About garbage collection & why writers like Cate Poe inspire me

(Photo by Cate Poe, Lake Travis, 2012 - totally stolen)

Today, I read a blog post by my friend Cate Poe. 

For those of you who don’t know the back story, Cate & I both attended Coronado High School in El Paso, Texas.  Although neither of us graduated from the halls of blue & gold.

We both remain connected by friends & memory.

I don’t remember ever meeting Cate at Coronado.  But when her name popped up in Facebook posts from CHS friends, I remembered something about Catherine Poe.  I was drawn to her by the fact that I believed I should remember something important about her & by the voice of her text on social media.

My friend Cate has lived an extraordinary life.  Her life as a community activist inspired me & changed the way I viewed the state of our world.  Her example left me filled with hope.

Cate currently lives in San Miguel Allende in Mexico, with the amazing Tejano.   Who has another name (which I know) , but I like Tejano better.

How she traveled from a community activist based in Brooklyn to a resident writer in San Miguel Allende, is her story to tell & write, not mine.

(Although I would happily be her biographer.)

Cate has a fabulous blog & today she posted about garbage collection in San Miguel Allende. 

http://50.87.144.90/~catepoe/garbage-san-miguel/

Cate has a unique voice when she writes – genuine, honest & full of an appreciation for the wonder to be found in what others find mundane or ordinary.

Always laced with intelligence & kindness & respect.

I, however,  have no scintillating stories about garbage. 

Although I still remember when the raccoons raided my friend Marguerite’s garbage & angrily threw away champagne bottles in search of food.

I also remember the times I watched the doors to the basement of my building on Virginia Avenue (next to the State Department) in Washington, DC, open to accommodate the trash trucks & watched the largest rats I had ever seen, except for in Naples, scurry. 

And I remember leaving out the remnants of my sons’ childhoods on the curb – car seats, high chairs, walkers, day beds - & a man at my door asking in broken English if he & his wife could take the items.

I remember all the mornings when I have forgotten to place the trash on the curb the night before.  When I run out of the house in my night clothes, open the garage door & try to take the trash can to the curb before the truck hits our spot.

One morning, I was pitifully late – the truck was at the curb.  I was at the garage door.  One of the workers ran up the driveway, grabbed the trash can, emptied it & then brought it back to me.

Cate’s blog post brought back of all those memories & experiences. 

And gave me a new perspective about each one of them.

I thought of the quote by Salmon Rashid posted on my refrigerator - so in the center of the note:  

The miraculous coexists with the mundane.

And  I was reminded to look & find the wonder & miraculous in every day.

Reading, words, matter.

From this reader, excellently well done, Cate.