BETWEEN THE SHOP AND THE TIP

We went to the tip the other day. Sorry, the dump - is that what you call it? Hmm, seems colloquial. I mean it’s really the ‘recycling centre’, but I don’t think many people call it that.

Anyway. I really liked the recycling centre. It’s a well-organised loop with perfectly labelled areas for the disposal of pretty much anything from paint cans to car batteries. You drive in, you sweep round, you throw your old junk into the right section and you go home grinning with the satisfaction of an empty boot.

Even the staff were helpful! I had it in my head that they’d be surly - I mean if your work is dealing with rotting garbage, I don’t think anyone would blame you for being grumpy of an afternoon. But no, the quiet high-vis operators happily nodded us in the right direction for textiles, electrical appliances, and bulky household waste.

What’s more, the recycling centre turns out to be a bit like Disneyland for little boys who like big machines - which of course is pretty much all of us, even the grown-up ones. I watched a gigantic forklift pick up cubes of squished plastic bottles, and load them onto a truck. Then, inside, massive grabbers swung their huge metal buckets over the towering mounds of waste, moving piles and piles of recycling, letting it tumble out of the thick metal teeth with a growl and a thud.

“It’s a shame to think how much of it ends up in the sea,” I said to Sammy. Given the amount of plastic in view, the terrible thought that this was just a small fraction, and the fact that it was all here, piled up like a mountain on one single day, it was quite a thought. There’s a frightening amount of plastic out there.

I took a boxful of old cardboard and paper and tipped it into the sea of recycling. Then I lugged a couple of heavy tins of magnolia paint (circa December 2015) over to the area where they collect such things. How can you recycle that stuff?

Pretty soon, the stuffed car boot was just some old carrier bags and the parcel shelf again. We drove out, and into the glittering sunshine.

We collect all sorts of stuff in life don’t we? Later that day, we were wandering around Stockholmhaven, and I saw a brand new drying rack - exactly like one I’d thrown away. Stuff has quite a short journey between the shop and the tip.

Emotions too - baggage from relationships that used to be new, thoughts, feelings, self-perceptions we’ve clung on to for far too long. How many people are hoarding those festering things in their hearts, longing for a sort of emotional recycling centre, I wonder? And could such a place exist?

“Over here for resentments!” cries a worker in an orange high-vis vest. “Bitterness and unforgiveness? Nah mate. Over there next to Pride and Painful Memories.”

Perhaps that’s how some people see church? Or their relationship with God? A place to confess, and then dump or tip all the garbage we’ve collected; sweep in, throw it all in, sweep out again? Well. I think it’s much more than that - just as it was much more than satisfaction we drove away with the other day.

Stockholmhaven was full of people doing their thing, buying their stuff. We bought a Kallax, which we later bolted together with enthusiasm. Some day, the chances are that it will be in the boot with us on the way to the recycling centre. I guess the joy, the reason, the life, is in the journey of using it between now and then.