I do not actually ‘dive’ into our dumpsters. In nice weather, or on the last of the month, when folks move out, I do like to make the rounds of our dumpsters. I cruise them all from my wheelchair, taking some plastic trash bags and my ‘reacher’ with me. I have even been known to ask a neighbor or passer by to retrieve something, or cart something home for me!
Of course, I contribute to the common good also! Anything that can be of some use to someone I put BESIDE the dumpter, not in! I recently put out several cans of cat food that I found out the hard way that The Sisters will not eat...
I do limit myself to the dumpsters here in the apartment complex, and though I have never counted them, there are a lot as there are 500 apartments here, many occupied by the young and/or affluent. It is amazing the stuff that people toss into the trash!
I have been Dumpster Diving for years; but especially for the last 10 years, as I have gotten poorer and am unable to supply what I need for myself! Heavens, half the contents of my apartment is from the dumpsters! (Then I have a lot of stuff that was just outright given to me by neighbors moving out.)
The above is one reason why I have decided to add this aspect of my life of poverty to this blog. (A 61-year-old woman who is on Social Security Disability should not HAVE to do this! And yes, I have too do this to help maintain a ‘quality of life’, it is not a ‘hobby’.)
The other reason I decided to include Dumpster Diving in evvy’s blog is to date and document my ‘finds’. Perhaps someday someone will throw out, or give me a digital camera, and I can actually take, and post, pictures of my finds!
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It IS amazing what people throw away. A friend who lived near a college regularly found TVs and stereos at the end of the school year.
ReplyDeleteIt's also amazing that in the richest country in the world, our disabled people have to go Dumpster Diving and begging to make ends meet because society will not properly provide for them.
I am not saying that the disabled deserve to live in luxury with annual vacations to Hawaii, but we also shouldn't have to beat ourselves up for spending $6 on something we need, which we got out of the clearance bin.
A friend who is on a strict diet recently received food stamps, and had to make the choice between following the doctor-ordered diet for 10 days or stretching the small amount of food stamps to cover the whole month by buying lots of carbs instead of lean meat/fish. Even with a doctor's note, there was no way to get the food stamp allotment increased to cover the recommended foods, so my friend was faced with a choice of eating right or getting sicker.
My personal problem is that I cannot get household help until the judge says I'm disabled, but he chooses to assume that because I don't have someone coming in every week that means I'm able to do all the housework myself. (What it means is that I can't afford a few hundred a month for cleaning after I pay for groceries and utilities.) Social Services agrees I need help, but the law says they can't give it to me. We need to change the law so that people are evaluated immediately on applying for Disability and get the household help they need from Day One.