It takes nothing but trash to boost my self esteem

I feel so self-righteous, holier than thou, and just a tiny bit superior. This is an unusual situation for me; usually I place my self worth somewhere between bag lady and politician, so, pretty low on the social totem pole.

But not anymore. From now on, when I walk down the street, I’ll hold my head high. There’ll be a spring in my step that says to the world, “I’m just a little better than you are, so there.”

Why this sudden change in my admittedly delusional self perception?

I got a recycling bin. That’s right, I’ve joined the tree-hugging, self-satisfied, legions of long-haired, hippy-type, Greenpeace-joining, electric car-driving, tofu-eating, Kerouac-reading, organic garden-planting, craft beer-drinking goody-goodies who want to do right by Mother Earth.

Well, I didn’t exactly join their ranks; I was kinda drafted. By Sweet Annie. She’s the one who signed me up for recycling. Until she did, I wasn’t even aware recycling was an option in our area.

Not only is it an option, it’s free! Turns out all I had to do was make a phone call (or, in my case, let Annie make a phone call) and voila, somebody drops off a recycling bin. I fill it up with discarded plastic, glass, metal and paper, then drag it to the curb and — presto — somebody picks it all up, grinds it down (or whatever it is they do to it) and turns it into new plastic, glass, metal and paper.

That seems so much better than seeing it all go to a landfill somewhere.

I know, I’m probably the last one to jump on this particular train, but now that I have, I intend to ride it all the way to the end of the line. I mean, recycling could be just the first step in my all-new, “ain’t I great?” lifestyle.

It turns out I enjoy feeling smug. Having so rarely done any good things in the past, I wasn’t sure this would be the case, but it is. It is!

So I can’t help but wonder, if recycling my trash makes me feel this self-satisfied, how much more unbearably self-congratulatory might I become if I did other good stuff?

If, for instance, I started wearing only all-natural, hemp shirts purchased at some pretentious mall store that specializes in “fair trade” clothing, how would that make me feel? Pretty superior, I’ll bet.

How about if I donated a few cans of lima beans to a local food bank? Or helped a little old lady to cross the street? Or … well … there are all sorts of “reformed Grinch” things I could do to make myself feel even more smug than I already do.

Of course, this could have a downside. If people start expecting me to be a decent human being all the time, I’ll almost certainly disappoint them eventually. That would make me feel bad, which would land my self-esteem right back there between bag lady and politician.

Maybe I’d better just stick with the recycling thing and see how that goes.

More Reality Check at mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com. Contact Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com.

Civilization is OK, but let’s not get too prissy

We’re becoming a society of effete dandies bent on transforming every aspect of life into an upscale fern and chrome shopping mall experience that smells faintly of lilacs and Chanel No. 5.

Maybe this is simply the next logical step in human evolution, maybe a byproduct of the sexual revolution, or maybe the change is fueled by Madison Avenue and simple economics. Whatever the reason, we seem determined to “deluxe-ify” pretty much everything.

Yes, everything.

Good enough is no longer good enough.

What am I talking about? To tell you the truth, I’m never quite sure myself. But it’ll be easier to explain if I first cite a few examples.

Garbage cans. When I was a kid (back in the early Mesolithic) garbage cans were metal, dented and, usually, very, very stinky. They served two purposes; holding garbage and breeding flies. 

Using one was simple. You lifted the lid and dumped in garbage. Then, once a week, you hauled it to the curb and the garbage man came by, removed the garbage and left the can.

It was a fairly simple system. Not any more. Now, trash (the part that isn’t recycled) is placed in strawberry scented plastic bags, securely sealed and placed in colorful (pink, if you give a damn about breast cancer) plastic dumpsters. The dumpsters — which never actually touch garbage — are emptied weekly by a sanitation engineer.

It’s basically the same system as the metal can, but it smells better, looks better, and — if you don’t count the millions of tons of non-biodegradable, strawberry-scented plastic trash bags — is better.

Then there are the burger joints and other fast food-type eateries. These used to be non-franschised, mom ’n’ pop establishments with questionable cleanliness standards and burgers to die for. They weren’t fancy, but the food was real good and real cheap.

These days, even the fast food joints are trying to go upscale. The other day I dropped nine bucks and change at an incongruously-named “cafe.” For my money, I received a burger that tasted like greasy sawdust and an order of fries that had been under the heat lamp so long they’d begun to develop melanoma.

But since the restaurant shoehorned the word “cafe” into its name and added a couple hanging plants, I at least knew I was dining in style.

Sweet Annie lives in a pretty, upscale neighborhood where folks really, really aspire to the genteel lifestyle. They upscale everything there, and then charge you for it big time.

She recently moved from her home into an apartment there. Not just any apartment, but an “apartment home.” It says so right on the sign at the complex’s manicured entrance. To me, they look just like apartment-apartments, but nope, they are “homes.”

Apartments are for poor people, apparently.

Down the street are even nicer “condo homes.” The condo homes also look exactly like apartments, but they’re not. They’re condos. If you doubt it, just look at what one costs.

The foo-foo factor that really got me, though, was the neighborhood’s store & lock storage facility. You know, the kind of place guys keep all their home theater equipment when they’re between wives.

In Annie’s neighborhood, these are called — and I kid you not — “storage condos.” Really? You’re telling me the junk you can’t fit in your new condo — sorry, condo home — needs a condo of its own?

I’m guessing these people park their cars in a “condo garage” and store their unmentionables in a “condo underwear drawer.” 

Where will it end? Will we eventually gift wrap our garbage with silken bows and ribbons to make our curbsides more appealing come trash day? Will we find a name for toilet paper even less offensive than “bath tissue?”

Look. I’m not a savage. I’m not advocating a return to the stinky, dented garbage can days of yore. On the other hand, those burgers from mom & pop’s greasy spoon were sooooo good…

More Reality Check online at mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com. Contact Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com.