Southern California is well known for erratic harsh wind conditions nicknamed Santa Ana. Either named for the city, the historic figure, or something else entirely, it makes little difference what they called it, but all I know for certain is that it wreaks havoc on the neighborhood.  Well, not so much the neighborhood itself but a crucial part of the neighborhood…the trashcans.
Come Wednesday morning all the trashcans are lined up like little smelly patrol men waiting their turns to flip their lids and vomit their vile continence out into a large, noisy truck. By the time I come home Wednesday night these sick little patrol men have rolled half-way to the corner liquor store, no doubt for a rum run. You’d drink too if your sole purpose in life was to hold garbage, right? Okay- moving on. So maybe they didn’t exactly make it all the way to liquor store, but somehow, thanks to Santa Ana, they always end up at the bottom of the street… along with every one of my neighbors’ cans. They all just lie against the gutter and sidewalk like hopeless hobos unsure where they came from or where to go. And there I stand trying to figure out which cans are mine among the mess of plastic and muck. Why do I bother going through so much hassle to identify my cans? Because they’re my trashcans! It would be so much easier to have everyone write their names on the cans for cases such as these; seriously would you want someone else’s trashcan? Unfortunately no one wants to put their name on the cans. Rightfully so. No one wants to fess-up to their own garbage, let along the receptacle we place it in. Heaven forbid if we own up to eating Fruitloops! Yeap, that my Bengay. Three buckets of KFC last week? Hey, hands off my Ben and Jerry’s carton. Hell no! When it’s tossed it’s gone, out of our thoughts and clear of our minds. The last thing we want is our neighbors to know that we read Teen Idol at age forty-nine, or that we’re trying to save money by buying the cheap paper towels. Just in case some incriminating evidence is left behind, stuck on the side of the can by some great glob of half-melted Jello, we can’t put our names on it nor do we want someone else’s can just in case their incriminating evidence is worse than your own. It really shouldn’t matter that your neighbor bought the latest Lady Gaga CD, and now the packaging is in your can. Isn’t all the garbage going to the same place? It’s not like we’re going to be judged in the end by what we threw away, or what someone thought we threw away… or will we? For now, I just hope the Santa Ana’s don’t blow by tomorrow; I’d hate to have to admit to what’s in my trashcan this week.