The Most Beautiful Dump In the World

It’s all about perspective: notes from Homer, Alaska

Recently, I was on a solo cross-country ski, when I saw below me the outline of my community’s waste transfer facility, otherwise known as the dump.

As the crow flies, the dump was a mile or so away, and so tiny compared to the sunlit horizon, the bay opening into Cook Inlet, the rolling hill sloping downward. The mountains were putting on a bold display, too.

Beauty is never half-way around here, even with the dump.

Once, I saw a coyote when I was skiing on these same trails, but closer to the actual dump. The coyote and I sized each other up and she licked her lips, tasting the last morsel from her garbage diving.

Mostly I feel safe on this hillside, even though it belongs more to the wilds than to any human.

And the Dump! The pinnacle of civilization! A place to put our rubbish, our waste, our unwanted and half-used items. All the empty cereal boxes! Packaging from Amazon! Yogurt containers! The same way that I look at our little reservoir and marvel that such a body could provide hydration for a community of nearly 6,000 people, I look at the dump and worry that it, too, will reach capacity.

From such a distance, you could almost forget that it’s dirty.

I look at it and also consider all the unwanted parts of ourselves that we would prefer to trash.

Personally, I’d like to do away with my anxiety. It really gets in the way. I’d also like to trash my temper. Shame is another big one: what I wouldn’t do to banish it under a heap of milk jugs.

But what if we could zoom out and see all of our flaws as part of a bigger picture?

What if, despite our trash, we are more beautiful than we think we are?

I also consider how people travel from all over the world to see Kachemak Bay and Homer, Alaska, and how easy it is to forget when you’re traveling that people have messy lives wherever they live.

Frankly, living in a beautiful place sets the bar a wee-bit high sometimes.

Sometimes I want to tell the mountains to bugger off; I’m having a bad day.

Sometimes the bay is having a bad day, and it looks more like a cauldron than a place of respite. I like those days when the external, physical world matches my internal reality.

I used to work in a women’s shelter in town and the clients would describe this town as “hell with a view.”

It’s all about perspective, right?

Anyway, dumps attract scavengers. The first bear I ever saw was at a dump in a small village — the locals promised me it was a guaranteed sighting. They were right. A couple of bears owned the place and delighted in their daily offerings, tearing through the garbage bags like butter.

I’m not fool enough to think I’m any better than the scavengers.

I don’t actually get to throw away the distasteful parts of myself, I learn to live alongside them, and if I’m lucky and work hard, maybe my better parts define me more.

But also, I scavenge for beauty — for ways of being in the world outside of myself.

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Thanks for reading! Here are some links to some more of my stories about life in Alaska: