An adventure

I've only 15 minutes, so this may be quick.

Yesterday was the Missions Team Parking Lot Sale for our trip to Cambodia, and also that other group that is going to Israel. The sale went from 8 in the morning until 1:30 in the afternoon. I received a text the night before asking me if I would mind showing up at 7 to help set up. My mind went through a few different reasons why getting there at 7 would not be a good idea, not the least of which was that a few friends and I had just sat down to eat tots and have a drink or two. After a little bit of internal struggle I came to the conclusion that my reasons were just excuses and that helping the team, and a friend, to get the parking lot sale going was more important. 

So I did, I woke up at 6:43 (two minutes before my alarm) yesterday and walked over to the sale. 

Later in the day, after the sale, is when the real adventure took place. I was out and about with a different friend looking for a place to get lunch when I got a text asking if I would be able to come back to the school to help clean up. This time (interestingly enough) I didn't have the same running through of potential excuses I just said yes. Unfortunately the Sixth Street Grill was overwhelmed with patrons and took FOREVER to get our food ready, which made me a little late getting back to help clean up. We moved boxes into vehicles, managed to wedge a heavy hide-a-bed into a staff person's Saturn. At this point I lead the way St. Vincent's to drop off the stuff that didn't sell at the sale, which was actually remarkably little. They won't take the hide-a-bed or a computer monitor. So we spend 20 minutes trying to hunt down a Salvation Army to donate the stuff. When we finally find the donation center they won't take either of them. Our team leader finds an electronics recycling place and pays $15 for the privilege of donating the monitor. 

After all of this, we decide that the only avenue left for this couch is the dump. As we are driving towards it (I know generally where it is, though I'd never been there) my thoughts wonder if they too will deny us. After navigating a maze of driveways and staring at different lines of cars, we finally decide on one that looks like it might be right. We pull up and find out that they don't take credit cards. Not only that, but that neither of us have checkbooks or any real amount of cash. We manage to scrounge up $7, which is the amount they charge senior citizens so that we can get a receipt and dump the couch. (Also, she called us seniors as we drove away) 

This is the real meat and potatoes of the story though, she tells us to just go throw it in the pit. What in the world does that even mean? I back the Saturn into the parking spaces next to other cars and walk over to take a peek at the "pit." It really is just a giant, football field sized hole, probably 20 feet deep to the surface of the garbage. There's a huge bulldozer thing smooshing all the filth down to make room for more. We kind of look at each other with "oh my goodness" looks on our faces before wrestling the couch (that took 5 or 6 people to load) out towards the pit. A nice man from the truck next to us hops out to help us through the couch down into the pit, where it joins the other refuse. 

I had hoped that there would be something vindicating about finally getting rid of the nasty, frustrating couch. There is something sad about the dump though, knowing that large amounts of what could be recycled or reused are cast aside. Knowing that we contributed to that monstrous pile of filth took away all (most anyways) of the pleasure of throwing that blasted couch into the hole. 

Afterwards my friend pointed out that this is another adventure to add to my list of questionable places gone for NCC, right up there with a sketchy bar. Oh the things that I've done and the places I've gone for Northwest Christian College.