What a load of rubbish

Bins on the railway have changed over time with both security and recycling in mind. From concealed “catch-all” containers, we moved firstly to a “no bins at all, take it home with you” policy and then to separate landfill and recycling “see-through” suspended bags. It’s now quite evident when the wrong stuff is put in the wrong bin and that’s even before a “how soiled has potential recycling stuff got to be before it becomes landfill?” decision. At least the intentions are on the right track.

I’m lucky enough to live in a nice village. Its so nice that planners and developers are busy trying their best to make it into a town. Longland Lane is an “L”-shaped road with a straight stretch of about a mile, providing a picturesque entry point to the settlement from the south. At the dog-leg, after about half a mile from the village, the road crosses the site of a Roman temporary or marching camp. There is now evidence that the road connected directly to Hexgreave, north of Farnsfield, indicating that it has been in existence for at least 2,000 years. To celebrate the millennium, daffodils were planted along the grass verge on both sides of the road for some distance. We always come this way after dusk on the look-out for barn owls.

In the day-time, too, with the woods to the right, fields on both sides and the church steeple rising into view on the approach, it is a pretty sight - except for the litter. I have got so fed up with looking at the rubbish thrown from passing cars that I acquired a pick-up stick, and yesterday, for the first time, I went off with plastic bags and a high-viz vest and started to clear it up.

I quite enjoyed myself. It was breezy and bright and the skylarks were making the most of it. There used to be corn buntings here, too. You could hear their jangling song through the open car window in summer, but they have since moved on.

I picked up a lot of what you would expect to find, dominated by take-away food and drink containers, cigarette packets, foil, and sweet wrappings. I also came across two pairs of surgical gloves, a pair of trainers [one on each side of the road] and bits of plastic car bumper.

The big surprise for me was the amount of packaging for pain killers, both empty packets and the plastic push-out strips that the pills come in. I can see that after all that fast food you might need something for your tummy, but there must also have been a lot of people driving around with a headache. Maybe it was brought on by guilt, having heaved every superfluous item that they own out of the window to spoil an otherwise carefully tended rural landscape.