Confessions of a Trash Digger

The fruit doesn't fall far from the tree they say (although I'm not sure who "they" is.) My dad is a celebrated, recognized trash digger so I grew up with my dad digging around in the neighbor’s trash to retrieve the morning newspaper. My mom would fuss and scold him for being “cheap”. My dad didn’t even feel slightly embarrassed because as he said, “Once it hits the trash, it’s up for grabs!”

Digging in the neighbor’s trash led to him going behind dumpsters to find goodies. He took us along on these “adventures”. My sister and I would come back with tangled jewelry that the drugstore through away. We worked at untangling them until we had in hand, brand new jewelry, ready to wear. (Or sell….that’s another post for another day.)

My mom would roll her eyes when we’d present our findings.

“Trash diggers!” she’d say.

“Yep! We sure are!”

Years later, I’m still a trash digger. Not the traditional trash digger though. I only go through dumpsters at random when I see something sticking out that maybe can be utilized. (Don’t want to give anyone the impression that I do this for a living or anything.)

I just discovered that at my job, the physicians subscribe to tons of magazines, and the mail room is a plethora of magazine treasures. They toss still wrapped, unread magazines in the trash just because…I dunno….I guess they can. It’s wasteful but it’s their dime. So, I’ve taken it upon myself to trash dive on behalf of readers everywhere. When I’m finished reading it, it gets passed on to someone else or donated to the library.

Are you a trash digger? If so, what cool finds have you found?