YACK on: Clean
Grant Sanders
This is the time of year when it seems that every other week there's some letter in the paper or a post on YACKon.com complaining about the trash on the side of the road or on the beaches of Nantucket. To me, these complainers are worse than the people who toss potato chip bags out of their car windows because all they do is point at a problem that is all too obvious for the rest of us. Their letters are often angry and worded in an attempt to make the town, the community and the litterbugs feel some level of shame for allowing this to happen. (Hint to the letter writers, the littlerbugs do not care. Not one bit.) Sure, these folks - many of whom have turned out to be summer residents angry that we're not taking care of their island for them - will take the time to pen some acid prose. But will they put on a pair of gloves and bend over by the roadside a few dozen times to make the island look nicer? Sometimes yes. Sometimes no.

The casual observer will note that I often complain about a lot of stuff. Mostly about things that I have no ability or aptitude to change, and those who do just aren't doing the right thing. But I do not complain about trash on the ground, because I have the ability to effect change in that regard. Instead, last year, I joined the Clean Team.

Clean Team Co-Captain, Sarah Otkay takes on Surfside Road.

I've been posting weekly reports with pictures of the exploits of the Clean Team on YACK, the Nantucket Online Community, at YACKon.com. For those who do not know, the Clean Team is a group of people who care about Nantucket enough to volunteer one short hour a week to picking up trash. We meet every Saturday at 8a.m., before the traffic gets too dangerous and the sun gets too hot. We split up and work for less than an hour. We separate our recyclables and often the DPW will come by and pick up our collection.

I thought this week, I would explain in detail what it's really like to volunteer on the Clean Team.

Each Saturday, I wake at 7, trying very hard not to disturb my beautiful wife, and I make some coffee. Then I put on socks and shoes and tie a bandana around my head. If we are going to a beach, my dog, Seven, comes with me in my ever-squeaky and slightly scratched and dented Ford Explorer (he is an expert trash picker-upper and retriever). We meet the group at the appointed site at 8a.m. sharp. Sarah Otkay and summer resident Bill Connell are often there before me (the three of us are the self-appointed Clean-Team captains, although the Clean Team was the brainchild of Bill, who is a wonderful, caring man who is only on island for a short time each week and still he volunteers his time to keep the place clean).

I down my last swallow of coffee and head to the back of Sarah's hybrid SUV where the bags and gloves can be found. I execute the Clean Team handshake with several folks who are there (we touch elbows because on the Clean Team, you never know where our gloved hands have been). I put on my blue nitrile gloves and head off to my cleaning assignment.

Often, one does not need to walk more than a few feet to find something. Here's a list of typical Clean Team found items.

The top to a coffee cup. I'm certain I'll find the cup a few feet away. A straw wrapper

A used packet of mustard.

The coffee cup that goes with my lid. Now all I need are seven more of each and I can have a complete set.

A scattering of beer cans. I put these in my recycling bag. My theory is that the person who throws these cans out of his window is getting rid of the evidence of his drinking on his way home so his spouse will not know.

Ah, gum wrappers. The traveling beer drinker is sweetening his breath to hide his crimes further.

Woman's underwear. No name or phone number written on the waistband, so I guess I won't be able to return them. Oh, well.

A dozen small, empty Jgermeister bottles in a scatter pattern suggestive of multiple launches from the same car window over a number of days. If the NPD wants to stop some drunk drivers I think they ought to set up closed circuit TV cameras in these bushes.

A blue nitrile glove like the one I'm wearing. Trash Irony.

A hunk of metal that at one time was affixed to the undercarriage of some late-model vehicle. I wonder how far the rest of the car got? Hope I don't have to try to fit that in my bag.

Gasp. A bag with a logo on it that I designed! Well, that's disheartening - seeing one's own hard work turned into careless litter. I quickly collect the offending trash.

A cigarette butt. Normally, there is a standing Clean Team policy of not picking up cigarette butts because (A) they're not a blight on the landscape unless you're looking closely and (B) there are so many of them that if we did pick them all up, we would not have the time to get to the bigger, more unsightly stuff. My hope is that if there is a Heaven and a Hell that smokers who throw their butts around will find themselves in Hell, bending over and picking them up for all eternity while demons with pitchforks jab them in the buttocks.

A soggy cardboard box. I often wish that I could find such items at the end of my cleaning session and not near the beginning so that I don't have to carry a wet, sopping hunk of trash for two miles.

A crescent wrench. I wonder about the owner who reaches into his tool box to find his 5/8ths-inch wrench and discovers it missing just when he needs it. Poor guy.

An old tennis ball, slightly chewed. Nantucket is a dog island and I find tennis balls everywhere. I pocket it and add it to Seven's collection.

A $20 bill! Bonus.

A perforated plastic bag filled with some kind of strange and noxious gelatin-like substance that has only gotten more interesting over the past few weeks sitting in the sun. Ugh. I think I earned my $20 with that one.

After about 45 minutes, we head back to the starting point and I take pictures of the collection. The piles are getting bigger and bigger these days, so we could really use more volunteers. Check out the Clean Team web site at ackcleanteam.org, or go to the Clean Team folder on YACKon.com to see where we are cleaning each week (This coming Saturday, it's Low Beach in 'Sconset.) See you there.

YACK on.

Grant Sanders is the Host of YACK, the Nantucket Online Community at www.yackon.com and he can trash talk with the best of them. His views are his own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial stance of The Nantucket Independent. But sometimes they do.

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