Lessons of a Volunteer Recycler

This is a Letter to the Editor from Thetford resident Liora Alschule. Sidenote welcomes and considers writing on any topic related to Thetford.

The December weekend between Christmas and New Years 2024 I made good on my commitment to Susanne, Amy, and Emily to come back a 2^nd time to help out at our Thetford Recycling Center. As before, my post was on the raised platform between the cardboard and paper dumpsters, across from plastics. 

It was cold and busy – a good combination especially since I was 2-hours-experienced and so not totally new to the task. 

Later that day, warmed up and in clean clothes, at lunch with a kind yet adamantly trash-indifferent friend I was challenged to explain why I had spent my morning this way, of my own free will. Hence this piece where I will try to explain the why and wherefore and what I gained as a volunteer recycler – the expected, unexpected; the small and the large lessons. 

As expected – you learn stuff, useful stuff. For example, one should already know that plastic objects less than 2” in diameter clog the sorting machines and are taboo in the plastics dumpster. Did you also know that the small pop-on lid to the plastic bottle is fine in the dumpster when it goes in attached to its bottle – and by extension, when stuffed safely inside the bottle before crushed and recycled? This yields a small yet satisfying reduction in trash. 

Also expected, if you’ve been here awhile, you run into and get to chat with friends and with long  ago acquaintances, like the distal end of a divorce who you wouldn’t normally run into. Some town gossip can be had, although another finding is that you are truly needed on the job. Answering questions, redirecting misdirected deposits, supporting the overwhelmed, and easing the anxiety of the inexperienced on that day demanded near constant attention. 

 Unexpected was how clear it is when a recycler is new to the task. Newbies standout, can be hesitant to ask questions and are grateful for the smallest support. Everyone around them seems to sail from bin to bin to deposit exactly the right container of exactly the right materials. My own initiation into 1990’s era Thetford recycling was unguided and it took me some time to realize want now seems obvious: veterans do a pre-sort at home. 

The volunteer recycler does have the opportunity to soothe the anxious and relieve the harried. That day, a recycler walked onto the platform with a substantial mixed box. They asked a question and then began to separate and toss. When I turned my attention back to see how it was going, the bulk of the abandoned and still-unsorted box remained on the platform. Not the way things should go, for sure.  Picking up the box to complete the job, though, I felt like I was giving a hand to a neighbor who must have been having a particularly bad day. If that was you, it’s okay! Next time, you can also ask for help. 

One regret sticks with me. I responded to a newbie’s question—likely the most frequent question, at least on that platform, re what is cardboard, what is not—and looking at his box of miscellany I mentioned that it’s easier to pre-sort at home. When I looked back shortly after to see how he was doing, he had left taking his unsorted box with him. If that was you, dear reader, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean that you had to leave. I would have been more than happy to give you a hand. 

Large benefit: a profound appreciation for the volume of stuff that Thetford can discard in the space of a week. Just seeing the giant bags of aluminum cans fill up and fill up again and again and again; the stacks and stacks of collapsed (thank you!) shipping boxes; the plastic containers topping the dumpster – it’s staggering and gave me pause. Can I take the time to stop off in West Leb to get a perfectly good bathroom scale versus ordering the ultimate-pro-highest-rated bathroom scale online? This year, that answer will be: “think on it” where last year it would have been: “click to confirm”. 

Small benefit: you get a cool reflective vest which you can keep so as not to be mistaken for some inanimate object on some dark night. 

I don’t know if this will prompt my New Hampshire friend to rescue even a single bottle from her trash. Perhaps it will prompt some of you, dear Sidenote Readers, to take a couple of your Saturday hours to lend a hand to your friends and neighbors so we can all be more thoughtful about what goes into the recycling bin and what goes to the landfill. 

Also accepted: 

Metal scraps, Plastic bags and wrap, Clothing/Textiles, Ceramics/Cooking container glass, Batteries, Fluorescent bulbs, Eyeglasses/Sunglasses, Copper wire/appliance cords, Leaf, yard & brush waste  

For a complete guide to recycling do’s and don’ts, see  https://www.casella.com/services/recycling/recycle-better/

Photo credit: Liora Alschuler