July 2002
People who say I don't go out much will not be surprised to hear that I did not leave the house often as a child. If I wanted, I could be tied to the garage door with clothesline a loop around my waist, a knot in the door handle and about 15 feet of slack and left to play on the driveway, to ride my tricycle, sometimes in the company of my cousin. But this was not much of a good time, and I soon cried to be brought back in. More often I would stand at the window in the living room, the sill against my chest, and look out through the bottom panes at whatever was happening on Englewood Avenue.
Once a week, I was rewarded with the garbage men. The cans sat at the curb, almost like bait. I would hear the truck even before I saw it and press my head sideways against the glass to try to see down the street. And then they would appear at our neighbor's, the truck huge and exotically noisy, the men jumping off, picking up the cans in their gloved hands, banging them on the back of the truck, trash cascading, men throwing the cans onto the lawn, whistling to signal the driver, jumping back onto the moving truck or running on ahead, and then they were at our house, flinging off our can lids and pouring our trash into the hungry machine, tossing our cans onto the lawn, and, one magic day, waving to me before they were gone in a rush.
They were dirty and threw things. They shouted and laughed while they worked. Holding on with just one hand, they rode on the outside of the truck. Outside! They broke all the rules. They were like pirates in our world.
* * * I received this response, for which I am grateful, from Doris Conway. It demands a wider readership.
"Your memory of garbage men brought back a similar one to me - with one difference, because of all the years that separate us. Our dining room looked out on the alleyway where garbage AND ashes (coal in those days for heating) were picked up, and the window seat where I would look out had one narrow window that looked out directly at the scene. Four huge horses pulled the mammoth garbage truck behind them. It was thrilling to watch them strain and then succeed when they heard the driver yell for them to start up again. In the winter, the steam would rise up from them. It was another world, another time."