One of the less pleasant duties of my job is picking up the dumped refuse people are too lazy or cheap to dispose of correctly. Usually we are too tired or jaded to feel much about it except for annoyance before we finish up and move on to the next job. This week was different.
The pile of mattresses and couches were loaded onto our truck using a mini-digger, but the rest had to be thrown on by hand, leading to an awareness of what lead up to this dumping.
There is a SPO2 Monitor, property of Perth Children’s Hospital. Next is a clear plastic envelop, marked with a caption indicating the contents being a prisoners property. Scattered around are photos of kids, happy, clean and well-fed. Under a pile of clothes is a folder from a law firm. Yonder is a school certificate, rewarded for good behavior, then documents from a court house. An application for public housing smothers makeup kits. No drug paraphernalia, which is unusual for us, and comforting.
Assumptions: The mother was jailed, and the children placed into foster care, and then evicted from their rental accommodation, and as is typical, the landlord or their contractor simply threw their entire possessions they couldn’t take with them into a truck to be dumped into the nearest forgotten and accessible corner.
Ill probably never get closure, I hope the kids are safe and are some point reunited with their mother, who gets the help she needs so this doesn’t happen again.
Adrian's Got The Moose 