I’ve been feeling a bit melancholic lately. Actually, I’ll just own it, I’ve been downright miserable. Everything has just been a bit ‘black holey’ these last few weeks. I think I can attribute most of it to not being able to do the outdoor things I love the most, thus distracting myself from the absolutely arse that this year has started out to be. Injury and lockdown restrictions have hindered access to the fells, and climbing is most definitely off the cards for me for now. I’ve been taking short, solo strolls along the river near my house, documenting my missions on Strava to see how long I can go before my ankle starts to nag, desperately trying to complete a mere ’30 hours of activity challenge’ for January despite the fact that an hour is about my threshold at the moment.
It’s not very scenic. On clear days you can see the Pennines which are pretty, but there’s constant road noise and rubbish everywhere along the footpath. The rubbish really grinds my gears. Littering is totally beyond my comprehension. Where do you think it goes? Who do you think cleans it up? Don’t you like small, furry animals and nature? How confusing and infuriating it is trying to understand the psyche of the person who lobs their beer can in a bush, pokes their Curly Wurly wrapper into a drystone wall or hangs their carefully collected bag of dog poo on a barbed wire fence. Most days it makes me angry, some days it makes me sad.
Whenever I go climbing, I make a point of picking up a few items of rubbish from the crag. Climbers are by their very nature, outdoor people, so I’m always surprised when they leave mess. It is undoubtedly the exception rather than the rule that climbers leave litter, but they do walk among us, the littering types. Anyway, I digress. My crag cleanup policy came about after accepting that there will always be people who will do these things, and usually they’ve already gone so I can’t passive-aggressively hand them back their rubbish, smile sweetly and say:
“Oh, sorry. I think you dropped this”.
It’s certainly an issue of education, and a matter of the information that is out there not reaching the people it needs to reach. If I’m a member of a plastic-free group on Facebook, chances are I already don’t consider lobbing an Evian bottle into the undergrowth a reasonable means of disposal. I can get angry about it and lament the perpetrators amongst likeminded environmentalists, but it wont make any difference and that hedgehog is still going to end up with a surgical mask wound round it’s prickly wee neck if I don’t actively do something, so I bought a litter grabber. I decided that if I’m destined to slowly amble, lop-sidedly and locally for the next few weeks, I might as well shift some of that crap that’s really putting a downer on my daily exercise.
It’s been baltic all day, but sunny and really quite lovely. So at midday, off I limped down the track that usually brings me so much annoyance, with a renewed sense of something. Within 45 minutes, Mr. Grabby and I had acquired a whole bin bag’s worth of stuff, from the usual energy drink cans, beer bottles and crisp packets to a lone sock, livestock feed bags and half an enormous plastic plant pot. As I ambled, people stopped to chat to me, which was honestly delightful. Some people eyed me suspiciously, like the only reason I could possibly be doing such a laborious task was under duress or as punishment for some heinous crime. Mostly people smiled, which is funny because usually when I encounter people on this same stretch of path they look down and avoid any verbal contact in a manner that goes way beyond the necessary etiquette of social distancing. Maybe they’d been feeling like me lately, and seeing someone do something nice (because believe me, it is actually quite nice) made them feel a bit better about things.
On my return journey, things genuinely looked much better. One person did comment that I was “fighting a losing battle”, and there’s a good chance they might be right. Rather than feeling defeated though, I think I’ll just keep on. I made sure to tell every person that stopped and spoke to me that I wanted to make the path nicer for us all so that whilst we have to stay local, we can enjoy what we’ve got a little bit more. Maybe that idea will reach a few more people, and maybe someone will finally think twice before they chuck something where it shouldn’t go.
I’m aware that this isn’t a new thing by any means, and I was very much inspired by the endeavours of the wonderful humans behind the Lakes Plastic Collective, Trash Free Trails and the many other organisations that are battling the systemic issues that are the root of the UK’s littering problem.
I’ve always been a bit of a litter picker, but I realise now that doing these things isn’t entirely altruistic and definitely brings about a much needed sense of accomplishment, especially when accomplishments seem scarce. More importantly, I think I learnt a big old lesson in rationalising anger, and channeling it into something more productive than just feeling frustrated and resentful of others.
As I waddled through the frosty field I had images of forming a group of local litter loathers, ‘The Penrith Pickers’. A bit soon maybe. I resolved to phone the council this week, to suggest a bin might be placed on the path somewhere and I thought about ways to convey the Countryside Code outside of my own echo chamber. Doing good made me feel good, and I highly recommend it if you’re feeling a bit rubbish yourself. Not sorry for the pun.
Stay tuned for the next instalment of my literary litter-picking recounts, which will unfortunately be entitled ‘D-Day’. The ‘D’ stands for dog poo. Yup, there’s at least 100 USED dog poo bags strewn along either side of the path. I wasn’t quite equipped for that today, but by posting it on the internet I am officially holding myself accountable for a far less appealing pick coming up! I genuinely believe that if there is such a place as hell, it holds a special little place for people who bag it but don’t bin it. I mean, what’s the point? Again though, we’ll chalk it up to education, and I’ll wrack my brains for a more productive, preventative way to tackle that issue.
I ought to say at this point that if you do plan a pick for yourself during lockdown, stay local. Don’t touch litter with your bare hands, take hand sanitiser, gloves and a grabber (Mr. Grabby cost about three quid). Don’t touch the real nasty stuff, report it to your local council if an item is dangerous to yours or other’s health and let someone know where you’re off to. That’s all. Peace and love.