Gray Matter

The color gray will always exist as that barrier between the good and the bad. Not so dark, but not quite light, it is a mediator. I would like to think that my person resembles that. Easy to deal with, taking no sides, being there to help out your average, middle class person. Gray, like the jumpsuit I wear every day of my life. My job, I pick up garbage. I ride around on the back of a twenty-five ton garbage eating monster that smells just as bad as the objects it consumes. I’m lucky to be the one that looks, handles, and takes care of this garbage. The life of a city worker is never a dull one.

"Luke, what the fuck, man, hurry up! We're going to be late for out route this morning," says the man who just came in six minutes late to work.

"Don't be a fucking hypocrite, Dale, just let me drink this cup of coffee and then we can go."

This is the usual routine for us garbage men. At least the ones who stick it out while riding on the back of the truck. Rain, snow, heat, you name it, we've stood in it. The U.S. Postal Service isn’t the only profession with pride. I would like to think that the two men in the driver and passenger seats are thinking about us, and are maybe even thinking that they would switch us places for the six hours of picking up garbage that we do on a daily basis.

"Never gonna happen, pussy!" screams the man sitting in the drivers seat as his head hangs out the window. "We were put here by the big man, so it's probably best it stay that way."

The funny thing is that I’ve never even said anything to the guy. Each day, he continues to make an ass out of himself and out of me by calling me out like he does. Even though I never even speak to him, he continues to rub it in my face. The contempt I have for this man is bottomless.

“Seriously, though, I bet those guys at the post office don’t have to put up with this shit,” I say as the roar of the garbage truck drowns me out completely. “Those bastards get all the benefits and the glory.”

Maybe I’m just not fully satisfied with my life or the things that are happening right now. I’m thirty-four and I have nothing to show for it. I live in my parents basement—two parents who are completely embarrassed of me and try to stay out of my “life” as much as possible. The only words that I ever get from them are: “Luke! When are you going to move out, boy?!” When I’m god-damn ready to, that’s when.

Absurdities

I was looking out the window yesterday, just looking and watching the traffic go by, and inside the space where the screen and the glass of the window is, a ladybug had somehow gotten trapped in there. It really made me think for some reason. Like, how frightening would that be to be trapped? Being that small in a world so big and being totally helpless and trapped within the confined space of something as simple as a window. What could possibly be going through that ladybug’s mind? If anything? Does the one-track mind of a ladybug feel fear? Was he panicking at all as he was trying to fly within the gap? His futile efforts of escaping were not working at all. The ladybug kept walking back and forth, up and down the screen, getting nowhere. Still trapped within the space. What could that ladybug possibly have done to get him free and back outside? What made him think that it was a good idea to go in there in the first place? I wonder what his motives were for getting there—what was he trying to accomplish with the task. For some reason, I did not help the ladybug. Does that make me a bad person? I just watched him until I got bored with it. Like he was there for my pleasure only, and when I got done being entertained, I just left him there to suffer. I went back to the window today, opened it, and in the far left corner, the ladybug was sitting. Completely still, unmoving. I felt bad in a way. Like I could have saved his life yesterday, but I did not. If I would have helped him, what great things could he have accomplished while being free? What significance would he have made in the world? It just goes to show you how easily life is taken for granted and how it’s so easily taken and toyed with. Life as a whole is so fragile. Really, one life plays no significant role in the grand scheme of things. We are all so small and so easily replaced.