Garbage Collecting

• Tahmeem Billah, Grade 12
• Short Story
• 2018

People believe that I should hate my job, because I need to deal with garbage all the time, the ridicule me by holding their noses whenever I halt by them. I do not understand why do people respect doctors for curing diseases and not appreciate garbage collectors for preventing them? Knowing this, I appreciate myself and I think of myself as a valuable member of society because without me disease will be rampant.
I like my job because it helps me know the city and the people in it but more so because it enables me to discover unusual things. In cold and wet days I see people drenched and shivering out of the freezing cold in their daily travail in contrast to me sitting in the warm air conditioned cabin of my garbage truck. At moments like these I sympathize with them and I feel that they would gladly switch places with me and not laugh at me. I see people in their pyjamas running to catch the garbage truck which remind me how valuable I am in society. These events in my daily working life are what enable me to remain unaffected by the judgmental attitude that I endure by my family and friends.
On one occasion I discovered something which enabled me to understand the saying “someone’s trash is someone else’s treasure.” I was doing my shift on a fresh spring morning at around 4 am; I stepped on a garbage bag that had been carelessly left in the gutter. I picked up the bag and threw its contents in the back of the truck as I disposed of the putrid smelling trash I noticed a shiny silver looking rectangle which caught my attention. I grabbed it and I took it out and I realized that it was a Lenovo laptop, which had incited me to take it home for further examination.
By 9 am I had finished my shift; I took the laptop from my cabin, put it in my truck and drove home. While I was eating a late breakfast, I opened up my laptop for a close examination and surprisingly it had battery left in it. The laptop had awakened and returned to life, I clicked the account titled “Frank” and there was no password to it. I was happy but startled to get this immediate access, but all of a sudden the laptop started talking. It said “you have mail”
I hit the Gmail app and gained immediate access to it, I was terrified when I saw an email from my boss my hands trembled when I saw it was addressed to “the Garbo”.
When I opened the email I saw “EMPLOYEE OF THE YEAR”
I was shocked but happy I almost jumped through the roof when a multitude of my cousins, siblings, and work mates had arrived. I heard a clamour of “Happy birthday Frank!”
I realized that people worry excessively about the perceptions of others and do not embrace the things in life demonstrate our value.