt qui aedificant eam.

As a child I recall being unable to comprehend why there was ever trash on the ground. Our civilized world is perhaps more prepared for waste than anything else; it is almost always only a minor inconvenience to dispose of one’s trash properly. To be so selfish as to make the world more ugly and transfer responsibility onto others and onto the surrounding world was always incredibly abhorrent in my eyes. I never really examined this impulse or tried to see the motivations of a person who throws an empty bag of chips out of his car window.

     In the past month, I have entered fully into the viper’s den of pollution. I intend by this not only that my coworkers throw cigarette butts and empty water bottles on the ground, but that my very work is pollution: each day gallons of concrete slurry are dumped into the ground. As the man often tasked with pushing the squeegee to get this slurry out of the way of the saw, I have come to understand one truth that escaped my prior romantic innoncence: there is nowhere for garbage to go. As I saw before the world we live in as filled with helpful receptacles for garbage, I now see that those are indeed fictions. I suppose I had always known this, having visited a garbage plant, junkyard, and driven by dumps before. These places are patches of corruption on the land, slices of the earth sacrificed to our various desires. It was not until I was responsible for putting this waste somewhere, however, that this truth rang through me, when my back and knees became sore from trying to - and failing - to move it to a place where it is actually meant to be. More often than not, it ends up strewn around a construction site or in a dirt pit somewhere. These become microcosmic dumps: small patches of the earth given over to concrete.

     It was here that I began to work my way back to the capacity for individual pollution. Especially when there is to be demolition, there is no real difference between throwing an empty water bottle on the job site and throwing it in the trash can. If it needs to be cleaned after the construction is done, there are people whose job that is, and anyway, there is inherently such a great deal of waste when buliding.

     The question I am brought to ask is one of great consequence for my being able to understand the people I work with: what does it do to a man’s soul to live in a world where trash can go anywhere indiscriminately? Instinct tells me I will not be able to understand until I work here longer and develop a similar outlook. Nevertheless, it is worthwhile for each of us to deliberate on this question for a few moments. We know each day that the world becomes more polluted, and the days when we can pay no mind to the nature of garbage disposal are fast dwindling.    

     Remembering that refuse does not have anywhere to go, I find it meet to consider the act of “properly” disposing of waste as a minding, one directed toward order. This account appears most vividly on the construction site. Regardless of whether I throw my empty water bottle directly onto the groud or put it into a dumpster or wheelbarrow for trash, it will eventually end up in the same place. The difference lies on the side of the subject. When I drop it on the ground, I neglect the opportunity to mind my surroundings; I choose not to order the world around me in a sensible way, and not to distinguish garbage from what is still valuable. And so, that choice is demonstrative of a certain carelesness inside the person polluting and a disorder characteristic of the world from his eyes.

     The results of this state are shocking: those to whom it applies do not have well-oriented senses of beauty or propriety, each of which requires some intentionality. Interstingly, they seem to have strong senses of justice and cleanliness/health, but both tend to be chaotic and careless.

     I hesitate to designate pollution as the origin of such a state of the soul. Rather, I think the urge not to intentionally order one’s surroundings or mind for order is a symptom of a blemish, one which is likely inherited from a man’s family or peers. A great difficulty lies in escaping this way of viewing the world, as intentional ordering appears fruitless. Conversely, people like me see its lack as vulgar and struggle to communicate the importance of such minding. A path forward seems dim, and I am left wondering if my own sense of order is an impediment to working most effectively. The level of violence (percussive maintenance) exercised upon the implements of work was, at first, shocking to me, but I have come to find out it is often necessary for quickly finishing a job. Such violence, though, clearly shares an origin with the violent anger exhibited towards coworkers and even oneself. I do hope this blister on the soul is not indeed necessary, but in any case I wil inevitably become more familiar with it and the people in whom it manifests.

     As a quite discriminating individual(often excessively so), I don’t see myself at risk of losing this urge to differentiate the world around me. I must resist the urge to leave my garbage where it lays, and God willing, it will help me remain free from anger and disorder.