Trash hands and no croissant

I told my father I would write this and he said “go ahead”

Aug 11, 2026

There is a specific rage available only to a woman in her 40s standing at a dump, peeling the remains of a slice of deli turkey from an empty seltzer can with her bare hands and aware that neither the turkey nor any shred of dignity is hers: I volunteered for this.

Like many of my generation, I was profoundly influenced by 50 Simple Things Kids Can Do To Save The Earth. We became “leak detectives” to save water, cut the rings that came on soda to save the turtles, and learned that proper recycling required checking the number on the bottom of every plastic container. Today, we have a trash bin, a recycling bin, and faith that sorting magic is happening somewhere downstream.

The only time when recycling gets more complicated is when we go to Nantucket. Since it’s an incredibly beautiful resort destination and I’m freeloading on housing, I have minimal complaints; 40 miles out to sea, proper waste management genuinely matters. At the dump, we have to get everything in the right disposal unit (non-recyclable/non-compostable trash, compostable trash, glass, plastic, aluminum, and cardboard), all while navigating the people enforcing proper disposal and tourists who are confused and seagulls who love trash in general and all the smells of public waste. While it’s not my favorite activity, I will say that nothing makes you more aware of your own waste and makes you rethink consumerist habits like a visit to the dump.

We keep five clearly designated bins/bags in the kitchen and sort when we throw things out (aligned with the One-Touch Rule of time management). When we’re there, Jeff and I swing by the dump twice a week, it takes under five minutes each time, and then we go to my favorite bakery. Maybe it’s simply the Pavlovian response I’ve trained in myself, but I don’t mind the dump at all and the ham and cheese croissant on the other side is always worth it.

Last week, when we went out to lunch and my dad announced his car would be headed to the dump after lunch, I knew there’d be no croissant reward and voluntold Jeff to ride with him.

Except that when we were leaving, Jeff wasn’t feeling well and asked if I’d switch spots. I said sure, because I’m a good person and I had no idea what I was agreeing to.

I hopped in the car and my father said “I’m surprised you switched since I don’t recall you ever volunteering to go to the dump before.” I reminded him that many things about me had changed since I was 19 and got out of the car thinking I’d take the bottles or the cans or something.

It was upon arriving at the dump eight minutes later that I discovered, to my surprise, confusion, and displeasure, that my father didn’t believe in pre-sorting the trash and had led others in my family to also think that sorting trash was some kind of Herculean feat — one my chore-averse and easily confused adult children somehow manage every single vacation. I was handed a bag with everything mixed together and told that the “best way” to handle things was just to walk individual pieces to their larger disposal bins.

First of all, no.

Second of all, ew.

I wrapped up sorting my bag quickly, didn’t offer to help with others, and ran to the car for a wet wipe. While I Purell-ed myself, I watched my father tilt at windblown tissues and empty food containers with all the conviction of Don Quixote. One gust of wind had exposed a flaw in his “best way.”

In the car, on the way home, and once home, I tried to make my father, man of science, understand that I was right. But he doubled down and kept arguing — which I should have expected because I got much of my stubbornness from him.

Except that this time, I wasn’t trying to explain to him why it was a double standard that in the ninth grade, my brother got to go see Guns N’ Roses with friends while I needed a chaperone to go to Lilith Fair. This time, I was definitively right.

In Cheaper by the Dozen, the children are horrified when their father uses their own tonsillectomies as an excuse for a time-and-motion study but perhaps I could do something similar: labeled bins, dotted travel path, a heat map of wasted motion. Or even a full step count map with sorting at home vs. sorting at the dump clearly defined and delineated.

None of that would matter because he wouldn’t read it. I’ve been cast as the spoiled kid who didn’t want to go to the dump in the first place (admittedly not that far off from the truth) and is just complaining. I know I’m someone who cares deeply about doing things the right way and is incredibly triggered by anyone arguing otherwise.

So I reminded myself: my father is a lovely and generous man, 99.99% of germs on my hands had been killed by the folks at GOJO Industries, and, most importantly, I wasn’t the one chasing trash around a parking lot.

But then Jeff told me the other car stopped for ice cream while I had trash hands.

And I hated everyone all over again.