It’s my philosophy that there is no piece of trash too small to pick up. I think about this a lot when I am cleaning up the block.
It’s a tedious task to repeatedly clasp tiny bits of litter with a trash grabber, but I think it matters to pick up the paper clips, safety pins, bottle caps, and bits of shiny plastic candy wrapper that are easily ignored.
The bike tire caps, shirt tags, broken zip ties, and pieces of aluminum foil that might be rationalized as being too small for anyone else to notice if dropped on the ground.
“Maybe someone will think it just slipped out of a pocket, unintentionally. Or flew out of a car door in a gust of wind…”
Lipstick-stained cigarette butts smoked down to the filter, wishfully thought of as blending into the landscape — but our eyes catch on them.
Faded yellow Post-It grocery lists, lollipop sticks, straw wrappers, event wristbands, ripped up lottery tickets.
Twist ties, rubber bands, price tags, used Band-Aids.
Styrofoam packaging, electrode patches, bus passes, nicotine pouches, torn open ketchup packets, to-go salt & pepper.
Square bits of gauze, crumpled fuel receipts, moist towelettes gone dry. Contact lens packaging, bread bag tags, empty coffee creamers, a random door stopper…and all of that is just from going around one city block on a Saturday in August.
I get it. It can feel overwhelming to a see a lot of trash on the ground. It is certainly easier to avert your eyes and block it from your visual field. Plus, you may think, “It’s not my trash, so it’s not my responsibility.”
You can take this perspective, but at the end of the day, it doesn’t really matter how the trash got there. The fact is it is there, on the ground, and the Earth can’t pick it up.
When you pick up litter, the built-in reward of a cleaner environment is instantaneous. You might notice feeling a sense of pride and accomplishment for taking care of the Earth and helping your community.
And, who knows? Maybe your action will be contagious and inspire others to do the same, or at least get someone to think twice before they toss their fast food bag out their window.