Not Exactly the Same Dumpster...But Close!
Most of you don’t know that, in addition to working as a full-time District Court Judge, writing novels, running a blog, working with Boy Scouts and confirmation-age kids, and being a dad and husband, I also teach. At UWS. This semester, it’s Environmental Law, which is a fairly sophisticated and demanding subject. I’m what is classified, within the University of Wisconsin system, as a “Senior Lecturer”. Now, I don’t know if you have to be AARP qualified to attain the designation as “Senior” when teaching undergrads, but if that’s the sole criteria, well, I meet it!
Anyway, Sunday evenings, I usually get ready for class by reading and outlining the selected text for the week from our course books, putting aside any relevant news articles of a conservation or environmental bent for class discussion, and setting aside any DVDs I’ll be using in class. My liturgical practice is to curl up on the sofa in my writing room, books and pen in hand, the computer tuned to MPR’s classical music station, Brahms, Bach, and Sibelius playing softly in the background, with the door to the great room shut, cozy as a caterpillar in a cocoon, as I prepare. That’s the way I’ve spent many, many Sundays the past three years and I truly enjoy the work. But not this Sunday. This Sunday, panic; mind-numbing, deep-roosted uncontrollable fear took the place of careful consideration and contemplation.
“I can’t find my text books!” I yelled.
Rene’, our 3rd son Chris, and our youngest son, Jack were all within earshot as I stepped from the study into the great room of our house in a funk.
“Did you leave them at work?” Rene’ asked.
“Nope.”
“Sure you’re not just overlooking them, Dad,” Chris offered.
At the suggestion I was less than diligent in my search, my blood began to boil.
“I guess I’d know if I looked or not, now wouldn’t I?”
“Chill, Dad. Chill.”
I shook my head and wrung my hands.
“That’s over two hundred dollars in books. They’re instructor copies. Provided by the publishers. I can’t afford to replace them and I need them for Tuesday’s class. Jack has Scouts tomorrow so tonight is the only night I can prep for class.”
“Are you sure you didn’t…”
I left Rene’ in mid-sentence. A thought, a horrible realization, dawned on me.
Oh shit! I said as I walked back into the writing room and stared at last year’s books. Those were supposed to get tossed with all those writing magazines I cleaned out of here last week. I bet I tossed this year’s books instead. Shit, I am an idiot.
I threw on my jacket, pulled gloves over my hands, and bolted out the door into the garage. Without a word of explanation to my dumbfounded family, I slammed the door, hit the remote garage door opener, climbed into Rene’s car, fired it up, and backed out of the garage.
I hope they’re still there.
I knew that Harold (the youngest member of our town board) was working at the Minno-ette, the neighborhood bait and convenience store. I whipped the Matrix into the lot, leaving it running as I dashed into the store.
“This is gonna sound weird, Harold,” I said through labored breath, “but do you have a key to the mixed paper dumpster at the recycling shed? I think I tossed some text books I need for a class I teach at UWS out along with some old magazines.”
Harold shook his head.
“Nope. Not any more. But Connie can open it for you.”
“Could you call her?”
Harold, being a nice guy and a diligent public servant did just that.
I drove over to the recycling center and waited. Within minutes, Connie (one of the recycling center attendants) and her husband arrived. I retold my tale of woe to Connie. She opened the dumpster. It was jam packed full of cardboard and magazines. I climbed the cold steel skeleton of the box and plunged in.
“You know,” Connie said thoughtfully as her husband shined a flashlight on my work, “I think they emptied this since you were here last.”
I ignored the nice woman’s observation. I didn’t want it to be true: I wanted to spy one copy of Poet’s and Writer’s Magazine or The Sun amidst all that trash. Then I would know: The books can’t be far away. No one else in Fredenberg, I reasoned with some sense of sinful pride, reads Poet’s and Writer’s.
Connie was right. I was wrong. There were no textbooks anywhere to be found in the cold, silent depths of that steel box.
Dejected, I drove home. I parked the Matrix in the garage, buzzed the door closed, and headed into the house uncertain of how I was going to explain my lack of preparation to my class. Then it hit me:
Environmental Law books sent to the recycling shed… Isn’t recycling part of protecting our environment? This all must be a lesson from God; some bit of knowledge I’m supposed to comprehend and pass along.
When I figure out the significance behind my dumpster diving, how it relates to the bigger scheme of things, I’ll let you and my students know.
Peace.
Mark
