Saturday, April 22, 2006

Earth Day 2006


When I lived and worked in the Atlanta area, I worked with a young man who lived out in the country on a farm south of the city. As an adult, he, his wife, and his children lived in the house that he had grown up in.

His father had passed away a number of years before and his mother wanted to simplify her life. She bought a condo closer to Atlanta and he bought the home from his mother. He didn't farm the land, he leased all the land to area farmers to use. So, he lived on a farm in a big, beautiful home, but worked with me at Delta Airlines at Hartsfield.

One day I went in to work and we were sitting there waiting for our shift to start...

Me, sarcastically: 'Robert, today is earth day, how did you celebrate?'
Robert, with sly smile: 'I burned my trash today. I heard earth day was coming up so I've been saving our trash and burned it all this morning. Took me all morning too.'

I had thought I was mentioning something he didn't know about, but he was ready for me. In fact he was glad I mentioned it so that he could tell somebody what he had done.


I haven't seen Robert in fifteen years, but I always celebrate earth day by thinking of him and wonder how much trash he was able to get burned before getting ready for work.

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